The Day Death Began to Die (John 11: 37-54) Myles Holmes | November 16, 2025

Hello and welcome to the Redemption Church Podcast.

We're a church in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada that exists to glorify God through the fulfillment of the Great Commission and the Spirit of the Great Commandment.

Thanks for joining us today.

It is good to be together this morning.

Before we get into God's word, I have a few exciting announcements I want to put before you.

One you probably saw on your way in.

I will say, by the way, I have no facility update.

I know what you're thinking when I say exciting announcement.

There's no update here.

I just want to warn you, otherwise, you're going to be completely let down.

Nothing about the facility yet.

Hope to update you soon on that.

But you saw on your way in that we have a table set up for the Life Center.

And this is an outreach opportunity we have this Christmas season.

The Life Center is right here in Newmarket, and they exist to provide support and education to women and families who are facing challenging life issues, whether that's relational conflict, family and marital struggles, unplanned pregnancy, and the emotional weight and trauma surrounding abortion.

This is a ministry that is very near and dear, not only to our heart, but to our mission to see lost people saved and saved people matured and mature people multiplied.

And so we are incredibly grateful for the opportunity to partner with them this Christmas season by providing Christmas gifts and gift cards to bless the women and families that the Life Center cares for.

And so you'll notice we have a table set up in the lobby.

After the service, you can sign up to purchase a gift or a gift card for one of these families.

And this will be a simple way for you to show these families the love of Jesus Christ.

So you can go out and buy those gifts or gift cards.

They are due back here by the 7th of December.

I believe Melanie's gonna confirm this.

You can bring them any Sunday, but you need to have them back by the 7th.

I have one more exciting announcement for you before we get into God's Word.

As many of you know, our kids ministry is one of the most important ministries in our church.

A third of the people who attend, nearly a third of the people who attend on a Sunday morning this church are kids.

And so as we think about our mission as a church, again, to see lost people saved, saved people matured, mature people multiplied, all to the glory of God, our kids' ministry becomes a critical component of accomplishing that ministry.

We believe deeply that it's not just childcare.

We're not just trying to make things quiet in here, that there really is real ministry happening there, real discipleship.

I think some of the most important ministry actually sometimes are the seeds that are being planted in the young hearts in our kids' ministry.

And today, having just sung about God's provision, we get to celebrate God's incredible provision and leadership in this ministry.

And so I'm thrilled to announce to you that Julie Smith is going to be stepping into the role of kids' ministry director beginning this December.

We can praise the Lord.

If you know Julie, you know that she is incredibly passionate about kids' ministry and that God has placed a unique calling on her life for this.

She has faithfully served here for years in a leadership capacity in our kids' ministry.

She comes from the experience of a much larger church context, being on staff in kids' ministry there.

But what excites me the most is that she has this contagious passion to see kids discipled, and that's what we're all about here at the church.

And so we praise God for her.

At the same time, I want to honor and celebrate Adam Ogborn, who has been faithfully serving kids' ministry for the last three years.

You know, coming out of COVID, that was a really strange time.

And Adam has been an incredibly faithful, hardworking, joy-filled presence in the kids' ministry.

And we are excited because as he steps out of the kids' ministry, he'll be stepping into a pastoral internship that will begin in January, where he'll focus on teaching, on relational ministry and discipleship, and really ask the Lord what might be next for him in ministry.

And so uh we're excited about this.

Adam is incredibly excited about this, and we are thankful to God for his provision.

I would love to invite Julie and Adam up right now, and we could pray for them, but they actually aren't even here.

They're in kids' they are in kids' ministry right now.

Which I think shows you their heart for the Lord and their heart for the ministry.

But they can probably hear us, so could we just thank the Lord for them?

So thankful for them.

On that note, you can open up your Bibles to John chapter 11, verses 38 to 57.

John 11:38–57

If you don't have a copy of God's word, you're gonna need one this morning.

And so the ushers are making their way to the front of the aisle.

You can flag one of them down, they'll get a copy into your hands, which you can keep as our gift to you.

We live in a time in human history where we have more perceived control than ever before.

Some of you on a chilly morning like this can open up your phones and control the temperature of your house.

Others can order groceries to show up at your doorstep at any minute.

We can schedule our time down to the minute, even down to the second, and yet with all that control, every so often something happens that reveals that our control is really just an illusion.

That thing is death.

You can go years thinking without thinking about death.

And then you get a text or a phone call, and with in moments you find yourselves at the bedside at the hospital or at the graveside.

The experience of death, it clarifies things for us.

It clarifies our weakness, it clarifies our smallness, it clarifies our helplessness.

Because no matter how much control we have in our lives, no matter how much technology is advanced to help us control our life, we cannot control death.

You can certainly delay it, maybe with a healthy diet and some exercise and what scientists are saying about happiness and stress-free living.

Certainly, maybe you have some power to delay it.

Certainly you have some power to ignore it, but you cannot escape it.

And if physical death were not enough for us to consider, Father Time reminds us that everything is coming to an end, that your most meaningful relationships are coming to an end, that your most meaningful accomplishments in the span of human history will shortly be forgotten, that every good and perfect season is coming to an end.

It's joyful things we're thinking about this morning, isn't it?

And yet it's true, it's it's clarifying for us that all of us are living on really borrowed death, that each second that ticks is a second closer to that day that all of us will inevitably face, that we cannot escape.

And it's in the face of this helplessness that hopefully you feel right now in the Holy Spirit that we stand united with Mary and Martha in John chapter 11.

John 11 · chapter mention

Today with Mary and Martha, we stand at another tomb.

It is the tomb of Lazarus, where John wants to teach us something, not just about the death of Lazarus, but ultimately about our death.

As Jesus stands at this day, I truly believe that what you're gonna see in John 11 is that it is a dawn of a new era.

That on this day, death itself gets that little red sniper bead.

That Jesus starts a march that specifically we see in this text starts on the day that he resurrects Lazarus, he begins a march to defeat death itself.

It is the very moment that death starts dying.

I want you to notice as we read this text how Jesus defeats death.

It is not by avoiding it as we often try to do, it's not by escaping it.

But what Jesus does is he enters right into the belly of death itself.

And the resurrection of Lazarus is the beginning of a larger story, which begins a chain of events that will end with Jesus in his own tomb.

This is the truth I want you to see this morning that can transform your life if you are willing to embrace it, and that is this.

When I believe in the one who entered death for me, I receive a life that death cannot touch.

When I believe in the one who entered death for me, I receive a life that death cannot touch.

Jesus dies so that we can live.

I want you to see that in the text this morning.

Would you stand with me as we read John chapter 11, verses 38 to 57?

John 11:38–57

Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb.

It was a cave, and a stone lay against it.

Jesus said, Take away the stone.

Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days.

Jesus said to her, Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?

So they took away the stone.

And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, Father, I thank you that you have heard me.

I knew that you always hear me, but I said on the account of the people standing around, that they may believe that you sent me.

When he had said these things, he cried out with a loud voice, Lazarus, come out.

The man who had died came out.

His hands and feet bound with linen strips and his face wrapped with a cloth.

Jesus said to them, Unbind him and let him go.

Many of the Jews, therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him, but some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done.

So the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered the council and said, What are we to do?

For this man performs many signs.

If we let him go on like this, every one will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.

One of them said, Caiaphas, who was the high priest that year, said to them, You know nothing at all, nor do you understand that it is better for you that one man should die for the people, not that the whole nation should perish.

He did not say this of his own accord, but being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus would die for the nation, and not for the nation only, but also to gather into one the children of God who are scattered abroad.

So from that day on they made plans to put him to death.

Jesus therefore no longer walked openly among the Jews, but went from there to the region near the wilderness, to a town called Ephraim, and there he stayed with the disciples.

Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand, and many went up from the country to Jerusalem before the Passover to purify themselves.

They were looking for Jesus and saying to one another as they stood in the temple, What do you think?

That he will not come to the feast at all?

Now the chief priests and the Pharisees had given order that if anyone knew where he was, that he should let them know, so that they might arrest him.

This is the word of the Lord.

You can grab a seat.

Before Jesus speaks life into Lazarus' bones, before resurrection power breaks through into our life, we are confronted with the crushing reality of death.

This is exactly where Mary and Martha stand in verse 38 of John chapter 11.

John 11 · chapter mention

And John here, I want you to see, could not be more blunt about the hopelessness of death.

The first thing I want you to see is this we stand powerless at the grave.

We stand powerless at the grave.

Now I think what we have in these beginning verses of John chapter 11, verse 38, is really humorous in a lot of ways.

John 11:38

John is being upfront that Lazarus is as dead as dead can be.

Rolling away a stone will do absolutely nothing for a dead man.

You can open this grave, but everyone here is very sure you cannot reverse death.

The problem is not the stone, the problem is death.

Now notice how John reinforces the helplessness by the way that he identifies Martha.

Did you notice?

I think it's becoming a little comical how John identifies people.

Martha, the sister of the dead man.

You know, you and I, we hope that people will identify us by our strengths, don't we?

You know, I hope that when you go home and you're having lunch, you don't say Pastor Miles, the preacher of dull sermons.

But Martha here is not identified by her strength or her history, or like Mary was earlier as the one who would wash Jesus' feet.

She is identified by a death that she cannot undo.

Martha, the dead man's sister, and then Martha voices her despair.

You see it in verse 39.

The sister of the dead man said to him, Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days.

Now we saw last week the meaningfulness of four days, that in Jewish thought that it was believed that the soul would hover near the body for three days, but after four days, everyone there was as sure as sure could be hope was gone.

And if that wasn't enough, if you know that cultural significance wasn't enough, John points us to something maybe even more practically significant, that maybe, you know, as you imagine yourself in the story, you can your senses start to activate and you could smell what this scene would be like.

Martha's concern is that Lazarus will be incredibly stinky.

It's a very practical concern, it's a very real concern.

And John here wants us to feel what Mary and Martha feel.

All hope is lost.

We stand powerless at the grave.

And loved one, as we stand here with Martha and Mary, can I can I ask you something?

Do you feel your powerlessness in this life?

Have you embraced your helplessness in this life?

You see, I'm convinced that much of our pain comes from our refusal to admit our helplessness.

That as 21st century individuals, we have created this version of success that says, I did it my way.

I am a self-made man, that I don't need help.

And what we find here at John 11 is that that kind of attitude just does not work with the gospel.

That the gospel really begins from the moment that you embrace your powerlessness.

So while we will do almost anything to avoid the truth that we cannot fix ourselves constantly in our lives, we run up to this brick wall reality that we really are powerless, and we know what that feels like.

We know what it feels like to be powerless to fix a marriage that maybe is slipping through our fingers.

We know what it feels like to be powerless to steer the heart of a child who we love more than anything, but we really can't control.

And maybe those are circumstances outside of us, but even as we look inside of ourselves, we realize we really cannot control anything.

You you cannot change your own heart.

You cannot break that addiction that you have that you know is horrible, but you keep going back to for relief.

You're powerless.

Anxiety, powerless to silence it.

Hopeless, despair, disappointment, all of these things.

Like if we really stop for a second and take a step back, can we not say that we are beyond our strength when we are dealing in these realms?

And we can take a step back and be honest.

We hate powerlessness.

We spend our lives trying to avoid it, trying to hide it, trying to muscle through it, pretending like we're okay.

And you know, it's possible even to do that in the church, even in a place where the very foundation of the gospel is recognizing that you are nothing more than a beggar in need of eternal bread and water.

It's very possible in a church to live as though, you know, I've I've got it all figured out.

I always read my Bible, I don't have any serious struggles, and yet the reality is that we all do.

John brings us to the tomb so that so that we'll finally take off the mask and face the truth this morning that you and I do not have the power to fix what is broken.

You and I do not have the power to heal what is wounded.

And certainly you and I do not have the power to resurrect what is dead.

John wants us to face this reality this morning.

And it's only once we face this reality that we are powerless that the hope of the gospel can come breaking into our lives.

Because loved ones, notice when when Martha and Mary are standing at the tomb, powerless in the face of death, what is Jesus doing?

What is Jesus doing in the face of the death?

You see it in verse 38?

And then Jesus deeply moved again came to the tomb.

You see that, loved one?

This word deeply moved.

It's we saw it last week.

It's this sense of agitated to the point of anger, furious at what sin and death have done to the people he loves.

It is the type of emotion that is in a parent who hates the cancer that is devouring their once healthy child.

But verse 40 shows us that something is significantly different about Jesus.

Notice what verse 40 says.

Jesus said to her, Martha, did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?

You see, the difference here for Jesus is that he's not just moved, you and I can be moved, he is able to overcome this enemy.

He's not just emotional.

I mean, you and I can be emotional, he is purposeful in this.

He's not just merely feeling our pain.

Jesus has come to conquer our pain.

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

Loved one, do you see what Jesus is pointing out in your life?

And I hope that you have the confidence and the and the trust in the Holy Spirit to embrace this.

That your powerlessness is a platform for his glory.

Jesus is not turned off by weakness.

Jesus does not push away from powerlessness.

And if you want to be a person who experiences the power that only Jesus can bring into your life, the resurrecting power, you must press close to Jesus with this powerlessness and with this helplessness.

He wants it.

And so listen, what we're learning.

This morning is that it's only once we reach the end of ourselves that we discover the beginning of Jesus.

Do you know that?

In fact, if you're unwilling to admit your powerlessness, if you're trying to do this, Jesus and me, Christianity, we can do it together.

I want you to understand you have never really experienced Jesus.

You want Jesus to help you, but but you aren't willing for Jesus to resurrect you.

And the Christian life begins here.

The Christian life begins at resurrection.

It begins with this reality that loved one, we are powerless.

But notice what it moves to.

This incredibly good news.

And I want you to see this next.

Notice, secondly, that what the grave claims, Jesus speaks life into.

What the grave claims, Jesus speaks life into.

Remember here that the resurrection of Lazarus is a model for us all.

This isn't just a, you know, kind of cool story about what Jesus did with the man 2,000 years ago.

This has incredible relevance and significance for your life.

John is showing us here in this room in the 21st century how the death of Jesus solves our death.

The story of Lazarus is to be a mirror in which you look at in your own life and you see that just as Jesus involved himself in Lazarus' death, so if your faith is in Jesus, Jesus has involved himself in your death.

So it's fascinating then that after asking them to move the stone, he prays.

Now Jesus doesn't pray like us.

He's not praying out of desperation.

He's really making a proclamation of what he is about to do.

His prayer makes that clear.

He's not begging for power he doesn't possess.

He's not wondering if the Father will respond.

He is praying.

And notice why he prays at the end of verse 42 that they may believe that you sent me.

Loved one, those words are there for you.

The resurrection of Lazarus, Jesus is telling us so clearly here, is not just about a cool miracle about the resurrection of a man from death to life.

It is about the revelation of a Savior who can defeat death.

Jesus is saying, this grave, this hopelessness, this powerlessness, this undefeated enemy, this is what I was sent for.

You know, Jesus looks at our powerlessness.

He looks at us standing in front of the tomb, and you know, you know, you know when you find something that you're really passionate about?

You know when you talk to someone about their hobby, about something that they're just really knowledgeable about, that they're really good at, and that light, you know, turns on in their eyes, and maybe they weren't willing to talk, but you know, you you kind of struck the chord and you're talking to them about their thing, and now they open up and they're so excited.

And and you know, you know what Jesus does with your hopelessness?

You know what Jesus does with your powerlessness?

He says, This is why I was here.

This is why I'm here.

Oh man.

Would you compare that to the way that Jesus talks to the Pharisees?

I mean, man, Jesus is sick of the Pharisees.

And he's sick of our legalism.

But you know, when you come to him with your shame, when you come to him with your guilt, when you come to him with this reality that you, you know, I just cannot do this, Jesus.

His eyes, his eyes light up.

This is this is what he was sent for.

Now, would you read with me verses 43 and 44 again?

Look, look at your copy of God's word.

Because I just think we've read this story so many times that we kind of lose what happens here when he had said these things.

You know, once he had revealed what this is all about, he cried out with a loud voice, Lazarus, come out.

And the man who had died came out.

Now that same voice that we are told in John 1 that was there in the beginning, the word which was in the beginning, that spoke galaxies into existence.

Now that same voice echoes into a tomb speaking to death, and even death obeys.

Commentators note that if Jesus perhaps didn't losarus' name, his voice would be so powerful that were he to just say, come out, every tomb on earth would have been emptied at once.

And we know theologically that there is a day coming when the voice of Jesus will do that.

That is how sovereign and unstoppable and how universe-commanding the voice of Jesus is.

That John writes one of the most staggering sentences in the history of humanity.

And remember, this is not fairy tale, this is biography, this is history.

The man who had died came out by the powerful voice of Jesus.

Jesus does not negotiate with death three words from the mouth of Jesus, and death releases what it thought it had owned forever.

This is the power of Jesus' voice to give life.

And what's happening here is not just this sentimental miracle to comfort sad people.

You know, if the the point that we draw out of this story is, hey, listen, you know, you can overcome your mountains.

Jesus is gonna speak life into you.

I just want you to know you have fallen short of what John is declaring here.

This is a theological declaration of your reality, that if your faith is in Jesus Christ, that same sentence is true of you.

The man who had died came out.

That's why Christianity doesn't work with kind of slumped shoulders.

Okay, I'm here again for another Sunday.

Because the reality is that if you're apathetic to the worship of Jesus Christ in light of what he has done for you, then it's likely that you have lost, you have lost the significance, the core of Christianity.

Lazarus, Lazarus was not sick, he was not weak.

Loved one, he was dead.

He could not respond to Jesus, he could not choose Jesus, he could not ask Jesus, he could not even reach out for Jesus.

What happened?

Jesus called his name, and scripture says that if you are in Christ, the same is true of you and me.

That you, Paul says in Ephesians 2, verse 1, you were dead in your trespasses in sins.

Ephesians 2:1

And what you and I needed was not spiritual encouragement.

Hey, get up, buddy, get to Jesus.

We needed resurrection.

And how did that resurrection happen?

It was not by our effort.

Lazarus did not need willpower, no amount of education, religion, morality, discipline would cut it for him.

What Lazarus needed was to be called out.

Lazarus, come out.

This is the doctrine in scripture known as effectual calling.

It is this sovereign, this irresistible, this life-giving summons of Christ by which he awakens dead hearts and creates what did not exist before.

Jesus does not stand outside the tomb and offer Lazarus a spiritual suggestion.

Hey, would you please come?

Jesus commands death itself.

Lazarus, come out.

And with a single word, he creates life and loved one.

If you are in Christ, this is your story.

I mean, I hope you see it in your own life.

I talk to people week after week.

I have no idea how I got here.

I have no idea in my own life what it was that led me to that conversation where the gospel was explained to me.

But in that moment, there was this power in the presentation of the gospel, which compelled me so that there was no other choice but to listen and follow Jesus and to give my life to him.

He didn't ask my permission, he didn't wait for my cooperation, he didn't respond to my worthiness.

He called me and I lived and loved one.

The same is true of you.

If you are in Christ in time and space, the Son of God spoke from heaven into the tomb of your spiritual deadness and said, Come out.

And your life in Christ began that day.

So we just take a moment here to worship Christ because what separates you from eternal destruction?

What is it, loved one?

What is it, Christian?

It is the powerful, effectual calling of Jesus Christ and nothing else.

It is the power of his word.

And if that's not enough to lift your heart in worship, I want you to see the wonder of our salvation even more deeply because this miracle is not just a display of his power.

What we discover next is this miracle is a revelation of his heart.

Because this miracle costs Jesus something.

You recognize that?

Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead was not a free decision.

It was a costly decision.

And the moment Lazarus walks out of the grave, what we find in this text is the clock begins ticking towards another grave.

And it is Jesus' own.

And from this moment forward in the Gospel of John, I mean John 11 is a hinge in the Gospel of John, where the cross becomes an undeniable, inescapable reality of Jesus' life.

As we consider this reality, that when I believe in the one who entered death for me, I receive a life death cannot touch.

I want you to see thirdly that speaking life required he surrender to death.

In order for Jesus to speak life into Lazarus' death here, it would require that he would surrender to death.

Now it's it should be shocking to us here that the resurrection of a dead man, Lazarus, is incredibly disruptive to the community of Jewish people surrounding him.

It forces a crisis and it becomes a dividing point in the history of the Jewish people.

It is something that demands a response.

After Lazarus, nobody can be neutral.

Everyone, either they must respond in belief or they respond in rejection.

So look at then verse 45.

Many of the Jews, therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him.

There is the response of belief, but look here at verse 46.

But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done.

Now, listen, I don't know how you report something like that in a negative light, but man, these people figured out how to do it.

Now, their report ignites, I think, what is one of the most chilling meetings in the history of humanity.

I mean, at this point in the movie, there's some really intense Hans Zimmer music playing.

And the Pharisees are getting together in verse 47, and look at what they're saying.

What are we to do?

Remember, about what?

About a man who has come and done nothing but given life to dead people.

And here are the Jews.

What are we to do?

For this man performs many signs, and if we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him.

And look at the consequence.

You see this in the text in verse 47?

Everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.

You see what terrifies the Pharisees of Jesus?

It is the exact same thing that terrifies our human heart today.

They do not want to lose control.

They know exactly what submission to Jesus Christ means, even if we do not know it.

They knew it meant a total abandonment of their lives, of everything that they possessed.

They knew that if Jesus was going to resurrect them, they would have to die to themselves.

And it was a death they were unwilling to embrace.

And still, today the story is the same.

If Jesus' death is going to have any relevance in your life, you must die to yourself.

You must surrender control.

In other words, you can say this resurrection life in your life, it begins with a funeral.

It is the funeral of self-rule.

Watch what happens next though in verse 50.

It is fascinating.

The threads that John is weaving here when the high priest says these words that even he doesn't know the meaning of.

But we can look back through the cross and interpret exactly what they mean.

Verse 50.

It is better for you that one man should die for the people.

Not that the whole nation should perish.

But John interprets this redemptively.

John interprets this without knowing it.

Caiaphas preaches to the heart of the gospel.

You know, this is the heart of Christianity, that one must die so that many may live.

As Lazarus walks out of his tomb, every step Jesus now takes will be towards his own.

And Lazarus' life will come at the cost of Jesus' life.

Loved one, this is the heart of the gospel.

I mean, if this reality is not in your testimony, you don't have a testimony.

If your story of salvation does not mention the reality that Jesus died in substitution for you in your place, you've lost the heart of Christianity.

This is the heart of the gospel.

The innocent dies for the guilty.

Death is defeated by substitution.

The righteous trades place with the unrighteous.

The Son, the perfect son of God, is condemned so that rebels can go free.

You see in this story, the resurrection of Lazarus is costly.

It sets Jesus on a direct path to the cross.

Speaking life would require that Jesus would surrender to death.

And this is what it means for you.

The way that your sin will be overcome in your life will not be by trying harder to overcome it.

Jesus wants us to see this so clearly that we will not defeat our greatest enemy by performing better or reading more or just having more willpower or trying to turn over a new leaf or maybe if we just instill a new habit.

None of these things will work.

None of these things solve the human condition.

And yet you go to all the self-help literature and isn't that what it's all about?

Well, maybe if you try this habit, maybe if you try this morning routine, try this diet, do this, do that, and what?

None of it can work because help is not within your own grasp.

It must come externally from a savior that is not you, but is Jesus Christ.

Self-salvation will always fail.

See, loved one, your sin will be overcome by realizing that Christ has already overcome it for you at the cross and resting in his finished work.

You know, this makes an incredibly practical difference in your life.

Instead of trying harder as you consider your own sin and shortcoming, you won't say, Well, I just need to try harder, I just need to, you know, battle this harder.

Faith says Christ has already won.

Trying harder, legalism, it says I can figure this out.

Faith says the stone has been rolled away and I have been called out.

This is where my life is found.

Now I want you to just see this so practically that what Christ did for Lazarus offers to change our daily reality.

Can we be honest this morning and say that if you are human, that guilt and shame, shortcoming, acknowledgement that you are just not the person that you even want to be, let alone the person that God has called you to be according to his law.

I mean, all of these things are human realities.

And listen, if you've overcome these things yourself, I just want you to know redemption church is not a place for you because we are just all messed up.

Every one of the members, you know, I did many of their membership interviews.

I know we're just all messed up, I'm sorry to say it.

The church is a hospital for the broken.

The church is the place that we see the gospel hope.

Is that because of Christ, we don't have to dig deeper inside of ourselves looking for something that never is actually gonna be there.

We can look outside of ourselves to Christ who already bore our shame, to Christ who already bore our guilt, to Christ who already paid the debt because you could never live up to the law yourself.

All of the Christian life is about getting your eyes off yourself, about stopping the navel gazing and looking to the cross and seeing there, there, there is where I have life.

Jesus gave his death to die for in my place in order that he might give me his life.

You know, someone drowning in the ocean trying harder will not help them.

It tires them out.

You you thrash around in the waves and you and you get tired out, and all it does is think you faster.

And and loved one, legalism is the same thing.

What we need is not to swim harder, what we need is a savior whose hand reaches in to grab us and pulls us out of the waters of eternal condemnation.

And so we, I mean, we look at this story, and the truth we need to pull from it is that trying harder will not solve our situation.

We need the voice of Jesus, but loved one, that there is hope.

Because God came down and he entered death on your behalf so that you could be carried out of death itself.

We rest in the one who entered death for us, and we receive a life that death cannot touch.

Church, what we find then is that if this is true, if if what Jesus has accomplished is true, that he has truly substituted himself, calling Lazarus to life and himself to death, then neutrality in light of what he has done is impossible.

You cannot leave this place in any other position than that of worship or rejection.

And as this story winds down, this is exactly what we see.

Some believe, some rejected, some plot murder, everybody responds.

And you have no choice but to respond to the resurrection of Jesus.

That's what I want you to see fourthly, that his resurrection demands our response.

His resurrection demands our response.

The resurrection of Lazarus to this day, it forces a decision.

Look at verse 44, 54.

It says, Jesus no longer walked openly among the Jews.

We would expect the opposite.

It's striking that the miracle that really should have united the world and proved that Jesus was who he said he was, did quite the opposite.

It divided it.

Where some hearts hardened, others softened, and to this day there is still division.

So that every human heart is divided over what we make of Jesus.

Verse 45, again, there are many who believe, verse 46, others go to the Pharisees, verse 53.

From that day on they made plans to put him to death.

And now, verse 57.

So the chief priests and the Pharisees had given orders that if anyone knew where he was, he should let them know, so that they might arrest him.

It's fascinating that everyone here saw the same miracle.

Everyone here has the same evidence.

What's the issue that's driving this divide?

Well, it's a hard allegiance, isn't it?

It's not a matter of evidence, and loved one, I want you to know that your hesitation to follow Christ, if you aren't a believer, it's not a matter of evidence.

All the evidence is there.

It's a matter of the heart.

It's a matter of the heart.

No one stays neutral.

The same thing is true today.

Do you know that the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the historical resurrection of Jesus Christ, puts an imperative on your life?

It asks something of you.

I mean, if Jesus was really resurrected, if Jesus really defeated death, if he truly has power over death, then it there's some implications.

It means that we can't just shrug at the one who walked out of the grave.

You and I can't be apathetic towards this.

It means you can't half-heartedly try to commit yourself to Jesus, as though Jesus can be your helper, but he can't be your Lord.

I love what Tim Keller says in his book, The Reason for God.

He says, if Jesus rose from the dead, then you have to accept everything he said.

If he didn't rise from the dead, then why worry about any of it?

The issue on which everything hangs is not whether or not you like his teaching, but whether or not he rose from the dead.

I mean, that's just true, isn't it?

If Jesus has the power over death, then all debate is over.

And there is no choice but to follow him in surrender.

So the resurrection then forces a choice on us.

Either we fall at his feet and surrender or we walk away in rejection.

There's no third way, there's no middle ground.

To delay surrender is to deny him.

And to cling to control is to reject him.

And church, this is the question that is posed to us this morning.

What will you do with the resurrected Jesus?

Will you accept his invitation to receive life?

Or will you reject him?

This is why we come to the communion supper.

This resurrection life is all that we've been talking about today, the life that Lazarus received, the life that you and I are invited to, that was purchased at a price.

It is the life that we receive because Jesus walked towards his own death to secure it.

Communion is a reminder, this cup that we hold in our hands, that it comes at a cost to us.

These are the symbols of substitution.

The juice is the symbol of his body broken instead of ours.

Sorry, his blood poured out instead of ours.

The cracker is a symbol of his body broken instead of ours, that he dies so that we can live.

And so as we take communion together, there's one question begging our attention.

Do I believe in him?

Have I surrendered to him?

If you didn't receive a cup on your way in, the ushers are coming down.

You can flag one of them down and they can get one into your hands.

I want you to know that communion is not for those who are half interested in Christianity or undecided.

Communion is for those, like in this story, who have laid down their control and have confessed their sin and have placed their faith in the one who entered death for them.

If you're here this morning and you've placed your faith in Christ, if you believe that he entered death for you, this cup is for you.

If you haven't surrendered to him, we would ask that rather than taking the bread and cup, you would allow it to pass, but to consider the offer that Jesus makes of life.

Now, before we take this, I want to just give us a moment of reflection.

It is good for us at a time like this to pause and reflect and to reflect on our life, asking ourselves this question: is there any part of your life you're still trying to control?

Is there any sin that you're trying to overcome in your own strengths?

We just take a moment before the Lord and reflect on those realities.

Father, we thank you.

God, that whatever has come across our mind, maybe your Holy Spirit has brought something to our attention that has been bothering us for days and weeks and even years.

Or maybe the Holy Spirit's brought something that is new and fresh and that we didn't even know about, Lord, and that we've been striving in our own strength and thinking that we can solve on our own.

God, thank you for this place that we stand right now, at the tomb of Lazarus, who was called to life by the voice of Jesus Christ, at the cost of Jesus' own life.

And God, we stand at that very same tomb, Lord, it is our tomb.

And holding this cup in our hands are reminded, God, that Lord, our salvation came at a cost.

That it was his death for ours, his life for ours.

So we give you all the praise, Lord, and we pray that that all striving would cease, that we would embrace our helplessness and find in our powerlessness a Savior who is sufficient for us.

God, we thank you and we love you.

And we pray this in the name of your Son.

Amen.

Jesus took the bread and said, This is my body broken for you.

Do this in remembrance of me.

Let's take the bread together.

Jesus said, This cup is the new covenant in my blood poured out for many, for many for the forgiveness of sins.

Let's drink it together.

Loved one, Jesus dies so that we might live.

In the light of that reality, would you stand with me and worship the one who died on our behalf?