How come Jesus weeps before raising Lazarus? —The Good Shepherd in Action

Speaker: 
Andrew Fountain
Date: 
Sun, 2020-02-09
  • Just before Lazarus is raised, Jesus weeps along with Mary. Why not just tell her everything will soon be ok?
  • If this account was just about Jesus’ power to raise the dead it would be told in just 7 verses,
  • but the other 43 tell of a Shepherd who loves each of his sheep in a unique way.
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Sermon Outline - How come Jesus weeps before raising Lazarus? —The Good Shepherd in Action

View or download the handout of the structure of the passage here.

John 11 – Raising Lazarus from the Dead

  1. Now a certain man was sick—Lazarus from Bethany, the village where Mary and her sister Martha lived.
  2. (Now it was Mary who anointed the Lord with perfumed oil and wiped his feet dry with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was sick.)
  3. So the sisters sent a message to Jesus, “Lord, look, the one you love is sick.” The Delay
  4. When Jesus heard this, he said, “This sickness will not lead to death, 1
    but for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified as a result of it.”
  5. Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.
  6. So when he heard that he was sick, he remained in the place where he was for two more days.
  7. Then after this, he said to his disciples, “Let us go to Judea again.”
  8. The disciples replied, “Rabbi, the Jewish leaders were just now trying to stone you to death! Are you going there again?”
  9. Jesus replied, “Are there not twelve hours in a day? Disciples
    Whoever walks in the daytime does not stumble, because they see the light of this world.
  10. But whoever walks at night stumbles, because the light is not in them.” These things he said.
  11. After this he told them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep.
    But I am going there to awaken him.” 2
  12. Then the disciples replied, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover.”
  13. Now Jesus had been talking about his death,
    but they thought he had been talking about the rest of sleep.
  14. Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus has died,
  15. and I am glad for your sake that I was not there, so that you may believe.
    But let us go to him.”
  16. So Thomas (called Didymus) said to his fellow disciples,
    “Let us go too, so that we may die with him.”
  17. When Jesus arrived,
he found that Lazarus had been in the tomb four days already.
  1. (Now Bethany was less than two miles from Jerusalem, 19so many of the Jewish people of the region had come to Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother.)
  1. So when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went out to meet him, but Mary was sitting in the house.
  2. Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. Martha
  3. But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will grant you.”
  4. Jesus replied, “Your brother will come back to life again.” 3
  5. Martha said, “I know that he will come back to life again in the resurrection at the last day.”
  6. Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life.
The one who believes in me, even if he dies, will live,
  1. and the one who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
  2. She replied, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God who comes into the world.”
  1. And when she had said this, Martha went and called her sister Mary, saying privately, “The Teacher is here and is asking for you.” Mary
  2. So when Mary heard this, she got up quickly and went to him. 30(Now Jesus had not yet entered the village, but was still in the place where Martha had come out to meet him.) 31Then the people who were with Mary in the house consoling her saw her get up quickly and go out. They followed her, because they thought she was going to the tomb to weep there. 4
  3. Now when Mary came to the place where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”
  1. When Jesus saw her weeping, and the people who had come with her weeping,
    he was intensely moved in spirit and greatly distressed. Emotion
  2. He asked, “Where have you laid him?”
They said, “Lord, come and see.”
  1. Jesus broke into tears. 5
  2. Thus the people who had come to mourn said, “Look how much he loved him!”
  3. But some of them said, “This is the man who caused the blind man to see! Couldn’t he have done something to keep Lazarus from dying?”
  4. Jesus, intensely moved in himself again,
    came to the tomb.
Now it was a cave, and a stone was placed across it. 39Jesus said, “Lift up the stone.” Lazarus
The sister of the deceased, Martha, replied,
“Lord, by this time the body will have a bad smell, because he has been buried four days.”
  1. Jesus responded, “Didn’t I tell you that if you believe, you would see the glory of God?”
  2. So they lifted up the stone.
Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, “Father, I thank you that you have listened to me. 42I knew that you always listen to me, but I said this for the sake of the crowd standing around here, that they may believe that you sent me.”
  1. When he had said this, he shouted in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 6
  2. The one who had died came out,
his feet and hands tied up with strips of cloth, and a cloth wrapped around his face.
Jesus said to them, “Unwrap him and let him go.”
  1. Then many of the people, who had come with Mary and had seen the things Jesus did, believed in him.
  2. But some of them went to the Pharisees and reported to them what Jesus had done.
  3. So the chief priests and the Pharisees called the council together and said, “What are we doing? For this person is performing many miraculous signs. 48If we allow him to go on in this way, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away our temple and our nation.”
  4. Then one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said, “You know nothing at all! 50You do not realize that it is more to your advantage to have one man die for the people than for the whole nation to perish.”
  5. Now he did not say this on his own, but because he was high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the Jewish nation, 52and not for the Jewish nation only, but to gather together into one the children of God who are scattered.
  6. So from that day they planned together to kill him. False Shepherds
  7. Therefore Jesus no longer went around publicly among the Judeans, but went away from there to the region near the wilderness, to a town called Ephraim, and stayed there with his disciples. 7

Translation by Andrew Fountain

Goal:

  • To see Jesus as one who understands human fragility
    and is truly present with us when we suffer

Typical message: Jesus is powerful enough to do the ultimate miracle—raise the dead!

  • This is absolutely true, but could have been told in just a few verses,
  • But why the long talks with the disciples, Martha and Mary?
  • Why all the emotional stuff?

Living in the Gap

  • It is all about the time gap between bringing our problems to Jesus and him bringing victroy.
  • In this gap there is suffering, confusion and pain.
  • Does Jesus tell us to live in denial because “everything is going to turn out fine”?
  • No, he walks with us, and weeps with us, and tenderly builds our trust.
  • Jesus is a good shepherd to Martha & Mary, to his disciples, to Lazarus, and to all who recognize his voice.

Overview

  1. Introduction
  2. Seven Conversations
  3. How Jesus speaks to us

John 1–12 “Book of Signs”

1 Prolog

Wedding Nicodemus Woman at well Child healed
5 Sabbath Healing: Take up your bed and walk
Teaching: the Son gives life
6 Feeds 5000, I am the Bread of life
7 I am the Living Water (after walks on water)
8 I am the Light of the World
9 Sabbath Healing: Man born blind
10 Teaching: I am the good Shepherd
11 Lazarus raised from the dead

12 Epilog

B. Seven Conversations

1. The Delay (v.1–6)

  • John 17:
  1. When Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you”
  • The one Jesus loves is sick, but healing him will cost the Shepherd’s own life.
  • Jesus is a “Good Shepherd” to Lazarus

2. Disciples

The disciples need a strong faith to survive Jesus’ death. It makes the Shepherd glad to give it.

3. Martha

Martha was horribly confused, and the Shepherd gently led her to beautiful clarity and faith

4. Mary

Mary was overwhelmed by her emotions, and Jesus was with her in her grief

Buddhism

Crying is a reaction to suffering, and the goal of Buddhist practice is to be free from suffering. So you may cry during your practice, and it’s normal for a worldling to cry, but a fully enlightened one will not cry, because he is beyond suffering.

That’s why you may see a statue of Buddha smiling, but never one crying.

Alan Chiu

Buddhism

All emotions are a result of our attachments or desires and cravings. This is fundamentally what falls under the term “sufferings” of life in this Samsaric human condition.

What allows emotions to arise is disappointment in some form of that which we cling to or desire. The entire practice of Buddhism was searched for and developed in the search to end this kind of phenomena.

To “detach” our human mind from this was the accomplishment of Shakyamuni.

Sylvain Chamberlain, Masters from Buddhism (1995)

Buddhism

From craving springs grief, from craving springs fear.

For one who is wholly free from craving there is no grief; whence then fear?

Dhammapada, 216

5. Emotion

Humans are fragile, in a broken world. The Shepherd is moved by our pain, even though he will end it.

Following Jesus is about final victory, but not about living in a state of denial in the meantime.

6. Lazarus

Lazarus—done in a way that involves the people with the goal of building them up

7. False shepherds

False shepherds are self-serving and reject the voice of the Shepherd

C. How Jesus speaks to us

Seven Conversations

  1. The one Jesus loves is sick, but healing him will cost the Shepherd’s own life.
  2. The disciples need a strong faith to survive Jesus’ death. It makes the Shepherd glad to give it.
  3. Martha was horribly confused, and the Shepherd gently led her to beautiful clarity and faith
  4. Mary was overwhelmed by her emotions, and Jesus was with her in her grief
  5. Humans are fragile, in a broken world. The Shepherd is moved by our pain, even though he will end it.
  6. Lazarus—done in a way that involves the people with the goal of building them up
  7. False shepherds are self-serving and reject the voice of the Shepherd

Jesus is with us in our struggles

  • He sees you right now, and weeps with you in your pain.
  • He enters into our pain, and ultimately has taken it on himself.
  • “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses” Heb 4:15
  • Bring your struggles to him, like Martha & Mary did, and trust him with how he choses to respond

Updated on 2020-02-09 by Andrew Fountain