John #32 The Resurrection Life

That you may Believe and Have Life #32

John 11:38-57

In two weeks we will celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. We will Celebrate his Death, Resurrection, the Empty Tomb.

But Jesus does not have the ONLY empty Tomb IN Palestine.

Lazarus of Bethany, brother to Mary and Martha, has an empty Tomb in Bethany …

<Slide one and two> –

They buried him there, we read that story a few weeks ago

It was a public, full of mourners and witnesses so, we know Lazarus was buried there … yet that Tomb is empty today …

But there is another Tomb … in Cyprus … the Tomb was discovered in 890 A.D. with the inscription, “Lazarus, the Friend of Christ” … a Greek Orthodox Church today stands over that grave site … <slide three>

Well, Lazarus died this first time and was buried in Bethany … and the Tomb probably looked like this one …

Let’s return to our text in John 11 and I want you to pay special attention to the Words of Jesus, which in many of our Bibles are Red …

READ John 11:38-57

Now, I believe that there are some parallels that we can use to learn about living Resurrection Life ourselves

I will say up front that we have to be careful that we don’t go too far in making the parallels.

I have even read some theologians that use the story of Lazarus to prove their belief system about Spiritual Regeneration … and the two are not necessarily ordered by the same laws … So … with that understanding … I believe we can use this story today as a Parable for understanding what I am calling the Resurrection Life.

Lazarus was DEAD … more than dying, more than sick unto death, more than in need of resuscitation … he was DEAD! … Buried for 4 Days … and at the end of the Story today he was ALIVE … and his life was never the same again … of this you can be sure.

Now there came another day when he died … we know that … but the rest of his life he never lived the same

How do we Live the Resurrection Life?

1. Take Away the Stone

Notice that Jesus came to the Tomb and then commanded the people there to “remove the Stone” … which brings thought to mind of the stones that separate us from the Resurrection Life …

A. We Can’t Move the Stone Ourselves

Apart from Christ we are dead.

Dead in our Trespasses and Sins

Yet God involves man in the process of calling people to Christ

Just as Jesus said “Lazarus Come Forth” … so God draws the heart of those who are dead in their sins … but Just as Jesus said “Take Away the Stone” … I also believe God calls us to be involved in the process for others …

I was reading Dr. Criswell yesterday as he simply preached on this one point … and he identified 3 stones that WE must remove when we join Christ in the process …

1. the Stone of Unbelief – Martha replied to his instruction “but Lord, there is a bad odor, he has been there four days” – KJV says “he stinketh”

a. How many times has the Lord challenged YOU to remove some obstacles in someone’s life, to bring them a testimony of truth, and you said “but Lord, you can’t do anything in their life, THEY STINK” --- “They are REALLY Dead”

b. Banish unbelief and don’t believe that God CAN’T move in the Life of that person who is dead to Christ.

2. The Stone of Laziness –

a. some times we lose our commitment to the process … we speak of our love … for God and For people … but we aren’t really motivated to do anything about it … I stole this story from Dr. Criswell about of the boy in love who wrote his sweetheart … perhaps today it could have been an email

b. I love you, for you. I would cross the deepest river. And I would swim the widest ocean. And I’d climb the highest mountain. For you, I love you! Signed “John” P.S. – “I’ll see you Saturday night, if it’s not raining.”

Third stone he describes is similar to the 2nd but more serious

3. The stone of Acquiescence –

a. That’s apathy which is laziness that has given in to the circumstance – it is like saying “yep they’re dead and that’s just the way it is” … “oh well” …

b. Aren’t you glad that someone didn’t think that about you … but told you about Jesus Christ?

c. William Wilberforce wasn’t satisfied with things the way they are in Slave Trade in England but fought tirelessly for decades until it was abolished.

d. He also wasn’t satisfied with the state of morals and lostness in his country and abroad and fought against the decaying morals and for the establishment of the Missionary movement

e. Mr. Kimball a Sunday School Teacher didn’t give up on D.L. Moody but led him to Christ and Moody preached under the power of the Spirit and shook the United States and God brought Revival.

f. With Ezekiel we have to answer the question … Can these dry bones live?

Will you take away the stones of Unbelief, Laziness, and Acquiescence or Apathy?

Well, While God chooses to involve us in the process … the greatest stone to the Resurrection Life, is one that we CAN’T Move for ourselves and Someone CAN’T move it for us … but have no fear …

B. Jesus Has Removed the Greatest Stone

1. the Stone of Sin …

2. We cannot pay for our own sins because the wages of Sin is death

Isaiah 59:2 (NIV)
2 But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.

Isaiah 59:16 (NIV)
16 He saw that there was no one, he was appalled that there was no one to intervene; so his own arm worked salvation for him, and his own righteousness sustained him.

The Greatest Stone has been removed … my cell door has been unlocked … if I will respond to his voice and Live the Resurrection Life …

When we respond to his voice we …

2. See The Glory

V40 again did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?”

A. I Promised

1. lego – to say, affirm, maintain, teach

2. when Jesus speaks … it is always true and it is always a promise … and so when he spoke … he reminded them of a promise … also we see here is affirming something, he is standing by his words, and he is teaching us something

3. Remember when the messenger came with Word that Lazarus was sick, Jesus sent word back “this sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it”

B. If You Believe

1. maybe you’ve seen bumper stickers that say “God said it, I believe it, and that settles it” – To which I’ve responded before “God said it, and that settles it, whether you believe it or not” … well obviously that’s not always true when it comes to experiencing things that are conditional …

2. For By Grace you are saved, through faith … Grace has been provided, but without Faith it is impossible to please God …

3. So when it comes to experiencing God’s Grace, the Gift of Life, of walking in the Resurrection Life offered by Christ, IF YOU BELIEVE …

4. the word in Greek ean (eh-an) if, in case … 14 times it is translated whosoever, and 16 times whatsoever

5. Belief is a condition by which we can experience the Resurrection life that God has for us. How many of us have experienced times in our life that although we know we are IN Christ, we aren’t experiencing the victorious life? It is because we aren’t living in the condition of obedience evidencing our faith

6. Believe – pisteuo – to think to be true, to be persuaded of, to credit, to place confidence in …

7. Some of us don’t experience the Resurrection Life because we don’t deposit our confidence in the words of God, the Power of God, the Promises of God … or we flat just don’t think they are true.

8. Don’t trust what you have always known, don’t believe what you have always thought, don’t rely on what you’ve always been able to do … you MUST Believe

Jesus said in Mark 9:23 – all things are possible to him who believes …

The promise Of Jesus is that if we believe …

C. You Will See The Glory

1. Now remember we have talked many times about the word doxa – translated “glory” – it means opinion, judgment, view – it is a reputation … and when we studied John 1:14 – we studied glory … and there is no better place to find God’s opinion / reputation, than from God himself … and for that our study took us to Exodus 33 & 34 – Moses had begged to see his Glory … so God said … “you can’t see me face to face or you will die …” Moses begged and God said “I will put in a cleft in the rock, and cover you with my hand … then you will see …”

And then the Lord Passed Moses and called out his OPINION / REPUTATION … i.e. his GLORY

V6-7 “the LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the 3rd and 4th generation”

2. IF you believe … you can experience Resurrection Life, and see the Beauty of his Glory … that is Compassion, Grace, Forgiveness, Love, Faithfulness … When we believe … we place ourselves in position to know his Grace, Love, Forgiveness, Power for LIFE, REAL LIFE … here and now as well as for Eternity …

3. But notice, to see God’s Glory and Goodness, Moses had to BELIEVE and OBEY … God said “stand where I tell you to stand … and I’ll cover you” and THEN you can see my glory …

But if Moses had NOT obeyed God, God’s same glory would have consumed him …

4. there are TWO sides of God’s glory … there is the compassion, love, grace, mercy, forgiveness, power, and then there is the other side … that he does NOT leave guilty unpunished …

5. If I believe in Christ, his punishment becomes my punishment and so his grace becomes mine, his power, mine, his forgiveness mine …

If you Believe …

You will See the Glory of God in all it’s goodness … that’s the Beginning of Living the Resurrection Life … that is being alive …

So, To be in the Resurrection Life; Barriers most be removed through the provision of Christ and the intervention of Friends …

Life must Come

But once Life must come, To Live the Resurrection Life …

3. Take Off the Grave Clothes

Two quick things that are obvious but we miss some times …

Jesus didn’t say “Lazarus come to life …” he said “Lazarus Come OUT” …

A. Come Out -

1. Lazarus didn’t BECOME ALIVE because he came Out of the Tomb

2. Jesus told him to come out because he was Alive

3. John 5:24 – says that whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life

4. When we respond to the offer of forgiveness and eternal life by the Grace of God, believing his promises … we are given Eternal Life in Jesus Christ … so … where are you going to stay, in the Grave?

5. So, Lazarus wasn’t going to live around the death and decay, because he was a LIVE person …

6. there was no need for him to live in the Grave … COME OUT

7. Ephesians 2:1-3 says you were dead in your transgressions and sins … followed the ways of the world … all of us lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings

8. we don’t have to stay in the tombs we have been seated WITH Christ in Heavenly Places …

HE Was alive in heaven … JESUS was Calling him into a different Dimension

God has made you alive now it’s time to LIVE IT in the WORLDLY DIMENSION

Lazarus comes out … which must have been a sight … They would wrap them up like a Mummy … and with sometimes 100 pounds of Spices … to control the decay AND the Stink … But sweeter smelling or NOT a dead body is still a dead body … I know some folks that Try and Sweeten up the smell with Good Works, but they’ve never received Christ, Never Received Resurrection and so they are STILL Dead and are NOT coming out …

But when we are Alive in Christ, By Grace, through Faith …

We can Come out of the Death Caves … and then we must …

B. Leave the Trappings of Death

1. there he comes hoping out of that cave as best he could … cloth wrapped all around him … 100 pounds of spices … I’m sure Everyone is shocked to say the least, staring in disbelief, perhaps frightened and not knowing WHAT to DO …

a. I’m mindful of when the disciples are praying for Peter to be set free from Prison, God answers there prayers brings Peter out … he knocks on the door, and Rhoda answers the door, sees him and slams the door and runs in saying “Peter’s ghost is out front”

b. Well … they’ve been praying for Lazarus but now he’s dead … he comes back to life … and they just stand there …

2. Jesus says “Take off His Grave Clothes” … the KJV says “Loose Him” …

3. Notice a couple of things … this is a command to the Living People close to the Newly Resurrected Lazarus …

a. when people come to faith in Christ … they are bound by the old Trappings of Death … they need to be taught how to live the Resurrection Life

b. we call it discipleship … Jesus told us to GO and Make DISCIPLES … that’s Jesus telling us to TAKE OFF THE GRAVE CLOTHES …

4. Colossians 1 says “since you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God … Put to death … whatever belongs to your earthly nature …”

5. The Writer of Hebrews said it this way – Let us Fix our Eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith,

6. As fellow believers it is our Job to help New Believers walk in the Life of our Resurrection … and as New Believers and Old Believers for that matter, it is our Job to Leave behind the things of our Dead Life …

7. How do you Leave the Trappings of Death? Col 3

a. “Set your HEARTS on things above … Where Christ is seated” ---

1) What is your heart set on? What do you Love?

2) Things of this earth or things above?

3) When you LOVE Christ you will Obey Christ

4) when you Love Heaven you won’t long for the things of this earth … it won’t matter about possessions, it won’t matter about the trappings of this life because you will be storing up treasures in Heaven not on earth

Mt. 6:33 – “Seek First the Kingdom of Heaven and God’s Righteousness and all these things will be added to you”

b. “Set your MIND on things above, not on earthly things”

1) make a decision that the things of Heaven will occupy your mind

2) do you see the practicality of this … how we would be saved … how our days would be changed if we set our MINDS on Heavenly things

Finally Col 3:9,10

c. you have taken off your old self WITH its PRACTICES and put on the New Self which is being renewed … notice that it takes Decisive ACTION … to live Like you have been Made to Be

If you died were buried … and were resurrected … would you waste any time living or acting like a dead person?

Peter said it in 1 Peter 4:3

You have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do…

He even says that other dead folks will think that it is STRANGE that you don’t diver right in with them …

Resurrection Life is Given so that you will LIVE …

So let’s bring this home …

The Resurrection Life begins with barriers removed, Faith Exerted to Receive the Life Graciously Given … Then Alive … you must consciously make the effort to leave behind Death and Live … Other Disciples will help you live, teaching you how to Live the Resurrection Life …

But it is all not an END to itself … it always for a purpose

It is FOR Freedom that you have Been Set Free

And it is FOR LIFE that you have been Made ALIVE …

Jesus said “Take off the Grave Clothes and Let Him GO!”

4. Go

We have been Given Life in Christ FOR a Purpose …

Jesus always calls us for a greater purpose … we are to leave where we are, where we have been, good or bad, leave our old plans and surrender to walk with God, in the Plans of God …

Think about something … Lazarus, faithful to God, had been in Paradise for these more than four days since his death … Paradise … but Jesus said, come back here, to earth, that means God has greater things for Lazarus to do.

So, you and I will leave behind nothing on this earth like what Lazarus left behind …

So what is our purpose of the Resurrection Life Lived among a believer … Maybe I’ll come back another time and Preach a full message here … but see these things as we close …

Jesus said …

A. Let Him Go

Two Greek Words with deep meaning here …

1. “Let” is translated from the word aphiemi (af-ee-ay-mee) and “Go” from the word hupago (hoop-ag-o)

2. hupago = to withdraw one’s self … to depart – so we are Called to Go … but how …?

3. aphiemi = to send away, bid going away, like a husband divorcing his wife, to yield up

4. The Resurrection Life is one where you DIVORCE yourself from your old Life … You Leave your old life, with no love for it, you leave your old life to live elsewhere … you leave your old life, face set forward separate from the things you used to know and love

5. When you Divorce yourself from the things of this World and Live Alive in Christ … you become Married to Christ … wed to Living a Resurrected Life and

Then Jesus says

B. Turn him Loose on the World

1. No those exact words aren’t in the text … but you read the story and you get it … Jesus says Send him out divorced from the World, married … LET HIM GO …

2. What happened v45 “many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, put their faith in him”

3. What had Jesus done? Raised Lazarus … Why did they believe in Jesus … because they KNEW Lazarus was DEAD and now they saw him alive

4. People who knew you as dead … will be amazed when they see you taught how to live a Resurrection Life, and Living it by Faith, they will come to have faith in Christ as well …

5. Not everyone will like it … some went to the Pharisees complaining …

But you Go On Living
C. Leave Behind the Past

1. Walk with the Living

2. When the women came to find Jesus’ supposed dead body, instead they found an Angel who said “why do you seek the living among the dead.

Resurrection Living is found among the LIVING not among the dead.

3. Some of you have come to Christ, be regenerated to New Life, you are a new Creation in Christ Jesus, but you have to leave the Tomb and LIVE

Jesus cast demons out of a man in Geresa who was living among the graves, but after he came to Christ, he didn’t stay there, he went back to the Living …

4. There are things you must leave behind to live among the living

The dead you knew if you old life will DEFINITELY take Notice … and that is to the Glory of God …

5. People, good and bad, will take notice and those truly searching will find verification of the truth that they hope is real.

6. The most dangerous thing to the Kingdom of death, is the resurrection life lived out by a new creation in Christ Jesus

v48 “if we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him”

7. IF This were a Church FULL of men, women, students, boys, and girls, Living the Resurrection Life in their Homes, Schools, and Jobs … then we’d start clearing out some of the Abortion Clinics and Abuse Shelters, The Boats and Bars, the Drug houses and Divorce Courts … and we’d see the Spiritual Graveyards Emptying and the Houses of Worship Full …

Talk about dying and giving a testimony, I found something yesterday online. A company called Vidstone … makes solar powered video screens that can play 5-8 minutes of multi-media content. They will mount their video screen along with headphones to a Gravesite Monument or Headstone. I thought wow … wouldn’t that be cool to offer a witness up for the rest of history to anyone who happens to be in cemetery … perhaps they would stop and listen and watch.

Maybe I could say something like “don’t stand too close … in case of rapture, I’m going up” J “will you meet me in the air?” …

But you know … I think that’s cool, and I might want to have one … but The Greatest witness also has renewable fuel cells … It’s a Born Again Believer in Jesus Christ, Living the Resurrected Life

Are you Living a Resurrected Life?

Who’s watching you?

Come Out of the Tombs

Leave Behind the Grave Clothes

Go … in the Power of the Spirit of God