Loose For A Purpose

LOOSE FOR A PURPOSE

John 11:44

John 12:9-11

Preached by At Greater Faith Church-Baptist

Waukegan, IL On Wednesday, April 18, 2007

John 11:44

[v.44] And he that was dead came forth, bound hand and foot with graveclothes: and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus saith unto them, loose him, and let him go.

John 12:9-11

[v.9] Much people of the Jews therefore knew that he was there: and they came not for Jesus’ sake only, but that they might see Lazarus also, whom He had raised from the dead.

[v.10] But the chief priests consulted that they might put Lazarus also to death;

[v.11] Because that by reason of him many of the Jews went away, and believed on Jesus.

Subject: LOOSED FOR A PURPOSE

This is a story that I am sure that most you have read and at the very least heard before. About how Jesus “cried with a loud voice, Lazarus come forth” and Lazarus after having been dead for four days got up out of the grave.

However, I do not know if you noticed but most of the sermons or Sunday School lessons that you may have heard hardly ever focus on Lazarus. However, I am a firm believer that if we slow down when we read the scriptures we just might learn something that we otherwise would have missed.

Oh yes sometimes we just need to slow down ... all of the scripture are there for a reason. In fact ...

2 Timothy 3:16-17 reminds us of this fact:

[v.16] All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

[v.17] That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.

Which simply means that all scripture is ... um um good ... even the parts that you do not like. God gave His Word to us for a reason. Even the part that we are going to deal with tonight ... it to has purpose.

So let us look again at our text...

John 11:44 And he that was dead came forth, bound hand and foot with graveclothes: and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus saith unto them, loose him, and let him go.

As we continue to set our minds on the vision of 500 ... there are three points that I want to leave you with tonight. And the first point is found in this scripture and it is:

Now there are a few things that we can take away from this scripture:

1. He (Lazarus) could not free himself.

He could not do anything until Jesus said loose him and let him go. Oh yes ... he still would have been dead sleeping in his grave ... but Jesus decided to set him free. I’m not sure if you know this or not but the word says over John 8:36

“If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.”

So Jesus says, “Loose him and let him go”

In other words ... I hope you don’t mind a little KELVIN-OLOGY ... get dem grave clothes off of dat boy ... I got some more work for him to do.

That is important for us to know ... as believers we cannot operate; we cannot do the things that God has called us to do still bound by your graveclothes.

Well ... we will talk about the grave clothes in just a minute ... but we need to understand that Lazarus could not do anything until Jesus said “... Loose him, and let him go.”

• He could not talk. Why because our text tells us that his face was bound with a napkin. So if he could not talk ... then that automatically tells me that he could not say AMEN.

• He could not clap. Why ... well our text tells us that he was bound hand and foot. Which means that he could raise his hands; could not do a praise dance; he could not do nothing until Jesus said ... “Loose him, and let him go.”

You know ... I use to sit back and wonder why is it so hard to get folk excited about the Lord...

Well ... it is no need to wonder anymore why folks are so quite ... it is no need to wonder why folks find to hard to say AMEN it is because they still have on their graveclothes.

So we understand our first point that we cannot do anything without Christ.

Which brings us to our second point found in ... John 12:9-11

[v.9] Much people of the Jews therefore knew that he was there: and they came not for Jesus’ sake only, but that they might see Lazarus also, whom he had raised from the dead.