Lazarus: The PROVIDENCE

Text: John 11:1-45

Theme: “Lazarus: The PROVIDENCE”

5^th Sunday in Lent

April 10, 2011

First Presbyterian Church

Denton, Texas

Rev. Paul R. Dunklau

In the Name of Jesus

Many of you, no doubt, have seen the motion picture Tombstone. It’s on TV nearly every night it seems. Actor Kurt Russell plays the role of Wyatt Earp who wanted to get away from being a sheriff out in the old West, but then he had to become a sheriff again since a group of bandits took over in a town called Tombstone. His sidekick is a hard-drinking, poker-playing sharpshooter by the name of Doc Holliday portrayed by actor Val Kilmer. At one point, while Wyatt Earp’s posse was out chasing the bad guys, Doc Holliday leaned over to another gunman and said, “Wyatt Earp is my friend.” The cowboy said, “Heck, I got lots of friends.” Doc Holliday replied, “I don’t.”

I wonder if Jesus Christ ever felt like Doc Holliday did. From what I read, it looks as though Jesus had plenty of followers – many of whom hung on His every word. There were thousands of folks about when He took the loaves and the fishes and made sure everyone had plenty to eat. Also, He had His twelve disciples, but the very word “disciple” implies more of a relationship – between a student and a teacher – than that of a friendship. Based on the Gospel accounts, we note that Jesus had His enemies as well. On the list of enemies, we would certainly place the Pharisees. But remember those folks who lived in Jesus’ hometown of Nazareth too! On one occasion, they attempted to throw Him over a cliff!

Our Lord has lots of followers. He had disciples, and He had enemies. But what about true friends, did Jesus have any of those?

In the Old Testament portion of the Bible, immediately after the book of Psalms, we come across a book called Proverbs. Basically, it’s filled with wise sayings. I would direct your attention to just one of them this morning which relates to what we’re talking about. It is Proverbs 18:24: “A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.”

Did Jesus have friends that stuck close to Him like that? Many followed Him, adored Him, confessed Him, and plotted against Him. But who befriended Him? Did He even have friends?

As a matter of fact, He did. Three extremely close friends of His happened to live in a little town not far from Jerusalem called Bethany – about as far as Denton is from Argyle. Jesus was a traveling man; that is abundantly clear. Often, when in the area, He would stay at the home of the people we’ve come to know as Mary, Martha, and Lazarus – two sisters and their brother. They would laugh and converse and share meals together. How the friendship got started, we do not know. But we do know that their home – and, in fact, their lives – spelled refuge. Genuine friendship has a sense of refuge. A true friend is a refuge, a shelter from the storm.

As the story goes, Lazarus became sick. From the original language, we learn that there was more to this than a case of the sniffles or a touch of the flu. The implication of the word is that he was deathly ill. Mary and Martha sent word to Jesus about the situation with Lazarus. Jesus, for His part, seems to treat it, at first, like a case of the sniffles. He says, “This sickness will not end in death.” Then He goes on: “No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.”

Our text says that Jesus loved Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. In the New Testament there are three different words for love. First, there is eros. This is the biological, instinctual, sexual love. Second, there is agape. This is the love – self-giving and self-sacrificing – that comes from God alone. Third, there is philew. This is brotherly or sisterly love, which is also known as friendship. Think of that city in Pennsylvania: Philadelphia. It is the city of brotherly love. The first four letters in the title are the first four letters in the Greek word for brotherly or sisterly love, which is, again, also known as friendship.

So the word gets to Jesus: “Your dear friend is very sick.”

Jesus stays put.

A friend of mine who came for my ordination last September is a retired chaplain in the military by the name of Conrad Walker. His friends know him as “Connie.” Connie broke the rules during the Vietnam War. Going against protocol, he jumped out of a helicopter and attended to a soldier who lay wounded and bleeding on the ground from enemy fire. He hoisted the man from the ground, and the copter pulled them back up. Connie saved the man’s life.

Years later, Connie, who lives in San Antonio, was reacquainted with the man whose life he saved. Years later, in April of 1995, he got a call from the man. The gentleman lived in Oklahoma. He said, “I need you again, Connie.” Why did he need Connie again? You see, this soldier’s daughter and grandchild were in the Alfred P. Murrah federal building in Oklahoma City on the day of the Oklahoma City bombing. The mother and child lost their lives. Within a half hour, Connie was on the road to Oklahoma City to console His friend and conduct the memorial services for the members of his friend’s family.

But Jesus stayed put; He didn’t hit the road o Bethany like Connie went to Oklahoma City. He stayed – for two more days. He knew that going to Bethany would be the beginning of the last journey. He would be walking right into the vise-grip of religious and political hatred and bigotry that awaited Him. He talks to His disciples about it, and he says: “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to wake him up.” Note: He didn’t say “My friend Lazarus”, he said “Our friend Lazarus.” The disciples thought it was good that he was asleep. “He’ll be feeling better in no time” was the thought. Then Jesus spoke plainly: “Lazarus is dead, and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”

When He eventually made it to town, they discovered that Lazarus had been in his grave for four days. The little home was still filled with mourners as the custom of the day. Martha, the gregarious one, heard that Jesus was on His way and went out to meet him. “’Lord,’ Martha said to Jesus, ‘if you had been here, my brother would not have died.’” There was a bit more than a gentle rebuke in those words. You can’t help but sense that they were tinged with a bit of anger.

Perhaps she pulls back on those cords of anger a bit; she goes on to say: “But I know that even now God will you whatever you ask.” Note that the faith triumphs over the anger. Jesus says, “You brother will rise again.” Marha replied: “I know he will rise again the resurrection at the last day.”

Well into her nineties, my grandmother died when I was but a fledgling teenager. There at the cemetery – next to the country church which overlooks the Platte River valley in Nebraska – sat my Grandpa Dunklau. Hard of hearing and tender of foot, He was old and quiet and strong. My eyes were riveted on him. I saw his lips move; they looked like they were quivering. Actually, as it turns out, they were mouthing the very words the minister was saying at Grandma’s grave. They were the words of Jesus: “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.”

Thank God that we have a God who sent a Son who gave us words like that. Without these words, all I see is nihilism, nothingness. All I would ever feel would be existential despair. My life would be a symphony on the theme of “What’s the use?”

But no. Dear friends, we have the God who is resurrection and life.

Not only that, God knows what it means to be human. On that day, not far from that grave that held his friend, His emotions were torn to shreds. He cried real tears – not fake ones for dramatic effect.

“Where have you laid him?”

“Take away the stone.”

“Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?”

“Lazarus, come out!”

“Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”

Fyodor Dostoyevsky, one of the greatest writers of all time, authored a book called Crime and Punishment, It is essentially a literary study of irrational evil. In the end, the main character in the story, Raskolnikov, is imprisoned for killing someone for no reason at all. It was irrational. It was like that line in the song of Johnny Cash, “Folsom Prison Blues”: “I killed a man to just to see what it felt like.” In the story, the prisoner’s life is redeemed when he comes the story of Jesus raising His friend Lazarus from the dead.

I’ve barely scratched the surface of that story today. But this much I want you to know, the more you ponder it the more you will sense the love, friendship, and providence of God for whoever you are and wherever you are at in life. Sickness and death and, for that matter, everything that can drive us to despair are all very real. But God provides. God is resurrection and life. God has the trump card. Even the meaning of the name Lazarus is helpful. Lazarus means “My help comes from the Lord.”

Amen.