THE RAISING OF LAZARUS AND THE PLOT TO KILL JESUS.
John 11:38-57.
1. The Raising of Lazarus (John 11:38-45).
Far from being unable to prevent death (cf. John 11:37), Jesus was about to overcome death in what was to be the seventh and final significant ‘sign’ (prior to Jesus’ own death and resurrection) in John’s Gospel.
Still "groaning within Himself," Jesus approached the cave where Lazarus' body was laid, and commanded that the stone should be rolled away (John 11:38-39).
It is interesting that Jesus, who is able to speak a word and impossible things get done, chose to give the witnesses a part to play in this great drama. If man does what he can, God will do the rest.
At this point the ever-practical Martha remonstrated with Him because by now it was too late, humanly speaking, to do anything for Lazarus. After four days, according to the common perception, corruption would have set in, and the spirit would have left the body for good.
We can imagine the volunteers pausing while they listened to what Martha had to say, and what Jesus would reply.
Jesus reminded Martha of His promise that if we have faith we will see the glory of God (John 11:40).
The stone was removed, and Jesus prayed a public prayer which was designed to encourage faith in the hearers (John 11:41-42).
Jesus “lifted up His eyes” to heaven, where the Father is, and addressed God in a familiar fashion as “Father.”
In fact, Jesus’ prayer is more a thanksgiving than a prayer. “Father I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always” (John 11:41-42).
These words let us know once again that there is a special union between the Father and the Son.
Yet although Jesus was praying to the Father, He was also doing so in a public capacity. With great sympathy He prayed in such a way that the people listening might benefit from the transaction between the Father and the Son: it is “because of the people I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent me” (John 11:42).
Having prayed with such humanity, Jesus now spoke with all the authority of the Godhead. He called Lazarus by name, just as the Good Shepherd does call His sheep by name (cf. John 10:3), and the dead man rose from the dead (John 11:43-44).
“And he that was dead came forth, bound head and foot with graveclothes, and his face was bound about with a napkin” (John 11:44a).
“Loose him, and let him go,” Jesus instructed (John 11:44b).
Jesus had already “loosed” Lazarus from the grip of death, but He wanted to involve the witnesses again. Lazarus was still bound about as a dead man, even though he was now alive. Those graveclothes had to be removed by the hands of men.
There is perhaps a picture here of the newly born-again Christian. Those who are made new people in Christ are still, at first, hampered down with old attitudes, old habits. It is a part of the ministry of the church not to criticise, but to encourage, and to help remove those old shackles.
After witnessing the raising of Lazarus, many of Mary’s attendants believed in Jesus (John 11:45).
Jesus, in pronouncing Himself the resurrection and the life asks US, “Do you believe this?” (cf. John 11:26).
2. The Plot to Kill Jesus (John 11:46-57).
However, some of the witnesses reported Jesus to the Pharisees (John 11:46).
Immediately the chief priests and the Pharisees convened a council. “This man does many miracles,” admitted the leaders (John 11:47). As so often in the Gospel of John, the word translated “miracles” is better translated, “signs.”
They acknowledged the miracles, the “signs” as I have translated, but refused the One to whom those signs pointed. What depravity, what baseness on the part of men, that they should want to destroy the Messiah for whom their nation had been for so long waiting. It was a deliberate, wilful, closing of their eyes to what had been manifested, and what had been attested by many witnesses.
“If we let Him alone, all men will believe on Him,” they complained (John 11:48). Now we have to ask, would it be so bad a thing if everyone believed Jesus to be who He professes to be? Religious leaders can sometimes be the most troublesome of opponents to the truth.
Their motives were political: “all men will believe on Him, and the Romans shall come and take away our place and nation” (John 11:48). We know with hindsight that the opposite was true: they rejected Jesus, and then the Romans did take away their place and their nation. We refuse Christ at great peril to ourselves.
“Ye know nothing at all,” complained Caiaphas the high priest (John 11:49). This man’s cynical solution was that one man should die, rather than the whole people perish (John 11:50).
The Apostle John informs us that Caiaphas was thereby unwittingly prophesying the substitutionary sacrifice of Jesus “for that nation” (John 11:51). “And not for that nation only, but that also He should gather together in one the children of God that were scattered abroad” (John 11:52). The Cross of Jesus stands at the crossroads of history, and hereafter the gospel would no longer be confined to one nation, and one people, but would spread to the ends of the earth.
From that day forward the Council took counsel as to how to put Jesus to death (John 11:53). Still keeping control of His own destiny, Jesus withdrew with His disciples to a city named Ephraim, twelve miles to the north of Jerusalem (John 11:54).
Now at last the Passover was approaching, and the early worshippers looked for Jesus. Will He perhaps not come to the feast? (John 11:55-56).
The chief priests and the Pharisees put out an order - at least within their own jurisdiction - that if or when Jesus came to the feast the authorities should be informed of His whereabouts, that they might apprehend Him (John 11:57).
