If you would please take your Bibles in hand and turn to John chapter 11. John chapter 11. Our passage this morning is on the first 44 verses, but we are going to begin by reading the first 27. After the reading of God's Holy Word, we will sing the Gloria Patri, which is on page 734, should you need it. Please stand for the reading of God's Word. This is John chapter 11. Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. It was Mary who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was ill. So the sisters sent to him, saying, Lord, he whom you love is ill. But when Jesus heard it, he said, This illness does not lead to death. It is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it. Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was. Then after this he said to the disciples, let us go to Judea again. The disciples said to him, Rabbi, the Jews were just now seeking to stone you, and are you going there again? Jesus answered, are there not 12 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. After saying these things, he said to them, Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him. The disciples said to him, Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover. Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that he meant taking rest in sleep. Then Jesus told them plainly, Lazarus has died, and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe, but let us go to him. So Thomas, called the twin, said to his fellow disciples, Let us also go, that we may die with him. Now when Jesus came, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. Bethany was near Jerusalem, about two miles off, and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother. So when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him. But Mary remained seated in the house. Martha said to Jesus, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you. Jesus said to her, your brother will rise again. Martha said to him, I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day. And Jesus said to her, I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live. And everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this? She said to him, yes, Lord. I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures. Let us bow our heads once again and go to our beloved Lord in prayer. Our God and Father in heaven, you are above all and you are mighty. You are gracious and loving. You are relenting from disaster. We thank you that you have gathered us here together, your saints, to worship you in the splendor of your majesty. And even though we see now by faith, we await that glorious day in which we will see you by sight. And so we ask that the worship we offer you now would be pleasing in your sight through Jesus Christ, our Lord, and that as we have read your holy word, you would add your blessing to it, that you would open our ears and our hearts would be ready to receive your word. that your name would be glorified and your word would be exalted. Please gift me with the words you would have me to say and the manner you would have me to say it by the power of your Holy Spirit, that your word would be proclaimed in boldness and in truth. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, the purpose of this series of events surrounding the death of Lazarus is, as we read in the first few verses, that God's name would be glorified. He says, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it. That is the purpose of these events regarding the death, and as we'll read later, the raising of Lazarus from the dead. And this is an important principle here at work, that whenever the Son is venerated, whenever the Son is honored, thereto the Father is honored. And before we get into the details of this passage, remember the purpose of the book of John. It is so that you may believe Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in His name. And so what John is offering here in this chapter is a beautiful portrayal of Jesus, the God-man. God in human flesh. We see His power, His emotions, the emotions of Jesus as He is a man. We see His wisdom and knowledge. And these things demonstrate that He is not some distant deity who leaves His creation to be. but a God who lovingly enters into the sufferings of His creatures, the sufferings of His saints. Which is why the beginning of this story is so curious and intriguing. It says Jesus loved Martha, and He loved Mary, and He loved Lazarus, their brother. And so naturally If you love someone so deeply and richly and then hear that they are ill, they are close to death, but certainly you'd up and leave so that you might be with them, so that you might comfort them in their last moments, to help in any way you can. And so what does Jesus do when He receives this news? He remains two days longer where he was. I mean, just consider that for a moment. I'll pick on Daniel Carroll, one of our elders. If I were to stop right now in the middle of this service because I was looking at my phone and received a text that says, Shelley is in the hospital and close to death. Daniel, you've got to get up and go. What do you think his response would be? We'd all expect him to stand up and leave immediately, to be with his beloved. But if Daniel were to respond and say, you know what, I'll let her be for a few days. I hope that she gets better. And he stays. We would all be astonished, wouldn't we? More than likely some of us would gather him up and take him to his wife. But that's precisely what Jesus does. He receives this news and he remains two days longer where he was. And so the question is why? Why would he remain? Well, the answer to that is given in verse 15 when he says to his disciples, so that you may believe. And we'll flesh this out in more detail later, but it's to say that when he arrived at Bethany, Lazarus had been dead four days, so there is no doubt left about who God is, who Jesus is, that he is God himself. He remained so that his disciples would believe, and he remained so that we would look back on this event and know that he is himself God, who has power over life and death. And so after remaining these two days, he says to his disciples, Let us go up to Judea again. The disciples say, the Jews were just now seeking to stone you, and are we to go there again? He responds by saying, there are 12 hours in the day. Essentially, I have work to do. I must be about the work my Father has given. In the light of day, for my hour of darkness is approaching. And so he says, we must go, for Lazarus has died. And I go to awaken him. And what is Thomas' response? Again, we'll consider this at the end. But Thomas doubts. Thomas shows his trust in his master by saying, yes, let's go too. That way we can all die just like Lazarus. And so they go. They go to Bethany, and as we have said, they find Lazarus has been dead four days already. And many of the Jews from Jerusalem had gathered with the family to grieve with them, to mourn with the family, to console them in their loss. And when word reached Martha that Jesus was near, she went out to meet him. And we have this dialogue here, which we will consider. She comes to him and says, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now, I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you. There's some differing views on Martha's response here as to whether she is trusting in Jesus or whether she is going to Him and accusing Him to say, Lord, if you had only been here, my brother wouldn't have died. But I take her dialogue positively because of the ending response she has in this dialogue of who Jesus Christ is. It is one of the most lofty confessions we are given. And so I think she is trusting in Jesus. She has confessed that she knows without a doubt in her mind that Jesus has the power to save her brother. And then when she says, but even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you. It's almost as if she's hoping against hope. She's trying to ask Jesus without actually asking Him, Lord, You could raise Him even now. It's as though she's trusting in His purposes, but not wanting to impose her request upon him to say, if Lazarus has died, there must be a good purpose. Jesus responds to her by saying, your brother will rise again. Your brother will rise again. And we have this continued attestation of faith by her. I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day." She knows the hope which every saint looks forward to, every saint anticipates, the resurrection on the last day. But she doesn't understand what Jesus is saying, saying, no, your brother is about to miraculously live again. in a few moments. And so his final response to her, he says this, and it is astonishing. I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live. And everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. I am the resurrection and the life. This is one of the great I am statements in the book of John. And what Jesus is saying is, I am the one who has the power of life and death in my hands. I am the one who has the power of life and death. He is both the commencement of life. He is the resurrection and the continuance of life, that if you have life in him, that life will never end. And of course, what he is speaking about here is spiritual life. He says, though he die, though the body pass away, if you believe in Jesus Christ, being united to him by faith, We are alive in him forever. For though this body die, when our bodies die, our souls are immediately made perfect and taken unto Jesus Christ himself in paradise. The words here, you shall never die, are literally, you will not die forever. What comforting words. John Calvin says this, the reason why it is said that believers never die is that their souls, being born again of incorruptible seed, have Christ dwelling in them, from whom they derive perpetual vigor. For though the body be subject to death on account of sin, yet the spirit is life on account of righteousness. And pay attention here. That the outward man daily decays in them is so far from taking anything away from their true life that it aids the progress of it, because the inward man is renewed from day to day. What is still more, death itself is a sort of emancipation from the bondage of death. And we have these other wonderful words from Paul, who says, for this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. So that's to say that we don't look forward to death. But if you trust in the Lord Jesus, your life has been purchased by Christ. And the expectation of death is that in that moment, when I pass from this life to the next, I will see my Redeemer. And that glorious hope should remove any fear. And so the Lord Jesus asks Martha, do you believe this? Do you believe this, Martha? And she answered Jesus with this wonderful confession of faith. an understanding of who He is and what His work is. Yes, Lord, I believe that You are the Christ, the Son of God who is coming into the world. You are the Christ, the Redeemer of God's people. You are the Son of God, the only one who is capable and able to save. What she is saying is, Lord, I trust that you are precisely who you have said you are, who you have claimed to be, as we have heard throughout the book of John in previous chapters. And so the question, which is before you, is do you believe? Do you believe that Jesus is the resurrection and the life? And if you believe, do you live in light of that reality daily? Live in knowledge of Jesus as the one who holds you in his hands, who has the power of life and death? Each one of us ought to meditate on these things, to consider them. and to consider how this informs our living now. We'll take your Bibles once again, and we'll read the last part of our passage this morning. Verse 28 through 44. When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary, saying in private, the teacher is here and is calling for you. And when she heard it, she rose quickly and went to him. Now Jesus had not yet come into the village, but was still in the place where Martha had met him. When the Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary rise quickly and go out, they followed her, supposing that she was going to the tomb to weep there. Now, when Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet saying to him, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. When Jesus saw her weeping and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. And he said, where have you laid him? They said to him, Lord, come and see. Jesus wept. So the Jews said, see how he loved him. But some of them said, could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man also have kept this man from dying? Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb. It was a cave and a stone lay against it. Jesus said, take away the stone. Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days. Jesus said to her, did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God? So they took away the stone. And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this on account of the people standing around, that they may believe that you sent me. When he had said these things, he cried out with a loud voice, Lazarus, come out. The man who had died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, unbind him and let him go. Well, here we have the introduction of Mary. And in the midst of her grief, she comes up to the Lord Jesus, falling at his feet and says, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. This reminds me of a scene in The Fellowship of the Rings. the very beginning of the movie when Frodo Baggins is reading in the woods and he hears the rumbling of a carriage passing by and an old man humming. And he runs over and finds Gandalf the wizard coming up on his carriage and Frodo says, you're late. A wizard is never late, Frodo Baggins, nor is he early. He arrives precisely when He means to. What Mary is doing here is coming up to the Lord Jesus, and though she is honoring Him and worshiping Him as she has fallen at His feet, there is a hint of accusation in her statement. She's essentially saying, Jesus, you're late. If you had been here, my brother would not have died. She is doubting the purposes of God. She is doubting that God's plan for her and her family and his saints is good. Well, we know the end of the story, that it ends well for this family. But as she is in the midst of her grief, she says, God, you're late. And there's something that we should all take from this, that we should learn from this, that it is ours as God's creatures, as God's people, to trust in the good purposes of God, even in the midst of our suffering. God has said He intends good and not evil. Calvin again says this in these comforting words. He says, as Christ is the only mirror of the grace of God, We are taught by this delay on his part that we ought not to judge the love of God from the condition which we see before our eyes. We do not judge God because of the circumstances of our life, but it is ours to trust in God always. Because God's ways are not our ways, and we must never forget that. He is Yahweh, and there is no other. And if God has ordained that He will be glorified through a moment of suffering for His saints, however long that suffering may be, whether it be a moment or a lifetime, then so be it. Turn to Isaiah 45, if you would. Isaiah chapter 45, beginning with verse 5 through 7. He is speaking here to Cyrus, the king of Persia. He says this, verse 5, I am Yahweh and there is no other. Besides me there is no God. I equip you though you do not know me. That people may know from the rising of the sun and from the west that there is none besides me. I am Yahweh and there is no other. I form light and create darkness. I make well-being and create calamity. I am Yahweh who does all these things. In other words, I am God. I am the sovereign one over all things, and I do not share my glory. In whatever circumstance I arrange, whether it be making well or creating calamity, I will be glorified. And yet the glorious hope that we have is what has already been said from the Apostle Paul, that suffering will not continue forever. For this light Momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. The sufferings which we experience in this life are not even worthy to be compared to the glory that awaits. And so if you have a problem with the sovereignty of God, if you have a problem with the holiness of God, R.C. Sproul says this, he says, let me offer some pastoral counsel if you have a problem with God's sovereignty or with his holiness. He says this, and I quote, tough." End quote. And I would add to that, repent. We are God's creatures. He has made us. We have no right to look to him and say, why have you made me so? If you have a problem with God, the problem is not with God, the problem is you. Repent. Repent. But what we see here in this passage is not a God who delights in suffering. He does not delight in the suffering of mankind. What we see is a God who has loved the world so much that He sent His Son to die for it. When Jesus saw Mary and all the Jews about her mourning and weeping, what did He do? Did He say, this is what you deserve? You have sinned against the holy majesty of God Almighty. Your judgment is death. He would be right to do so, but he doesn't. What he does in response to Mary, in response to seeing his creatures agonizing over death, he says, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. Jesus wept. Jesus shed tears. He entered into the suffering of His beloved children. He mourned with those who mourned. He grieved with those who grieved. And this word here, where it says He was greatly troubled, this carries with it a sense of anger and grief. It carries the sense of being irate. Jesus is looking at the suffering of His creation under the weight of sin and death, and He is angry. And He mourns with them. He grieves with them. He shed tears for them. We have been given the most precious gift in Christ Jesus, a God in human flesh who sympathizes with us in our weaknesses. This is not a God who is far off, who has left his creation, but who enters into our suffering, who intimately knows our weaknesses, who knows our sufferings. The Bible speaks of him as a man who was acquainted with grief, as a man of sorrows. And it is this man who is the resurrection and the life. It is this man who, without any show of ostentatious glory, he says, where has he been led? And he has led to the tomb. and commands that the stone be taken away. And Martha, the pragmatist, says, and I appreciate the King James Version here, Lord, by this time he stinketh. He's been dead four days. Lazarus has been dead four days already. And the reason that John repeats this, that Lazarus has been dead four days, is to say he is dead. He is fully dead. His body is a corpse. His flesh is rotting. He lies dead in the tombs. So there is no doubt in the minds of the Jews, and there should be no doubt for us here who hear this word now. He was dead. And that is why this miracle is nothing less than the power of God on full display. This man, Jesus, is God who has the power of life and death in his hands. And he cried out with the voice of command, Lazarus, come out. And death was ended. Lazarus got up and he walked out, his rotting flesh healed, his heart beating again, his brain functioning. And the mourning ceased. And that sorrow was turned into joy. The comfort to us is that though weeping may tarry for the night, joy comes with the dawn. There is an assortment of responses to Jesus' actions that we see in this passage. Thomas, who went with Christ, doubted the whole way, saying, we'll die with Lazarus. Martha trusted. in Him, that He was, and we would say is now, God in human flesh, the Son of God, the Christ. Mary said, where were you when I needed you? Some of the Jews looked at Him and said, could He not have healed this man too? And so the question before you this morning is how do you respond to God? When you consider God, do you moan or do you trust? Believing that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, the resurrection and the life. And do you give glory to the Son and glorify the Father? It is this Jesus who entered into our suffering and paid the penalty for our sin upon himself. He is the one who has the power over life and death. Trust in him and you will not be dismayed. Turn to him daily and your hope will be steadfast. But one day you will see Christ, not merely a disembodied soul, but there is the hope of that last day which Martha speaks. when our bodies will rise from the dead and in our own flesh we will see our Redeemer. Amen. Let us praise God. Let us go to the Lord in prayer. Our God and Father in heaven, We cannot but barely begin to understand the love which you have upon us, that you have looked down upon a world which has fallen in sin, which groans under the weight of death, groaning to be made anew. and that You have looked at us who bear Your image, men and women who have sinned against You, who have violated Your law, we who are worthy only of Your wrath of judgment. And yet You have loved us, even when we could only hate You. Even when we could only spit in Your face, You have given us Jesus Christ, to bear our sins upon Himself that we would have life in Him. That we would become the righteousness of God as it is written in Your Word. O Lord, please grant by the power of Your Holy Spirit that we who trust in You, who believe in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, would be strengthened daily to live according to that upward call you have given us in Christ as new creatures made for good works. Strengthen us that we would go now from this place to love our neighbors, to love the husband or the wife whom you have given us, to love the children whom you have given us, to love all of your people, to love even our enemies. This we can only do by your power at work within us. We thank you and praise you for so mighty a salvation you have worked here. And we pray this in the name of Jesus Christ, our great High Priest, who intercedes for us. Amen.