Sermon Tone Analysis

Intro:

In the summer of 1915 in Blackville, South Carolina, 30 year old Essie Dunbar had a serious episode of epilepsy.

So serious that she showed no signs of life and was declared dead by Dr. D. K. Briggs.

Essie’s body was placed in a wooden coffin and the funeral was being arranged for the next day at 11:00 in the morning.

In those days, funerals would be held sooner but Essie had a sister that lived a few towns over and they wanted to give her enough time to come and see her sister’s face one last time before she was buried.

The next day came and they decided they couldn’t wait for Essie’s sister any longer.

They needed to get this funeral going.

You see, this is before people were embalmed like they are today and the decomposition process would start a lot faster than it does today.

They wanted to give her sister as much of a chance as possible to get there so they had a long ceremony with three different preachers taking turns to preach.

She still didn’t arrive and so they lowered her coffin into the ground and buried her.

A few minutes later, Essie’s sister arrived… She begged and cried and pleaded with the ministers to dig up Essie so she could say good-bye to her.

They agreed and had her dug up.

But when the screws on the coffin were removed and the coffin lid opened, Essie sat straight up and smiled at her sister!

According to the story, the three ministers were all so taken aback by this they they all fell into the grave!

The mourners and even Essie’s sister thought that she was a ghost or a zombie and so they all fled the scene screaming.

You can imagine even someone you know and love climbing out of a grave and running toward you… you might act a little hysterically too right?

Essie was buried alive.

Luckily for her she was dug up.

She even lived 47 years before her true death in 1955.

Today we are going to witness Jesus bring back someone from the grave who wasn’t buried alive like Essie… instead, he’s going to bring back to life a man who has been dead for 4 days and has begun to decompose and rot.

A man who was a friend of Jesus.

So if you have your Bibles, open those up to John chapter11.

And today we are beholding Jesus the friend.

Last week, Pastor Barry walked us through John chapter 8 where Jesus stands up for a woman who was caught in sin.

He stopped her execution and showed her mercy by forgiving her sins and changing her heart.

In chapters 8 through 10, there are more healings and miracles… there is teaching from Jesus.

We’re skipping ahead to chapter 11 to when one of Jesus’ best friends dies.

So if you have your Bibles opened to chapter 11 of John look with me starting in verse 1.

11 Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2 It was Mary who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was ill. 3 So the sisters sent to him, saying, “Lord, he whom you love is ill.” 4 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.”

5 Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.

6 So, when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.

7 Then after this he said to the disciples, “Let us go to Judea again.”

8 The disciples said to him, “Rabbi, the Jews were just now seeking to stone you, and are you going there again?” 9 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.

10 But if anyone walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.”

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

12 The disciples said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover.”

13 Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that he meant taking rest in sleep.

14 Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus has died, 15 and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe.

But let us go to him.”

16 So Thomas, called the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

This is the Word of the Lord.

Let’s pray.

This is a great story from the gospel account and I think there is so much we can get out of this for our own lives.

If you are taking notes I have three observations from this story and the first one is this.

Point I: Lazarus died for the glory of God (vs.1-16).

Jesus and his disciples are busy doing ministry.

It is well known that Jesus was out healing the sick so when Mary and Martha’s brother Lazarus came down with a serious illness, they sent word to Jesus to come and heal their brother.

In their minds Jesus would stop everything he was doing to come and heal Lazarus because Jesus was close with them.

You see this in verse 3 when the messenger that the sisters sent said...

3 So the sisters sent to him, saying, “Lord, he whom you love is ill.”

And in verse 5 when John writes...

5 Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.

But Jesus confidently responds...

4 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.”

Lazarus dies.

This does not come as a shock to Jesus.

He knows that this is going to happen.

When Jesus received this message, He did not immediately set out for Bethany.

Instead, He said, “This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified through it.”

He said that the purpose of this illness that had befallen Lazarus was not to terminate his life in this world, but he had been visited with this affliction for the glory of God, that the glory of the Son of God would be made manifest through it.

Jesus lingered for two days after he got word that Lazarus was seriously sick.

Why would he do that.? It seems heartless especially if he loved them.

But the fact remains that Lazarus’ sickness will not lead to his departure in this world but would serve to glorify God.

Glorify comes from the word...

δοξάζωb: to attribute high status to someone by honoring—‘to honor, to respect.’

To glorify means magnify… to make God look good.

And Jesus is saying that this illness that Lazarus has this purpose.

To make God look really good.

Did you know that bad things that happen to us can serve to glorify God.

We are often the ones that determine that with the way we see our own suffering.

The illnesses that we go through or our loved ones go through can serve as vehicles to glorify God.

That doesn’t mean that God will take away our suffering but it does mean that he can use it to both advance the gospel to those watching our suffering and to make him look as good as he truly is.

We all go through suffering.

Illness, loss of job and income, deaths of loved ones, a break up, persecution for our love of Jesus...

Tim Keller writes in his book Walking with God through pain and suffering,

“No matter what precautions we take, no matter how well we have put together a good life, no matter how hard we have worked to be healthy, wealthy, comfortable with friends and family, and successful with our career — something will inevitably ruin it.”

(3)

You can choose to knuckle down, bear it, and get depressed over it or you can suffer well so that Jesus is glorified.

Look a Jesus on the cross.

That was a horrible brutal scene.

The Son of God was murdered by evil men and God used it to bring about the salvation for many.

Jesus says that Lazarus is sleeping in verse 11.

He tells his disciples that he has to go wake him up.

Do you remember when we talked about the storm on the sea of Galilee?

And we saw in the Mark’s account of the same story that the reason that they had to go through the storm is because they didn’t understand what the miracle of the feeding of the 5,000 meant?

These guys are hard headed.

Look at what they say in verse 12...

12 The disciples said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover.”

13 Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that he meant taking rest in sleep.

They didn’t understand that he meant that Lazarus had died so Jesus lays it out for them.

14 Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus has died, 15 and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe.

But let us go to him.”

I love this.

Jesus has already said that Lazarus has died so that God may be glorified in it and now he’s giving a secondary reason for everything that is happening.

He says, “I’m glad that I wasn’t there because you guys are still hard hearted!”

Gladness isn’t the usual response to the death of a friend, but Jesus stated that the reason for His gladness had to do with the disciples.

Because of Lazarus’ death, and because of what He knew He was going to do, the disciples would see His power made manifest and would be strengthened in their faith in Him.

In this way, God would bring good out of the agony of Lazarus’ death.