John 11:31-44
31 When the Jews who had been with Mary in the house, comforting her, noticed how quickly she got up and went out, they followed her, supposing she was going to the tomb to mourn there.
32 When Mary reached the place where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”
33 When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. 34 “Where have you laid him?” he asked.
“Come and see, Lord,” they replied.
35 Jesus wept.
36 Then the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”
37 But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”
38 Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. 39 “Take away the stone,” he said.
“But, Lord,” said Martha, the sister of the dead man, “by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days.”
40 Then Jesus said, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”
41 So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42 I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.”
43 When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 44 The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.
Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.” [1]
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Last week at confirmation our theme was “Where is God when it hurts?” We talked about God and suffering, what it means and how God is with us in our suffering. This is one of the passages we talked about, Jesus weeping outside the tomb of Lazarus.
One of the points made by skeptics is that God can’t be both all loving and all powerful. If He’s all loving He can’t be all powerful because He apparently can’t stop bad things from happening. And if He’s all powerful, He must not be all-loving, because He apparently chooses to let us suffer. This is not a new discussion and in fact we see it in this passage in verses 36-37 regarding Jesus.
But in this passage we do see the love of Jesus, moved to weeping by the loss of His friend. And we see the power of Jesus, doing the impossible in raising the dead. He is both all-loving and all-powerful. It’s just so hard for us though because we can’t see what He sees, and know what He knows.
The truth is that He is at work in our suffering in ways we cannot see, and may not see until eternity. I believe that resurrection means that God is at work in all the broken pieces of our lives – even in the pieces that He let break – to work a glory and a blessing beyond our comprehension.
But does this meant that God is uncaring? That He is the ultimate task-focused Vulcan, running roughshod over hurting people for the sake of His master plan?
This passage answers that question, because whenever we want to know what God is like, we look at Jesus. There is Jesus, who made the choice to allow Lazarus to die, and the tears are streaming down his face. He is deeply moved and troubled in spirit. God allows bad things and it breaks His heart to do so. But that’s why the Word become flesh and went to the cross and rose again: To give to us and all creation the eternal solution, a rebirth and resurrection in Him
So this passage today is leading me to pray for those who are going through suffering, and there’s no shortage of them on my list. I’m praying that they find strength and comfort in the presence of Jesus, who weeps with them.
What is the Word leading you to pray about today?
[1] The New International Version. 2011 (Jn 11:31–44). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
