Imperishable Inheritance

What a beau­ti­ful story demon­strat­ing the Hypo­sta­tic Union of Christ and the great­est metaphor for sal­va­tion in the Bible. In the pas­sage I am about to exam­ine, we see Christ weep (v. 35), show mercy (v. 11, 25–26), com­pas­sion (v. 5), love (v. 5, 36), fear­less­ness (v. 7–10), reproof (v. 9–10), anguish (v. 33), and all the while main­tain­ing the praise and glory of The Father (v. 15, 25–26, 40–42) and demon­strat­ing the process of salvation.

As unre­pen­tant, unre­gen­er­ated sin­ners we are ‘dead’ to the things of God (Romans 3:10–12). God could’ve eas­ily passed over all us to demon­strate his just nature (Romans 9:22–24), but He did not.

We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the broth­ers. Who­ever does not love abides in death.
1 John 3:14

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?“
John 11:25–26

We now will look at the story of Lazarus.

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.“
John 11:4

From this account (v. 4), we can safely deduce that the divine pur­pose and decree of sal­va­tion for fallen man is solely for the glo­ri­fi­ca­tion of the Tri­une Cre­ator of the universe.

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 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.” After say­ing these things, he said to them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him.“
John 11:5–11

Christ demon­strates his fear­less­ness over human threat when He returns to Judea solely out of his com­pas­sion and love for Lazarus. This is also seen as the metaphoric love that Christ had for us to come, in the flesh, despite the tor­ture and per­se­cu­tion He knew He would endure (John 16:28). By stat­ing ‘If any­one walks in the day, he does not stum­ble, because he sees the light of this world (v. 10)’ it is an affir­ma­tion that Christ’s time to con­tinue per­form­ing mir­a­cles had not yet fin­ished (the day).

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.“
John 11:12–15

Christ again has to clear up His words to His dis­ci­ples, because they did not under­stand that Christ mean, by say­ing ‘sleep,’ that his death is only tem­po­rary. And this is as it is with our death, tem­po­rary. He also speaks how Lazarus’ death is glo­ri­fy­ing to Him­self. Let us never think that death is of any injustice.

Verse 16 demon­strates the loy­alty of Thomas in that he was ready (although he later doubts), and ral­lied the dis­ci­ples, to go with Christ to Judea and ‘die with him [Christ],’ because there was immense dan­ger for Christ to go near Jerusalem. Verses 17–19 tell us the place of the account (Bethany), and that many were gath­ered to mourn the death of Lazarus.

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.“
John 11:20–23

Verse 21 expresses her grief by exclaim­ing at Jesus that Lazarus would not have died if He were there, because ‘what­ever you ask from God, God will give you.’ But what does Jesus do? He affirms who He is.

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.” 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.” When she had said this, she went and called her sis­ter Mary, say­ing in pri­vate, “The Teacher is here and is call­ing for you.“
John 11:23–28

Martha mis­con­strues what Jesus was say­ing by: ‘Your brother will rise again’ into think­ing Jesus was speak­ing of his spir­i­tual res­ur­rec­tion on the last day. What does Jesus say: ‘I am the res­ur­rec­tion and the life [not mutu­ally exclu­sive] â?¦ every­one who believes in me shall never die.’ Christ affirms the impor­tance of faith in this process of sal­va­tion (regeneration).

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.“
John 11:29–34

And what does Mary do after hear­ing from Martha? Ques­tions Him the same as Martha did. We should see this as a rep­re­sen­ta­tion of how we con­tin­u­ally ques­tion Christ despite His per­se­ver­ance for us. Let us stop accus­ing God of what we lose or what we don’t have but for what we do have.

Jesus was ‘deeply moved’ and ‘greatly trou­bled’ at watch­ing oth­ers suf­fer. Let us remem­ber he was moved and trou­bled even after see­ing Martha accuse and seem­ingly deny His will.

Jesus wept.
John 11:35

What an incred­i­ble verse! This verse affirms the human­ity all the while His divine pur­pose through this chap­ter. Let us remem­ber that Jesus is moved for all of us. Not just elect vs. repro­bate, or sin­ners vs. right­eous peo­ple, but all in cre­ation. We know God does not delight in the death of the wicked (Ezekiel 18:32), so let us pon­der the incom­pre­hen­si­ble love of God for His Creation.

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.
John 11:36–38

Verse 38, ren­dered in the KJV, says: ‘Jesus there­fore groan­ing in him­selfâ?¦’ We can deduce that Jesus was full of love, com­pas­sion, but at the same time anger for the Jews around Him.

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.“
John 11:39–42

Jesus demon­strates that Martha con­tra­dicted her­self by pro­fess­ing her belief in v. 27. The ulti­mate pur­pose behind this event is for oth­ers to believe, and we see this lit­er­ally demon­strated in His prayer to the Father. He also affirms His desire and will to glo­rify the Father.

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.“
John 11:43–44

Here is we were we truly see the com­mand and author­ity of Christ Jesus we he com­mands: ‘Lazarus, come out.’ Jesus does not say: ‘Lazarus, please come out,’ He com­mands for him to come out. Here were see ‘the man who had died came outâ?¦’ Verses 45 and 46 close out the story effec­tively by demon­strat­ing the suf­fi­ciency of God’s grace, and yet in spite of His work’many are still dead to the truth (that is to say that God leaves some dead to the truth). From this we see the ulti­mate metaphor for sal­va­tion by Christ.

This pas­sage metaphors sal­va­tion on this extent: we as fallen crea­tures (Romans 5:17) are dead to the things of God (Jere­miah 4:22, Romans 3:10–12), and this is metaphor­i­cally described through the lit­eral death of Lazarus. God has the mercy, grace, com­pas­sion, and love to inter­cede on unwor­thy sin­ners. God, through the aton­ing work of His Son, and the effi­ca­cious work of His Spirit saves, and we see God’s decree of sal­va­tion through his son by the com­mand to call Lazarus out of death.

Christ came on Lazarus’ behalf, not the other way around; Christ makes the ini­tia­tive towards us in sal­va­tion as well. We are in con­stant rebel­lion to God, yet He inter­cedes for us.

‘Amaz­ing Grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind, but now, I see.’