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The death of Lazarus; man's real state; evil allowed to go on to the end
We come now to the testimony which the Father renders to Jesus
in answer to His rejection. In this chapter the power of
resurrection and of life in His own Person are presented to faith.*
But here it is not simply that He is rejected: man is looked upon
as dead, and Israel also. For it is man in the person of
Lazarus. This family was blessed; it received the Lord into its
bosom. Lazarus falls sick. All the Lord's human affections would
be naturally concerned. Martha and Mary feel this; and they send
Him word that he whom He loved was sick. But Jesus stays where He
is. He might have said the word, as in the case of the centurion,
and of the sick child at the beginning of this Gospel. But He did
not. He had manifested His power and His goodness in healing man as
he is found on earth, and delivering him from the enemy, and that
in the midst of Israel. But this was not His object here — far
from it — or the limits of what He was come to do. It was a
question of bestowing life, or raising up again that which was dead
before God. This was the real state of Israel; it was the state of
man. Therefore He allows the condition of man under sin to go on
and manifest itself in all the intensity of its effects down here,
and permits the enemy to exercise his power to the end. Nothing
remained but the judgment of God; and death, in itself, convicted
man of sin while conducting him to judgment. The sick may be healed
— there is no remedy for death. All is over for man, as man here
below. Nothing remains but the judgment of God. It is appointed
unto men once to die, but after this the judgment. The Lord
therefore does not heal in this instance. He allows the evil to go
on to the end — to death. That was the true place of man. Lazarus
once fallen asleep, He goes to awaken him. The disciples fear the
Jews, and with reason. But the Lord, having waited for His Father's
will, does not fear to accomplish it. It was day to Him. Lazarus' death not prevented; Christ who died shown to be the resurrection and the life
But let us follow out the depths of this doctrine. Death has
come in; it must take effect. Man is really in death before God;
but God in grace comes in. Two things are presented in our
history. He might have healed. The faith and hope of neither
Martha, Mary, nor the Jews, went any farther. Only Martha
acknowledges that, as the Messiah, favoured of God, He would obtain
from Him whatsoever He asked. But He had not prevented the death of
Lazarus. He had done so many times, even for strangers, for
whosoever desired it. In the second place, Martha knew that her
brother would rise again at the last day; but true as it was, this
truth availed nothing. Who would answer for man, dead through
judgment on sin? To rise again and appear before God was not an
answer to death come in by sin. The two things were true. Christ
had often delivered mortal man from his sufferings in flesh, and
there shall be a resurrection at the last day. But these things
were of no value in the presence of death. Christ was, however,
there; and He is, thanks be to God! the resurrection and the life.
Man being dead, resurrection comes first. But Jesus is the
resurrection and the life in the present power of a divine
life. And observe that life, coming by resurrection, delivers from
all that death implies, and leaves it behind* — sin, death, all
that belongs to the life that man has lost. Christ, having died for
our sins, has borne their punishment — has borne them. He has
died. All the power of the enemy, all its effect on mortal man, all
the judgment of God, He has borne it all, and has come up from it,
in the power of a new life in resurrection, which is imparted to
us; so that we are in spirit alive from among the dead, as He is
alive from among the dead. Sin (as made sin, and bearing our sins
in His own body on the tree), death, Satan's power, God's judgment,
are all past through and left behind, and man is in a wholly new
state, in incorruption. It will be true of us, if we die (for we
shall not all die), as to the body, or, being changed, if we do not
die. But in the communication of His life who is risen from the
dead, God has quickened us with Him, having forgiven us all our
trespasses. Life communicated by Christ to the believer: death cannot subsist before Him
Jesus here manifested His own divine power to this effect; the
Son of God was glorified in it, for we know He had not yet died for
sin; but it was this same power in Him that was manifested.* The
believer, even if he were dead, shall rise again; and the living
who believe in Him shall not die. Christ has overcome death; the
power for this was in His Person, and the Father bore Him witness
of it. Are any that are His alive when the Lord exercises this
power? They will never die — death exists no more in His
presence. Have any died before He exercises it? They shall live — death cannot subsist before Him. All the effect of sin upon man is
completely destroyed by resurrection, viewed as the power of life
in Christ. This refers of course to the saints, to whom life is
communicated. The same divine power is, of course, exercised as to
the wicked; but it is not the communication of life from Christ,
nor being raised with Him, as is evident.** Death the end of natural life; resurrection the end of death
Christ exercised this power in obedience and in dependence on
His Father, because He was man, walking before God to do His will;
but He is the resurrection and the life. He has brought the power
of divine life into the midst of death; and death is annihilated by
it, for in life death is no more. Death was the end of natural life
to sinful man. Resurrection is the end of death, which has thus no
longer anything in us. It is our advantage that, having done all it
could do, it is finished. We live in the life* that put an end to
it. We come out from all that could be connected with a life that
no longer exists. What a deliverance! Christ is this power. He
became this for us in its full display and exercise in His
resurrection. The need and sorrow of Martha and Mary: the Lord's sympathyMartha, while loving Him and believing in Him, does not understand this; and she calls Mary, feeling that her sister would better understand the Lord. We will speak a little of these two presently. Mary, who waited for the Lord's own calling her to Him, modestly though sorrowfully leaving the initiative with Him, believing thus that the Lord had called her, goes to Him directly. Jews and Martha and Mary all had seen miracles and healings that had arrested the power of death. To this they all refer. But here life had passed away. What now could help? If He had been there, His love and power they could have counted on. Mary falls down at His feet weeping. On the point of resurrection power she understood no more than Martha; but her heart is melted under the sense of death in the presence of Him who had life. It is an expression of need and sorrow rather than a complaint that she utters. The Jews also weep: the power of death was on their hearts. Jesus enters into it in sympathy. He was troubled in spirit. He sighs before God, He weeps with man; but His tears turn into a groan, which was, though inarticulate, the weight of death, felt in sympathy, and presented to God by this groan of love which fully realised the truth; and that in love to those who were suffering the ill that His groan expressed. The need brings the Lord's power to meet itHe bore death before God in His spirit as the misery of man — the yoke from which man could not deliver himself, and He is heard. The need brings His power into action. It was not His part now patiently to explain to Martha what He was. He feels and acts upon the need to which Mary had given expression, her heart being opened by the grace that was in Him. Man's sympathy and the exercise of the power of life by the Son of GodMan may sympathise: it is the expression of his powerlessness. Jesus enters into the affliction of mortal man, puts Himself under the burden of death that weighs upon man (and that more thoroughly than man himself can do), but He takes it away with its cause. He does more than take it away; He brings in the power that is able to take it away. This is the glory of God. When Christ is present, if we die, we do not die for death, but for life: we die that we may live in the life of God, instead of in the life of man. And wherefore? That the Son of God may be glorified. Death came in by sin; and man is under the power of death. But this has only given room for our possessing life according to the second Adam, the Son of God, and not according to the first Adam, the sinful man. This is grace. God is glorified in this work of grace, and it is the Son of God whose glory shines brightly forth in this divine work. Martha and Mary, and what marked themAnd, observe, that this is not grace offered in testimony, it is the exercise of the power of life. Corruption itself is no hindrance to God. Why did Christ come? To bring the words of eternal life to dead man. Now Mary fed upon those words. Martha served — cumbered her heart with many things. She believed, she loved Jesus, she received Him into her house: the Lord loved her. Mary listened to Him: this was what He came for; and He had justified her in it. The good part which she had chosen should not be taken from her. When the Lord arrives, Martha goes of her own accord to meet Him. She withdraws when Jesus speaks to her of the present power of life. We are ill at ease when, although Christians, we feel unable to apprehend the meaning of the Lord's words, or of what His people say to us. Martha felt that this was rather Mary's part than hers. She goes away and calls her sister, saying, that the Master (He who taught — observe this name that she gives Him) was come, and called for her. It was her own conscience that was to her the voice of Christ. Mary instantly arises and comes to Him. She understood no more than Martha. Her heart pours out its need at the feet of Jesus, where she had heard His words and learnt His love and grace; and Jesus asks the way to the grave. To Martha, ever occupied with circumstances, her brother stank already. The family at BethanyAfterwards (Martha served, and Lazarus was present), Mary anoints the Lord, in the instinctive sense of what was going on; for they were consulting to put Him to death. Her heart, taught by love to the Lord, felt the enmity of the Jews; and her affection, stimulated by deep gratitude, expends on Him the most costly thing she had. Those present blame her; Jesus again takes her part. It might not be reasonable, but she had apprehended His position. What a lesson! What a blessed family was this at Bethany, in which the heart of Jesus found (as far as could be on earth) a relief that His love accepted! With what love have we to do! Alas, with what hatred! for we see in this Gospel the dreadful opposition between man and God. God's testimony of his grace thrown over His feeblest servantsThere is an interesting point to be observed here before we pass on. The Holy Ghost has recorded an incident, in which the momentary but guilty unbelief of Thomas was covered by the Lord's grace. It was needful to relate it; but the Holy Ghost has taken care to show us, that Thomas loved the Lord, and was ready, at heart, to die with Him. We have other instances of the same kind. Paul says, "Take Mark, and bring him with thee; for he is profitable to me for the ministry." Poor Mark! this was necessary on account of what took place at Perga. Barnabas also has the same place in the apostle's affection and remembrance. We are weak: God does not hide it from us; but He throws the testimony of His grace over the feeblest of His servants. Jesus' death proposed by the high priest; the Lord quietly in the place of serviceBut to continue. Caiaphas, the chief of the Jews, as high priest, proposes the death of Jesus, because He had restored Lazarus to life. And from that day they conspire against Him. Jesus yields to it. He came to give His life a ransom for many. He goes on to fulfil the work His love had undertaken, in accordance with His Father's will, whatever might be the devices and the malice of men. The work of life and Or death, of Satan and of God, were face to face. But the counsels of God were being accomplished in grace, whatever the means might be. Jesus devotes Himself to the work by which they were to be fulfilled. Having shown the power of resurrection and of life in Himself, He is again, when the time comes, quietly in the place to which His service led Him; but He no longer goes in the same manner as before into the temple. He goes thither indeed; but the question between God and man was morally settled already. |
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