In this sermon, the speaker shares a personal experience of receiving a message from the Lord while preparing for a series of meetings. Despite wanting to help his sick father, he felt a prompting to wait for a few more days before traveling. The speaker emphasizes the importance of honesty and trust in God, encouraging listeners to believe in His ability to perform miracles. The sermon also highlights the example of Jesus, who, despite hearing that his loved one Lazarus was sick, waited for two days before going to him. The speaker challenges Christians to walk as Jesus walked and live according to His principles.

Since last Sunday morning, we've been studying the subject of God can solve every problem. And we've been looking at the Gospel of John. Among the hundreds and perhaps thousands of miracles that Jesus did, John the Apostle selects under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, eight, only eight, out of all those miracles, and he doesn't call them miracles, he calls them signs. Meaning that each miracle had spiritual meaning and significance for our walk with the Lord today. And that's why we've been looking at these signs. The first was the turning of water into wine. The second was the healing of a royal official's son. And the third was the healing of the lame man who'd been in the pool of Bethesda for 38 years. It's John 5, and then two miracles in John 6 we saw. One is the feeding of the 5,000 and the Jesus walking on the water. And then in our last study we looked at the healing of the blind man, man born blind in John chapter 9. And in each of these we've seen spiritual truths that the Lord wants us to learn. And today we want to turn to John chapter 11. This is sign number 7. And this is the story, the whole chapter, about Lazarus being raised from the dead. It's one of those remarkable miracles. There are two other cases of people being raised from the dead in the Gospels. One is the raising of Jairus' daughter who had just died. And Jesus came and raised her up from the dead. And another was the raising of the son of a widow in the city of Nain. And he had died and his body was being taken in a coffin to the burial ground. Jesus stopped the procession and raised the young man from the dead. But this was even more remarkable because Lazarus had been dead for four days. There are other cases of people being raised from the dead in the Scriptures. We read in the Old Testament of Elijah and Elisha both raising people from the dead. Elisha even raised a man from the dead after he himself had died. When the man was thrown into Elisha's grave, a dead man. And when the man's body touched Elisha's bones he was raised from the dead. It's quite amazing. And Peter raised, in the Acts of the Apostles we read of at least two instances of people being raised from the dead. Peter raised a woman called Dorcas from the dead who had just died. And Paul raised a young man called Eutychus from the dead who had just died. But this is different from all of those instances because here was a man who had been dead for four days. He had been buried and his body had begun to decompose when Jesus came and raised him from the dead. And there are some wonderful truths here that we can learn. Being raised from the dead is a picture first of all of our being raised from spiritual death. The Bible says we were dead in sins. All human beings are dead in sin. And one mark of being dead in sin is that our conscience does not convict us of sin. I remember hearing a story of a man who was preaching on the streets for the Lord. And talking about this burden of sin. And there was a heckler, someone who wanted to make fun. Standing in the crowd and saying, what are you talking about preacher? I don't feel any burden of sin. And the Lord gave the preacher a right word at that time. He said, try putting a heavy weight on a dead man's chest. He doesn't feel a thing. You don't feel a burden of sin? Well, you must be dead. A person who is alive feels something when a weight is put on his chest. Sin is like that. If you can sin and not be disturbed in your conscience, you're probably dead. A dead person doesn't feel anything. You can poke him, you can kick him, you can do whatever you like. He doesn't feel a thing. But the more alive we are, we feel a pinprick. Conscience is like that. So Lazarus being dead is a picture of our being dead in sin. And Jesus comes to raise us up to life from our dead state through the ministry of the Holy Spirit. So that's basically what this miracle is about. And there are other things also here that we can see. Now, let's look at the first verse. A certain man was sick. John 11 verse 1. Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. Now, Bethany was the one place that's referred to frequently in the Gospels as the place where Jesus loved to come and visit and perhaps rest. It was one of those homes, it's one of the only homes that we read of in the Gospels that openly welcomed Jesus warmly every time. They took a lot of pains whenever he came. He could come with his 12 disciples and food would always be available. He could walk in anytime without any warning. It was a home that was completely open. There may have been other homes like that that were open to Jesus, we don't know. But Bethany stands out in the Gospels as the home of Lazarus, Mary and Martha. We don't know if there were any other members in that home other than Lazarus and his two sisters, Mary and Martha. And they were living in that home and it was a home that Jesus loved to come to. They were God-fearing people. They loved to sit at Jesus' feet and hear his word. Remember, they were living in a community of Jewish people who had rejected Christ. And here was a home that had accepted and had openly acknowledged that they were followers of Jesus Christ whom others had rejected. And it was in such a problem, it was in such a home where there was a home that honored God that there was a problem, a serious problem. And that's one of the things we've been seeing through the miracles that we've been looking at in John's Gospel. That those who follow the Lord are not exempted from facing the problems that other people face. God doesn't put us in some sort of space suit here on earth, protect us from the problems that other people face on earth. He doesn't do that. He allows us to face the very same problems that other people face. He allows us to face trials, difficulties, opposition, financial difficulties, we lose jobs, we've got to hunt for houses to live in, and sickness, death, all these things. We know that believers face the same things that unbelievers face. In fact, it says in Psalm 34 that the afflictions of the righteous are many. Psalm 34 verse 19. So, it's not that we have less problems when we are believers, we have more. But, the rest of that verse says, but the Lord delivers out of all of them. So, when you become a Christian, your life's going to be exciting because you're going to have more problems. The exciting part is that you're going to experience the Lord delivering you out of them. Solving those problems, God can solve every problem, not perhaps in the way that you expect, but in a way which He chooses. And His way is always better for us in the long run. When we are, you know how our own little children sometimes don't understand why we treat them in a certain way, or why we tell them not to do certain things, or don't give them certain things they ask for. And they may think that their parents don't love them, but that's not the truth. It's because you love them that you deny them certain things, and don't permit certain things, and tell them that they're expected back home at a certain time, etc. They don't understand it. And when we are spiritually little children, we also don't understand why God denies us certain things, why He doesn't give certain things to us whenever we want. But His wisdom is far superior to ours, much more than our wisdom is superior to our little children's wisdom. So, if we keep that in mind, we'll never have a complaint against God. We'll never murmur about anything. In every situation, we will bow down and say, Thank you Lord, your way was perfect, I don't understand it fully yet, but your way is perfect. That is always the response of a man of faith. So, here we see in John chapter 11, Lazarus, it says in verse 2, Mary, who anointed, this is the home of Mary and Martha, and their brother Lazarus was sick. And the sisters therefore sent to him saying, Lord, he whom you love is sick. They didn't even have to mention his name. The Lord loved this home so much, that they just have to send a message to him saying, Lord, the one whom you love is sick. And when Jesus heard it, He said, this sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified by it. There is a truth here in this verse that we need to understand. That God who runs this universe, who has got all power in His hands, and who can do everything, and in whose eyes, earth is a small speck of dust. This thing which we call planet earth, is a small speck of dust. And on this speck of dust called earth, are still smaller specks called you and me. And we small specks, have got still smaller specks called problems. And can you imagine this almighty God who runs this universe, having a difficulty solving this little problem. I sometimes think of ants. You sometimes see ants crawling, struggling along with one grain of rice, or something like that. And boy, that's such a burden for that ant. But it's no burden for me. And if I were to help that ant, I say, hey, I can help you any amount. That one grain of rice, what's that? I sometimes feel that we need to look up, and see the greatness of God. And see how powerful He is, and how almighty He is. I do that sometimes. I sometimes just sit and look at the stars, to see how great my heavenly Father is. He who runs this universe. You know when Job had a problem, God didn't talk to him about his sin. God just talked to him about how great and powerful He was. I believe that's the answer to many of our problems. God can make everything work for His glory. That's what I want to show you in this verse. This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God. You can take that word to yourself. That problem you are facing right now, is for the glory of God. Do you believe that God can be glorified through that? If you react in the right way. If you can trust Him. It all depends on faith. In the midst of the most difficult problem, that any human being faces. If he can say, my Father in heaven, I trust you, that in this situation, you will glorify yourself, God will be glorified. But God can't do that, unless you trust Him. I want to show you another verse, before I come back to this chapter. In John's gospel chapter 12, Jesus was facing death. And, He was very conscious that, the time had come, for Him to be crucified. And do you know how He describes it? In John 12, 22, 23, He says, The hour has come, for the Son of Man to be glorified. He thought of His crucifixion, as being glorified. And then, He says, and this is the verse I wanted to point out to you. It's a very good verse for us to think of, whenever we face a trial. Verse 27, Now, my soul, has become troubled. I am in a difficult situation. What shall I say? Father, save me from this hour? No. I'll pray, Father, verse 28, glorify Thy name. And you can take that verse, I've taken that verse many, many times, in different situations I've faced. And I say, Lord, what shall I say in this situation now? I know, the natural reaction, the natural prayer that comes out of me is, save me out of this. But I shall pray what Jesus prayed. Father, glorify Thy name. And that's the best prayer to pray. Because that's an expression of faith. See, the entire race of Adam, wants to be saved out of a situation. Father, glorify Your name. And there's a world of difference between these two prayers. So, in any situation we face, if we can believe, God is able to bring tremendous glory to His name, and at the same time, work this thing out for my good, in a far better way than I'm praying. I will pray, Father, glorify Your name. That's why in the Lord's prayer, when the Lord taught His disciples to pray, they asked Him, Lord, teach us to pray. He told them, you know what must be the uppermost desire in your heart? And you may have a lot of problems. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Glorify Thy name. Lord, whether my back gets healed or not, whether I get that house I want, or that job I want or not, glorify Your name. And you will find, when you pray that prayer, God is not only glorified, but you get something far better than you could ever ask for, or even think. The Bible says, He's able to do exceedingly abundantly, about everything that we can ask or think. We're missing something, when we pray, Lord save me out of this situation. We'll get something far better. We'll probably get the salvation, and in addition, something else, if we pray, Father glorify Your name. So Jesus said, this sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God. Jesus' whole life was focused on, how can my Father be glorified? How can my Father be glorified? And you can say that a man's become more Christ-like, when his vision is also focused on, not how he can get out of some difficult situation, but how can the Father be glorified in that situation? Now it says here, some amazing words, in verse 5 and 6. Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus. Therefore, when He heard, that Lazarus was sick, what would you do? He rushed. No. He stayed there two days longer. Imagine getting a message, that someone whom you deeply love is sick, and you say when you heard it, you decided not to go so soon. Go a couple of days later. It's amazing. There's something wonderful I see, as I study the life of Jesus in the Gospels, because the Bible says, anyone who says he's a Christian, must walk as Jesus walked. 1 John 2.6. Anyone who says he abides in Christ, must walk as Jesus walked. So if you say you're a Christian, according to 1 John 2.6, you must walk as Jesus walked. That's a challenge. And if there's a verse that says that, it must be possible. And so, we need to understand the principles, by which Jesus lived His earthly life. Anyone who says he's a Christian, must live as Christ did. How did Jesus live His earthly life? He didn't respond to everything that He saw and He heard. He responded to the inner promptings of the Holy Spirit. Now, the race of Adam responds to what they see and what they hear. There's a very wonderful verse, if you don't know it, let me just quote it to you. If you want the reference, it's in Isaiah chapter 11. But let me read it to you. Isaiah 11, it says in verse 3, about Jesus, that He would never make a decision by what His eyes saw or His ears heard. But He would make a decision by the fear of the Lord, the Holy Spirit, referred to in the previous verse, giving Him wisdom and understanding and counsel and etc. The things mentioned in verse 2. So, here are two principles by which you can live. The entire race of Adam. Now, if you look at the way all human beings decide, take decisions in their life. It's all based on what we see and what we hear. Almost all the information that we have in our minds comes from our eyes and our ears. When we see something, we hear something and we decide. We use our mind perhaps and decide. Jesus lived by a much higher principle. He prayed. Children of Adam don't pray. They say, I don't need to pray. I'm intelligent. I assess the situation. I'm going to take a decision. Such people can never become spiritual. A spiritual man is one who has learned to take note of what he sees, take note of what he hears, but not take a decision entirely based on those things alone, but to listen to the promptings of the Spirit. And when you live like that, your life becomes far more useful to God. That's how Jesus lived. So, here he heard, Lazarus is sick. Now, the right thing for any child of Adam to do is rush. He's sick. I mean, go and see him. But he listened. And he felt, you know, this is one of those things which you can't explain. But those who experience it know it. The prompting of the Holy Spirit. And Jesus felt the prompting of the Holy Spirit saying, don't go right now. And he didn't go. And later on, as we see the story develop, Jesus went after two days. It was a long journey of about 80 miles. And he took about four days to reach there. And by the time he arrived, Lazarus was already dead. Four days. As we see later on in the story. So, what have we learned from that? Even if Jesus had started immediately, as soon as he heard the news, he wouldn't have arrived in time. Lazarus would have been dead already. But there was a reason why he delayed. And that doesn't appear in this Gospel of John chapter 11. But when we compare Scripture with Scripture, when we compare the other Gospels with the Gospels and see certain events mentioned in for example, Luke chapter 19, which are not mentioned here. We see that Jesus took four days to go from Galilee, where he was, all the way down to Bethany. And on the way, he passed through Jericho. And that's where we read that he met Zacchaeus, who was sitting on the tree. And he called him down and Zacchaeus got converted. So, that would not have happened if he had gone immediately. That's just one of the things that Jesus would have missed out on. And Zacchaeus would have missed out on. If Jesus hadn't listened to the prompting of the Spirit. Now, when we get into eternity, we'll discover the number of things we missed out on and the number of people we couldn't bless because we lived like the rest of Adam, the rest of the children of Adam. And we did not pray, we did not seek the will of God, we did not seek the prompting of the Spirit, we relied upon our own cleverness. Okay, we probably didn't commit any serious crimes, but we were not the blessing that we could have been. So this is one of the things I've always encouraged young people. I say, you'll make mistakes, no doubt we all make mistakes. How does a child learn to walk? By making mistakes, by falling down. So, we shouldn't be afraid of making mistakes, but we've got to learn to develop the habit of listening to the prompting of the Holy Spirit. The Bible speaks about walking in the Spirit. What does that mean? It means to listen to these promptings of the Holy Spirit. And perhaps, if Jesus had gone by Jericho an earlier day, perhaps Zacchaeus was out fleecing money from somebody as a tax collector, and he wouldn't have been there that day. And the Spirit knew all that. I'll give you another example of it. If you read the Acts of the Apostles, you read about a man who was lame, who was more than 40 years old, lame from birth, who was placed near the temple as a beggar. And he begged for money from Peter and John. And Peter said, I don't have any money to give you, but I'll give you what I have in the name of Jesus of Nazareth. Get up and walk. And that man got up and walked, and there was such a revival, it says 5,000 people got converted, seeing that miracle. And I thought of this when I read that. Can you imagine how many times Jesus saw that man when he went into that temple? Jesus used to walk in and out of that temple three and a half years. So many times. And that man was sitting at the gate of the beautiful gate of the temple and begging. And I can imagine he must have begged from Jesus many times. What did Jesus give him? Money. He didn't heal him. Why? He who had the power of healing. Why didn't he heal that man? You know, some people say that Jesus healed everybody. He didn't. He went into the pool of Bethesda and healed one man. We read in John 5. Here is this lame man at the beautiful gate of the temple. He may pass by so many, perhaps a hundred times. And each time he'd give him money. And not healing. Why? Because Jesus lived by the prompting of the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit would say no. Okay. Here's the money. Because if Jesus had healed him, there would not have been that revival that took place in Acts chapter 3. See, that's what happens when we don't listen to the prompting of the Holy Spirit. We live according to our reason. We think we're so clever. We do what we like. We'll probably discover only in eternity how much we messed up God's work. And hindered what God wanted to do through us. So I want to say to you, those of you who are serious about living the Christian life the way Jesus lived it. Who are serious about being spiritual people and not living at the low substandard level of most Christians around us these days. You want to be a godly person. You want to live like Jesus did. You want to live like the apostles did. Let me encourage you to listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit. And first of all listen to the voice of the Spirit speaking to you about sin. Deal with that first. A lot of people like to hear about the Holy Spirit telling him to go here and telling us to go here and there. But we first got to listen to him telling us about sin. Jesus' life was so totally free from sin. So totally pure. That's why he could hear the Holy Spirit so clearly. He'd walk down the road and the Spirit would say stop. Look up into the tree. There'd be somebody there. Isn't it exciting to live like this? Do you know that God's given us the Holy Spirit so that we can live like that ourselves? That we can walk as Jesus walked on this earth and be a blessing to people. I remember once, so here we read that Jesus waited. I remember some years ago when I was a young Christian and I'd gone to another part of India to preach the gospel to some young students. I was single those days. And I got a message, a telegram from my father who was quite old, who needed my help saying that the doctors had diagnosed him as having cancer and I was the only son available. So he wanted me to rush back immediately to be there when he was admitted into hospital. And here I'd gone just, I'd just gone for the beginning of a series of meetings with young people. And I said Lord and he sent a message to me this is urgent. So I said Lord what do I do? I love my dad and I want to help him but what am I supposed to do now? And as I was reading the scriptures I felt a prompting in my heart that I should wait for another four or five days and then travel. So I sent a message back saying I'm coming but I'll be able to come only after a week. And do you know what happened during that one week? In that one week my father's medical report was sent to another doctor who examined the x-rays and said there's no cancer here. There's no need for a surgery. See all the devil wanted to do was to get me out of that place so that I wouldn't preach the gospel to those students. It's wonderful to listen to the prompting of the Holy Spirit. Whenever you have to take a decision let me encourage you to pray and say Lord these are the facts. This is what my eyes tell me. This is what my ears tell me. Now what do you tell me? I want to hear what you have to say. Does it take long to pray a prayer like that? Let's develop that habit. So Jesus stayed there two days longer and then he said to his disciples let us go to Judea again. And the disciples said verse 8, Rabbi the Jews were just now seeking to stone you. Are you going to go there again? They're going to kill you. And Jesus said there are only 12 hours in the day. If you walk in the day you don't stumble because he sees the light of the world. What he was saying is applying it to ourselves is that if you walk in the light of God there is no danger anywhere. Which is the safest place in the world to live in? There are over 200 countries in the world. Which is the safest place in the world today? The safest place is the center of the will of God. If you are in the place where you say Lord I want to do your will in my life you can go to what the world calls dangerous places and you're safe there. If you walk in the light the Lord says there's no danger. The problem comes when you walk in the darkness. When you allow sin in your life. When you think when you have things in your life that you want to hide. Come out in the open with God. Walk in the light and you're safe. One who walks in the night, verse 10, who stumbles. Then he said our friend Lazarus sleeps. Jesus called death sleep. But I go that I may waken him out of his sleep. Then the disciples said, verse 12, well Lord if he's fallen asleep he'll get up after a while. But Jesus had spoken about death. Then Jesus said plainly to them, Lazarus is dead. And verse 15, I want you to notice this verse. Here's one reason why Jesus didn't go. I'm glad for your sakes he told the disciples that I was not there so that you may believe and see something of my supernatural power. Now let us go unto him. Everything that Jesus did was for the good of others. Here he said it's good for you disciples that I was not there. So that your faith will be strengthened. I wonder if you realize that one of the things, perhaps the thing that God wants to strengthen most of all in us is our faith. If he didn't go to Lazarus' home in time to heal him of his sickness it was so that the disciples' faith would be strengthened. Mary's faith would be strengthened. Martha's faith would be strengthened. Lazarus' own faith would be strengthened after he rose from the dead. And many other people would, faith would be strengthened. God allows many things in our life in order to strengthen our faith. We read of you know a time when Peter was going to deny the Lord. And Jesus predicted it. He says Simon Satan has desired to have you and you're going to deny me three times tonight. And he said I'm praying for you. But I'm not praying that you won't deny me. I'm praying that after you've denied me, after you've failed, that your faith does not fail. That's what Jesus prayed for Peter. We would think the right thing to pray is Father don't let him deny me. But something worse than that is to lose faith. And Jesus, everything that Jesus did was to make sure that people's faith was strengthened. Do you know that faith is in God's kingdom the exact equivalent of what money is in this earthly kingdom. You know the value of money on this earth? Well that's exactly what faith is in God's kingdom. The more money you have, the more luxurious a life you can live, the more you can bless and help others. If you got a lot of money, the less you have the more difficult life is on earth and the less you can help others. It's the same with faith. The more faith we have, the more victoriously we can live for God, the more we can bless other people. The less faith we have, we struggle along in the Christian life. Jesus understood that. And so his aim was always to strengthen faith. And that's why he allows a lot of things in our lives which we may think are not for our good. That's why sometimes we ask and the answer doesn't come immediately. Can you imagine Mary and Martha wondering why in the world Jesus didn't come. He's heard the message, he got the message, he's heard the prayer and he hasn't turned up. And the next day goes and the next day goes, Lazarus dies in 1 day, 2 days, 3 days, 4 days and Jesus still hasn't come. Here's a picture of what many believers face when they've sent a message to Jesus in prayer and the answer hasn't come. This miracle is to give an answer to such situations where we pray for something and the answer doesn't come. And we wait. It's to strengthen our faith. And it says here in verse 16 the disciples thought, well Jesus is going to go and die there and Thomas who was called Didymus, verse 16 said to his fellow disciples, let us also go that we may die with him. It's wonderful to see the dedication of these disciples. They said let's go and die with them. This man Thomas by the way was the one who came to India in the year 55 A.D. The same Thomas who said let's go and die with him. He came to India and died in India preaching the gospel, speared to death by non-Christian people. But way back there 20 centuries ago he came and established a church and number of believers in the very part of India where I come from. It's amazing the dedication of these disciples. It says here in verse 17 he came and he found that Lazarus had already been dead for 4 days and notice it says in verse 20 Martha when she heard that Jesus was coming, went to meet him but Mary sat still in the house. These two sisters, I think they were both wonderful sisters both loved the Lord tremendously but they were completely different in their temperament. Martha was the extrovert, the outgoing person as soon as Jesus come she rush off into the kitchen and make food for him. Mary was the more introverted melancholic type that would sit and she sat at Jesus feet and heard his word and here also we read she was so melancholic that even though she heard that Jesus had come she still sat in the house. It says but Mary still sat in the house and Martha was the person who went out and met the Lord immediately and what I want to say is that God loved both, Jesus loved both of them there is a place in God's kingdom for the extrovert and the introvert the person who is outgoing and the person who is retiring some of us may look at other people who have certain advantages in their temperament and wonder why God has made us like this I remember when I was younger I used to envy the extrovert who could slap people on the back and say hi and I couldn't do that type of thing and I couldn't do it naturally anyway and it would be a poor imitation if I try to do it and then I used to be discouraged I said Lord those are the type of people they are the life and soul of every party wherever they go they cheer everybody up and here I am sitting there I wonder if any of you feel like that but I was tremendously helped when I discovered that every temperament has got its advantages and disadvantages a lot of people who are this outgoing type that's a good advantage they make friends with people very easily but some of these folks are very slip short in little details in their work whereas the introverted type you give him a job to do and he will do it perfectly so I see that God has needs both type of people and when the Holy Spirit comes and fills us what he does is he strengthens the strong points in our temperament and he helps us to overcome the weak points in our temperament so nobody need ever feel discouraged because their temperament is not the type of temperament you'd like to have Martha and Mary were different you find even among the disciples Peter and John were different they were different but God could use both of them so we read here that Martha went straight up to Jesus and Mary sat still in the house now I want you to notice verse 21 Martha said to Jesus Lord if you had been here my brother would not have died she had a complaint in her heart for four days that she had nursed a grudge a complaint because prayer was not answered Lord if you had been here Lord if you had answered this prayer if you had come immediately this situation would not have cropped up I wonder if there is someone sitting here with a similar grudge against the Lord for some unanswered prayer say Lord if only you had answered that prayer this situation wouldn't have arisen well Jesus said Jesus answered her with another if and that's what I want to say to you who got a question against God today saying if you had answered my prayer here is the Lord's answer to you Jesus said to her in verse 40 didn't I say to you that if you believe you will see the glory of God that's the answer if you believe so that's the answer to the if in your life this is the Lord's if to your if it could be a problem which you feel is so aggravated now because God didn't answer the prayer in time but the Lord says if you trust me I can bring glory to God even in this complicated difficult situation there is no problem God cannot solve there is no situation in which God cannot bring glory to himself but he is so dependent on someone trusting him if we don't trust him that miracle will not happen not because he can't do it or he won't do it but because he doesn't work where there is no faith some of the saddest words written in all the Gospels are found in the last verse of Matthew 13 where it says he couldn't do many miracles there not because he didn't want to but because of their unbelief is it possible? that's being written about someone here the Lord couldn't do something there because you wouldn't trust him he wanted to do it, you needed it you needed it, he wanted to do it and it still didn't happen because you wouldn't trust him and here is another person whose situation is ten times worse than yours who needs a miracle and God wants to do it for him and the only difference is he says Lord I believe you can do it and he experiences it if you believe you will see the glory of God but coming back to what we saw earlier we finally read that Mary Martha, sorry Mary also finally got up in verse 32 and went to Jesus and she also said the same thing she also had this grudge in her heart, Lord if notice the ifs here Martha saying Lord if you had done this and Mary coming and saying Lord if you had done this they had a complaint against God the answer to both of them was the Lord's if in verse 40, if you believe and once you see this truth in this miracle we'll have no more ifs in our life we'll never have to go to God and say Lord if you had done this no the only if is if I can believe if I can believe in that situation the Lord can bring glory even though it looks as if things are pretty bad further down we read in verse 35 that when Jesus came to the grave he wept this is the shortest verse in the whole Bible only two words Jesus wept amazing words, this is the only place in the whole in all the gospels where we see Jesus actually weeping over a situation where other people were weeping we know in another place he wept over Jerusalem because they wouldn't accept the gospel but here we see when other people were weeping Jesus entered into their sorrow so much the Bible says weep with those who weep and Jesus did that he was so human I mean it even moved the Jews around him who said behold how he loved that wonderful song that hymn I stand amazed in the presence of Jesus the Nazarene and wonder how he could love me a sinner condemned and clean has one line in it which always blesses my heart it says he had no tears for his own griefs but sweat drops of blood for mine he had no tears for his own griefs and sorrows but sweat drops of blood for mine never did Jesus weep over his own problems he had people trying to kill him and never even when he was carrying the cross beaten and hammered and he was going through the streets of Jerusalem carrying the cross and the women were weeping around him he turned around to them and said daughters of Jerusalem don't weep for me I'm ok I'm doing the will of my father yeah I've been beaten up and all that's ok but I'm doing the will of my father weep for yourselves and for your children that's how Jesus was he had no tears for his own griefs his life was so completely taken up with serving the father and blessing other people that he had no time to weep over his own problems now the application for this whenever I sing that song the way I apply it to myself is I say Lord I keep saying I want to be like you, don't you want to be like Jesus, we all want to be like Jesus what does it mean to be like Jesus it means it means to have no tears for our own griefs but tears for the sorrows of others that is true spirituality where I say Lord my burdens I cast on you you take care of them here I am now Lord my hands are empty I can take the burdens of other people that's how Jesus lived you know and that's how you and I are supposed to live and you'll find when you live like that when you care for the sorrows of others God takes care of your problems as well and very often we don't experience that because we are so taken up with our own problems all the time we have no concern for the problems of other people if you read the story of Joseph in Genesis chapter 40 you read that when he was in prison with so many problems himself having been cast out I mean sold as a slave in a far far country away from his parents and accused falsely put in jail he wasn't taken up with his own problems he saw Pharaoh's butler and baker one day looking discouraged and he went and said hey fellas why are you discouraged why are you discouraged he had a concern for other people who were looking sad and if you read that story that's how he got a contact that finally led him to Pharaoh's palace and brought him out of prison but how did it all start it started with his having a concern for somebody else's problems when he had enough problems of his own to worry about and very often that is God's way of deliverance Jesus wept he never wept for himself but he wept when he saw the sorrow that other people were going through and he wept when he saw the havoc that the devil had brought through sin on this earth he was angry with the devil and he wept for the people who were around him but the interesting thing here is some people said behold how he loved him but there were some others who criticized even his weeping they said oh couldn't he have come a little earlier and saved this man from dying further we read in verse 43 Jesus came he first of all told them in verse 39 remove the stone I want you to notice something here in this little command to remove the stone in our study through these miracles we've been seeing one thing that Jesus never does a miracle on his own he always asks the other people to do something for example he told the servants fill up the water pots with water you do the easy part and I'll do the difficult part of turning the water into wine there had to be a partnership you know the Lord wants to do everything along with us he could have fed the multitude with nothing but he said give me what you have you have only 5 loaves and 2 fish ok we'll start with that and Jesus and the young boy entered into a partnership where the boy gave his 5 loaves and 2 fish and Jesus fed the multitude it's always like that we've got to do our part to experience a miracle it's a very small part it's a very easy part Jesus could have commanded that stone to be rolled away without anybody touching it but he didn't do it he said you fellas go and move the stone away and they removed the stone you do the easy part of moving the stone out of the that's blocking up the grave and I'll do the difficult part of raising that person from the dead and apply this to our own life the Lord never asks us to do the difficult part but he does ask us to do the easy part do that and trust him he'll do the difficult part it's a partnership and then we read that when the stone was removed Jesus raised his eyes and said father verse 41 I thank you that you've always heard me and he cried with a loud voice saying verse 43 Lazarus come forth and he who was dead came forth immediately here we see the greatest physical miracle that Jesus did but the man came out bound hand and foot with wrappings because that's how they buried people those days they wrapped them up completely and now Jesus told them to do something he could have removed those wrappings too but he said now you do that easy part again you unbind him and let him go now here is a picture of a person who's come out of spiritual death it's a picture of a person as I said was born again life has come into him and a lot of Christians are like this they've been born again there's absolutely no doubt that they are born again but they are wrapped around with the grave clothes of some old traditions and rules and all types of things the Jews had this problem many of the early Jewish converts they were bound with the grave clothes of the law they had arguments about should we circumcise people should we keep the sabbath and things like that and Jesus commanded always loose him and let him go it's no use saying we have life if you are tied down with all these traditions of men if you read the gospels you find that one of the great conflicts that Jesus had was with the Pharisees who insisted on people keeping their traditions and it's the same today many of us are not able to do all that God wants us to do it could be some tradition that's holding us back and the word of the Lord is unbind him and let him go so we see here two things in this miracle one is the coming to life of Lazarus and the other is his being set free from these legalistic rules and regulations and many many of these miracles we've seen that truth coming forward Jesus healing people on the sabbath day Jesus rebuking the Pharisees for not allowing him to heal the sick on the sabbath day this principle of being free from the law and free to serve the Lord so as we come to the end of this miracle it says here that many many people believe verse 45 and because of this they went and told the Pharisees and the Pharisees tried to kill him Jesus was willing to take that risk I want to say one last thing before I close when Jesus asked them to remove the stone Martha said Lord verse 39 there's such a stench here for he's been dead four days here is a picture of a Christian home Bethany where there's a stench it's smelly you can't try to you can't move a stone to look inside many a Christian home is like that today many a Christian life is like that there's a stench inside because there's something dead there and the first thing the Lord says to us is expose it remove the stone confess it that's the first lesson and when we roll the stone away and confess our sin to God and say Lord there's a stench here I'm honest my home life is not what it should be it all looks nice on the outside Mary sitting at Jesus feet and all that but there's a stench there I want to acknowledge it then the Lord can come and do a miracle and we read that in the same house in the same house where there was the stench you read in chapter 12 in the next chapter and the third verse that when Mary after the resurrection of Lazarus took a costly perfume and anointed the feet of Jesus the whole house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume that's a beautiful way to see the end of that story that in the house where there was a stench the whole house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume and the message that comes to us the message of this sign is that if there is a stench in your life or in your home life or in your married life if you will roll the stone away and open it up to the Lord and say Lord it's true I don't want to hide it I've hidden it long enough it's not what it should be everybody thinks I'm a wonderful Christian everybody thinks my wife and I have a wonderful relationship at home but it's not true Lord do something the Lord will do something but if I keep the stone rolled over the grave and never open it up the stench will only go from bad to worse but not only will the Lord remove the stench He will fill us with the Holy Spirit so that the fragrance of the life of Christ can come and replace that stench in our life and in our home let's pray so what does the Lord expect of us this afternoon honesty honesty honesty roll away the stone don't hide it and that's all and trust believe me however bad the situation if you believe you can see the glory of God in your home in your life Lord we want to believe that you can do miracles you these signs have been written down in such detail that we might learn from them and we pray that everyone here who needs this message will find something from it for their personal life that will bring life and deliverance to them pray in Jesus name Amen you are invited to visit our website on the internet www.cfcindia.com 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