Martha, Mary, and Lazarus

Introduction

Encounters with Jesus

Seeing who Jesus is

Encountering Jesus for ourselves

Tonight we are going to be in John 11—looking at Jesus’s interaction with three people: Mary, Martha, and Lazarus

We’ll be see Jesus interacting with those who are suffering …

What does encountering Jesus look like when we are full of sadness and grief?

Lets look at the setting:

John 11:1–7 CSB

Now a man was sick—Lazarus from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with perfume and wiped his feet with her hair, and it was her brother Lazarus who was sick. So the sisters sent a message to him: “Lord, the one you love is sick.” When Jesus heard it, he said, “This sickness will not end in death but is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.” Now Jesus loved Martha, her sister, and Lazarus. So when he heard that he was sick, he stayed two more days in the place where he was. Then after that, he said to the disciples, “Let’s go to Judea again.”

Things to Note:

Lazarus was Jesus’s friends

Jesus knows what it is like to lose a loved one

But if we read the text carefully we should be surprised

“Now Jesus loved Martha, her sister, and Lazarus”

“So when he heard that he was sick, he stayed two more days in the place where he was”

This goes against our expectation

This is because he knew how the Lazarus’s story would go

John 11:4 CSB

When Jesus heard it, he said, “This sickness will not end in death but is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.”

For us, I think the temptation again, is to put God in a box

Reading this it can be easy to paint Jesus as insensitive to the loss and suffering of this world

“I know this is going to suck… BUT it’s for God’s glory”

Does anyone think like this?

That God doesn’t really care about our suffering or pain—that he is only concerned with his glory

And if it takes suffering and pain—he is pleased with it because it glorifies him

Biblical Example: Potter and Clay//Refiner’s Fire

The clay/metal doesn’t feel pain

The potter/blacksmith is concerned with forming and strengthening but not about how it feels to be the clay or metal

But in this story we see that this is not true

That Jesus is bigger than our suffering

But He also deeply cares and he suffers when we suffer

His heart breaks when our heart breaks

This is because Jesus is fully God—and fully human

He sees the big picture—knows God’s plan

But he also experiences the brokenness of humanity

In this story we see two sisters that have two different encounters with Jesus

Martha is met with hope and inspiration in a time of loss

Mary is met with sympathy and tears

So tonight, I have two points:

Jesus is bigger than our suffering

Jesus chooses to enter into our suffering

Jesus is Bigger than Our Suffering

First, let’s look at Jesus’s encounter with Martha:

John 11:17–25 CSB

When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. Bethany was near Jerusalem (less than two miles away). Many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to comfort them about their brother. As soon as Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went to meet him, but Mary remained seated in the house. Then Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died. Yet even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you.” “Your brother will rise again,” Jesus told her. Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.” Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me, even if he dies, will live.

Martha comes to Jesus and she has one complaint

If he would’ve come sooner—Lazarus wouldn’t have died

And Jesus was a miraculous healer, this would have been true

But she also knows that Jesus is in control, even over this devastating loss

John 11:22 CSB

“Yet even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you.”

And this is important!

Jesus sees this flicker of hope and kindles it

He makes one of the greatest statements to inspire her to see through the darkness of this difficult time

John 11:25 CSB

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me, even if he dies, will live.

You don’t have to fear death—I am the resurrection

He lets Martha know that he is bigger than the present suffering

That God is still in control

Now let’s look to Jesus and Mary, where we see that:

Jesus Chooses to Enter Into Our Suffering

John 11:32–37 CSB

As soon as Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and told him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died!” When Jesus saw her crying, and the Jews who had come with her crying, he was deeply moved in his spirit and troubled. “Where have you put him?” he asked. “Lord,” they told him, “come and see.” Jesus wept. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Couldn’t he who opened the blind man’s eyes also have kept this man from dying?”

It is very interesting, Mary also has the same thing to say to Jesus: “If you had been here, Lazarus would be alive”

But notice she doesn’t have the same confidence in Jesus that Martha had

Martha added “Yet even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give it to you”

Mary is losing hope

And Jesus’s response is interesting

He doesn’t bash her over the head with hope

“I'm the resurrection, come on!”

He doesn’t try to convince her that what has happened is actually good

Jesus is deeply moved and weeps with her

This is the God of the universe… He knows what its like to lose a friend

These aren’t fake tears

Even the onlookers see how much Jesus loved this man

Jesus heart is broken at the brokenness of this world

Death was never God’s plan

It’s not supposed to be this way (We know it!)

We see that Jesus mourns with those who are mourning

Conclusion

And Jesus goes on to raise Lazarus from the dead

But that’s another lesson

I think here we see a great amount of wisdom in Jesus

We see that Jesus meets people where they are

And he knows exactly what to say, and when to say it

Two sisters are going through the same grief, yet Jesus has a unique way of meeting them

God doesn’t work in blanket statements—He treats us each as unique individuals

Jesus wants to meet you where you are—whether it is happy, sad, angry, or whatever

I think one of the most dangerous things that can hinder our prayer life is the thought: “I shouldn’t feel this way”

I shouldn’t be sad… I gotta get over it // I shouldn’t be angry… it’s not that big of a deal

Those thoughts don’t make the feeling go away… they actually make things worse

Because they then bring guilt

I shouldn’t feel this way —> but I do! —> So something is wrong with me (are you guys tracking?)

But when we let Jesus know where we really are… he will meet us there

When we are sad… He will weep with us

When we are angry… He can take it

When we are anxious… he is patient with us

When we are hopeless… he will sit with us

When we have a flicker of hope… he will kindle it

We see here that encountering Jesus… means coming to him as we are

C.S. Lewis:

“We must lay before him what is in us; not what ought to be in us.”

And he will give us what we need

Lastly, I want to talk about what this means for us relating to other people

I think we need the same wisdom that Jesus has, in treating people individually

In Romans, Paul tells us:

Romans 12:15–16 CSB

Rejoice with those who rejoice; weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud; instead, associate with the humble. Do not be wise in your own estimation.

We are to be like Jesus

We are above suffering (in the grand scheme of things)

But we must choose to enter into suffering and the pains that others experience

Live with an among people—Not over people looking down on them

Even if they are over reacting

We don’t always need to say something

We don’t always need to give someone an answer

Or solve their problem

Sometimes all someone needs is a listening ear and a shoulder to cry on

And for you to sympathize with them

I don’t have the answer but I am sorry. I know what you are going through is very difficult. I am committed to being by your side through this. Let me know if there is anything I can do to help.

We must be willing to enter into other’s suffering with them

So I know there is a lot in this story that we didn’t necessarily cover but I think we should take time in small groups to discuss what this means to us

Discussion Questions

What are ways we try to fix ourselves up before meeting with God?