DA Carson: A Miracle Full of Surprises, John 11 (1:18:40)
Jesus shows his love by delay. Two days later and Lazarus is dead. Now it’s time to go.
What’s the point in waiting two more days?
You can’t actually be dead in this country (the US) unless some doctor has said so. In other words, you need some medical advice to be declared dead. We have open caskets. For many places in the world, this is bizarre. This most certainly wasn’t the case in the first century. In the first century they tried to bury you within one day because decay progresses quickly. Sometimes they weren’t dead. As a result, the Jews had a certain way of talking about these sort of things. They claimed the soul hovers over the body for the first three days, intending to re-enter it, but as soon as it sees its appearance change, then it departs. Then death is judged is irreversible. This was the way of the first century. This is certainly not something Jesus believed, but it was the popular culture’s explanation these occurrences when people appeared to come back to life (who were in fact, never really dead).
So suppose Jesus got there within two days of his death. What would people have said? They would have said it had only been two days. His spirit hadn’t left yet. Interesting, but certainly not unique. By delaying two days, when he got there Lazarus was long dead.
This was different than Jesus’ encounter with the widow of Nain. Jesus raised her son as he was on his way to the grave. Similarly, Jairus’ daughter had not yet been put in the grave. Lazarus had been rotting in the grave four days.
* interestingly, Carson is the only expositor I’ve encountered to date (having listened to roughly 10-15 sermons on John 11 and an equal number of commentaries) that mentions the other resurrection accounts. Many simply dismiss the others or erroneously claim this is the only resurrection account. None mention the resurrections of Elijah or Elisha.
Jesus waited two days. Lazarus dies two days later. Presumably then it took Jesus two days to make the trip. However, even had Jesus left immediately when the messagers had arrived, Lazarus would have still been dead when he arrived at Bethany.
I could imagine what was going through their head. Are you so busy you can’t come back to the one you love? Jesus demonstrates his love…by delay.
Little children are like that. They live in the present. They struggle with delays. Often Christians are like that. They want God to work now, not later. Sometimes God, out of love, treats us to a good dose of delay. Sometimes God has something more spectacular to show us. Part of walking by faith is persevering with God in self conscious choice that he really does know what best, even in our narrow focus it doesn’t feel like it.
Jesus controls grief by diverting attention to himself. Jesus takes attention away from the problem and puts the focus on himself.
Verse 21 (Lord if you had been here) should probably not been read in a nasty way. It is probably an anguished cry. Then she realizes what she says and that it sounds like blame. So she says, as a generality, that God can do anything.
Jesus makes two claims. I am the resurrection. I am the life. It is a strange expression. Without me, there is no resurrection and no life. Jesus has diverted the tragedy to himself. There is a pastoral lesson here. If you’re going to talk about death, then you need to talk about Jesus.
All of our English translations say, “he was deeply moved and troubled” and all the German versions read, “he was outraged and troubled” and that is what the Greek verb here means. He was extremely angry and troubled.
And Jesus wept. What on earth is going on here. Why is he weeping? Jesus knows Lazarus is coming out in about three minutes. The only thing that seems to make sense is that is he is outraged and troubled for the same reason. He knows what he’s going to do. But he understands like no one else does, the sin, the curse, the brokenness, the decay, the death. It’s not the way it is supposed to be. There’s a sense in which we should all be outraged at death for this reason. We weren’t created to die. Death is the last enemy. But thank God it doesn’t have the last word.
The responses of the crowd are both good and bad simultaneously. See how he loved them. They base this on his tears, but his tears don’t prove that he loves Lazarus. He knows he’s going to raise him from the dead in about three minutes. Others say could he not have prevented this man from dying? That is to say, Jesus really isn’t that great. When you need him he’s not there. Yet the delay was for their benefit.
Jesus comes to the tomb. Take away the stone. Martha objects due to the odor.
Have you ever thought about the conversations Lazarus had with Mary and Martha later? We don’t know. Did he keep quiet or is John just being discreet? The only thing we can infer is that God didn’t want us to know. The focus is intended to be on Christ.
Jesus comes up against moral and spiritual death by dying himself. Jesus becomes the resurrection and the life by dying.