NIV Life Application Study Bible, Third Edition - Flipbook - Page 49
page 1825
J ohn 1 1 : 4 8
41 So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up y and said, “Father, z I thank you
that you have heard me. 42I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit
of the people standing here, a that they may believe that you sent me.” b
43 When he had said this, J
esus c alled in a loud v
oice, “Lazarus, come out!” c 44The
dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, d and a cloth a
round
his face. e
Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”
11:41
yJn 17:1
zMt 11:25
11:42
12:30
3:17
aJn
bJn
11:43
cLk 7:14
11:44
19:40
20:7
dJn
eJn
11:45
fver 19
gJn 2:23
hEx 14:31; Jn 7:31
11:47
iver 57
jMt 26:3
kMt 5:22
lJn 2:11
•
Religious Leaders Plot to Kill Jesus (168 )
45 Therefore many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, f and had seen what Jesus
did, g believed in him. h 46But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus
had done. 47Then the c hief p
riests and the Pharisees i called a meeting j of the Sanhedrin. k
“What are we accomplishing?” they asked. “Here is this man performing many signs. l
48 If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and then the Romans will
come and take away both our temple and our nation.”
THE DETAILS SURROUNDING DEATH MAY VARY, but the reality is universal. Scenes like Lazarus’s funeral in Bethany are repeated many times around
the world each day. A grieving family gathers at a graveside. Friends agonize over
what to say. Their helpless silence, downcast eyes, mumbled clichés, and shuffling feet provide more distraction than comfort. When death is unexpected, the whys hang in
the air like choking smog.
Drawn by grief and duty, people came from Jerusalem and the surrounding area to pay their
last respects to a notable citizen of Bethany. Jesus’ friend Lazarus was dead. His brief sickness
proved stronger than any available medicine. Jesus had been sent for but had delayed his arrival
until it was too late. Death didn’t wait. Following the wisdom of hot countries, the body was soon
wrapped and buried. Four days later, Jesus arrived.
Lazarus’s sisters, Mary and Martha, reacted in shock. Grief-stricken, they struggled to understand
why Jesus had delayed in coming. We have no idea how Lazarus felt about this experience. In
fact, we don’t have a record of a single word he spoke. We do know that he listened to Jesus. Even
when the curtain of death was between them, Lazarus responded to Jesus’ voice. He came hobbling out of his cave-tomb, still wrapped with strips of linen. Jesus had raised him from the dead!
When all is said and done, only what God has accomplished through us will really matter. We
will take little credit. Jesus worked in and around Lazarus just as he does with us. We have Christ’s
invitation to participate in his work, but we must not forget that he will do much more than we
will ever know. Meanwhile, we delight in what Christ does with the little we have to offer him.
Lazarus’s resurrection poses an important question: When you die, do you fully expect that your
next conscious experience will be hearing the voice of Jesus call you by name?
Lazarus
Strengths and
accomplishments:
• Regularly hosted Jesus in his home
Notable fact:
• Raised from the dead by Jesus after four days in the grave
Lessons from
his life:
• Once we have given God ownership of our lives, we can’t predict what he will do
with them.
• Jesus’ circle of relationships went beyond the 12 disciples.
• God can use even the most difficult experiences in our lives for his glory.
Vital statistics:
• Where: Bethany
• Relatives: Sisters: Mary and Martha.
Key verse:
“When he heard this, Jesus said, ‘This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s
glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.’” (John 11:4)
Lazarus’s resurrection story is told in John 11:1–12:11.
11:44 Jesus had raised others from the dead, including Jairus’s daugh-
ter (Matthew 9:18-26; Mark 5:42-43; Luke 8:40-56) and a widow’s son
(Luke 7:11-15).
11:45-53 Even when confronted point-blank with the power of Jesus’
deity, some refused to believe. These eyewitnesses not only rejected
Jesus—they plotted his murder. They were so hardened that they preferred rejecting God’s Son to admitting they were wrong. They wanted to
fit God into their own plans instead of be open to his marvelous power.
Beware of pride. If we allow it to grow, it can lead us into enormous sin
and spiritual blindness.
11:48 The Jewish leaders knew that Jesus was becoming dangerous to their way of life. They feared that if they didn’t stop him, the
Romans would misunderstand the kind of kingdom Jesus had come
to establish and lash out against them. Rome gave partial freedom to
the Jews as long as they were quiet and obedient. But Jesus’ miracles
often caused disturbances as people began to wrongly think he was a