The One Who Believes in Jesus, the Resurrection and the Life (John 11:17-27)

Let us bless one another, Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God. I pray that the new grace of God will come upon everyone that are worshipping in their homes with their family, on the roof, and in the church. Everyone has no choice but to face death, everybody knows that death is a reality; it is a fact. However, how are we going to overcome that death? There’s no one who overcomes death, so a lot of ways that people try to avoid death is to live a life of hedonism and pleasure. In reality, the reason why people indulge so much in eating, drinking, and revelry is because they are avoiding death. There are also people who live a pious life because they try to overcome death with their righteous living.

Many people challenge to overcome death through something called religion. If you look at the pyramids in Egypt, the Pharaohs dreamed of an eternal life after death. Even in China, if you look at the very ancient monarchs, they created clay statues of soldiers so they could take all their warriors with them into the afterlife, after death.

What happens if you’re not able to solve this problem called death? You just live your life on the earth, then your life ends. It doesn’t matter how kindly or well you try to live your life on earth with success. You’re honestly being dragged to death. In one way, you can see the life you’re living today is walking one step closer to death.

Whatever you’re working for or studying towards, honestly speaking, you’re doing that for death, but people try to reject that. Even if you reject it, death will find you, and then when you stand before death, you have no choice but to surrender entirely. However, people try to reject that, they don’t acknowledge it and live for today so diligently, so you have to solve this. Without solving that problem, you cannot have happiness in life.

1. Death of Lazarus

Today’s passage talks about the family of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus who are all siblings; they don’t mention a parent, but Jesus was really close with them since childhood.

1) Lazarus Falls Ill

Lazarus gets deathly ill, so, the family members send someone to request Jesus to come back quickly. Jesus was about 2 miles from where they were, and it was about a 30 minute walk. Mary, one of the sisters of Lazarus, was the one who poured out a very expensive perfume upon Jesus’ feet and washed his feet with her own hair. That perfume is actually more expensive than an entire year’s worth of wages, and it is also the dowry that women take when they get married. She just used that entire bottle to wash Jesus’ feet. So their family and household was very devoted to Jesus Christ, and Jesus would go back and forth from that household very comfortably in a close friendship.

2) Jesus’ Reaction

That Mary went to Jesus and said, “Lazarus is sick,” and Jesus’ response in John 11:4 was that, “This sickness will not end in death, but it is for God’s glory so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.” When the Bible talks about the glory of God, it is talking about God’s intended result. According to God’s intended plan, the result will follow exactly in accordance with the plan. In other words, whatever is happening right now is because God has a plan, therefore, you’ll be able to see God’s glory and receive God’s glory.

But a lot of people don’t understand what this means. Even though he was so close to where they were, He stayed where he was for two days and bided His time. That family knows He’s only about 30 minutes away, so they continued to wait. There’s something we need to restore in our own faith with this. They knew that their older brother would be healed if Jesus Christ came, but Jesus did not come. From there, we have a lot of conflicts, cowardice, and fear, but we need to believe in God’s timeline.

It’s not about solving the problems I want to be solved, in the way I want them solved, in the time I want them to be solved. I’m sure you have a concern in your life that you want solved right now. You know that God is alive, but your problem is not solved, and that is when our faith becomes very confusing. I absolutely believe that God exists, but why is He not solving the problem that needs to be solved right now?

The real problem is that you don’t believe in God’s time schedule. Even if they didn’t say anything to Jesus, I’m sure that Lazarus’s sisters were upset at Jesus. Jesus waited there for two days and then walked slowly over. What did Jesus say? Jesus said through His disciples, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; let’s go to wake him up.” Because the disciples have never heard of the spiritual term of “falling asleep,” they interpreted it in a physical way and thought, “We’re just going to wake up Lazarus from a nap.”

Even though we listen to the Word of God, we’re not able to listen to it spiritually. It’s the same thing today. We listen to the words of Jesus Christ, but we listen physically instead of spiritually, and that’s why the disciples had all these foolish reactions. The Bible expresses physical death as, “Going to sleep,” because we are eternal beings. When we die physically, that’s just falling asleep.

Even though we listen to the Word of God, we’re not able to listen to it spiritually.

3) Disciples’ Reactions

What was God’s intended result here? In John 11:15, Jesus says, “For your sake, I’m glad I was not there so that you may believe.” Even in Lazarus’s death, Jesus’ interest was in the disciples. He wanted to give them faith, and later on, we’ll talk about what kind of faith that is. Jesus Christ is getting closer to the time where He had to go upon the cross to die.

When Jesus first came, He said, “I am the Light of the world,” and because our fields are so varied and diverse, we need to believe Jesus Christ and know Him correctly within our field. Jesus Christ being the Light of the world means that the world itself is dark. Jesus also said, “I am the gate for the sheep,” and nobody can go into the Kingdom of God without going through Jesus Christ. He said, “I am the Good Shepherd,” and that means He is our owner. Why did Jesus Christ explain Himself in these various ways? Because the present circumstances and reality of our lives can take many different forms, so Jesus Christ is explaining Himself in many different ways. Today, Jesus Christ is creating this entire scenario so that He can give the message of God regarding death.

2. Tomb of Lazarus

Then in John 11:17, it says that Jesus Christ arrived at the house. “After Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days, He went to the house with His disciples.” That means that, after He heard the news of Lazarus being sick, He waited there for two days, then He took two more days to walk over.

1) Martha and Mary

Imagine what Martha and Mary must have felt during the time while they were waiting. They were going crazy. Lazarus was already dead, and it’s been four days since he’s died. “There’s nothing that happens after death; he’s dead.” No matter what kind of answers you use to try to avoid death, even if you do transcendental meditation or some kind of mind control, when you face death, you die.

2) Jesus’s and Martha’s Reactions

Upon hearing that Jesus Christ arrived, Martha runs out to greet Him, and in John 17:21, Martha says to Jesus, “If You had been here, my Lord, my brother would not have died.” What does that mean? It means she was sad.

Is there anything you think is unfair or discouraging from God? Mary was someone who devoted all her expensive perfume to Jesus, but she didn’t even go out to greet Him; she was stuck in her room. She felt wronged, she thought, “Look at all I’ve done for you, Jesus.” Is Jesus the problem or are these two women the problem?

They do not believe in the perfection of Jesus; they don’t believe that Jesus must have a plan. Their only interest is their brother not dying. They just wanted their sickness to be healed. Our interest is in solving our problems, our interest is in quickly restoring our business, or our interest is in quickly restoring our children, but the Lord just stays still and we cannot wait for Him. That might be our present reality.

Martha continues in John 17:22, “But I know that even now, God will give You whatever You ask.” When I look at a lot of American people, when they speak English and have a conversation, they use the words, “I know, I know,” a lot. When I tell my daughter, “Don’t say that, it makes me feel bad,” and she says, “I know, I know.” I think that’s a very common reaction in American culture, to just react, saying, “I know, I know.”

Here, Martha says, “But I know that even now, God will give You whatever You ask.” By looking at this, we can see she has a lot of theological knowledge. She’s standing in front of God Himself and says, “I know that God will give You whatever You ask,” isn’t that a little ironic?

Then Jesus says, “Your brother will rise again.” Then Martha continues to say, “I know, he will rise again on the resurrection in the last day,” and she keeps saying, “I know.” It’s easy for people to become like this if they go to church a long time, if they know the Bible, and especially if they’ve studied theology. There are people who know a lot of religious doctrine, but they still don’t believe.

3) Jesus Christ

This woman Martha is saying, “I know,” and the Lord is standing right in front of her, God is right next to her, but she just knows things as doctrine and theory. Jesus responds to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in Me will live even though they die, and whoever lives by believing in Me will never die. Do you believe this?”

Why are you always conflicted in your faith? Why does it always feel like your faith isn’t resolved? It’s because you know, you know who God is and you know the history and works of God, and you know who Jesus is, but what’s not happening? You don’t believe that Jesus Christ is the resurrection and that He is right now with you. That is the beginning of every problem.

Why are you always conflicted in your faith? You don’t believe that Jesus Christ is the resurrection and that He is right now with you. That is the beginning of every problem.

Nonbelievers don’t believe at all, but believers know without believing. In order for you to believe, you have to know to begin with, but the goal of knowing something is to believe. Resurrection means that He is the One who overcame death, it means that for Jesus Christ, death is not a problem. He has eternal life. The One who has eternal life is right in front of her, but she was not able to see Him.

She knew everything in terms of doctrine, and imagine how much she did Bible study. She knows everything so much. She’s gone to seminary, she knows the religious doctrine so well, but she doesn’t believe that God is right in front of her, right now.

4) Jesus’s Question and Martha’s Response

Then in John 17:27, Martha responds, “Yes, Lord, I believe that You are the Christ, the Son of God Who is to come into the world.” If you just know something as knowledge with religious doctrine, there is no life in that. It’s just knowledge that you learned on a piece of paper; it’s very different than seeing the realistic life in God that Jesus Christ gives.

When is the devil bound? When you truly believe in the fact that the Lord is with you as True and Eternal Life, all of your worries and anxieties will disappear. Unless that happens, you will always been enslaved by Satan and physical things because of your fear of death. You’ll always be a slave to the problems in front of your eyes that have to be resolved right now.

The Lord has resurrected and is with you right now as True Life and the problem in front of you is not a problem at all. Whether the problem is there or not, that problem is not a problem at all, and the reason is because the Lord is with you, living, right now. David said, “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,” it means that his circumstances are very fearful, and the reason why he doesn’t fear is because the LORD is his Shepherd.

Fear is something the devil gives you; it’s not even something you create yourself, but it’s something the devil gives you, and that’s how the devil works, through fear. God says, “I do not give you fear; I give you peace,” and it’s very easy to tell whether something is the work of God or the work of the devil. Are you afraid, or are you at peace?

Even if there are so many problems before you, the reason why you’re not afraid is because the Lord is with you as True Life. That’s what it means to overcome death, that’s what it means to be truly strong. Every single person in this entire world is struggling in life, trying not to fail or die, and trying whatever they can to avoid this thing called death.

3. Jesus Christ’s Goal

After Martha makes this confession, Jesus goes to find Lazarus’ Tomb.

1) Open the Door of the Tomb (John 11:39)

God doesn’t move when you know something. God moves when you believe. The kids come up to me and say, “Pastor, I know this already,” but do you believe? You’re only afraid because you don’t believe. You think your problems are a problem because you don’t believe, and that’s why church members become so confused, because they think they know everything but the problems are still there.

If you believe, a problem is not a problem at all. If you believe in the life, then even death itself is not a problem. While you’re living on this earth, you’ll have eternal life and you’ll continue to live this eternal life even after this earth, and that is why you’ve been liberated from death. You’ve been liberated from the devil who controls death.

A lot of people talk about the death on the cross, but they don’t talk about the resurrection; they just squeeze out these tears, saying, “Jesus Christ died for my sins,” but they don’t talk about the resurrection. What happens then? It is true that you receive salvation because Jesus died for you on the cross, but if you don’t believe in the resurrection, you’ll be trapped in problems as a slave to death.

It means Jesus Christ is victorious, Jesus Christ who overcame all problems is with me right now. That’s why you have to have the death and resurrection together. Don’t only emphasize the death of Jesus Christ because Paul himself said in the New Testament, “If Jesus Christ did not resurrect, then our faith is futile.” It becomes a half gospel. You need to be able to enjoy the complete gospel, “He is with me right now as Life,” and that is how you will be able to overcome any kind of problem.

Any kind of problem may really be a problem, but it’s not a problem for you, why? Because you believe that the One who lives is with you now. That overcomes every problem. That is what the Bible and the church talks about. If you say, “I prayed and God gave me this physical blessing or that physical blessing,” that’s what religions talk about, but the Bible is telling you that nothing is a problem. Even if you have a problem, it’s not a problem. Even if I die, it’s not a problem. That’s what the Bible is telling us.

So you need to talk about the complete gospel. If this complete gospel is not relayed, you have no choice but to be enslaved by the authority in this world, and because you don’t have that, you have no choice but to fall into the meditation of the world, and because you don’t have that, you’ll be sucked into the New Age meditation of this world.

“How am I going to solve this problem?” Your interest is always with you. You’ve been crucified on the cross and now Christ lives within you, but you’re still just interested in yourself. When I say, “You’re interested in yourself,” I mean you’re only interested in your physical life. So, even though you live your life so diligently and earnestly, you’re still a slave to Satan in your fear of death in your physical life.

Jesus Christ goes with His disciples to find Lazarus’ tomb, and when the Jews see that Jesus is weeping, they say He was deeply moved in His spirit and was troubled. The reason why Jesus was so deeply moved and troubled was because He looked at His field who really did know and believe Him, but they were still enslaved by their fear of death. They had no choice but to be in this suffering because they had never seen nor experienced this resurrection. They were trapped in their own sense of trying to solve their own problems to overcome death, and He felt so bad because He was looking at His field. Another time that expresses Jesus Christ’s deeply troubled spirit was when the harvest was ready but the workers were few.

In John 17:34, Jesus asks, “Where is Lazarus?” They say, “Come and see, Lord.” Jesus wept, and in John 17:36, the Jews said, “Imagine how much He loved Lazarus that Jesus is weeping.” But all the Jews in the surrounding area said, “Could not He who opened the eyes of the blind man prevent Lazarus from dying?”

In John 17:38, Jesus Christ goes in front of the tomb, why? Because that’s everyone’s main focus. They say, “God, why can’t you just cure my cancer quickly?” That’s what they’re hanging by. They need to receive the gospel that makes them okay even if they do have cancer, and that’s the reason why Jesus’ heart was so troubled.

Even if Lazarus was revived back to life, who cares, he’s going to die again. There’s no one who received true resurrection except Jesus Christ Himself. Resurrection means you don’t die, you resurrected. Other people might come back to life after death but they die again, yet everyone is so hung up on that. That’s not everything, there is eternal life.

You have life even after you die, it is eternal life, but instead of focusing on that, they’re focused on, “Oh, is Jesus Christ crying right now because Lazarus is dead or not?” We must know the correct gospel of Jesus Christ and relay that. We cannot relay a mixed gospel, and we cannot relay a half gospel. You must know, understand, and enjoy the complete gospel and relay that in order for others to be liberated as well. Otherwise, even after receiving salvation, you’ll still be a slave to your physical needs, your diseases and illnesses in life.

In this Biblical time, people’s tombs were made of caves. They would lay the person in the cave and roll a stone over it. In John 17:39, Jesus says, “Take away the stone,” but Martha responds, “By this time, there will be a bad odor because he has been in there for four days.” This woman doesn’t believe to the end, because even though she said she believed before, she doesn’t believe now, but she knows all the doctrines so thoroughly, and if you ask her any questions, she responds so accurately, but she doesn’t believe right now.

John 17:40, Jesus said, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?” After receiving the confession of faith from Martha, He says, “Lazarus, come out!” There’s some pastors who say, “If Jesus Christ said, ‘Come out!’ then all the dead people in the cave would have come out, but He said to Lazarus specifically to come out.”

2) Jesus’s Resurrection

The words of the Lord are the words of Life. You shouldn’t just look at the words of God as a text written on a page. The words of the Lord are words of life, that give life and save. If you properly receive the Word of God, then your spirit will come to life. That’s the Word of God. But you know with your brain instead of believing in your spirit, and that’s why you’re always enslaved by your problems and fear of death.

Jesus Christ says in 17:42, “I know You always hear me, but the reason why I say this is for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that You have sent me,” and this is where we find a very important message here. People are always clapping and applauding, “Wow, Lazarus is alive again!” But when he dies again, they’re going to be sad again, but that is not what the Lord is saying at this time.

First, Jesus is using Lazarus to demonstrate to His disciples what it means to have a resurrected life, and He also wanted to plant a proper faith into Martha and the disciples. The final motive of God was to take the nonbelieving Jews who did not believe and to show them that He was the Messiah by raising Lazarus. You have to know that in order to see God’s glory.

Are you still interested in seeing the works of Lazarus being revived, or are you truly having the faith in a resurrected life? There are so many people who look at the Bible but they look at it physically without looking at what God’s original intention was.

3) Resurrected Jesus

How does God explain this resurrection? In Hebrews 2:14, it says, “Since the children,” that’s us, “have flesh and blood, he,” that is, Jesus Christ, “too shared in their humanity so that by His physical death, He might break the power of him who holds the power of death, that is, the devil.” The devil holds the power of death.

In Hebrews 2:15, “It was to free those who their entire lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.” The fact that Jesus Christ is the main figure of Genesis 3:15 means that He has crushed the authority and the head of Satan. People live all their lives with the fear of death. If your business fails, it fails, but you’re afraid because you think you’re going to die. People who don’t have eternal life are afraid because they don’t have eternal life, but the reason why Jesus Christ came was to liberate us from our own bindings. That is why Jesus Christ used Lazarus today to demonstrate that He is the resurrection and the life.

4) Eternal Life

In John 5:39, it says that the entire Bible is talking about Jesus Christ, and the Bible talks about giving eternal life. Even if you do Bible study so diligently, studying all the Old and New Testaments, if you don’t receive the eternal life of Jesus Christ, it’s a useless Bible study.

Then, even if you know the entire Bible from the perspective of Jesus Christ and you know all about Jesus Christ, if you don’t believe that He is realistically working in you right now, that’s useless, too. Jesus Christ died on the cross and realistically resurrected, that means that death is not death to Jesus; death is not a problem. For us who believe in Jesus Christ, death is also not a problem.

Why are you afraid? You’re worried because you think you’re going to fail. Why are you afraid of failing? Because you think you’re going to die. Ultimately, you’re enslaved by the devil. The fact that He resurrected from death and is with us in life means that nothing is a problem for Him. Now, we live from now until the rest of eternity with that Lord.

Even our failures are not a problem, our successes are not a problem; nothing is a problem. That’s what it means for all my problems to be solved on the cross, because God has given me something called eternal life, and He is living with me. That is why after Jesus Christ resurrected, He called His disciples and explained the Kingdom of God for 40 days. The Kingdom of God is the eternal kingdom, because the Triune God is eternal, and we are the ones who live eternally with God.

If our physical body dies on this earth, then our spirit goes to an eternal life in spirit with God. That’s why death is not death for us; we go into the eternal life with God. Then, the reason why God has given us this gospel in this life right now before we have physical death is so that we can relay this gospel to others. That’s why God told us in Matthew 28 to go to all nations.

Your business must be related to people of all nations. Your studies must be the studies that is related to all nations. That is how the word of God is fulfilled. What Word of God is that? The One Who has all authority in heaven and on earth is with me. Mark 16:13-16 says, “Go into all the world.” We go into all the world, preaching the good news to heal them. You liberate them from their lifelong slavery to death.

Conclusion

1. Resurrection Life Is Within Me – Start

Everybody is suffering from mental disorders like depression and bipolar disorders and anxiety, however the fundamental source of all of that is the fear of death. When that mental disease becomes too severe, it becomes a physical disease. How do you heal that? You tell them to believe in Jesus Christ who is the Life and the Resurrection. You give them that complete gospel to heal them.

Then, go to the ends of the earth as His witnesses. Being a witness until the ends of the earth means that, every place you step until the day you die, you will be a witness. A witness of what? A witness of the fact that He has resurrected from the cross and is with me right now. Nobody can say anything in front of a witness. Even in a trial, if there’s a witness who has seen a situation, no one can say anything against that. So, nonbelievers will not be able to say anything against you when you stand as a witness that the Lord Jesus Christ is living with you right now as the resurrected life.

But no matter how much you are spouting out the words of the Bible, if you are not a witness, then nonbelievers won’t believe you because God doesn’t work upon doctrine. When you stand as a witness of faith, that’s when the works of faith happen. Martha said, “I know, I know, I know,” so she says she believes, but she doesn’t believe. That’s the problem for believers. Your problem today is nothing other than the fact that you need to believe that that Lord is with you as Life, and He has solved all problems.

It doesn’t matter if you believe in Him back then, but you need to believe right now because God is alive right now, and right now, Satan is being bound, and right now, your problem is not a problem. The works that happen right now, where even if you catch a fatal disease, it will not be a problem for you; you won’t die.

Do you believe that? Everybody knows that Jesus Christ is the resurrection and the life, but do you believe that? When you believe, that’s when the devil flees. It doesn’t even matter if you believe it, but only when you believe will your fear go away, and when you believe, your mental problems and physical problems will go away. Before you believe, yes you need to know the content, but you need to be able to believe in the Bible.

2. Today within Eternity – Possess

If you look at Romans 16, it says this gospel was established from long ages past. We don’t know the word, “eternity” very well, and honestly, we can’t even fathom the concept of “eternity” because we have a beginning and end to our lives. That’s why we use this word, “Faith.” God existed before eternity and after eternity, but we are trapped in this frame of “time” and cannot understand. However, the only way to transcend your problems that you’re facing right now is to believe in the One who is eternal. When you look at today, it is the “today” within eternity.

When you read a book while knowing the conclusion already, then while reading through the middle, there’s no time when you get overly excited or sad because you know the conclusion. If you look at a lot of people who talk about their blessings in Korea, they talk about it in the morning. A lot of soccer games in Korea are in the early morning times in America, and if you record it to watch later on, but you look at the internet, the score is already published, so if you watch the tournament while already knowing the score, it’s kind of lame. But if you look at “today” within the span of eternity and you already know the conclusion, then whatever problem you face right now is not that big.

“Oh, that’s what’s going to happen? Then God is going to fix it,” why? Because I’m living an eternal life. If you don’t know the eternal life, then you live a life that’s so extremely frustrating. “Oh that’s a miracle!” That’s not a miracle; you need to look at today from the perspective of eternity.

3. Physical Death within Eternity – the End

Even when you study, you need to know the beginning and end, and you look at the content today in order for you to know the holistic concept. Romans 16:26 says, “The gospel that had been hidden from long ages past is now revealed,” and in verse 27, “To the only wise God be glory forever,” it’s talking about eternity. It is talking about the eternity past, eternally ahead, and you are living today.

Do you believe that Jesus Christ resurrected and is with you as eternal life? Then you will have the conclusion that nothing is a problem, why? Because you are living within eternal life. The reason why we are still breathing, the reason why we have a physical life is because we need to proclaim this gospel.

Even your failure is not a failure because it is just one small aspect of the life you have. Even your success is not really a success, but within the eternal life you have, it is something God is using because it is something God is doing. I hope that you and I will be the ones who truly believe in the life and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Let us pray together holding onto the Word. Let us pray together.