How Love Looks (Part 32)
Text: John 11:1-16
Well it’s good to see you all this morning. Last Sunday, we had originally intended to go out to Arkansas to celebrate my dad’s birthday. And we did get to spend time with him on his birthday, but not at his house… in the hospital. I think most of you know my dad. He’s been here three or four times… maybe five times – I can’t remember. He’s not doing so great. He went to the emergency room on Tuesday with pneumonia. And while he was in the hospital, the pneumonia went sceptic. The toxins from that have severely damaged his liver and kidneys, and brought him to the point of renal failure, messed his liver up, and now he’s got an irregular heartbeat. So the doctors are trying to deal with the pneumonia, they’re trying to deal with the toxins from the sepsis, they’re trying to deal with kidney failure, his blood pressure, and irregular heartbeat… it’s horrible… So if I seem a little out of it today, please forgive me.
But I will say this… it’s good to stand up here, and look out and see God’s people…
What we’re going to do this morning; is go back to the Gospel of John. We had gone through John’s Gospel up through chapter 10, and just to set up a little context, the last thing that took place in chapter 10 was that Jesus claimed to one with the Father, and the Jews picked up rocks and wanted to kill Him. There’s an old saying that goes, “In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.” In other words, when the world around you is in darkness, it can be dangerous to start shining a light. But that’s what Jesus does… and of course they tried to kill Him, but He managed to escape… But that’s the background to chapter 11, and it’s going to play a role in some of what we see in our text.
So let’s go ahead and open our Bible’s to John 11:1-16 (READ).
A few years back, MJ, the girls, and I got to go to Chicago; and the number one thing that I wanted to see in Chicago was The Field Museum. I mean, that is a place where… if you’re into history, you have to go and see it. But the problem was, we had never been to Chicago… and we’re small town folks driving in a big city. FIVE LANES of bumper to bumper traffic. And MJ was trying to read the map, and we were trying to see the street signs, and we couldn’t change lanes when we needed to, and it was a nightmare. So really we were just stuck in the flow of traffic, and you get this sinking feeling that you’re going to end up totally lost, and I was starting to get a little stressed… but then all of a sudden, we looked ahead and there it was. The Field Museum. I whipped over, and found a parking spot at Soldier Field, and we spent the day looking at T-Rex skeletons, ancient Egyptian artifacts, and all kinds of other cool things. And the reason I bring that up, is because sometimes life can be like that. We don’t always clearly see what’s ahead. We don’t always know exactly what the Lord is bringing our way. But somehow; by God’s grace, He gets us to where we need to be. Somehow, God was directing our steps, and we didn’t even know it. And it’s because often times, God is working in a way completely different than what we would think or even imagine.
Here in our text we’ve got Mary and Martha, and their brother is really sick… he’s dying. They send a message out to Jesus and ask Him to come. But Jesus delays His coming.
Lesson Number One: GOD IS NOT AT OUR BECK AND CALL!
He is the Sovereign Lord of ALL CREATION! He doesn’t jump when we say jump.
And we need to understand this… Jesus isn’t delaying because He thinks Lazarus might get better. Some people have said that… they say that verse 4 shows us that Jesus thinks Lazarus might get better. No. That’s not it at all. Jesus knows full well that Lazarus is going to die. But He also knows that death is not going to be the final result of this situation. Jesus already knows that He is going to raise him up from death. The whole purpose of this is for the glory of God. And if you look at verses 5 & 6 it says, “Jesus loved Martha and Mary and Lazarus… so He stayed two more days.” Now that will mess with you if you’re theology is wrong.
Let me explain to you what I mean by that. Sometimes you’ll hear people say things like: “God if you love me, You’d make me wealthy?” “God if you love me, You would heal me of this sickness.” “God if you love me, You would get me out of this mess.”
But the truth is, and what Scripture teaches from beginning to end, is that OFTEN TIMES, God grows us THROUGH hard things. God matures us through suffering. God strengthens our walk through loss. And so yes, at times; God speaks with a still small voice… you know, that inner leading of the Holy Spirit, informed by, and guided by His Word. But sometimes God has to pull out the loud speaker, and that loud speaker might be pain, or suffering, or hardship. The text tells us that JESUS LOVED MARY, MARTHA, AND LAZARUS, but that love went beyond physically healing Lazarus and keeping him from death. In-fact; the most loving thing Jesus could do, is exactly what He does. He shows them that He is God in the flesh. That He has power over death and the grave. He does something that shows them that He is the one and only Savior and Sovereign Lord of all things. But in order to show them that, He has to allow them to go through something very hard.
And so Jesus delays in coming to them. He waits two more days. And again; this is going to first mess with, and then straighten out Mary and Martha’s theology. But then after two days, Jesus finally says to the disciples, “Let’s go to Judea again.” And that’s going to mess with the disciples theology. Because they’re thinking that Jesus is going to overthrow the Roman government, that at this time He is going to sit on a physical throne in Jerusalem… and so for Him to go back to Judea, knowing full well that the Jews wanted to stone Him to death after the last time He was there… this is suicide. This is crazy! They’re thinking “Jesus, how are you going to set up your kingdom if you die?” What they didn’t understand is – that’s actually HOW He’s going to do it!
And of course; we know the story. We know how it ends, but put yourself into the disciples shoes for a second. Sure, they escaped the region last time… but Jesus is a wanted man there, and to go back would mean facing off against the Jews and the religious leaders. So they’re a bit leery of going back there, but look how Jesus answers them in verses 9 and 10.
“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. But if anyone walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.” This is going right back to what we talked about during Advent… these ideas of light and darkness, and how light drives out darkness, and how light allows you to see where you’re going so that you’re not stumbling around blindly in the dark. And Jesus is saying kind of the same things here in these two verses. You see; the Jews divided the daylight portions of a single day into 12 different portions. So from sun up, to sun down, it was 12 portions or “hours”… So during the shorter days of the winter months, the 12 “hours” were a little less than our 60 minute hours, and during the longer days of summer, the 12 “hours” were a little longer than our 60 minute hours. But during those daylight hours, that’s when we are to get our tasks done… to get our work done… to go where we need to go and do what we need to. And so Jesus is saying to the disciples, who are afraid of going back to Judea, “Listen fella’s My time has not yet come. And so nothing is going to happen to us. There’s no power in hell, or scheme of the world that can overcome God’s plans.”
And of course they do end up going, and Lazarus end’s up getting resurrected from the dead. But what I want you to see this morning, and what I want you to take with you is, that Mary, Martha, and the disciples… they didn’t see the BIG PICTURE. They didn’t fully understand the mind of God and how God’s plans were going to play out. Mary and Martha didn’t know what would happen, but they did right by calling on Jesus… the disciples; they were like, “We’re going to die… but at least we’ll die following Jesus.” So they have an element of faith… they believe certain things about Jesus… Mary and Martha, both say, “Jesus if you had been here, our brother wouldn’t have died.” Which is showing us that they believe in Jesus’ power to heal… but they didn’t understand that He also has the power over life and death. The disciples, they believe that Jesus is the Messiah… but they don’t fully understand what that means, and how He’s going to set up His Kingdom.
This is why it’s important to stay in God’s Word, and to continue to gather with the Church. We should always be learning more and more about Christ, knowing Him better and better. Growing in our knowledge and understanding of Him, and His will, and His ways. And sometimes we can have a head full of knowledge, but the truths of Christ haven’t penetrated into our heart. In other words, we can say all the right things, and have a right understanding, but if we aren’t living it out, if it’s not affecting how we live, and think, and what we do… there’s still more work to be done. Sometimes we have ideas about Jesus that are formed by our traditions, or our limited understanding… of from something that someone told us a long time ago, but it might not even be Biblical. But remember John’s purpose in writing this Gospel account – SO THAT YOU MIGHT BELIEVE. He wants to take us from the point of saying, “God if you love me, you’ll do this thing or that thing for me.” To where we say, “God I know you love me, because you sent your only begotten Son.” “God I know that you love me, because greater love has no man than this… that He lay down His life for His friends, and that’s exactly what Jesus has done.” There’s absolutely no doubt that you love me. Because when I was far from you – You came for me. Because even while I was still a sinner, reveling in my sin, You sought me, and died for me, and rescued me.
All through this Gospel John has been showing us that. He’s been showing us what real faith is. He’s been showing us that it’s not about the miracles… turning water to wine, healing the nobleman’s son, or the lame man, the miraculous feeding of 5000 +, or the giving sight to the blind… or even this raising of Lazarus from the dead. It’s about the One doing the miracles. It’s about the I AM. JESUS IS THE PRIZE! JESUS IS THE GOAL!
IT’S ALL ABOUT JESUS!
And so in this life it might seem as if we’re stuck in bumper to bumper traffic. We can’t seem to change lanes, or get our bearings. But if we are with Jesus, He’ll get us to our destination. If we stay close, stay in His Word, trust and obey. He will get us where we need to be.
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