As often happens, when I study one thing out, I'll see something new that is related to it. That is the precept upon precept principle of Isaiah 28:10 at work. In this case, I got a fresh view of the way Jesus closed the door on the devil when He raised Lazarus.
There were many opportunities for the devil to use fear, doubt, and unbelief that day. Those are the schemes that he uses to 'substantiate" his lies. People who concentrate on their fear, who dwell upon their doubts, and who wallow in unbelief put themselves in Satan's robbery zone. This is how the devil succeeded in turning KatieLyn, Woman of Destiny, into a runaway bride. Satan got her to think that his lies proved that the marriage would not work.
But back to John 11. Let's go through the chapter in order to see the progression:
(verse numbers shown for reference)
3. The sisters, may and Martha, sent a message to Jesus: "Lord, the one You love (Lazarus) is sick."
4. This is where Jesus begins shutting the door on the devil. Jesus' initial and immediate response was to speak faith-filled words: "This sickness will not end in death but is for the glory of God." Lazarus was not dead—yet; Jesus declared the outcome at the onset. This was a "word" foundation to which He would later be able to apply an "act of faith." With those two components in place, it would then be the Father's job to bring it to pass. Man's chief role is to hear the word and act in obedience to it.
6. When Jesus heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was. He knew His Father's timing had a purpose: increased and amplified Glory. Jesus was coming into the home stretch of his earth ministry, which meant that he was ramping up and doing the advanced class levels now.
7. A couple days later, Jesus tells His disciples, "Let us go to Judea again."
8. We can tell by their response that Lazarus' condition was not the top thing on their minds. They were far more concerned about being the targets of stoning.
9-11. Jesus gives them a metaphorical reply which basically says that His spiritual eyes are wide open, He has seen how to avoid that problem, but Lazarus needs help.
12-13. Initially, Jesus uses 'sleep' as a euphemism for 'dead.' This often puzzles many people, but once you see that Satan's strategy is to insert doubt and unbelief so that the disciples will have 'misgivings' about Jesus original statement that "the sickness would not end in death," You can understand that Jesus was walking circumspectly (cf Ephesians 5:15 'See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise,') by not giving the devil any extra ammo to shoot (eg. fiery darts, Ephesians 6:16) at his already wavering disciples. (That watch-your-words to preserve-your-faith skill point, however, would remain over their heads until after Jesus was resurrected, had ascended into heaven, and sent the Holy Spirit to teach them.)
15. With a touch of foreshadowing, Jesus says, "I am glad for your sakes that I was not there" in Bethany when Lazarus died. The reason He was glad was so that the disciples could have the opportunity "to believe," which requires them to have faith in what He had said from the get-go.
Notice that Jesus has now stated that, "for your sake I am glad I was not there." When He does get there, the first words out of the sisters' mouths will lament that he was not there. Two women, with the best intentions, will blurt out stuff that is 180° out of phase with the purpose of the Father, the purpose that Jesus will carry out with an act of faith when commanding Lazarus to "Come forth!"
17. When Jesus got close to Lazarus' hometown, He found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. This gives us a bit of insight into how Jesus communicated with and received revelation from His Father. Jesus had known by the Spirit that Lazarus was dead before he made the return trip to Judea, but he had not been given the full picture.
[As an aside, this plays into KatieLyn's disastrous run into the night. She had been told the essential information—that Joe was the man God picked for her husband. But like Jesus, she had not received all the details. These were left for them to discover as they walked in obedience. Fortunately, Jesus' mom was not chronically looking over his shoulder, reading his mail, and fighting with Him about the "what-ifs" of Lazarus' being in a stinking tomb.]20-21. When Martha hears that Jesus is in the vicinity, she runs to him and blurts out, "Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died." It was nice that she remembered to use a proper term of address, Lord. This tells us that even in her state of distress, she still retained half a clue about the position of Jesus and the power of God.
23. This is where Jesus keeps His hand on the closing door. Jesus responds, not with an apology, but with a strong statement of faith: "Your brother will rise again." He says it as a fact, not as a hope or a wish.
[KatieLyn had the same option available to her; she could have chosen to confirm what the Lord had told her previously. Unfortunately, she had a mother who was telling her that consideration of doubts was wise.]
24. Martha struggles. She wants to believe that Lazarus will rise again, but her mind is not renewed, and its thinking in worldly, fleshly patterns of reasoning. Trying to make sense of it all, she goes to sounding very religious: "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day." While true, that is not what Jesus had told her. This is another strategy of Satan; he substitutes an alternative truth that pulls your faith off the main point, but does not bother your conscience because you are still believing "a" truth. The less that your conscience is bothered, the thicker that your pride can grow.
25-26. Martha's words had cracked opened the door to the devil and she had not even noticed it. She was convinced that she was "saying the right thing." But her future tense statement is one of hope, not one of faith. Without faith, it is impossible... (Hebrews 11:6) Jesus gets her back on point with His in-the here-and-now faith statement, "I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die."
This call to believe the resurrection and the life, when acted on, shut the door to on the devil's lies.
27. In the end, Martha makes the proper choice of whom to believe, and get her timing right as well. She concludes, "Yes, Lord; I have believed that You are the Christ, the Son of God, even He who comes into the world."
32. Martha went back and told Mary that Jesus was just outside the village. Mary get up and goes to Him,saying essentially the same thing her sister had said earlier, "Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died."
33. Although the wording was identical, the voice inflection and presumably her motivation was somewhat different because Mary was weeping when she said it. It would seem that Mary "didn't have her public face together" quite as well as her sister did. Jesus was moved by the weeping.
34-35. Jesus response was different with Mary than it had been with Martha. "'Where have you laid him?' he asked. 'Come and see, Lord,' they replied." Jesus wept.
36-37. Those who saw this were of two minds. One group looked for Jesus' heart and commented on His love for Lazarus. Others analyzed his so-far inaction and questioned His power.
With the benefits of being outside observers to this story, we know that Jesus' weeping was not soley for Lazarus; He had already heard from His Father and knew that Lazarus was due to return in glory. Some, if not most, of the weeping was for the lost state of those standing around Him. But that need was going to be met too—for some, but not all. It would be their choice.
41-42. Ultimately, the miracle greater than raising Lazarus was the miracle of having the crowd believe that the Father had sent Jesus. That is evident in the prayer Jesus prayed after the stone was rolled away.
"Jesus raised His eyes, and said, 'Father, I thank You that You have heard Me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this on account of the people standing around, that they may believe that you sent me.'"
This is where Jesus finished shutting the door on the devil. Faith was in place, and His action would be the catalyst to bring it to life—for faith without works is dead.
It was time for action. Jesus calls Lazarus to come forth and orders that the bindings be loosened. The story continues...
45. Many of the Jews who came with Mary and saw Jesus in action believed in him.
46. But some went to the Pharisees and stirred them up further by telling them what Jesus had done.
48. John, the author of this Gospel, tells us the true motivation of the Pharisees: "If we let Jesus go on like this, all men will believe in Him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation."
A man had been raised from the dead, the Glory had been seen, and the Pharisees were concerned about losing their rank and position!
The Lesson
Gwen is a Pharisee. The Lord was ready to show His glory by uniting a couple in marriage, If KatieLyn had believed, we'd have seen the miracle of two becoming one. But Gwen was concerned about losing her position, about Joe taking KatieLyn away from her! The codependency would crumble.
Gwen began acting exactly like the Pharisees did.
53. So from that day on, the Pharisees planned together to kill Jesus.
Gwen did not physically kill bodies, but she set out to kill the love in KatieLyn's heart. She did that.
Jesus closed the door on the devil when it came to those who would value His word enough to have their faith increased, but He did not change the intents of the hearts of those who considered worldly position and prestige to be more important than seeing God's glory.
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