Jesus: Our Comfort & Our Hope for Life
Sermon • Submitted
0 ratings
· 19 viewsShort Graveside Sermon
Notes
Transcript
Thank you all for being here today.
I want to take a few minutes to give you some words from scripture that I hope will help encourage you during this difficult time.
Taken from from the book of John chapter 11, we start in verse 1
Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. It was Mary who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was ill. So the sisters sent to him, saying, “Lord, he whom you love is ill.”
In John 11:17, we read that Lazarus had passed away and had been in the grave 4 days before Jesus would return.
When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary, saying in private, “The Teacher is here and is calling for you.” And when she heard it, she rose quickly and went to him. Now Jesus had not yet come into the village, but was still in the place where Martha had met him. When the Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary rise quickly and go out, they followed her, supposing that she was going to the tomb to weep there. Now when Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus wept. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”
The first thing that I want you to see from this passage is that Jesus offers comfort.
I. Jesus Offers Comfort
I. Jesus Offers Comfort
It’s important first of all to allow time to grief.
For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
Grieving is hard, but is a natural part of the process of dealing with difficult things.
Jesus even modeled the fact that grieving is part of this process. (John 11:35) “He wept”
Is. 53:3- “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” is how Jesus is described
But even in our grief, Jesus offers us comfort.
First He offers us...
A. Comfort from others
We read in verses 19 & 31 that “many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to comfort them concerning their brother”
I want to say that there is no time in a family’s life when there is a greater need for expressions of love and sympathy. With the cards, letters, flowers, food, phone calls and spoken words friends can let their love be known. Even time spent with the family at such a time is a silent but eloquent way of expressing love and sympathy.
These are important things that we must do. God designed us in this way that we need each other. That there is strength when we come together and offer our love
We read also in
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.
Though we may offer comfort and love, this verse clearly calls out that all comfort comes from Christ.
I want to read you a poem that clearly defines the thought of this:
“When sorrow comes, as come it must,
in God man, must place his trust.
There is no power of mortal speech
The anguish of his soul to reach.
No voice, however, sweet and low,
can comfort Him or ease the blow.
He cannot from his fellow men
take strength that will sustain him then.
With all that kindly hands will do,
and all that love may offer too,
He must believe throughout the test
that God has willed it for his best.
…. No words which we have the power to say can take the sting of grief away.
That power that marks the sparrow’s fall
Must comfort and sustain us all.
When sorrow comes, as come it must,
in God man must place his trust.
… And only he may stand serene
who has faith on which to lean.”
-Edgar Guest
Though we can find comfort from others, Jesus is where we find ultimate comfort
B. Comfort from Jesus
Again reading from
Now when Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus wept. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”
Jesus was deeply moved, He even wept for Lazarus. But why did Jesus weep
He wept because...
He deeply loved Lazarus just as he deeply loves each and every one of us. His love for us is deeper and greater than any love we can possess for anyone else.
But Jesus also wept because he knew that this wasn’t the way it was supposed to be. He grieved because the world that He created has now been entangled in sin and evil which in turn has brought sorrow and death.
For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
It is because of sin that death plagues this world.
Yet, still though there now is death here, Jesus offers us comfort and peace and strength in our afflictions.
The Bible says in
Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
The Lord is near to the brokenhearted
and saves the crushed in spirit.
“Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.
You keep him in perfect peace
whose mind is stayed on you,
because he trusts in you.
And though we go through these things, Hebrews tells us that God will never leave us or forsake us.
This peace is only found in Jesus and the world cannot replicate.
But there is something else that only Jesus can offer.
II. Jesus Offers Life
II. Jesus Offers Life
So when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, but Mary remained seated in the house. Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you.” Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” She said to him, “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.”
Jesus recognized that death is a reality because of sin. But Jesus loved us so much, he cared about us so much, that He was willing to endure the worst of all pain & shame that he might be able to offers us everlasting life.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
Jesus tells her that even though you will die someday, if you believe in me though, will have everlasting life.
Jesus paid the penalty for sin. Jesus died on our behalf. Even though we all have sinned, Christ paid the penalty for our sin that we may have life.
because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.
The results of this is that the dead will live again in paradise with God. Where He will wipe away all tears. And as scripture states…
For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
The affliction we face today is great, but the greatness of the home in heaven for those who believe is so much greater than its not even worth comparing the afflictions we face today. That is hope, that is comfort. Knowing that in the end, such wonderful blessing awaits those that believe.
But that is the question. The question that Jesus asked Martha. “Do you believe this?”
I trust that if you haven’t already that you will chose to do this today. God is a God of all comfort and God a God that brings life even after death.
I’m going to pray now, but before I do, if any of you would like to trust Christ as Savior, or know more about what it means to believe and have everlasting life, please come talk to me afterwards. I would love to share this life changing truth with you.
Also after I pray and we dismiss, the family would like to welcome you to a luncheon at Steve and Donna’s Devanney’s house. If you can stay, please do.
Pray.
Thank you again for coming, your are dismissed.