Thank you for joining Dr. Michael Youssef for Leading the Way Audio. Dr. Youssef is the author of more than 50 books and his latest is a timely message for churches and Christians in 2025. The title, God's Final Call. You can talk with a ministry representative at 866-626-4356.
Or you can visit ltw.org. Learn about this and all of Dr. Youssef's books available and the far-reaching impact of Leading the Way's global ministry. Up next, Dr. Youssef takes you to one of the most powerful moments in the life of Jesus when he raised his friend Lazarus from the dead.
Join me now in listening as Dr. Michael Youssef begins today's Leading the Way message. What is your greatest challenge for your faith walk? Think about this with me. What is your number one challenge to your faith walk? What is the one thing that hampers your growth in Christ?
Think about it. The hardest part of my Christian walk is when God does not do or act as I want him to. When he disappoints me. When he takes too long to answer. When he lets us down. God already raised this problem in his word.
Why? Because he knows that is a problem. And he wants to help us with our problem.
Why again? Oh, because he wants us to grow in our faith. He doesn't want us to be stagnant, stand still. He wants us to grow in our reliance on him. He wants us to completely and totally trust him, even when we don't understand him.
I believe with all my heart, listen to me, our precious Lord Jesus Christ want his children to face this problem squarely and courageously. And my beloved friends, this is precisely the problem which lies at the throbbing emotional core of the seventh as number seven in the evidence of the exclusivity of Jesus. Turn with me to John chapter 11.
The series of messages comes to conclusion today on the evidence of the exclusivity of Jesus. Just to review with you, John does not call them miracles as the synoptic gospels. The other three call them. He calls them evidence.
He called them sign. In Greek, simion, they are evidence of his exclusivity as the only God, man, Jesus the Christ. And in raising of Lazarus from the dead, after being buried for nearly four, end of four days, Jesus demonstrates that he and he alone defeats public enemy number one, death. In all the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, there are three resurrection from the dead. Jesus raised three different people from the dead before his own resurrection, glorious resurrection, of course. He raised the son of the widow of Nain.
He raised the daughter of Jairus. And here chapter 11 of John, he raised Lazarus from the dead. He raised one before a funeral procession. He raised another in the funeral procession. And he raised Lazarus after the funeral procession. He raised one who was dead for half an hour. He raised the other after being dead for half a day. And he raised Lazarus from the dead after his being dead for three and a half days. Look with me again John 11.
I want to give you the context because it's very, very important to get the context. Judea is in the south. That's the headquarters of all the religious hierarchies.
These religious leaders have threatened Jesus and said, if you come down to our territory, you are a dead man. And so he was up in the north ministering. And he stayed up there until he knew that God's time table, his father's time table is here. Bethany where Lazarus, Mary and Martha, the two sisters have lived, is a suburb of Jerusalem. It's actually only about two miles from Jerusalem.
It's like a suburb. And our Lord receives a word while way up in the north ministering with his disciples and to the crowds. He receives a word from Mary and Martha saying Lazarus, whom you love, is seriously ill. Now while they did not say that, they did not ask him to come down, they assumed that he's going to come down. They want him to urgently come down and heal Lazarus because he's sick and close to death. Just like you and me when we pray for something and we want an answer immediately.
They wanted an answer exactly the way we expected. They thought that Jesus would drop everything and come running back to Bethany in order to heal their brother Lazarus. Oh, Jesus could have done that, right?
Our expectations can be our biggest obstacle for our growing in faith. Was Jesus heartless when he waited? Did he not care about Lazarus? Was he unloving? Was Lazarus not a priority for him even though he was his friend?
None of that is true. Listen carefully. Underline verses 5 and 6 in your Bible. John 11, 5 and 6. Underline them because the Greek scholars have said that these two verses mark the foundational verses for this whole incident, for that whole encounter with death. If I get it literally translated, it will go like this. Now Jesus so loved Mary, Martha and Lazarus, so he stayed two more days where he was.
That's how it reads. Some of you may say, wait a minute Michael, wait a minute preacher. He loved them so much that he waited two more days instead of coming immediately? Yep, that's what the word said.
Please listen. As much as Jesus loves us and gave his life for us, it is his glory, not our wishes that come first. His kingdom comes first, not our kingdom. His will comes first, not our will. It is his eternal perspective, not our earthly perspective that comes first. It is heaven's long view of things, not my shortsightedness that comes first.
Sometimes, as you know, I use sanctified imagination when I read description, the passage like this one. I try to imagine Mary and Martha, heartbroken, over their one and only brother dying, very ill, and they're probably taking turn, looking after him, and the other would probably go on the rooftop to look and see, and she comes down and says, is the master anywhere near? No, no sight of him. And the other one would take turn and take care of Lazarus. The other one goes up and said, is the master here? No, not anywhere to be seen. Until to their utter, utter bewilderment, Lazarus died.
Meanwhile, way up in the north, Jesus with his disciples ministering, serving, and he said to them, finally, Lazarus died. Let's go and see him. Oh my goodness, our honest Thomas. Remember honest Thomas? Don't ever call him doubting Thomas again. He's honest Thomas. Honest Thomas not only panics, he freaks out.
What? He died and we're going to go and see him? Don't blame him. Please don't blame him.
Don't blame him. Think about it. Jesus was using a metaphor. First he kept telling them Lazarus is asleep and we're going to wake him up and finally they didn't get it that the believer does not die.
A believer sleeps because it's only temporary. But when they didn't get this, he said, okay, Lazarus died. And that's when our brother Thomas absolutely freaks out. We're going to go back to Bethany?
That's a danger zone. That's why they're going to kill us. And he's dead and we're going to go and see him? We must be going to die with him.
Listen to me. The disciples could not be more baffled. They could not be more baffled at our Lord's decision to return to Bethany. They were all baffled.
Just Thomas honest enough to blurt it out. They left Judea a week early and they went north to get away from danger, get away from the death that is awaiting Jesus on the cross. They felt a sense of relief when they got up in the Galilee region and left Judea and they wanted to stay away from there. And now he's saying, what? He wants to go back there? He wants to take us with him?
Probably that's more important for them. This is one of the many times that our Lord confounded the disciples. Does he confound you? He confounds me. They just couldn't understand his action. They couldn't understand it. Listen to me.
I can identify with them and some of you do too. In this whole teaching on Jesus is talking about the daylight and the night time and he was telling them, yes, we're going back to the hot spot. Yes, we're going back to the danger zone.
Yes, we're going back to Judea. But don't be afraid. You will not stumble there. There are no accidents in the believer's life. Hostility cannot touch you until the hour comes. Hostility cannot touch me until the hour comes. I am walking in the light of my Father's will. I am not experimenting. I'm not anxious.
No one is going to lay a finger on me until the Father says so. His timing. His hour. And listen, it's going to be an hour of the Father's choosing, not the hostile people. So by the time they reach Bethany, they come down all the way down from the north. Lazarus has been dead almost four full days and his body began to decompose. You know in the Middle East, the rituals of mourning where they actually mourn hard, sobbing, feeding themselves at times, tearing their clothes for three full days.
Three full days. This is the official, mourning ends after three days. The professional mourners, now let me tell you about professional mourners. They're hired hands and they pay to come to grieving families. And they compose poems and songs about the deceased. And the family of course, I mean they were wrought out. They're just sobbing their eyes out. That's the idea. These professional mourners do this for three days until the third day.
Then they stop. It's sort of the third day reaches fever pitch. Really.
By the end of the third day, mourners have been thoroughly exhausted. Physically. Emotionally. Mentally. And after they've been wrought out by these professional mourners, after they finally were thoroughly exhausted.
Did you guess it? Jesus shows up. He didn't want to come in the midst of the frenzy. He wanted to get it all out of their system.
He shows up on the fourth day. And Martha of course expresses her deep disappointment. Had you come when he was sick, you could have healed him.
Now he died. In all truthfulness, I often identify with Martha. And I get a tug in my heart. Because as many of you know and you heard me say this, in 1964 in March I gave my life to Christ. And then I began to pray fervently. I thought now that I know Jesus in a personal way, I began to pray fervently for the Lord to heal my mother who is not well.
But in July of that year, she died. I was young in my Christian walk. Very immature.
Not very wise. And I was thoroughly confused. Until the Lord in his graciousness gave me a vision that lifted my spirit and transformed my ministry. But listen to me. From that time on, never do I see the death of a believer as the master of the house. Never do I see the death of the believer other than being a porter in the king's lodge. Death of the believer is an honorable discharge from the battles of life. Death of the believer is only the gatekeeper that opened the king's gate to the king's friends. Death for the believer is a funeral for our sorrow in this life. Well now, after this brief introduction, I get to the message I want to share with you. Three significant things from this amazing supernatural intervention of raising Lazarus from the dead.
Very briefly, I want to share those three with you. First of all, verse 33, Jesus groans. Jesus groans. Secondly, Jesus asks them to do something. Verse 39. Thirdly, Jesus called Lazarus by name. Verse 44.
Let's look at these very, very quickly. The Bible said that our Lord Jesus groaned. We know he wept also. It's the shortest verse in the Bible.
But he groaned. Try as you may. You're going to find that there is no equivalence to the Greek word here of what our Lord did.
I mean, it's so awesome. It cannot be translated into any language. The closest thing you can come to it is the way the horse snorts. It's an expression of violent displeasure. It's an expression of indignation. And the reason for his anger and indignation is what sin did to humanity. The root cause of death is sin.
James said in chapter 1 verse 15, when covetousness conceives, it brings forth sin. And when sin is finished, it brings death. Romans 6 24, Paul said that the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. And that is why only those who have been washed by the blood of Jesus Christ will escape eternal death.
Hell is the eternal death that awaits all those who have rejected Jesus Christ and God's plan of salvation as the only way to heaven, as the only way to salvation, as the only way to forgiveness. Seven things I pray to God you will not forget in a hurry. Sin earns wages. Sin pays wages. Sin insists on paying wages. Four, sin pays wages in kind. Number five, sin pays in installments. Six, sin pays in full unless the blood of Jesus Christ washed it away. Sin is self-executive.
It pays its own bill because the wages of sin is death. Death of the body, the mind, the soul, Jesus was angry. He was angry at what sin did to humanity. Secondly, Jesus asked the people to do something. Actually, I asked him to do two things, but this one is verse 39. He asked the living to remove the stone. You have to wonder, wait a minute, the one who clicked his finger and Lazarus coming out of the death after four days, could he not click his fingers and get the stone moved?
Love it. Have you noticed throughout the series of messages of the evidence of the exclusivity of Jesus that Jesus always used something or someone as he performed the miracle? In Cana of Galilee, he told the servants to fill the jars with water and he changed it into wine.
In feeding of the 5,000, he used the old boy's lunch. In healing of the blind eye, he used the clay. Listen to me, whenever God is performing and whatever God is performing in your life and he does, trust me, he does, you have to act.
You have to act. Even in salvation, we know in this church, we teach us only by grace alone, through faith alone, that even in salvation, which is a gift from God, yet you have to respond, you have to accept it. The third thing and final thing I want to highlight here is that Jesus called Lazarus by name. After Jesus called Lazarus, he comes out, grave clothes. Again, this is a Middle East thing and remember Jesus was wrapped with grave clothes, always made of linen. He was wrapped up and when he came out, he said, loose him and let him go.
D.L. Moody said that just as well Jesus said, Lazarus, come out. Had he just said, come out, all the dead people would have risen.
Why did Jesus say, loose him and let him go? Again, as I told you in the Middle East culture, they don't dress him up in a nice suit and makeup and as we do in the West now that before the burial, they wrap the body around with linen cloth, known as burial cloth. And so his hands and feet were wrapped around his body like all people were at that time. And so Lazarus was tied up with his grave clothes, even as his heart began to pump and his arteries began to pulsate once more and his muscles began to move once again. But he shuffles out, he shuffles out of the tomb with these bandages and Jesus said, loose him, loose the bandages and let him go. I want to tell you something as I conclude.
I hope if you forgot everything I said, you're not going to forget what I'm going to tell you because I know absolutely categorically it's true. This is a real picture of what happens to all of us spiritually when the Holy Spirit of God begins to breathe in us and quicken our dead spirits by which we're born. We're still walking around with these grave clothes of the past. These grave clothes hamper us. They pull us back. They hinder us from growing in Christ. They block our view. They keep us being ineffective for Jesus.
They are all hindrances that must be set loose in Jesus' name. A challenge to walk in the resurrection power of Jesus from Dr. Michael Yusef. Thank you for being a part of this episode of Leading the Way. And if you have any faith questions, won't you consider speaking with a Leading the Way pastor or counselor? They'd be so happy to listen and to offer practical help. Visit ltw.org slash Jesus.
My name is Matt. I listen to Dr. Yusef daily and his advice and his preaching helps me every day to think more clearly about God, His law in my life and the stakes that I have made and that I am forgiven and that God does love me and I have a place in this world because of Him and that I am forgiven. Even though I am broken, I am forgiven and there's nothing more powerful than that. So thank you for bringing that to me on a daily basis. Learn more about the impact of Leading the Way with Dr. Michael Yusef and ways you can join him when you visit ltw.org or call us. Speak to a ministry representative at 866-626-4356. I believe it is important to give testimony of how God is working in your life and if Leading the Way is part of that, we would want to know. You can call our testimony line at 877-941-7934. That is 877-941-7934. Do it today. Thank you in advance and God bless.
