Three Burials of Amad Lahem Lazarus
Selected Scriptures
This morning I want to tell you a story.
While this story is partially based on actual events, some of it is what we call “poetic license”.
This means I can say this is based on a true story and then make almost the whole thing up.
The name of the story is Three Burials of Amad Lahem Lazarus.
Our story begins with our main character Amad Lahem Lazarus
A middle aged Jewish man living in the first century.
He was unmarried, which was quite strange, but in turn he devoted most of his time to his family.
He and his two sisters lived a quiet life in a quiet suburb.
But unknown too many, Amad Lahem had some friends in high places, the highest as a matter of fact.
For you see, Amad Lahem had met and befriended the most popular man in all the land, and the two became very close friends.
They loved each other very much.
And one day his esteemed friend would show to what extent his love really reached.
But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
Three specific events in Amad Lahem’s life are very much worth discussing, we will call them his 3 burials.
The first burial was an amazing event.
Not at all painful, or sorrowful.
No weeping or wailing.
No mourners or obituaries.
Actually, there was a great celebration. In fact the very angels in Heaven rejoiced at this blessed event.
Let’s read about the first burial of Amad Lahem Lazarus.
Romans 6:4, 6-7 Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death: that just as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. 6 Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin (or be slaves of sin). 7 For he that is dead is freed from sin.
Did you catch it?
The old man, Amad Lahem’s old sin nature was dead.
We will call this first burial Justification.
This was the day Amad Lahem Lazarus met Jesus Christ as his personal Savior.
II Corinthians 5:17 says if anyone is in Christ he is a new creature, the old things passed away, behold new things have come.
I. JUSTIFICATION
A. This is what is commonly referred to as salvation,or the salvation experience.
When a person comes to know Jesus Christ as their personal Savior.
The old self is dead
The Greek word for old does not refer to something old in years
Refers to something that is worn out and useless.
A. Our Justification Comes From God
II Corinthians 5:18 “Now, all these things are from God who reconciled us to Himself through Christ.”
Where does our righteousness come from?
Romans 3:10 says there is no one righteous.
Psalm 14:1+3 There is no one who does good, not even one.
Our righteousness comes from God
It is His righteousness, not ours.
We can not generate even one once of righteousness.
Romans 3:22 This righteousness from God comes through faith.
C. We are justified of made righteous by God.
Not of ourselves, why?
Because then we would have something to boast about.
The first few chapters of Romans speak of the Jews boasting about their Jewish ness, and how much that displeased God.
When we believe, we are declared righteous by Christ’s blood.
We are justified
Not “Just - as - if - I’d” never sinned, because you did sin.
Illustration Lets say you where caught speeding down this highway in front of the church.
You were doing 100 mph, obviously slightly out of the acceptable speeding window.
You go to court and just as the judge is about to throw the book at you, someone steps forward and says I will pay the fine.
"I will take the punishment."
And you get off, without paying the fine, without any punishment at all.
You have been justified.
Made right in the eyes of the law.
That doesn’t change the fact that you were speeding.
But the court sees you as innocent.
That is what Christ did for us.
God’s wrath and justice demands punishment for our sins, His righteous judgment.
But God looks at us through Christ’s blood and sees us as innocent.
We are made clean.
We are a new creature just like in II Corinthians 5:17.
Illustration - New vs. Like new. Like a Lexus certified pre-owned it’s a new class of vehicles they say in the commercials.
Now we are in no sense the old man made over or improved.
We are a new man.
The old man is dead and buried.
Hence the first burial of Amad Lahem Lazarus.
Now, Amad lived a good life.
He lived in a small town, enjoying the comforts of country living, but still close enough to the big city to benefit from its conveniences.
He knew everyone in town, and waved as they met going down the street.
He enjoyed the games on Friday nights at the local boy’s school
And probably worked at the yearly Festival Days booth in order to help raise money for the volunteer fire department.
He especially loved the quiet evenings sitting on the roof with his sisters reminiscing about old times or listening to the noise of the city off in the distance.
He was retired and loved to spend time with his family and friends.
He had an especially close friend in a man named Jesus, one that loved him very much, and who would visit periodically on those cool quiet evenings up on the roof.
One day though Amad Lahem’s leisurely days of retirement was shattered as he became deathly ill.
His family as you can imagine became very worried.
His sisters knew of only one person who could help him.
His good friend Jesus.
Jesus had healed many sick and dying people, surely He would come and heal one of His closest friends.
So they sent word.
“Jesus, your dearly loved friend is sick.
Please come help.” But Jesus didn’t go.
He had a bigger plan in mind.
So Amad Lahem Lazarus died and was buried.
His second burial.
We will call this burial Sanctification.
II. SANCITIFICATION
A. This is another fancy word we hear a lot but what does it mean?
A simple way to put it would be, growing in holiness.
It is the work of the Holy Spirit making the whole nature more and more like Christ.
Growing in likeness to the Lord, imitating Him while serving Him on earth.
B. At Justification we become a new creature and Sanctification is us living like a new creature.
The Christian life is designed to reproduce Godliness as modeled by our Savior, in whose image believers have been RECREATED through the new birth, which is justification.
We are to become more and more like our Heavenly Father.
Like it says in Ephesians 5:1 “Therefore, be imitators of God…”
C. We were created from dirt, so we are dirt. Especially men are dirt right?
ILLUSTRATION: Jesus Christ gives us living water (John 4).
So water mixed with dirt makes mud.
So when we are saved we receive the living water, mixed with our sinful dirty life, becomes mud.
But Jesus is the pure Living Water, crystal clear, spotless Lamb.
As we grow in Christ, as we allow Him to pour more of Himself into our lives, we actually become clearer and clearer.
The more we become like Him, the closer we get to being crystal clear ourselves.
But, we can not completely clear up while in this life.
There will always be that imperfection in our water.
Also, who is doing the clearing up?
Is it me?
No its Christ, pouring Himself into me, but only when I let Him.
I have to remove the top and allow Him to come into my life and dissipate the dirt amongst my muddy water.
Only then can He continue to wash me clean.
I wish I could continue to pour this in, until it overflowed the top.
A water hose would be the perfect example, because if we allow Jesus in to the point of letting Him take over completely, our muddy water would get clearer and clearer, until that dirt was all but flushed out, and all you would see would be Jesus’ Living Water.
Amad Lahem Lazarus lived like a new creature.
His first burial, the death of the old man, his old self occurred at his glorious justification
When he was made righteous in God’s sight by the blood of Christ’s death on the cross.
His second burial, his actual physical burial after a painful struggle with sickness reminds us of his sanctification.
Becoming more and more like Christ.
For he lived a good life.
He imitated God.
He loved and cared for his sisters.
And was loved greatly by the very Son of God.
You may know Amad Lahem Lazarus by a different name.
Of course his Hebrew name was Eleazar, which in Greek would be Lazarus.
His two sisters, Mary and Martha along with Lazarus were very close friends of Jesus.
And we all know that Jesus purposefully delayed His going to their small Jerusalem suburb of Bethany in order to raise Lazarus from the dead.
The reviving of Lazarus was designed to strengthen Jesus’ disciple’s faith in Him as the Messiah and Son of God.
Let’s read from John 11:14-15 “Then said Jesus unto them plainly. Lazarus is dead. 15 And I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, to the intent ye may believe; nevertheless let us go unto him.”
In other words Jesus said I’m glad he’s dead, so that you might believe.
Lazarus was dead.
He had been dead now for four days.
And his dear friend that could have, and probably would have healed him did not make it on time.
In fact he had delayed his coming on purpose.
As Jesus approached the town of Bethany Lazarus’ sister ran out to meet Him.
“Why didn’t you come sooner?’ She said.
“If you had only been here, my brother would not be dead.
But I know you have a special relationship with God Himself, and your prayers can bring some good from this sad event.”
Jesus comforted her with these words.
“Your brother will rise again.”
And Martha answered
“ I know he will rise again at the resurrection” WOW what a witness to the life of Lazarus, to his salvation, his JUSTIFICATION.
Makes you wonder.
What will they be saying at your funeral?
Three friends were discussing death and one of them asked:
“What would you like people to say about you at your funeral?”
The first said: “I would like them to say, he was a great humanitarian, who cared about his community.”
The second said: “He was a great husband and father, who was an example for many to follow.”
The third friend said: “ I would like them to say, Look he’s moving!”
Will someone be a witness to your justification?
Are you living a life of sanctification, striving to imitate Him every day?
But back to our story, Jesus continued to comfort Martha,
“Your brother will rise again, I am the resurrection and the life.
He who believes in me will live, even though he dies.
And whoever lives and believes in me will never die.
Do you believe this?”
Martha answered “Yes Lord I believe you are the Christ” but not fully understanding his response.
At this Martha ran and informed Mary that Jesus was asking to see her as well.
She blamed Jesus for her brother’s death too.
“Why weren’t you here Jesus?
You could have healed him.”
She wept at His feet, as others gathered around them also weeping. Lazarus was well known in town and probably a wealthy man, so there were several people there to help and comfort Mary and Martha.
This open display of lack of faith in the resurrection and belief in the temporary nature of death troubled Jesus.
He groaned in the spirit, and the word used here for groaned actually means to “snort with anger”.
He was angry, OUTRAGED! at their unbelief.
They are acting like pagans who have no hope.
He understands that grief is to be expected, but this group is acting in despair, as if denying the resurrection would come.
This is an outrage an OUTRAGE!
“Where is the tomb?” Jesus asks.
They promptly take Him there.
Once there Jesus weeps Himself.
Not in a loud lament like those around Him
But silently shedding tears.
Those observing surely must have thought
“Look he too mourns for the dead.”
Or perhaps they said “He cares so much for this family, he feels their pain.”
But no, His tears are not generated out of mourning, since He was to raise Lazarus.
Yes they were tears of grief, but not for the dead or for this family.
Grief for a fallen world entangled in sin-caused sorrow and death.
The prophet Isaiah wrote long ago that He was a man of sorrows and familiar with suffering.
By now thoughts of why didn’t He do something to heal this man spread through the crowd like wildfire.
The whispers “This man should not have died”
And “He healed the blind he could have healed Lazarus”
Permeated through the large group like strong perfume.
Of course Jesus knew what they were thinking.
He knows their every thought and again was angered at their unbelief.
As He approaches the grave He says loudly to the shocked crowd,
“Remove the stone.” Martha quickly responds,
“Lord he has been dead for four days, by this time the stench will be unbearable. “
Again Jesus is astonished at her unbelief.
“Were you not listening?”
He says. “If you would only believe, you will see the Glory of God.”
So they removed the stone.
The crowd takes a few skeptical steps back shielding their noses.
And Jesus does something that shouldn’t have surprised a soul in attendance.
He starts praying.
And not really a prayer of petition but of thanksgiving to His Father.
He says “Father, I thank you that you have heard me.
I know that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.”
Then Jesus faces the tomb.
And to the shock of the crowd shouts with a loud voice “LAZARUS COME OUT!”
It has been said good thing Jesus specifically called Lazarus by name
Or possibly the whole graveyard would have been filled with revived corpses.
And then it happened.
The dead man came out.
Still loosely wrapped in strips of linen, covered in spices to try and help assuage the terrible odor.
He stumbles, for his head and face is still covered, as the crowd stared mouths agape.
Jesus, as if trying to snap them back into reality says,
“Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”
Of course Lazarus went on to live many more years.
And he was more then eager to share his story with anyone willing to listen.
The second burial of Amad Lahem Lazarus was just a temporary one.
He awoke from death to live again.
But not forever.
For eventually Amad Lahem passed away
This time for good, or so it seemed.
The third burial of Amad Lahem Lazarus was not surrounded by a large group of mourners.
The very Son of God did not visit his grave.
No one was there expecting to see him arise from the dead again.
For this time Jesus was no longer with us.
You see, not long after Jesus performed this amazing miracle, He himself was pronounced dead.
Jesus Christ was wrongfully accused and put on my cross and executed in my place.
The third burial of Amad Lahem Lazarus.
He is still in the grave, and will be until Jesus returns.
For you see, even though he remains in the ground, Jesus doesn’t.
Jesus rose again. HE IS ALIVE TODAY!
Living in His glorified body.
The third burial of Amad Lahem we will call Glorification
For it points us to that day when Christ will return.
III. GLORIFICATION
A. Transformed into the Image of Christ.
The power Jesus displayed at the raising of Lazarus was just a preview of the power to be fully displayed in the final resurrection when all the dead hear the voice of the Son of God.
John 5:28-29 Jesus says “ and hour is coming in which all who are in the tombs will hear His voice, and will come forth those who do good deeds to a resurrection of life…”
That is our Glorification
One day we will be like Jesus
I John 3:2 says “Dear friends, now we are children of God, and not what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when He appears we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.”
B. This is the final completion of our Sanctification.
The process of becoming more and more like Christ will not be completed until we see Him face to face.
You can never be fully sanctified in this life.
C. One day we will be glorified.
1. We will finally be with our Lord and Savior.
2. We will receive our Glorified body.
3. We will be like Jesus.
Just like that day when Jesus called Lazarus out of the tomb
One day he will call all that are dead in Him
And they will raise and be glorified
Transformed into the Image of Christ
Along with those of us that are alive and remain.
That is were our hope lies, eternity with the Lord.
There was a woman who had been diagnosed with a terminal illness and was given 3 months to live.
As she began getting her things in order she visited her pastor to discuss certain aspects of her funeral.
She told him which songs she wanted sung
What scriptures to be read
And what dress she wanted to be buried in
She also requested to be buried with her favorite Bible in her left hand
Everything was in order and as she got up to leave she remembered one last request.
She said this is very important to me
I want to be buried with a fork in my right hand
The pastor obviously answered ooookay?!?
She explained
You see pastor, in all my years of attending church socials and potluck dinners
I remember that when the dishes were being cleared after the main course
Someone would inevitably lean over to me and say
“Keep your fork”
It was my favorite part of the meal because I knew that something better was coming
Like velvety chocolate cake or deep dish apple pie
Something wonderful to end the meal
The pastor listened intently a smile coming across his face
She continued So I just want people to see me there with a fork in my hand and want them to wonder
What’s with the fork
Then I want you to tell them
Keep your fork, the best is yet to come
The pastor’s eyes welled up with tears of joy as he hugged the woman goodbye
He knew this would be one of the last times he would see her before her death
But he also knew that she had a better grasp of Heaven than most did
She knew and trusted that the best WAS yet to come
At the funeral every one that walked by the casket saw her wearing a beautiful dress with her favorite Bible in her left hand and a fork held in her right
Over and over the pastor heard the people ask the question
Why is she holding a fork, what’s with the fork
And his smile began to get larger and brighter each time
During his message the pastor told the people about their conversation
He explained the fork and what it symbolized to her
The pastor told everyone how he could not stop thinking about that fork
And how he hoped that they would not be able to stop thinking about it either
The best is yet to come.
Amad Lahem Lazarus’s
First Burial: Justification - we are given God’s righteousness, the old man is passed away.
Second Burial: Sanctification - becoming more like Christ, live a life of example.
Third Burial: Glorification - transformed into the image of Christ, one day the grave will give up its guests.
Have you been justified this morning?
Do you know Jesus as your personal savior?
If you do know Him, are you living a life that shows you know Him?
Are you experiencing sanctification, becoming more and more like Jesus?
Do you look forward to the hope of that day when we shall rise, when the trump of God shall sound?
Will you be part of that glorious resurrection morning?
The best is yet to come!
