Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. So the sisters sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one you love is sick.” When he heard this, Jesus said, “This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s son may be glorified through it.” John 11:1, 3-4
“The one you love is sick.” Have you ever had to be the communicator of those words? Have you ever been the one to receive word that a loved one is sick? Jesus received that message about Lazarus, so he knows what that feels like.
When a loved one is sick, we jump to immediate action by traveling to be at their side. Or we send cards, order flowers, and visit their room in the hospital. We might think of ways we can show support to the family. Our response is one of compassion and of love.
When Jesus received word of his friend’s sickness, his response was one of love as well, but it didn’t look like the immediate show of concern. His response to Lazarus’ sickness was delay. Jesus chose to wait and initially to do nothing to offer comfort and support.
Lazarus’ sisters, Mary and Martha, told Jesus about Lazarus because they wanted him to come and heal their brother. They knew he was capable of restoring Lazarus to health. Since they were close friends with Jesus and knew him well, they had full confidence that he would offer them help.
He does, but not in the way or at the time they expected. I can imagine the worry the sisters felt as they watched Lazarus decline. Hour after hour, with their eye on the road, they looked for Jesus, waiting on him, helpless and scared until that final moment when Lazarus breathes his last breath.
Jesus never came. Now he was too late to effect any healing on Lazarus’ behalf. The sisters moved forward with their preparations for burial and laid their beloved brother in the tomb.
This is the scene unfolding in Bethany. But let’s switch the point of view over to Jesus.
Life Comes Through Unexpected or Confusing Avenues
Prior to this story, Jesus had been in Jerusalem for the Feast of Dedication. Then he left town to go to the place at the Jordan River where John had baptized him. John had already been killed by this time, so Jesus may have gone there to remember, but also to talk about the kingdom. John chapter 10 notes in that place many believed in Jesus.
When Jesus received news of Lazarus, he proclaimed the glory of God. Verse four says, “When Jesus heard this, he said, ‘This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.’” And then he stayed where he was for two more days.
The disciples would have known and loved Lazarus, too, so when Jesus apparently does nothing to change the situation, they may have felt confused and frustrated, wanting to start on their way to Bethany, impatient with Jesus.
Jewish culture believed that at the time of death, the spirit of the deceased person hovered around the body in the hope of a resuscitation. After the third day, when the skin on the face began to change color, the soul departed permanently. The person was then pronounced well and truly dead.
Jesus’ intentional delay provided enough time for Lazarus’ body to die and his soul to fully leave it. Then he made the trip to Bethany.
In his classic book on prayer, Ole Hallesby comments on the mysteries of God’s ways. He says that Jesus’ strange and often incomprehensible way of dealing with us is prompted by his love, which is so great the He not only desires to give us what we ask for, but much more.
The sisters sent Jesus their message. They shared their painful concern with him, and then heard nothing from him and saw nothing of him. It would have been easy for them to draw the conclusion that Jesus didn’t even receive their message. Or if he did, he chose not to read it, in essence, ignoring their request of him.
But that isn’t how Jesus was seeing this situation. He’d received their message and decided from the first moment to intervene. Ole Hallesby notes that if Jesus gave us the things we prayed for immediately, He would not succeed in giving us what He had appointed for us.
For Mary and Martha, Jesus knew that by responding to Lazarus’ death in this way, He could manifest more of His power, more of the glory of God. In that way, Mary and Martha would receive not only what they asked for, the restoration of their brother to health, but their faith and trust in Jesus would also be strengthened and deepened.
Life Comes Through Belief
When Jesus determined the time was right to go to Lazarus, he informed the disciples. They don’t understand Jesus’ wish to return to Jerusalem or his perspective on death. Jesus said to them he is glad he wasn’t there so that they may believe. Three different times Jesus prompts people to believe.
The first time happens here with the disciples. They are the ones he is training to spread the gospel so their first-hand witness of his power and glory was crucial to the establishment of the Christian faith.
The second reference to belief is with Martha. After the message of Lazarus’ sickness took one day to reach Jesus, then he waited two days, and then the journey to Bethany took one more day, a total of four days passed before the sisters get any response.
Martha went out to meet him before he had yet entered the village. In the course of their conversation, Jesus says that whomever believes in him will live even though they die, and whoever lives by believing in him will never die.” Then he prompts Martha with the question, “Do you believe this?”
She answers, “Yes.”
The third reference to belief is about the people with Mary and Martha who had come to share in their grief. In his prayer to his father, Jesus asks that they may believe that the Father sent him. Verse 45 says many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary and seen what Jesus did, believed in him.
Belief is what carries us. Each one of us much decide to depend on Jesus to save us personally. By doing this we move from being an interested observer of the facts of salvation and the teachings of the Bible to being someone who enters into a new relationship with Jesus Christ as a living person.
This is what Jesus was encouraging from each group in this story. From the disciples, from the sisters, and from the Jewish neighbors, Jesus draws this decision to move from fascinated bystander to committed relationship.
Mary and Martha already had a friendship with Jesus, and Martha articulated some pretty sound theology out on the road. But were they prepared for the show of God’s glory in their family and in their lives? Would they welcome the fundamental change in their hearts and life trajectory that a decision to believe in him would bring?
Do we welcome it? The question, “do you believe this?” that Jesus asked of Martha still waits for an answer from each one of us today. “I am the resurrection and the life,” Jesus says. “The one who believes in me will live, even though they die, and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
