HOW
Jesus DEALS WITH DEAD THINGS
Miracles Still Happen
Part 1
02-23-14 Sermon
17 On his arrival, Jesus found
that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. 18 Now
Bethany was less than two miles from Jerusalem, 19 and many
Jews had come to Martha and Mary to comfort them in the loss of their brother. 20 When
Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went out to meet him, but Mary stayed
at home. 21 “Lord,” Martha said to Jesus, “if you had been
here, my brother would not have died. 22 But I know that even
now God will give you whatever you ask.”23 Jesus said to her,
“Your brother will rise again.”24 Martha answered, “I know he
will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”25 Jesus
said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me
will live, even though they die; 26 and whoever lives by
believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?”27 “Yes,
Lord,” she replied, “I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, who is
to come into the world.”28 After she had said this, she went
back and called her sister Mary aside. “The Teacher is here,” she said, “and is
asking for you.” 29 When Mary heard this, she got up quickly
and went to him. 30 Now Jesus had not yet entered the village,
but was still at the place where Martha had met him. 31 When
the Jews who had been with Mary in the house, comforting her, noticed how
quickly she got up and went out, they followed her, supposing she was going to
the tomb to mourn there.32 When Mary reached the place where
Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if you had been
here, my brother would not have died.”33 When Jesus saw her
weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply
moved in spirit and troubled. 34 “Where have you laid him?” he
asked.“Come and see, Lord,” they replied.35 Jesus wept.36 Then
the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”37 But some of them said,
“Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from
dying?” 38 Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb. It
was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. 39 “Take away
the stone,” he said.“But, Lord,” said Martha, the sister of the dead man, “by
this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days.”40 Then
Jesus said, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of
God?”41 So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and
said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42 I knew
that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing
here, that they may believe that you sent me.”43 When he had
said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 44 The
dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth
around his face. Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him
go.” John 11:17-44
How does Jesus deal with dead things?
1.
Jesus embraces them ____________________________.
35 Jesus wept.
2.
Jesus exposes them ______________________________.
38 Jesus, once more deeply moved,
came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. 39 “Take
away the stone,” he said.
3.
Jesus exhibits His ________________________________.
40 Then Jesus said, “Did I not
tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”
4.
Jesus engulfs them ________________________________.
43 When he had said this, Jesus
called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 44 The dead man
came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around
his face. Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”
5.
Jesus expects them to ______________________________.
25 Jesus said to her, “I am the
resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though
they die; 26 and whoever lives by believing in me will never
die. Do you believe this?”
Video Clip of Dr. Chauncey
Crandall, Cardiologist
HOW Jesus DEALS WITH DEAD THINGS
HOW Jesus DEALS WITH DEAD THINGS
Miracles Still Happen
Part 1
02-23-14 Sermon
Today I am starting a new
series called Miracles Still Happen. Did you know that hundreds of
millions, yes hundreds of millions of people around the world today testify to witnessing
or experiencing a miraculous healing? Even in America 72% of Americans believe
that God can cure even a mortally ill person that doctors have given up on. 79%
affirm that miracles still occur today as in ancient times. And over 100
million Americans claim to have had a dream that accurately predicted the
future. Next week I am going to be ministering in Florida and Dr.
Crunk is going to come and speak to you about some miracles he has seen as a
medical doctor. I really wish I
was going to be here to hear that.
Today I want us to look at
what Jesus does with dead things, and especially focus on the story of Jesus
raising Lazarus from the dead. Lazarus
was a close friend of Jesus along with his sisters Martha and Mary. These three people were part of Jesus’
support group. They were “replenishing
people” for Jesus. When Jesus was
hanging around Lazarus and Martha and Mary He wasn’t working. He was just relaxing and chilling. It seemed that He stopped by their home
often when He traveled in their region.
He was so close to them that it says when Lazarus fell ill the only
message that was dispatched to Jesus was this, “Lord, the one You love is sick.”
That’s all they needed to say.
By the time the message
arrived Jesus knew better. He knew
that Lazarus was already dead. So
He stayed where He was for two more days then headed on down the road to
Bethany to meet with the family.
He wasn’t in danger of missing the funeral because in that time Jewish
funerals lasted ten days. You had
three days of excruciating mourning followed by four days of relatively intense
mourning then followed by three days of more moderate lighter mourning. There’s probably something to be said
for grieving a loss over that kind of time.
So Jesus knew if He got there
in the third or fourth day the funeral was still going to be in full
swing. So He heads down the road
to Bethany.
As He got close to the village
Martha got word that He was coming and she went out to the edge of town to meet
Him. She came to Jesus, ran up to
Him, and she comes to Jesus I think in the same way most of us come to Jesus
when we deal with our dead things.
She comes with her “if only.”
“Jesus, if only You had been here my brother wouldn’t have died.” And Jesus said, “Martha, your brother will live.”
And Martha said, “I know. I know he’s going to live in the last
day when the resurrection takes place.” And Jesus said, “Martha! The resurrection is not an event. The resurrection is a person. I’m the resurrection and the life. Anybody who believes in me even though
he dies, he’ll live. Do you
believe this?” Jesus sparked
something in Martha and she said, “Yes, I
do believe that. I believe You’re
the one who came from God.”
It seems that that was all
the faith that Jesus needed to work a miracle. But He still called for Mary. “I want to talk to
Mary too. Tell Mary I want to see
her.” Mary gets word that
Jesus wants to see her. She comes
out and she is followed by a whole crowd of mourners. This is an interesting group of people. Some of them are family and friends who
are legitimately grieving the loss of Lazarus. Others are just kind of part of the people who would wail
and grieve and mourn as some kind of religious custom in those days. You just wailed for the dead whether
you knew them or not.
So Mary comes out with this
mob of grievers in tow. And Mary
goes up to Jesus and she’s a little more demonstrative than Martha. She falls down at Jesus’ feet and weeps
and says the same words that her sister Martha did “Jesus, if only You had been here my brother wouldn’t be dead.”
When Mary came to Jesus with
her “if only” she fell down weeping and the Bible says that Jesus was deeply
moved and troubled in His Spirit.
Then the Bible says that Jesus wept. Tears came pouring down His face. He said, Show me where
he is. Where’s the tomb. They say, Come follow us, and they take Him to the tomb and He sees it with a
big boulder right in front. By the
way, this is just a few weeks before Jesus’ own death and burial and
resurrection. He sees that boulder
and He says, Take that stone away!”
People objected at first but then with a little prodding they roll the
stone away and Jesus says “ Lazarus! Come forth.” And the dead man lived. This mummy appeared at the door of the
tomb and Jesus said, “Loose him and let
him go.” That’s how Jesus
deals with dead things.
How does Jesus deal with dead things?
1. Jesus
embraces them with tears.
The verse in the Bible that
goes like this, “Jesus wept.” That’s all there is to it. Jesus wept. Two seconds to memorize it! John 11:35.
That’s the shortest verse in the Bible.
What I want you to know
though is this. Jesus’ weeping is
not a trivial matter. There’s
something very significant about the fact that Jesus wept. He thought, “These people are grieving, they’re in despair and this is not what I
made life to be.” He entered
into the pain of these people. He
feels it knowing full well in His mind that not five minutes into the future
He’s going to raise this guy to life and the funeral was going to turn into a
party.
Jesus embraces dead things with
the same anger and the same anguish that you feel. For some of you that’s all you need to hear today. Maybe you came here today with a whole
truckload of dead things in your life.
You walk in here wondering is there any person anywhere who gives a rip
about what I’m going through. I want
to tell you today there is. Jesus
embraces those dead things with the same anger and the same anguish that you
feel. But the good news is He
doesn’t stop there.
How did Jesus deal with dead things?
2. Jesus
exposes them for a purpose.
He says, Take away the stone.
When Jesus gave that command Martha’s sense of propriety kicked in and
she said, “Wait a second. He’s been in there four days.” That’s significant because Jewish
folklore says that when a person died his spirit hovered around the body for up
to three days. If there’s going to
be any kind of miracle, any kind of resurrection it’s going to take place
inside of three days. After three
days, forget it. The spirit moved
on and it’s gone forever. But
beyond that you know that if you just leave a dead body lying around for four
days it starts to smell. That’s
what Martha says. She says, “Jesus! Bear in mind.
He’s been in there four days.” You don’t roll the stone off of old dead things like
that.
Jesus understands that for
dead things to come to life they’ve got to be exposed. They’ve got to be opened up. You’ve got to take the stone away and
face them for what they are and then they can be exposed to light and then they
can be regenerated.
That’s why we Christians are
really big into confession and into repentance and into sharing our grief and
our hurts and our dead things with other people in appropriate social
settings. That’s why we do
that. Because we know that you
have to expose the dead things to bring some life to it. This church is a safe place to expose
those things. We are all in the
same boat. We have all had to deal
with dead things in our lives.
How does Jesus deal with dead things? He
embraces them with tears, He exposes them for a purpose, but He also does this
and this is the biggie really…
3. Jesus
exhibits His glory in them.
He exhibits His glory. This is the purpose of the entire
situation. When the news first
came to Jesus that Lazarus was sick He said, “This sickness will not end in death.” He didn’t say Lazarus wouldn’t go through death. He said it wouldn’t end there. But Jesus said this, This is all going down for the glory of
God. This whole situation is
taking place so the glory of God can be displayed.
Then when He approached the
tomb and said, “Take that stone away,”
and Martha objected, He said this, “Martha,
didn’t I tell you that if you believed you’d see the glory of God? Take the stone away.” Then Jesus says, “Lazarus! Come on down!
Lazarus come forth!” In
the original language he doesn’t really use much of a verb there. Just “Lazarus! Here! Outside! Front and center!”
Then in effect He said, “Ladies
and gentlemen of the jury, my I present to you Exhibit A of the glory of
God. The dead man lives.” That’s what Jesus loves to do with dead
things. Exhibit His glory in them
and through them.
The glory of God really
carries the idea of weightiness, heaviness. It’s God just kind of throwing the sum total of who He is
out on the table and saying, Get a load
of this! What He wants us to
do is go, Wow! That’s God’s glory.
That’s what God loves to do.
Make Himself heavy, make Himself weighty. He wants to make Himself huge because Jesus knows and He
said this, “If I can be lifted up both
literally on the cross and figuratively, If I can be lifted up and shown to be
huge and weighty and heavy, then I’ll draw all people to Myself.” That’s what He loves to do.
Often Jesus loves to make
Himself heavy by resurrecting things, by healing things, by fixing things, by
doing miracles. He loves to do
that. He loves to resurrect dying
relationships and dead hopes and dreams and even dead bodies sometimes. He loves to heal people physically and
emotionally. He loves to fix
problems.
But He doesn’t always do
that. I think we need to
understand this. One of the things
He’s guaranteed to do when we bring Him our dead things, He’s guaranteed to
exhibit His glory in them. But,
it’s His prerogative on how He does it.
It seems to me that just as often, Jesus chooses to exhibit His glory by
giving us the strength and the perseverance and the courage to bear up under
the load of that dead thing and live with it and deal with it. To bear up with it. Either way, it’s His choice.
When we bring Him our dead
things He either resurrects them and makes Himself huge that way, or He gives
us the perseverance to bear up under them and makes Himself huge that way. That’s what Jesus wants to do with the
dead things you bring Him today.
What does Jesus do with dead things? How does
He deal with them? He embraces
them with tears, He exposes them for a purpose, He exhibits His glory in them
and…
4. Jesus
engulfs them with love.
Those are kind of sweet words
to me when that mummy appears at the door and Jesus says, “Now loosen and let him go.”
Unwrap that guy! Let’s
just remove anything that reminds us of the death that was here. Let’s fully restore this man.
I think it’s instructive here
that Jesus Himself doesn’t loose and let Lazarus go. And He certainly doesn’t say to Lazarus, Loose yourself and let yourself go. He says to the people around them, Loose him and let him go. I think it illustrates a principle of
the kingdom and it’s this-- That restoration takes place in relationship. It’s a family affair. You get a lot of people around you to
restore you and bring you back to wholeness. You were never meant to be restored through self-help but by others’ help. It’s not a personal individual kind of
thing. It’s a family thing.
I can see all these people
surrounding this man and Jesus saying, Loosen
and let him go get the death clothes off of his body and restore this man. Joy breaks out and the funeral becomes
a party and Lazarus was restored.
What Jesus wants to do with
your dead things is He wants to engulf them with love. He wants to fill you with His presence
on the inside and He wants to surround you with His people on the outside. Then you’re really living. Then you’re restored.
Finally what does Jesus do with dead things? How does He deal with them?
5. Jesus
expects them to really live.
When He’s gone to all this
trouble to embrace them and expose them and exhibit His glory in them and
engulf them with love He expects them to really live. This is where our story diverges from Lazarus’ story. Because Lazarus got his old life
back. That’s important. Was he a changed man because of
that? Probably. Did he fear death like he did in the
past? Probably not. But Lazarus just got his old natural
life back. He came back into the
same life of pain, hurt, difficulty.
He probably struggled with the same sin habits that he had before. And, eventually, Lazarus died
again. I mean he is not still
walking around Israel is he?
Lazarus just got his old life back.
But when Jesus engulfs you
with His new life you get a brand new life and He pretty much expects us to
live a brand new life. Something
totally new and different. That’s
what He wants us to do.
What’s a brand new life? What’s it look like?
I think a brand new life is
when Jesus infuses you with His spirit and you start oozing out love and joy
and peace and patience and kindness, the kinds of qualities that you didn’t
have before. I think brand new
life is when you get in touch with the spiritual gift that Jesus imparts to you
and instead of frittering your life away with trivial pursuits, you start
employing that gift and seeing God change lives and loose people and let them
go through you. I think a brand
new life is when every day you expose yourself to the nourishment of God’s word
so that gradually every single facet of your person hood is brought into line
with who Jesus made you to be.
New life. New life is when you embrace all that
God wants to be for you in Jesus.
That’s the new life that Jesus wants us to live. New life that He expects us to
live.
Believe and live is the theme of the gospel of John. John 20:31 says
(John says) “I’ve written these
things that you may believe in Jesus and by believing in Him have life.” Those two words believe and live
are used in the gospel of John more than in any other book of the Bible. I just wrote a few of them out here
just to see what kind of life that Jesus wants to give to us. The Bible says “In Him was life and that life was the life of men. … Whoever believes
in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.” It’s a different kind of life. “For just as the
Father raises the dead and gives them life even so the Son gives life to whom
He is pleased to give it. … I’m
the bread of life,” Jesus said “Whoever believes in Me streams of living
water will flow from within him….
I came that they might have life and have it abundantly…. Jesus said to Martha, ‘I am the
resurrection and the life. It’s
not an event. It’s a person. Do you believe this?’”
Today you see a miracle and
Jesus says “Do you believe in miracles?”
And more importantly “Do you believe in the miracle worker?” If you do, Believe and live. That’s what He wants you to do.
I can’t leave this story of
the raising of Lazarus without us dealing with the fact that Jesus raised this
man from the dead. Not in a
figurative sense, but really.
Lazarus was dead and Jesus brought him back to life.
The book of Hebrews tells us
that Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever. And the fact is that Jesus continues to raise people from
the dead, not just in a figurative sense, but really. If you look at church history you find that Jesus continued
to raise people from the dead after the New Testament was finished and the last
of the apostles died. There is an
account in John Wesley’s journal where he tells of raising a Mr. Meyrick from
the dead. And early Methodist
billy Hibbard raised someone from the dead. And literally hundreds of people are being raised from the
dead today around the world in response to the prayers of Christians. But what about here in America?
I want you to watch the
testimony of Dr. Chauncey Crandall, a well respected cardiologist here in
America who raised a man from the dead.
Prayer:
Jesus,
I just love it so much that You know how to weep with us, You know how to
embrace our pain. I also just love
it Jesus that You’re huge. You’re
full of glory – You’re weighty.
And You make us say, “Wow!
That’s heavy!” You engulf
us with Your love and You show us how to live a brand new life. I thank You that this is a church that
looses people and lets them go. And
I thank you that you still raise people from the dead today. We pray these things in Your name. Amen.
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