Scripture Reading: John 11:1-44
In this chapter we will continue to consider the signs in John 11.
In 11:1-3 we see the sign of sickness. Verse 1 says, “Now there was a certain man who was sick.” In verse 3 the sisters of Lazarus sent word to the Lord Jesus and said, “Lord, behold, he whom You love is sick.” Sickness is weakness leading to death. We may say that sickness is the calling card of death. This means that sickness indicates that death is coming. Once, I saw human life pictured in this way: birth, old age, sickness, and death. After someone is born, he begins to age. Eventually, he will become sick and then die. Hence, sickness is an announcement that death is on its way.
Christians may realize that when we are sick, we are weak. However, we may not realize that this sickness, this weakness, is a sign of death. Whenever you say that you are weak, you need to realize that your weakness is the “calling card” of death, for death is behind your weakness.
In 11:4-6 we have the sign of the Lord’s delay. When the sisters of Lazarus sent the news to the Lord Jesus that Lazarus was sick, no doubt their intention was that the Lord would come to heal him. However, when the Lord received this report, He did not do anything. Here we have the third sign in this chapter, the sign of the Lord’s delay.
What was the reason for the Lord’s delay? When I was young, I was told that the Lord delayed because He was testing their faith, because He was teaching them to believe. I do not think that this was the reason for His delay. The Lord’s delay in this chapter is a sign that the Lord did not want to be a healing Savior but a life-giving Savior. Healing corresponds to the natural thought, but life-giving is a divine thought. Many Christians have never heard about life-giving; they are not familiar with this term in the spiritual vocabulary. However, it is common for Christians to talk about healing. Do not misunderstand me and think that I do not believe in divine healing. I definitely believe in divine healing, and I myself have experienced it. The point here is that the concept of healing is natural, whereas the concept of life-giving is divine.
God’s intention is not merely to heal us, for in His sight we are not sick — we are dead. God’s salvation is not a salvation to heal the sick but to enliven the dead. God’s salvation is to enliven the dead, to cause those who are dead to become alive. In 10:10 the Lord Jesus did not say, “I have come that they may have healing and may have it abundantly.” In this verse He said, “I have come that they may have life and may have it abundantly.” This life is not psychological life (psuche) or physical life (bios); it is the divine life, the eternal life, the uncreated life of God (zoe), which is actually God Himself. The Lord came that we may have this divine, eternal life and have it abundantly.
In chapter 11 the Lord Jesus delayed until He knew that Lazarus had died. The Lord’s delay here is a sign indicating that He did not intend to heal the sick man and thereby only be a healing Savior; rather, it was His intention to raise the dead and thereby be a Savior who gives life. This was the reason the Lord did not come to do anything to heal Lazarus from his sickness.
The Lord Jesus waited not only until Lazarus had died but even until he had been buried and had begun to stink. It is actually a blessing to be in such a condition, for then we are qualified for the Lord’s life-giving. The Lord will not resurrect a sick one; He will resurrect one who has died, who has been buried, and who has begun to stink.
In principle, we all have asked the Lord to heal us of certain “sicknesses.” After we were saved, we realized that we had certain defects and imperfections, and we wanted to improve ourselves. For example, many of us wanted to be “healed” by the Lord of our troublesome temper. After I was saved and began to seek the Lord, I realized that the main defect in my human life was my temper. Therefore, I made up my mind that I would never lose my temper again, and I asked the Lord to help me in this matter. In a sense, I sent word to the Lord that I was “sick” with the illness of my temper and that He should come to “heal” me. However, I can testify that the Lord did not come to heal me of this sickness. On the contrary, the more I prayed about my temper, the worse this sickness became. Just as the Lord did not heal Lazarus of his sickness, so He did not heal me of my temper. Many of us can give a similar testimony concerning our experience.
In John 11 Mary and Martha seemed to be saying to the Lord, “Lord, the one whom You love is sick. Lord, You are obliged by Your love for Lazarus to come and heal him.” However, the Lord set aside that request and delayed going down to Bethany.
The Lord’s disciples were not happy with this delay. We know this by the way the disciples responded to the Lord’s word to them, “Let us go into Judea again” (v. 7). When the Lord said this to them, the disciples replied, “Rabbi, the Jews were just now seeking to stone You, and You are going there again?” (v. 8). The disciples seemed to be saying to the Lord, “Why did You not go when the news came to You that Lazarus was sick? Why do You want to go now?”
Many things are exposed by the Lord’s delay. When we want to go, He does not want to go. But when we do not want to go, He wants to go. He will never take our way. Instead, we need to follow His way.
In our Christian life we have uttered a number of vain prayers. We may have prayed for the Lord to “heal” us in this manner or in that thing. But instead of healing us, the Lord allows us to become weaker. Eventually, we become weak to the uttermost and die. After we die and are buried and have begun to stink, that is the right time for Him to come to give us life. From experience we have learned that when we have become weak to the uttermost, weak to such an extent that we die, then the Lord will come not as a helper but as the Life-giver.
The Lord’s desire as revealed in this chapter is not to help us, to be our helper; His desire is to be our Life-giver. But unless we die, we will not realize that we need Him as our Life-giver. We may think that we need Him only to be our helper. Because we have this realization, we often ask the Lord to help us. However, often we have prayed to the Lord for help, but He did not come to help us. Like Martha and Mary, we sent news to the Lord about our sickness, expecting Him to heal us, but the Lord delayed before doing anything. The Lord always does things in His own time. When He knew that the time was right, He said to His disciples, “Let us go into Judea again.”
When the Lord wanted to go into Judea, He encountered the frustration caused by man’s opinion. In other chapters of this Gospel the opposition to the Lord Jesus and the frustration came from those in the Jewish religion. But in this chapter the Lord Jesus was in Galilee, far away from Jerusalem, the religious center. In this chapter the frustration came not from the opposers in religion but from human opinion. The disciples were the first to express an opposing opinion (vv. 8, 11-16). They said to the Lord that the Jews were seeking to stone Him and therefore He should not go into Judea.
The Lord’s word to His disciples in verses 9 and 10 indicates that their opinion was a sign that they were walking in darkness: “Jesus answered, 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.” All opinionated persons are in darkness. Opinions are a sign of darkness because to utter an opinion is to speak nonsense. The reason a person speaks nonsense is that he is in the darkness. But the Lord Jesus is fully in the light, and He Himself is the light. Furthermore, whenever the Lord is present, there is day. In these verses the Lord Jesus seemed to be saying, “As long as I am here, you are not in darkness. I am the light. Since the light is here, it is daytime. I say that we should go into Judea. But if you say that we should not go, you are expressing a contrary opinion, and you are in darkness.”
Whenever we express an opinion that is contrary to the Lord’s will, that opinion signifies that we are not walking in the day but in the darkness. If we are following the Lord, we should say Amen to whatever He says and not express any opinion. As long as we express an opinion of any kind, that opinion will be a sign that we are in darkness and that we do not know what we are saying. Only the Lord knows what to say. When He says, “Let us go,” that is something in the day, in the light. The Lord’s guidance always is light. If we follow His guidance, we will be in the day, and we will walk in the light. But if we follow our opinion, we will be in darkness. Therefore, man’s opinion is a sign of darkness.
Man’s opinion is also a sign of the frustration to the Lord’s resurrection life (vv. 11-40). In verses 11 through 16 we see the disciples’ opinion. When the Lord told them that He wanted to go into Judea, they should have immediately gone with Him. But instead they expressed their opinion, and this was a frustration to the Lord. In verse 11 the Lord said, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going that I may wake him out of sleep.” This word is the Lord’s revelation. But the disciples went on to expound this revelation in their own way: “The disciples then said to Him, Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover” (v. 12). This expounding of the Lord’s word made it necessary for Him to tell them plainly that Lazarus had died (v. 14). Eventually, the Lord’s disciples followed Him to Judea.
In 11:17-28 we see Martha’s opinion. Martha did not give the Lord an opportunity to say a word. Immediately, she complained to Him, saying, “Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died” (v. 21). Martha seemed to be saying to the Lord, “Why didn’t You come earlier? If You had come four days ago, Lazarus would still be alive. But he is dead and buried. What is the use of Your coming?”
The Lord said to Martha, “Your brother will rise again” (v. 23). Martha replied, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection in the last day” (v. 24). When the Lord said that Lazarus would rise again, He meant that Lazarus would be resurrected that very day. Martha, however, in her expounding of the Lord’s word, postponed this resurrection until the last day. Like Martha, sometimes we also explain away the Lord’s word. We may read something in the Scriptures and then say that this is not for our experience today but for some time in the future. For example, some may claim that eternal life is only for eternity and not for our experience today. This is to explain away a word from the Lord that is meant for us to experience today.
After Martha had explained the Lord’s word about Lazarus’s resurrection by saying that he would rise again in the resurrection in the last day, Jesus went on to say to her, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes into Me, even if he should die, shall live; and everyone who lives and believes into Me shall by no means die forever. Do you believe this?” (vv. 25-26). Here the Lord Jesus spoke in the present tense, saying, “I am the resurrection and the life.” The words I am indicate that He is Jehovah, the great I Am. With Him there is no time element. Because the Lord Himself is resurrection, whenever He is present, resurrection is there. The Lord seemed to be telling Martha, “There is no need for you to complain that I have come too late. I am the resurrection, and I am the life. With Me there is no element of time. Therefore, with Me there is no such thing as being too late.”
In verse 27 Martha again spoke to the Lord in an opinionated way. When she had finished speaking, “she went away and called Mary her sister secretly, saying, The Teacher is here and is calling you” (v. 28). There is no indication that the Lord had called for Mary. It is likely that this was initiated by Martha and that her word to Mary was yet another aspect of her opinion. Martha may have thought that it was not sufficient for her to talk to the Lord. She may have wanted her sister to join her in complaining about the situation.
In 11:29-32 we have Mary’s opinion. In verse 32 she said, “Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died.”
Verse 33 says, “Jesus, when He saw her weeping and the Jews who came with her weeping, was moved with indignation in His spirit and was troubled.” The Lord was moved with indignation in His spirit because He realized that no one, including Mary, knew Him. The Bible says that the Lord was moved with indignation in His spirit, not in His emotion. In His spirit He was one with God and was having fellowship with God. He realized the situation and perceived that everyone around Him — the unbelievers, Martha and Mary, and all the disciples — did not know Him. That was the reason the Lord was moved with indignation and even wept (v. 35).
Expressing their opinion, the Jews said, “Behold how He loved him! But some of them said, Could not He who opened the eyes of the blind man also have caused that this man would not die?” (vv. 36-37). These verses indicate that the Jews did not understand why the Lord wept. They thought that Jesus wept out of love for Lazarus. The Lord, however, did not weep for that reason. He was moved with indignation in His spirit and wept because of their ignorance of Him. None of them knew Him. At that very moment, the Lord was the resurrection and the life. But no one realized this. What a pitiful situation! The situation today is similar. Not many Christians truly know the Lord. Not many know Him as resurrection, as life, and as the present One.
When they came to the cave where Lazarus was buried, the Lord Jesus said, “Take away the stone” (v. 39a). But Martha, expressing her opinion again, said, “Lord, by now he smells, for it is the fourth day that he is there” (v. 39b). This opinion caused further frustration. If there had not been any opinion, it is likely that the Lord Jesus would have resurrected Lazarus at least half a day earlier. But all the different opinions delayed the resurrection of Lazarus.
Eventually, the Lord overcame all the opinions, and Lazarus came out of the tomb. This is resurrection. The resurrection of Lazarus is a sign indicating that the Lord Jesus is not merely a healing Savior but is a life-giving Savior. The Lord wants to give us life, to resurrect us, not only to heal us. But in our concept we have the thought of healing, not the thought of life-giving. The reason we do not have the thought of life-giving is that we do not realize what our need actually is. We may think that our need is to be healed of our sickness. Actually, our problem is not merely sickness — our problem is death. Therefore, we need not only healing, but we need life-giving.
Chapter 11 of the Gospel of John is a clear picture of all of us under the power of death. We have even begun to smell. Hence, we not only need healing; we need the Lord as the Life-giver. We need Him to give us life.
All Christians appreciate the Lord Jesus as the Savior. However, not many appreciate Him as the life-giving Savior. Rather, they may only realize that as the Savior He is mighty, sufficient, and able. When I was young, I was not taught that Jesus Christ is our Savior in the sense of being the One who gives us life, that He saves us by giving life to us. We need the Lord not only as a mighty Savior; we also need Him as the life-giving Savior. Instead of merely asking the Lord to help you, ask Him to give you life. We need to say, “O Lord Jesus, I need Your life-giving. Lord, impart Yourself into my being as life. I need You as my life. Lord, I’m not only sick and weak — I’m dying. My sickness is not a disease; my sickness is death. Therefore, what I need, Lord, is You imparted into me to be my life.” This is resurrection.
God’s salvation is a matter of resurrection, not a matter of healing. Regeneration is the initial stage of resurrection. Every aspect of God’s salvation involves resurrection. After resurrecting us through regeneration, the Lord is now continuing this process of resurrection by sanctifying and transforming us. Eventually, the Lord will glorify us. That glorification will be the consummation of resurrection. God’s salvation, therefore, is a process of resurrection. He has resurrected us in our regeneration, and now He is continually resurrecting us through sanctification and transformation. Then as the consummation of the process of resurrection, He will glorify us.
Later on we will see that chapters 14 through 17 of the Gospel of John are in the Holy of Holies. Everyone who enters the Holy of Holies has not only been forgiven of his sins by God but is also one fully resurrected from the natural life. Whoever enters the Holy of Holies must pass through the riven veil. This veil signifies our flesh, our natural man. The natural man must be set aside. Then when we come into the Holy of Holies, we will no longer be a natural man. Rather, we will be a resurrected person, a person regenerated and transformed. In resurrection life we then may have direct fellowship with God in the Holy of Holies.
The apostle John shows us that in order to come into the Holy of Holies, we need to begin our journey at the altar, at the cross. Then in life we need to experience Christ as the table of the bread of the Presence and the lampstand. When we enter the Holy of Holies, we will no longer be natural; we will be fully in resurrection fellowshipping with our God. In this way we have the fulfillment of the tabernacle and all the offerings.
