Lazarus Is Dead An I Am Glad

Good morning. You know, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. I heard one preacher one time say the fear of the Lord is the ABCs.

You need to know your ABCs before you can ever learn to talk or write. And in order to be able to function as a Christian, you start out by learning the ABCs of the Christian life. And the ABCs are to fear God.

Everything is established upon the basis of the fear of God. If you don't fear God, you don't need salvation. That's why the atheist can put his fist up in the sky and just shake his fist at the Lord, because he doesn't fear judgment.

He doesn't think he does. And so the fear of God, the Bible says there, or the song says when we sang there, that I feared God by His grace, and then His grace relieved me of my fear. And so if you've never experienced the fear of God, you've probably never experienced real salvation.

It is the fear of God that drives you to the Savior, knowing that your sin is going to come under judgment. Let's turn in our Bibles this morning there to John again. For some of you who are visiting, we're teaching through the book of John, the Gospel of John.

We're following the life of the Lord Jesus. He's approaching the day of Pentecost. It may be February.

It may be January. It may be March. I'm not sure.

But here in March or April, on our time clock is going to be the Passover. And the Lord is going to be offered up on the Passover evening. And so as we get further down here in John 13, 14, 15, the Lord is going to make preparation, start talking to His disciples about His departure and what's going to happen after His departure.

But here in John 11, probably the greatest miracle that Jesus ever did, and that was the miracle outside of maybe raising Himself from the dead, that is the miracle of the resurrection of Lazarus. The Lord has throughout this Gospel and other Gospels showed His power over sickness by healing many people. He showed His power over sin by overcoming the devil's temptation, by living without sin in His life.

He showed His power over the wind and the waves. He showed His power over devils and demons. And now He's going to show His power over death.

He is the one who's going to say in this chapter, I am the resurrection and the life. He that believeth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And He that liveth and believeth in Me shall never die.

So the power over death, I like to look at it this way, there's a lot of power in that outlet over there, and you stick something into that outlet and connect to that outlet, you're going to have that power flowing through you. Anything that is stuck into that outlet is going to get the power and the energy and the life that is in that outlet. And so that outlet represents the Lord Jesus Christ.

You go and attach yourself to Him. You're attaching yourself to eternal life. You're attaching yourself to one who has all the power, all the wisdom.

You're being attached to that. And when you're attached to that, that energy flows into you, like the vine and the branches. But if you're not attached, you might be sitting close to that.

You know, our children can take their... I get a little concerned when our little children take that plug and they start trying to put that thing in there. And there's no power that comes out. You really have to stick it in there nice and the right way.

And once that gets to a certain place, boom, it connects. All of a sudden, you're now connected to the whole power chain right there. And so when you come to Jesus with a broken and contrite heart and you cry out to God for mercy and you ask Him to save your soul, you get connected to the source of life.

And that means you have eternal life at that moment because you're connected to the vine. So, Jesus says, I am the resurrection and the life. And so, we've been seeing some miracles the Lord is doing here.

And these miracles are to prove to the Jewish people and to anyone who will observe and watch who He is, who He is. And yet, the vast majority of people, as we've been seeing, are rejecting His demonstration of His person and His power and the fact that He is the Lord. And here's an amazing verse.

We're going to see it in John chapter 12, but let me read to you what it says. It says this in verse 37, But though He had done so many miracles before them, yet they believed not on Him, that the saying of Isaiah the prophet might be fulfilled, which he spake, saying, Lord, who hath believed our report? And to whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed? Therefore they could not believe, because that Isaiah said again, He hath blinded their eyes and hardened their heart, that they should not see with their eyes nor understand with their heart and be converted, and I should heal them. And so there is this, and I think the Pharaoh in Egypt experienced this.

You know, Moses came to him and showed him amazing miracles and amazing power, and the Pharaoh rejected it and he hardened his heart. And then a little later on, you see that the next time he rejected the miracle that God hardened his heart. And then the next miracle he rejected that the Bible says Pharaoh hardened his heart.

And then the next miracle, then God hardened his heart. And it's this process. You harden yourself against me, I will harden your heart.

You soften yourself towards me, I will soften your heart. I will get involved in this work. And so these Jews, as they saw these miracles, they would harden themselves.

And then the Lord would harden them. And they began to be so hardened that they could not even see. And you're going to see here an amazing miracle, the raising of Lazarus from the dead.

I mean, there are people standing there watching it, watching this man come out of the grave, and yet they will not believe in spite of the fact that they see this incredible miracle. And so men's hearts are hardened. And in our society today, there are many people whose hearts are hardened.

You've heard me tell this story before, but it's a very good illustration. I believe when I was a young man, you know all the other children were running on those stones in the driveway, but I got out on those stones, and I stepped down on those stones, and those stones brought pain to my feet. And when I felt that pain, I said, nothing doing, I'm getting off these stones.

I got back and got my shoes on. And I would walk on the stones with my shoes because I had a desire to avoid pain, but also keep my feet tender. Some of my friends, when I got on those stones, they felt the pain, but they kept running.

And in a few days, a few weeks, a few months, their feet were calloused. So much so that they could run on stones and not even feel a thing. But even to this day, I go outside, I step on stones, I just, oh, painful.

You know why that is? Because the bottom of my feet are very tender. I've kept them that way. I've kept them that way because when I step on stones and it hurts, I say, nothing doing, I'm getting away from that.

The beautiful picture. You know, when you come up to sin and you feel conviction, and you hear God say, don't do that, and you say, okay, I've got to get away from that, I'm not going to do that, you tenderize your heart. But when you say, Lord, I don't care, I'm going to go ahead and do it anyway, all of a sudden you begin to harden your heart.

And then you go the next time and you feel the pain, the conviction of sin, and you say, I'm going to go ahead and do it anyway, and you harden your heart, and you get to the place in your life where you can sin and not feel any conviction. It's like running on gravel and feeling nothing. Because the heart has become so hardened against God.

And that's how the atheist is. That's how this man that we read about here this morning, that's how a life can get that way. Because of an unwillingness to repent of sin.

An unwillingness to address sin, to confess sin. And so I want to encourage you, if you want to keep your hearts tender, make sure if you do sin that you run to your closet and get on your knees and cry out to God for mercy and confess your sin to Him. And make your heart right with Him.

The Bible says if we confess our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sin. But I tell you, it's a dangerous thing when we go on and sin and not even bother to confess and make it right with God. And move week and month and year even.

All of a sudden, one day we wake up and we have no convictions anymore. No pain over sin. And we're living in ungodliness.

And we've lost our conviction. So sin, and this is what was happening to many of the Jewish people, sin was unrepentant. Sin was hardening their hearts.

And the Lord, or Paul I believe it was, who wrote the book of Hebrews says, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. Well, I told you this. I think it was last week.

The same sun that melts the butter hardens the clay, right? The same God that will melt the heart that is willing and desires to be soft, God will melt Him. That same sun, that same God will also harden an unrepentant sinner. Look over to John 11.45 before we begin here in John 11.1. But I want to show you what happens here in verse 45.

After Lazarus comes out of the grave, verse 44, he's got his grave clothes still on, his face wrapped around with a napkin. And verse 45, then many of the Jews which came to Mary and had seen the things which Jesus did believed on Him, praised God for those, but some of them went their ways to the Pharisees and told them what things Jesus had done. And they actually were applauding against Him to kill Him.

Would not a resurrection like this cause these people to believe? We're going to look at this resurrection here, but you would think that a miracle like this would cause people to get serious with God. I mean, can you imagine brother Chris here passing away and we have a funeral and the casket is up here and we're all sitting here and maybe I'm having a message and all of a sudden, brother Chris rises out of that casket and he stands up and he begins to declare to us that he had gone to meet God and God had told him He wants him to come back in His body and he just stands before us. How many of us would be an unbeliever after that one? Somebody being raised from the dead right in our midst.

Well, there's a story in the Bible of a rich man who went to hell, if you remember, and Lazarus, by the way, it wasn't the same Lazarus. Lazarus was a beggar. And this rich man was over there in the torment and he was trying to get out of this place and he realized that there's a great gulf and he's not going to get out and there's this communication between him and Lazarus and finally, he asked Lazarus to send someone to his brothers that they do not come to this place of torment and he thinks in his mind if someone will go back from the dead, if someone can come out of this place and be raised from the dead, my brothers will believe.

What did Jesus say? No. No one will be raised from the dead. They still will not believe.

And then he says to them, and I'll get to this at the end of the message this morning, they have Moses and the prophets. Let them hear them. And you know, you don't need someone to be raised from the dead either.

You just need the Word of God. You've got Jesus and the apostles. And we've got His words written here that we can believe.

Well, I think it's amazing, I'm going to pray here in a minute, we're going to start with John 11, but I think it's amazing that when Jesus was raised from the dead, He wasn't going around showing Himself to all these unbelievers. Can you imagine when Jesus was raised from the dead, He should have went to Pilate. He should have went to some of these people, the ones that maybe were mocking Him and ridiculing Him, and ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, you know, here I am, look at me.

He never did. He only went to the believers. And He showed Himself.

Well, most of you, I trust, are believers here this morning, and most of you are very blessed. I just want to bless you for believing. It is a blessed condition to be a believer.

I think of this man Thomas, and I'm not going to read about him in John 20, but Thomas had a hard time believing. Thomas watched Lazarus come out of the grave. I mean, these disciples saw it too, but it's two months later and Thomas is still doubting and questioning.

So much so that Thomas needs to reach or thrust his finger into Jesus' side and look at his palm of His hands to be without doubt and to believe. Well, I want you to know this morning as was shared already, that eternal life comes through believing. Martha in verse 27 says this, She saith unto Him, Yea, Lord, I believe that Thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come into the world.

That was a wonderful testimony. And you know, everyone in your hearts here today either believe or you don't. How many of you truly believe this morning as Brother Cleet shared? I believe it was Brother Cleet that I truly believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the Savior of the world.

I have no doubt in my heart that He died for my sins. There are some of you who are really back and forth. You know, the world is a good place.

You know, it's exciting. There's a lot of pleasures out there. I don't know if I believe this whole thing or not.

You know, this whole Bible thing. I'm not sure. I still want to try the world and see how it goes out there.

You know, I'm back and forth. Well, let me encourage you. Life comes through believing.

Let's go back and look at John chapter 11 starting in verse number 1. And I'm going to go down through about seven or eight verses here today. Before we begin reading, let's pray and we'll ask the Lord to help us here this morning. Heavenly Father, we acknowledge You in all of our ways.

Thank You for the Word of God and the testimony that we have that we can believe this wonderful book, the truth. And in believing, we can have eternal life. So I pray, Heavenly Father, that Your Word would encourage us and strengthen us in our faith here this morning.

Bless us now in Jesus' name, Amen. Alright, I'm going to start reading here in verse number 1. The story of Lazarus and his resurrection from the dead or Jesus raising him from the dead. Now, a certain man was sick named Lazarus of Bethany, the town of Mary, and her sister Martha.

There were three brothers and sisters here, maybe living by themselves. We're not sure. It was that Mary which anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped His feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was sick.

Now, in Luke chapter 7, there's a story, and I'm going to read it this morning for the sake of time, but in Luke chapter 7 is the conversion of this Mary. Jesus is at Simon the Pharisee's house. This woman comes in.

She's a sinner according to Simon. She has this alabaster box of oil. She comes behind Jesus and anoints Him, washes His feet with the tears and with her hair, and then the Lord says some wonderful things to Mary.

First off, He says to her, Thy sins be forgiven. What a wonderful word that was. Thy sins be forgiven.

Mary, you're a sinful woman, but I want you to know your obedience and your act of faith towards Me, your belief in Me, your sins are forgiven. And then He says this to her after that, Thy faith has saved thee. Go in peace.

That's beautiful there, isn't it? Mary, you're troubled. You've come to worship Me. You've come to pour out this alabaster box.

You're weeping. You're broken over your sin. Mary, I want you to know your sins are forgiven and your faith in Me has saved you.

Now, Mary, go in peace. Go in peace. You don't have to be troubled anymore, Mary.

With a conscience of your past sin, Mary could have been in harlotry. Mary could have been an evil woman. I don't know all about Mary.

This is not, by the way, Mary Magdalene out of whom were cast seven devils. This is a different Mary. But Simon thought she was a sinner because in his mind he said, this sinner is touching Jesus.

He doesn't even know it. If he were a prophet, he would know that this woman is a sinner. Well, there's a possibility that Mary went home from that encounter and she was so changed that Mary converted Martha and Mary converted Lazarus.

We don't know how they all became believers. We do know that Mary had an experience where she was converted there with the Lord, but we find that both Martha and Lazarus are also converted. And it seems as though Martha and Mary are very hospitable people toward Jesus because they often invite Him to their home.

In Luke 10, there's an example there of Mary and Martha and them inviting Jesus into the home. And some of you ladies probably know this story very well that in the home, Martha is busy about trying to get everything in order and prepare some things, and Mary is sitting at Jesus' feet and listening to His words and maybe worshiping Him. And Martha's all troubled, and she comes in and says, you know, Jesus, do something about this lazy Mary.

She's just sitting at Your feet. She's not helping me. And the Lord rebukes her and says, Mary has chosen that which is needful, and that shall not be taken away from her.

And just the importance, yes, service is good, but the importance of making sure that we sit at Jesus' feet. Well, these two ladies are living with Lazarus, their brother, and it comes to verse 3 here, and it says this, Therefore his sisters, because Lazarus was sick, and we're not told what his sickness was, but therefore his sisters sent unto him, saying, Lord, behold, he whom thou lovest is sick. Now, I don't know why they don't take him to Jesus.

Maybe he's quickly deteriorating. It came upon him suddenly. We're not told about all the details, but Lazarus gets sick, and the sisters send them to him.

Jesus is about 30 miles away distance-wise, and they send a messenger to Jesus to let him know that Lazarus is sick. They don't even ask him to come. They just want him to know, leave it up to him, what he is going to do about it.

But I think we can learn a lesson here, and I know that some of us go through this. I mean, we all go through this sometime in our life. But when we have difficulty, when we have sickness, when we have trouble, who is the first person we ought to turn to? The Lord.

And a good example here, Lazarus is sick. They evidently do not turn to the physicians. They do not turn to all kinds of different ideas.

Let's send Lazarus to Mexico. Let's do this, that, and the other thing. They say, let's call for Jesus.

And I just want to share this with you this morning, because as we go on here, you're going to see this. Think about this. If God knows the number of hairs on your head, which you believe He does, don't you? If He knows the number of hairs on your head, and Eli mentioned in Psalm 139, He's acquainted with all your ways.

With your down setting, your uprising. He knows all your thoughts. I mean, He has so much interest in you as a person that He even knows the hairs on your head.

Then how much more is He interested in every little problem that you have in life? Would you agree with me on that? Every little issue that comes up in life. Now if He is interested in that, then He's also interested in teaching you and instructing you. And He's going to instruct them.

Mary and Martha and even Lazarus are going to learn some lessons today from this resurrection. But this sickness has meaning. You know, oftentimes we go through life and oh, I caught a cold.

Or oh, I bumped my head. Or oh, I broke my leg. Or all this stuff.

And this is what happens. But in truth, if God is concerned about the number of hairs on your head, He's probably concerned about a broken leg. He's probably concerned about a runny nose.

Would you agree with me on that? And that there is some purpose and meaning for all of these things. My Bible says in Romans 8, all things work together for good. Notice it doesn't say all the big things that happen in life.

All the good things that happen. You know, I got in a car wreck. God is trying to speak to me about this car wreck.

That's a big thing that happened. What about the small things? So, I want to commend them here in the Scriptures and us also. The first thing they thought about was called Jesus.

Or let's get Jesus involved in what's going on here. Now, this sickness does have a purpose. He goes on to say here in verse 4, when Jesus heard that, He said, this sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby.

And so again, remember we saw this in the blind men, that this blindness had a purpose. This sickness here or this thing that Lazarus is going through has a purpose. And I've shared some of these things before, but sickness has purpose.

There are reasons for sickness. Let me just give you them briefly. One reason for sickness is death.

There is a sickness that leads to death. We're all going to have to die someday. We're all going to get sick and die.

It's appointed unto men once to die. You're going to get sick and die someday. Are you going to have an accident? So sometimes sickness is because it's time to go.

You're appointed with death. Sometimes it's for the glory of God and that's what it says here. And this is why Lazarus got sick was for the glory of God.

Sometimes it's chastisement. In 1 Corinthians 11, there's a good example of that. The taking of the Lord's Supper in an irreligious way brought many sicknesses.

And it went on to talk about chastisement. God is chastening the people. Sometimes sickness is due to the affliction of the devil and that God is testing us like with Job.

Remember, Job got very sick with all these boils. And it wasn't because of chastisement so much. It wasn't because of other reasons of sickness unto death.

It was because God was testing Job and the devil was testing Job. But I do want to encourage all of you in this. One thing that's very important is that anything that happens to your life or sickness or anything of this nature, it's very important to inquire first of the Lord.

Because always there's purpose. Purpose. Some of my favorite verses in the Old Testament I've used many, many times in my life.

Hundreds of times in my life when I'm in trouble. When something happens. There's a couple promises I use and one of them is this promise.

Call upon Me in the day of trouble and I will deliver thee. I like that one. I will deliver thee and thou shalt glorify Me.

Here's another one. The righteous cry and the Lord heareth them and delivereth them out of all their troubles. And that's a promise.

God can deliver and will deliver those who will trust in Him. Well, they did the right thing. They called for Jesus.

Some of you are familiar with this story in 2 Corinthians 16 of King Asa. I just want to read the verse to you. It says, And Asa in the thirty and ninth year of his reign was diseased in his feet until his disease was exceeding great.

Yet in his disease, he sought not to the Lord, but to the physicians. And Asa died in the one and fortieth year of his reign. That's just a commentary right there.

Asa got sick. He had some sort of a gout or something in his feet. Infection.

Got very serious. He never sought the Lord. He never went to the Lord.

But he was looking all other places to doctors, somehow to cure. And finally, he died. I don't know what would have happened if he had sought the Lord.

But it's very important in our problems to first seek the Lord. You know when you seek the Lord in your troubles, it's a testimony to the fact that we believe that He is truly, intimately involved with all that we encounter in life. And that it has a purpose.

So I think if we get sick, if we have problems, we ought to first get on our knees and say, Lord, what's going on? Why? And sometimes God has reasons. It's not always that way. But I think we ought to inquire.

That's happened to me in my life a number of times. How many times for you parents, your children get sick, very sick. And you're looking at this helpless little child.

And God uses that sickness to change something in your own heart. Oh, God. Maybe you're not ready to pray.

Lord, I'm not in a condition here to cry out to You and to pray. I need to get my own heart right if I'm going to pray for my children. Probably eight or ten years ago, I was going through a difficult time in my own personal life with my own thoughts, having some lustful thoughts in my heart.

And I was working at a church, painting a church. And I was painting and all of a sudden, I started to see these spots in my eye. I thought my eyes... You have two eyes.

You don't know whether it's one or two. And it kept getting worse and worse. And I just kept rubbing my eye.

I had my contacts in. I took my contacts out and still I saw these blotches. Whoa, am I going blind or something? It kind of brought the fear of God in my heart.

And I left and I went out in my car and tried to rub my eyes and get this stuff out, but it wouldn't go anywhere. It was just like these blotches. Brown, red, black blotches.

So I managed to get home and went to the doctor, come to find out that I had a blood vessel that had burst in my left eye and that that was blood in the vein that was in my lens. And I had some surgery, laser surgery done on the eye and it took a few weeks for it to clear up totally. But it was the process of going through that that God spoke to me about my own eyes and using my eyes in a pure way.

And so I believe that God uses these things. Sickness. God uses troubles.

He's trying to speak to us about things in our own life. And so if God does know the number of hairs on your head, certainly He's bringing troubles. Maybe you have some issues with your car breaking down or your children are sick or these things are happening in life and you're having financial loss.

You're the first to stop and say, let's call upon the Lord and see maybe something's going on here that I need to address. Oftentimes, the Lord will touch that which is close to our own hearts in order to speak to our hearts. I think Abraham had a real revival in his heart when God said to him that day, take Isaac up and offer him on the mountain.

I'd love to think what Abraham was thinking all the way up there about his own life, his own heart. And that whole situation probably brought a thorough repentance in Abraham's heart. I'm going to go up and put to death my own child.

Well, I'd like you to notice here because this is really one of the great lessons of this story in verse number 4. The purpose of this sickness is given to us here. And if you get anything out of the message, I'd like you to get this. I'm going to share with you in just a little bit.

There are two messages here, lessons in this first part of the story. But the purpose of the sickness is given to us, and that is the glory of God. The glory of God.

I want you to follow me as I read here, starting in verse number 3. Therefore his sister sent unto him, saying, Lord, behold, he whom thou lovest is sick. Jesus loved him. When Jesus heard that, he said, the sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of Man might be glorified thereby.

Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. Here again, he mentions his love for them. When he had heard, therefore, that he was sick, he abode two days still in the same place where he was.

Then after that he saith to his disciples, Let us go into Judea again. Now Jesus loved them. I don't know if you put yourself in the Lord's place.

He loved them. Here he hears of his friend Lazarus. Probably spent a lot of time in Lazarus' home.

And he had a real love for them. So what's going to happen in your heart when you hear that your friend, 30 miles away, is sick and perhaps dying? If you have a love for that friend, what are you going to do immediately? Probably take off for them, aren't you? You're going to leave. You're going to go.

You're going to seek your friend out, especially if you can help them. Well, why doesn't Jesus go? It says here he waits two days. Can you imagine? I thought about me as a minister and somebody gets sick and I hear someone's brother Mike here is sick and dying in the hospital down in Columbus.

And someone says, Brother Jerry, you need to go down and see him. He's getting bad. And I wait two days.

I wait two days. Wow. What are you going to accuse me of? You don't care! Boy, you don't care about Brother Mike.

He's down there suffering. He's laying in a hospital and he's going to die and you should be down there encouraging him and praying for him and here you're up here waiting for two days. Well, that's exactly what Jesus did.

He had someone that he loved and he is now waiting for two days. Now, I'd like to just picture this here for a little bit. Lazarus is sick.

Lazarus is sick. You know what it's like when you're sick? Lazarus is suffering greatly. Those around him, you know when your children get sick? I'm sure Mary and Martha are very anxious, troubled about Lazarus' condition.

Lazarus begins to worsen. He gets to the place where he is near death. Probably they're thinking, where is Jesus? And so they watch him deteriorate over the couple of days that he is sick and then all of a sudden, Lazarus goes through the pains of death.

He passes through the valley of the shadow of death. I mean, this has been a difficult two or three days that this family is going through, these ladies and Lazarus are going through and where is Jesus? He's nowhere to be found. Well, that's not all.

Now it's time for the funeral. The Bible says he was in the grave four days. He must have died shortly after they gave word because Jesus was two days waiting.

He was at least probably a day or two in traveling the 30 miles. By the time he gets there, he's been in the grave four days. So we have a funeral.

We have girls. Mary and Martha crying, weeping. We have the funeral and the Lord's not even at the funeral.

You have all the family. The Bible talks about Jews coming from Jerusalem to weep with them. You have this time of mourning that goes on for two, three, four days.

And you say, well, why didn't the Lord just go immediately and heal Lazarus and avoid all this heartache and all this weeping and all this suffering? Why didn't He just go quickly and heal Lazarus? But He allows Lazarus, Mary and Martha and those that are family members to go down through this very sorrowing time, difficult time. You know what it's like to go through a death, a family member? Not only watch them get sick, watch them die, then watch them put in a grave and go through all the things that death brings to your family. And so after probably six days of this, Martha and Mary are pretty spent.

They're emotionally spent. And you can see some of this with the response of the girls when Jesus finally arrives. If you look here at John 11, verse 18, it says, Now Bethany was nigh unto Jerusalem, about fifteen furlongs off.

And many of the Jews came to Martha and Mary to comfort them concerning their brother. Then Martha, as soon as she heard that Jesus was coming, went and met Him. But Mary sat still in the house.

Then said Martha unto Jesus, this is the first thing you'd say, Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. Do you think there's any frustration in those words? There might even be some bitterness. Lord, if You would have been here, my brother had not died.

Verse 32, Then when Mary was come where Jesus was and saw Him, she fell down at His feet saying unto Him, Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. So there is some frustration here. I don't know if maybe Jesus' level of respect kind of dropped in their eyes at this point.

Where have you been? We sent for you. We've been sorrowing. We've been going through great sorrow and pain.

And now Lazarus is in the dead. He stinks by now. It's four days.

But I'd like to teach you a lesson here. There's two of them. I want to share this morning from this story that the Lord is trying to communicate to Martha and Mary.

And by the way, you're no different than Martha and Mary and Lazarus here. You and I, we're just the same. And this lesson is for all of us, all of our troubles, all of our difficulties, all of our sorrows, all the things that we face also.

Now I want to look this morning at two reasons why Jesus delays. And He tells us why He delays. And allows Martha and Mary and Lazarus to go through a difficult and a sorrowing time.

And I want to look at the first one. It's given in verse 4. That God might be glorified. Verse 4 says when Jesus heard that, He said, this sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby.

Now God wanted to be glorified. And God wanted to glorify His Son through the life of Lazarus. Now God could have sent Jesus to go immediately to Lazarus and while Lazarus was on the sickbed, pray over Lazarus and Lazarus be healed.

But God wanted to glorify Himself far greater. God wanted to glorify Himself by raising up Lazarus from the dead. And so Jesus is told by His Father to wait two days.

Allow Lazarus to die. Because I want to glorify Myself and I want to glorify you in the life of Lazarus by raising Him from the dead. And so Jesus says, I'm going to wait for the purpose of bringing glory to God.

Do you know, and here's something I want to communicate to all of you, do you know that the reason why you're here and the reason why everything in life happens to you and the reason why the world is the way it is, God has orchestrated things and He desires for everything to bring glory to Him. The Bible even says this, whatsoever you do, whether you eat or drink or whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of God. You know, everything in life is designed to bring glory to God.

The ultimate purpose for everything you encounter in life is that God may receive glory in it. I think you're very wise when everything that happens to you, you first think this, how can God receive glory from this situation? How can God receive glory? Because I think when you do that, you'll get yourself on the right page with the Lord. Okay, God, something awful just happened.

How then are You going to bring glory to Yourself? And there's hundreds of them. I went and looked up in my concordance and saw all the phrases that talk about the glory of God, the glory of God, but I just want to read just a few of them. Ephesians 3.21 says, Unto Him be glory in the church by Jesus Christ throughout all ages, world without end.

Amen. 1 Timothy 1.17 Now unto the King, eternally mortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.

Some of you think of that. That's talking about someday in heaven where we're going to glorify Him. No, the truth of the matter is He wants to be glorified here.

It's like with Lazarus' life. That God would be glorified in everything. Stop and think about it this way.

All that happens to you in life is ultimately occurring for the glory of God or His desire is to have glory to Himself. The glory of God is the highest goal of humanity. The glory of God takes the highest place above everything else.

Here's something interesting. Look at verse 3 and verse 5. It says, Therefore His sisters sent unto Him, saying, Lord, behold, He whom Thou lovest is sick. And verse 5, Now Jesus loved Martha.

He wants us to know this. He loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. Interestingly enough, in spite of the fact that He loved them and He certainly did not want them to suffer, He certainly did not want them to have to be weeping for days and to lose their brother and Lazarus having to go through the valley of the shadow of death, in spite of the fact that He loved them, there was something higher than even that.

And that was the glory of God. There was a higher purpose here. And I think that Jesus being like us, He was made in the likeness of us, He faced that human aspect here.

He probably thought this. You know, I love them and want to alleviate their suffering. But there's a higher motive and calling here.

And that was the glory of God. I'm going to let my friend suffer and die because there's something higher here. And that is, I want my Father to receive glory.

In other words, the Lord was willing to let Lazarus suffer and go through death. Mary and Martha to suffer and to sorrow and to go through difficulty. He was willing to say, you're going to go through that because there is a higher purpose.

And that is the glory of God. Now, I think that love between human beings is a wonderful thing, but there's a higher calling than that. You know, there's two commandments, two of the greatest commandments.

You know what the first one is? Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy strength, with all thy soul, with all thy mind. The second is like unto it, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. The greatest commandment though is to love God with all your heart and soul and strength.

And so here's a choice. The Lord is faced with the choice of my brother Lazarus, my sister Mary and Martha. I love them.

I could alleviate their suffering. I'm going to go immediately and heal them. But I love my father.

And my father wants to glorify himself. And he is the greatest. And my desire to obey him is a supreme desire.

And his glory is the supreme object of my life. And so Jesus chooses to allow his friend's hardship so that his father can be glorified. And you see this throughout the Bible.

Jesus said it this way, Whoso loveth father and mother and wife and children more than me is not worthy of me. And you know, we tend to look at things, and I know that we're humans. We tend to look at things from the human side.

When someone is suffering, we tend to feel empathy and that's good. And we tend to want to alleviate suffering. You know, my child is sick.

That's the focus. Somebody needs to alleviate my child's sickness. My father is dying.

That's the focus. Someone needs to alleviate the pain and the suffering that my father is going through. And yet what the Lord is saying to us is this, there is a higher calling than even that.

Our hearts have loved toward each other to try to alleviate the suffering that we all face. But there is a higher calling and that is, what is going to glorify God? And we tend to not think about that very much. The glory of God.

Can you imagine sitting beside Job those times? It's like, wow. You're suffering. And you're not suffering because of your sin.

You're just suffering. But there's a greater purpose here. And that purpose is that God is wanting to be glorified through the life of Job.

Now, the Bible always gives us this encouragement that Jesus always goes before us. Isn't that right? He's our example in everything. And He is going to be the great example in this whole thing.

He is going to go through suffering. He is going to go down. He's about ready to go down.

He's going to go down and He's going to be crucified. He's going to be mocked and ridiculed. He's going to be beaten.

He's going to die just like Lazarus. He's going down into the grave. He's going to be three days in the grave.

There's going to be sorrow and sorrow and sorrow and weeping over Him. Yet He's doing it for what? The glory of God. Somebody even said that this morning when they read Galatians.

The cross... I think it was Brother Arlen. The cross is the what? The glory of God. And so the Lord is going to show us this example.

He Himself is going to suffer and be beaten. He Himself is going to lay three days in a grave. He Himself is going to go through that all for the glory of God.

Hold your finger here and turn to John 17. This is His prayer before He goes down this road. In John 17, verse number 1, I just read a couple of verses here.

The first thing that the Lord does in John 17 is He gives us this high priestly prayer. It says in verse 1, These words spake Jesus and lifted up His eyes to heaven and said, Father, the hour has come. Glorify Thy Son that Thy Son also may glorify Thee.

What's first and foremost on His heart? The glory of God, right? The first thing out of His, Father, I'm facing some very difficult suffering coming up here, but I just want You to glorify Yourself and glorify Me. Look down to verse number 4. I have glorified Thee on the earth. I have finished the work which Thou gavest Me to do.

And now, O Father, glorify Thou Me with Thine own self, with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was. And so, He's going to be praying here at the end of this prayer about His people and unity and brotherhood and loving each other, and that's important too. But He starts off with first and foremost His prayer that God might be glorified.

Here He stands. He's about to go into the suffering, to death and to burial. And the first thought is the glory of God.

And I would encourage us, you know, a right perspective of life and get on the same page with the Lord as we go down into difficult times. And instead of looking at it from the human perspective, how is it affecting people? And yes, I want to help this person, this person. I don't want this person to suffer and this person to feel bad and all the sorrow and the heartache.

Just stop and say, wait, first of all, I want to glorify God first and foremost. In whatever happens, that God would be glorified. That that's my first desire.

And it may take Lazarus dying that God would receive glory, and He did, by the way. You know, as human beings, when we face troubles or we face sickness, we tend to come to God with first alleviate my suffering, not glorify Thyself in me. Oh, that would make it look a little different, wouldn't it? I'm sick.

Father, glorify Yourself in me. Glorifying God is the ultimate purpose for everything that happens to us in life. Sometimes that may mean healing.

And by the way, many people were healed in Jesus' day, and they glorified God, and that was the purpose. Some weren't healed. Lazarus was one of them.

But it still was for the glory of God. God had a purpose. Let me ask you to turn to another place here.

Hebrews 11. I love this passage here in Hebrews 11. You're probably familiar with it.

Hebrews 11, verse 35. We have all of these wonderful examples of faith and how God received glory. You know, Moses goes to Pharaoh and all the wonderful miracles that were done.

And it says up here in Hebrews 11, verse 29, by faith they passed through the Red Sea. Boy, they glorified God in that one. The Egyptians were drowned by faith.

The walls of Jericho fell down. They glorified God in that one, and on and on and on. And then we come down to verse 35.

Women received their dead, raised to life again. Hey, that's glorifying. We ought to glorify God for that one.

And then you have these two words, and it's mentioned twice. Once in verse 35 and then in verse 36. But after it says, women received their dead, raised to life again, then these two words and others.

And others were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. And others had trials of cruel mockings and scourgings. Yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonments.

They were stoned. They were sawn asunder. They were tempted.

By the way, there was no deliverance. You know, Lazarus, you could have been healed, but no, you go into the grave, you're dead. You're done.

They were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented, of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and in mountains and in dens and caves of the earth.

And these all, both the conquering and those who didn't see the conquering, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise." So sometimes in life, it's the purpose of God, it's the glory of God for you to get sick and God to bring you out of that and heal you. And you bring glory to God. Sometimes it's for you, like Lazarus, to get sick and go into the grave for the glory of God.

And so we need to be willing to say, Lord, first and foremost, do all to the glory of God. Glorify yourself in my life, right? Whether it be by life or death. And that was Paul's heart.

Just glorify yourself in me. And that takes faith. That takes trust.

That takes a confidence in the Lord. You don't have to turn there, but I want to read one more. You can write this down here, maybe look at it.

1 Peter chapter 4. You can turn if you'd like. 1 Peter chapter 4. Peter talks about this in verse 12. He says, Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial, which is to try you as though some strange thing happened unto you.

Lazarus and the girls here. What about this trial you're going through? But rejoice insomuch as you are partakers of Christ's sufferings, you're following His example, that when His glory shall be revealed, you may be glad also with exceeding joy. Now, we've been having a Bible study on Saturday morning, and when His glory is revealed, that's talking about the revelation of Jesus Christ.

There is going to be a resurrection. Amen? And in that resurrection, His glory will be seen in those who are resurrected. And so whether you bring glory to God on this side of the grave or bring glory to God on that side of the grave, it doesn't matter as long as your heart is willing to bring glory to God.

Some people are going to have to go down into the grave and suffer and have no, quote, glory on this side of the grave. So I think Lazarus is a beautiful picture of this. Everybody's weeping, sorrowful.

They put Him in the grave. They close the stone. Where is the glory of God? You have to wait until after death.

And then four days later, the Lord resurrects Lazarus and God is glorified. Someday those people who die and you say, how is this bringing glory to God? It was just a miserable, hard, difficult, suffering death. How does this bring glory to God? Wait until the resurrection and see.

You had to wait for it in Lazarus' day. God is asking us to have faith and wait when His glory shall be revealed. Verse 14, if you be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are you, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you.

On their part He is evil spoken of, but on your part He is glorified. So this suffering, this being reproached is bringing glory to God. Verse 16, yet if any man suffers a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God on this behalf.

Glorifying God is an act of faith. Believing that God will get glory in my suffering. Let me ask you this, did Mary and Martha see any glory in this suffering that Lazarus went through? Was God glorified in any of it? Did they just watch this brother of theirs get sick and basically in three or four days die and put him in a grave and put a stone over it? How is God glorified in that? Probably not, they didn't see any glory, but at His resurrection they did see the glory of God.

And that's a type and a figure. There's going to be people, probably some of us right here that's going to go down through difficulty, just like Lazarus, probably go through hard times, get sick, crying out to God. Some people are going to get sickly and they're going to get healed.

Some are going to go down through the valley and like Lazarus, nothing. But as Lazarus, we need to remember that the glory is not only seen on this side of the grave, it's also seen on the other side. Lazarus is our example of that.

The Bible says in verse 13 of 1 Peter 4, Rejoice. Rejoice that you're following in the steps of Jesus. By the way, that's what happened to Jesus.

I mean, everybody was really discouraged and distraught. All of the disciples were just perplexed. Here we thought this guy was going to be the Messiah, and now he gets put on a cross, now he's in a tomb, and we're hopeless.

What glory is that? But the glory came at the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And so the hope that we have is when people go down into the grave, there's no healing. There's no help.

Where's God? We've been calling on God for these last couple of days, Martha and Mary said, but He's not showing up. And Lazarus is getting sicker and sicker, and look at this, he's dead. We've got the funeral, and the Lord never showed up! He never showed up! He never answered our prayer.

He never came and delivered us. Well, I've got news for you. He's going to glorify Himself.

He will glorify Himself. Sometimes it's on this side of the grave. Sometimes it's on the other side of the grave.

Well, there's another reason here outside of the glory of God why the Lord waits, and that is here in John 11. And I'll close with this one here in John 11. Verse 11, These things said He, and after that He said unto them, Our friend Lazarus sleepeth, but I go that I may awake him out of sleep.

He's talking to His disciples. Then said His disciples, Lord, if he sleepeth, he shall do well. Howbeit, Jesus spake of his death, but they thought that He had spoken of taking of rest and sleep.

Then said Jesus unto them plainly, Lazarus is dead. And here's the lesson. And I am glad for your sakes that I was not there to the intent or for this purpose that you might believe.

Nevertheless, let us go unto Him. And I like verse 16. Then said Thomas, Who was one of the greatest doubters? Doubting Thomas, right? Hey, Thomas is watching this.

And the Lord says, I'm waiting for this purpose that you might believe. And I think He's speaking right to Thomas. Thomas has got real doubts.

Even after this resurrection of Lazarus, he's still struggling with his faith. Well, this is an interesting little phrase here in verse 14 and 15. Jesus says, Lazarus is dead and I am glad.

What a statement that is, huh? Lazarus is dead and I am glad. It doesn't sound like He loves him. But notice in verse 15 what He means here.

I am glad for your sakes that I was not there. If I was there, I'd have healed him. And if I'd have healed him, you wouldn't see this incredible miracle I'm about to do of raising him from the dead.

That's going to strengthen your faith. I'm glad I wasn't there for your sake because this is going to help you believe. So in the Lord's heart, He rejoices that His disciples and one of them in particular, Thomas, was not there during this sickness, but we'll get to see Lazarus raised up so that his faith or their faith could be strengthened.

To the intent, it says in verse 15, that you may believe. You know, not only did the disciples get their faith strengthened by this, but also look over to verse 44. Well, I read this verse.

After Lazarus comes out of the grave and he that was dead came forth bound hand and foot with grave clothes, his face was bound about with a napkin. And Jesus said to them, Loosen and let him go. Then many of the Jews which came to Mary and had seen the things which Jesus did believed on Him.

This miracle that glorifies the Lord and glorifies the Father also brought faith to many. Many believed in Him. And I've read this verse a number of times, but this is the reason why John's Gospel was written.

In John 20 it says, And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written, this is what we have, that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you might have life through His name. So these miracles were actually given to us.

These signs and wonders so that we might believe. And certainly those disciples and those that saw those miracles, those miracles were a testimony to the person of Jesus Christ as the Messiah. And so perhaps the greatest miracle that Jesus did was raising Lazarus from the dead and what a testimony that was.

But I'd like you to notice something here. They had those miracles. They could see them with their own eyes.

But you know what? You and I don't get to see those miracles. But still God wants us to have faith. Amen? And I like what it says here in John 20.

Notice this. Verse 30, And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in the book. But these are written, these are written that you might believe.

Generations to come, you're not going to see Jesus raised dead, healed blind eyes, cured limbs, but we're going to give you a record. We're going to give you an account. These are written that you can read those accounts like we're doing here today.

The resurrection of Lazarus. And that in reading them that are written, you might believe that Jesus is the Son of God. I don't know that you'll ever see anybody raised from the dead like Lazarus was.

But you know, in the end, God's still going to expect you to believe Him and believe His Son. Not based upon what you saw, but based upon what is written. Right here.

These are written. And these are given that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ. And now, I just want to close with this verse.

I quoted it just a little bit ago. I don't want you to make the same mistake that this person made. But listen to what Jesus says here to the rich man in hell.

In Luke 16, it says, the rich man says, I pray Thee therefore, Father, that Thou would send him to my father's house, for I have five brethren, that he may testify unto them, lest they also come to this place of torment. Raise up this Lazarus, this beggar. Raise him from the dead.

Take him out of this place. Send him to my father's house. When they see the beggar who they knew before, who they knew died, when they see him raised from the dead, then they'll turn.

They'll repent and they'll believe. That's what he's asking. And Abraham said unto him, They have Moses and the prophets.

Let them hear them. Do you have Moses and the prophets? I've got better news for you. You've got Jesus and the apostles.

You've got Jesus and the apostles. They look back to Moses and the prophets. We look back to Jesus and the apostles.

You know, there are many people in hell that would love to send someone out of hell, raise him from the dead, send him to their family, plead with them to get converted, get their hearts right with God, not to come to this place of torment. And the Lord would say the same thing to them. They have Jesus and the prophets and the apostles right here.

It's right here. They have a New Testament. They can read it.

They can see all the miracles. They can see how I raised Lazarus from the dead. It's all right there.

And he said, or the rich man said, Nay, father Abraham, but if one wanted them from the dead, they'll repent. And he said unto them, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead. You know, if we raised Brother Chris up from the dead here, some of you would say, I need to see something like that before I'm going to truly believe in Jesus.

Well, God has a message for you. There's something even more powerful than that. I know what would happen if Brother Chris was here in a casket for two or three days and he popped up like that.

People would start saying, oh, they must not have embalmed him right. You know, all these reasons why he was delusional and he probably was never really truly dead and all these excuses. But you know, someone would say that would be a great witness.

Boy, would I be a believer then. That's what the rich man in hell thought. But I can tell you this.

The Lord will tell you this. If you don't hear Jesus and the apostles, neither would you believe if Chris raised from the dead. And that's true.

You have the truth right here. And so I encourage you to believe it and embrace it. You have this and you have all the information and vanity of the world to choose from.

As Brother Cleat was sharing here this morning, you can meditate on all kinds of things. Oh my, there's so many things to meditate on. Your mind can be preoccupied with news, sports, money, games, bitterness, all kinds of things.

You can fill your mind with all kinds of things or you can fill your mind with Jesus and the apostles. Some of the reasons why we don't truly have a lot of faith is because faith comes by the Word of God. And as we study and as we read God's Word, we build faith in our hearts.

So the glory of God. You know, sometimes, probably some of us are going to get sick. Some of us are going to have difficult lives probably.

Probably some of us are going to maybe have tragedies in our homes and maybe accidents. And we wonder why, Lord, why? And we never see the glory of God on this side of the grave. But like with Lazarus, we need to trust that when Lazarus is raised, God is going to be glorified in him.

Alright, let's close. We'll continue with this story next Sunday. Some of the lessons that we can learn from the resurrection.

But let's remember...