Sermon Tone Analysis

Intro:

Transition:

Context: Reflect on funerals I have done… my own grief and loss… no more finalized time, what will life be like without someone I have always known life with… (we try to sanitize death.

Today this process has been sanitized, taken over by professional hospitals, hospices, and morticians.

As a result, few of us have seen someone die, and I dare say that before the twentieth century there were few who had not seen someone die.

We build coffins that look like plush, oversized jewelry boxes and cemeteries that evoke the peace and serenity of a botanical garden.

We use euphemisms (“Mrs.

Taylor passed away on Tuesday”) to gloss over what we dare not say.

All of this is cultural, springing from the heartfelt wish to make death pleasant.

But it masks a profound anxiety that even the prettiest funeral service cannot disguise.

Burge, G. M. (2000).

John (p.

326).

Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House.

After the final confrontation in the temple, our Lord went to the wilderness to carry on his ministry (10:40).

The last verse in John 10 says, “And in that place many believed in Jesus.”

His ministry was fruitful.

But while he was there, a personal emergency arose in Bethany.

READ 1-14

crucial!!!

Jesus responded with a sermonette.

Employing the traditional religious theme of light and darkness usually associated with good and evil, he applied these symbols to the imagery of travel by day and night.

The former permits of safe travel whereas the latter is to be associated with the danger of stumbling.

But picking up the theme from the Festival of Tabernacles that he was “the light of the world” (cf.

8:12; 9:5), Jesus reminded his disciples that the light enables them to see (blepein).

Conversely, those who do not have the light in (en) them were in danger of stumbling.

Time designations in John often carry powerful theological implications such as references to “night” (e.g., 3:2; 13:30) and “winter” (10:22).

Like Nicodemus, who came by night, Jesus was implicitly suggesting in his sermonette that the disciples needed to deal with their spiritual condition of “nightness” by relying on the presence in their midst of “the light” (Jesus).

Unfortunately, it will become evident in the crucial remark of Thomas (11:16) that the disciples were stuck in the fearful condition of night and were not responding to the presence of light.

Paul spoke of death as the last great enemy (cf. 1 Cor 15:26; Rev 20:14).

To deal with that “last” enemy requires the Lord of life.

In such a reality context of death Jesus told his disciples that he was glad he had not been at the bedside of Lazarus because what was about to happen would greatly enhance their believing (11:15)

Thomas is not a flat, one-dimensional character in John.

He appears as a real person with genuine personality characteristics.

Here he recognized the imminent danger that was lurking in the south, but he was willing to follow and to die with Jesus (11:16).

History, I believe, has treated Thomas rather superficially.

Although he can be labeled as a doubter, I cannot help but ask, Who would cast the first stone in condemnation (cf.

8:7) of him?

Surely one can sense that his realism also was linked with courage here.

And one must never forget that Thomas offered the major confession of this Gospel following the resurrection (20:28).

The organization of this chapter is rather straightforward.

Following the introduction (11:1–4), the miracle story can be divided into four segments: Jesus’ dialogue with the disciples (11:5–16), his encounter with Martha (11:17–27), his encounter with Mary as well as the mourners (11:28–37), and the miracle at the tomb (11:38–44).

The chapter then contains three final segments: the hostile reaction of the Jewish authorities epitomized in the Passover plot (11:45–53)

Humans generally interpret any delay in rendering help as cruel because of our perspectives on the avoidance of all pain and because of our general commitment to the immediacy of action as it pertains to time.

But cruelty is hardly what this story is about.

When one reviews the time sequences in the story, it is quite possible that Lazarus was dead by the time Jesus received the message.

By the time Jesus reached the tomb, the text says that Lazarus had been dead four days (11:39).

Given the two-day delay and the time for travel, both of the messenger and of Jesus, it is not impossible that the sick man could have died while the messenger was en route.

If such was the case, then the argument, as will become clear later, has an entirely different focus.

Paul prays that Christians will know the hope and the power available to them in Christ.

He prays that the reality of their rich inheritance will transform them and that they will have a glimpse of the power of God at work when Jesus came from the grave.

This is an apt description of the sort of confidence he carried as he stepped into Bethany that afternoon: God is victor over death.

Jesus, as his Son, likewise understood God’s “incomparably great power” to call a man like Lazarus out of the tomb.

He is in control v.1-

So the sisters sent word to Jesus, ‘Lord, the one you love is sick.’

Implied in this message was a request that Jesus come and heal Lazarus (cf.

11:21–22, 32).

The basis of this request was Jesus’ love for Lazarus (cf.

5).

Love the below observation and explination cut and paste it in...

The sisters’ implied request to Jesus to come and heal their brother was based upon his love for Lazarus (3).

In 11:5 the evangelist reiterates Jesus’ love for Lazarus and his sisters.

This shows that Jesus’ failure to respond in the normal way, staying where he was for two more days, was not due to any lack of love for either Lazarus, who was on the verge of death, or his sisters, who had sent the urgent request for help.

The NIV translation ‘yet when he heard’, which implies that Jesus’ delay was somehow at odds with his love for them, is misleading.

The original (hōs oun ēkousen) should be rendered ‘so when he heard’ (as in the RSV), which shows that Jesus’ delay was not at odds with his love, but motivated by it.

How could this be?

When Jesus arrived, Lazarus had been dead for four days.

Had he left immediately, Lazarus would still have been dead for two days.

So nothing would have been gained by an immediate departure.

However, there was something to be gained by waiting two days before setting out.

The spirit of the departed was thought to hover around the body for three days in the hope of a resuscitation.

The raising of Lazarus after four days, then, would be clearly seen as a manifestation of the glory of God (4), which would strengthen the two sisters’ faith.

This was not an invitation or even a request.

They did not say, “Lord, please come.”

They just assumed that as soon as the Lord learned of the situation, he would hurry there.

They knew Jesus.

They understood his wonderful compassion.

The word they used for “love” is the word for friendship.

They were saying, “Your good friend whom you love is sick.”

Of course Jesus would come—to think otherwise was inconceivable.

The word translated “loved” here is a different word than the sisters used.

It is the word agape—that unstoppable, highest type of love, the love of God.

Christ loves us with that kind of love.

Knowing this, we might expect Scripture to say, “Jesus, upon hearing that Lazarus was sick, went to one of his disciples, found a horse, and rode as fast as he could to be with Lazarus!”

But that is not what our text says.

Our text says he loved Mary, Martha, and Lazarus so much that he stayed away.

Incredible!

From ground level it sometimes appears to us that even though we are Christ’s children and we love him, he does not care about us anymore.

At times, humanly speaking, our circumstances seem to admit no other interpretation than that.

I think about Joseph being sold by his brothers into slavery.

Here we read the story of the most dramatic, provocative miracle in this Gospel.

Jesus is master of life and death and proves it by bringing Lazarus back from the grave.

John assumes that Mary (11:2) is so well known to his readers that he can refer to her as the one who anointed Jesus with oil even before he describes the scene (12:1–8).

No doubt they are in a dilemma.

They know about the hostility of the Jerusalem’s leadership toward Jesus (11:8) and conclude that for Jesus to visit would mean considerable risk

to help us reflect on the confidence and power of the person of Christ, and to wonder at the truth and glory of his presence on the earth.

As we have seen in other chapters (e.g., chs.

1; 4; 9), John 11 provides another catalogue of names for Jesus so that we as readers will not miss who this central character is (Jesus, rabbi, Lord, Christ, Son of God, he who is coming into the world, the resurrection and the life).

Therefore John 11 teaches us not simply about an idea, but about a person.

It will not do simply to say that the Lazarus story is about men and women coming from death to life metaphorically, having their grave clothes removed as they are converted to Christ.

This is an important theme, but is better suited to or 4, where people move toward faith out of their religious (and irreligious) contexts.

is about real life and real death.

It is about Jesus’ death (and life) as well as our own.