Lord Over Death: John 11:1-44

Happy Easter!  Today I would like to preach a text to you that I often turn to when I’m called upon preach at a Christian funeral.  The text is John 11:1-44, where John recounted the story of Lazarus’ death and resurrection in order to persuade His readers to hope in Jesus Christ as the resurrection and the life. 

The reason I have picked this passage rather than a passage about Jesus’ resurrection is because of Jesus’ statement in John 11:25: “I am the resurrection and the life.”  I find that sometimes in celebrating Jesus’s resurrection, we overlook the truth that Jesus is not just resurrected; He is THE RESURRECTION and THE LIFE.  The greatest need of every person alive today is to come to a hope and trust in Jesus Christ as the resurrection and the life.  My prayer is that God would use this passage to establish Jesus Christ as the Mighty Lord over death in the hearts of His people. 

I.              Tour of the Text

[11:1] Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. [2] It was Mary who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was ill. [3] So the sisters sent to him, saying, “Lord, he whom you love is ill.” [4] But when Jesus heard it he said, “This illness does not lead to death. It is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.”

[5] Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. [6] So, when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was. [7] Then after this he said to the disciples, “Let us go to Judea again.” [8] The disciples said to him, “Rabbi, the Jews were just now seeking to stone you, and are you going there again?” [9] Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours in the day? If anyone walks in the day, he does not stumble, because he sees the light of this world. [10] But if anyone walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.” [11] After saying these things, he said to them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him.” [12] The disciples said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover.” [13] Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that he meant taking rest in sleep. [14] Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus has died, [15] and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.” [16] So Thomas, called the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

[17] Now when Jesus came, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. [18] Bethany was near Jerusalem, about two miles off, [19] and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother. [20] So when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, but Mary remained seated in the house. [21] Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. [22] But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you.” [23] Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” [24] Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” [25] Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, [26] and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” [27] She said to him, “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.”

[28] When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary, saying in private, “The Teacher is here and is calling for you.” [29] And when she heard it, she rose quickly and went to him. [30] Now Jesus had not yet come into the village, but was still in the place where Martha had met him. [31] When the Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary rise quickly and go out, they followed her, supposing that she was going to the tomb to weep there. [32] Now when Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” [33] When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. [34] And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” [35] Jesus wept. [36] So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” [37] But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man also have kept this man from dying?”

[38] Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay against it. [39] Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days.” [40] Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?” [41] So they took away the stone. And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. [42] I knew that you always hear me, but I said this on account of the people standing around, that they may believe that you sent me.” [43] When he had said these things, he cried out with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out.” [44] The man who had died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”  (John 11:1-44 ESV)

II.            Thoughts from the Text: How does this passage cause us to hope in Christ? 

a.     The Apparent Victory of the Last Enemy: Death

To me, this passage is simultaneously one of the darkest and brightest passages in the all of the Bible!  The darkness appears first, reminding us of the realities of living in a fallen world.  Those realities are sickness, death, and despair.  We are reminded here that, given enough time, the people that we love dearly will get sick and die.  Have you every considered that Lazarus was someone’s son, brother, possible someone’s father, and obviously “many” people’s dear friend?  

The Bible calls death an enemy (1 Corinthians 15:26: the last enemy to be destroyed). We see death for the enemy that it is in the emotions of God’s people in this passage.  This passage is a reminder that death is an enemy that will hunt down everyone that we love.  It will hunt down our friends.  It will hunt down our parents, our siblings, our spouses, and it will hunt down our children as well.  They will die.  We will die.  And all of it will hurt.  The realities of living in a fallen world are that the people that we love will suffer and die, and so will we.  It is often said that the only things in life that are certain are death and taxes, but let’s be honest: you can cheat on your taxes and maybe even get away with it.  No one will cheat death. 

Every death carries with it a sobering reminder that world we live in is not the way God originally made it to be.  Our world is broken.  The irony, however, is that we broke it.  Death is an intruder, but is one that entered into God’s creation because of our sin.  Romans 5:12: “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.” 

We see also death for the enemy that it is in the emotions of Christ here in this passage.  In John 11:33, the original Greek communicates that Jesus was more than sad, He was “outraged in spirit” and was “indignant & angry.”  And then comes the memorable John 11:35, which says, “Jesus wept.”  Many commentators have tried to figure out exactly why we see such emotion in Jesus in this passage.  I believe that this is Jesus’ reaction (1) to the presence of death in the world that He made and also (2) to the presence of doubt in the people that He loves.  I hope that you see here that when a loved one passes and the hurt sets in that you are not alone.  Death bothers Jesus on an even deeper level than it bothers us.  And this is good news because Jesus is about to do something about it, not only in this passage, but later in John’s gospel as well.  What we have in this passage is a picture of how Jesus, the Light of the world, will dispel the darkness that death casts over His people forever. 

b.     The Certain Victory of the Lord Jesus Christ  

Death’s victory is only apparent an apparent one.  As I said earlier, this passage contains darkness, but through the Light of the World dispels the darkness of this passage bringing life and hope when we take a closer look. And the way this passage aims to give us life and hope is by revealing Jesus Christ in glory. 

The first way that this text does so is by declaring Jesus to be the Lord over death.  Now, the obvious way that Jesus is shown to be the Lord over death is in His power over death.   Notice in verses 43-44 the power and authority of Jesus’ voice.  There is no spell here, just the mighty voice of Jesus!  And death obeys His every word.  This miracle shows Jesus to be the greatest Deliverer that this world has ever seen!  If there were a handful of truths that I would want you to take home today, one of them is that death will not have the last word in anyone’s life; the Lord Jesus Christ will. 

But we also see Jesus’ Lordship over death in His purpose in death.  In John 11:5-6, we read that Jesus delays until Lazarus’ death because He loves this family.  What!  Then in John 11:14-15, Jesus says that He is glad that He wasn’t there to prevent Lazarus’ death for His disciple’s sake. Friend, the implications of these verses are absolutely STAGGERING: that God has a purpose in death and suffering.  Two purposes are crystal clear in this passage: (1) the glory of God: John 11:4,40-42 and (2) the good of His people: John 11:5-6, 15.  There is some benefit to His glory and the good of His people in the dying of Lazarus that would not have been gained had Lazarus not died.  They need this experience of Lazarus’ death and would not have come to know Jesus in the way that they did without it.  Remember that Mary, Martha, and the disciples still think that death is beyond Jesus (21,32). 

This passage also declares Jesus to be the resurrection and the life.  What do these two things mean?  Our passage tells us.  In John 11:25, we see that Jesus being the Resurrection means that if we believe in Him, though we die, we will live again.  Jesus speaks in John 5:25-29 of a resurrection that will take place at the end of history.  Revelation 20:14 also speaks of this last event in history will be the resurrection and final judgment, and there death will be the last enemy to be defeated and thrown into the lake of fire.  This will be a resurrection to either eternal life or eternal death.  From John 11:26, we see that Jesus being the Life means that if we believe in Jesus we will never die.  So not only will those who follow Jesus come to life again on the last day, they will also in some sense “never die.”

One final thing that I want to point out about this statement is that Jesus is the Resurrection and the Life.  What I mean to emphasize here is that Jesus is the key to experiencing this resurrection to eternal life.  What we do with Him and how we respond to Him is the difference between eternal life and eternal death.  In this monumental statement, Jesus wants to move Mary from abstract belief in a resurrection to personal knowledge of and trust in Himself as the One who will make it happen.  This is what we must remember at Easter: that Jesus is not just resurrected; He is the resurrection!  Being a Christian isn’t just giving mental consent to a set of facts; it is knowing and hoping in a person: Jesus Christ. 

As great a miracle as this is, the resurrection of Lazarus is not the greatest miracle in John’s gospel.  Jesus Himself would go on to taste death and judgment for every one of us.  Every death is a tragedy, but Jesus’ death would be history’s greatest tragedy.  But in suffering history’s greatest tragedy, Jesus won history’s greatest victory.  In His bearing the wrath that we deserve and dying the death that we deserve, He was paying for the sins of His people and securing their place in glory with Him.  The Father crowned this great victory by raising Jesus from the dead, vindicating His Son.  It is because of the victory achieved by Jesus Christ that we can have hope and life today.  It is infinitely more than a cliché to say that a Christian is in a better place!  It is the most real thing in the world.

May I would remind you that the only thing that separates us from what Jesus says to Martha in these verses is PERSPECTIVE.  This teaches us that the greatest need for people who find themselves between death and resurrection is to learn trust Jesus. We must remember that neither the death of a loved one or our own death is beyond Jesus.  Hebrews 2:14-15 says one reason that Jesus died was to deliver us from the fear of death.  And from this passage we see that death is no match for Jesus!  But the key is found in John 11:26: do you believe this? 

I love Thomas’ statement in verse 16: If Jesus is going to die in Judea, then we are going to go and die with Him.  This statement along with Martha’s statement in verse 27 reveal what our response should be to such a risen Lord: to believe in His and so love Him that we would follow Him anywhere, even into death.  Will you?  He is the Lord over death; He is the Resurrection and the Life; and He is the Lord who is worth dying for.