Bible Study series: John 11:1-16. Why did Jesus delay when Lazarus was sick? Then he died. Is it too late now?
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In the next link to the original chapter, I write a more thorough commentary and offer the Greek text.
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Let’s begin.
Scripture: John 11:1-16
1 A certain man was sick, Lazarus from Bethany, from the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2 Mary was she who anointed the Lord with myrrh and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was sick. 3 The sisters sent for him, saying, “Lord, see the one whom you love is sick.” 4 But when Jesus heard, he said, “This sickness is not for death but for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.” 5 Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. 6 So when he heard that he was sick, then he remained in the place where he was, for two days. 7 After this, he then said to the disciples, “Let us into Judea again.” 8 His disciples said to him, Rabbi, the Jews were once seeking you to stone you, and you want to go there?” 9 Jesus replied, “Are there not twelve hours in a day? If someone walks around in the daytime, he does not trip because he sees the light to this world. 10 But if anyone walks around at night, he trips because the light is not in him.” 11 He said these things, and after this he said to them, “Lazarus our friend sleeps, but we go so that I may awaken him.” 12 So his disciples said to him, “If he has fallen asleep, he will get well.” 13 But Jesus had not spoken about his death, but they thought that he was talking about the natural sleep. 14 At this, Jesus spoke plainly to them. “Lazarus has died. 15 And I am glad for your sake that I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.” 16 Then Thomas, called Didymos, one of the disciples said, “Let us also go, so that we may die with him.” (John 11:1-16)
Comments:
1-2:
For another intimate view of this family, see Luke 10:38-42.
38 And while they were going along, he entered a particular village, and a woman named Martha welcomed him. 39 She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and began listening to his message. 40 Martha was distracted by all the serving. She stood over him and said, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me alone to serve? So tell her to help me!” 41 The Lord replied and told her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and troubled by many things, 42 but one thing is necessary. Obviously, Mary has chosen the right part, which shall not be taken from her.” (Luke 10:38-42)
John is saying to his audience that they had heard of a certain Mary, the one who anointed his feet and wiped them with her hair, and now John introduces them to her sister and brother Lazarus. John will tell this story in 12:1-7. So we have a “prolepsis” or “anticipation” of what is to come. John is setting up the entire chapter and 12:1-7 with these sixteen verses.
This is not the same Lazarus in the Parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man (Luke 16:19-31).
Bruce points out that an ossuary (bone box) inscribed with the names “Mary, Martha, Lazarus” was near Bethany, in 1873. He calls it a coincidence because the names are common (comments on vv. 3-5).
Also, in v. 1, John calls Mary “Maria” and then in v. 2 he calls her “Mariam” (Miriam). Evidently, John was not obsessed with giving her a Hebrew name, nor was John deliberately undermining the Jewish roots of earliest Jesus community. He switched back and forth between the two. The Hebrew Roots Movement is an American-Israeli concern. Personally I celebrate their efforts to reach out to the unconverted Jewish community, but I wish they would make it clearer that the movement is simply a way to reach out to Jews, and not some sort of ultra-pure interpretation of the Torah and the NT. These efforts are not a cheap knockoff of the Hasidim, the extra-sacred, and everyone else is not quite up to standards. The NT streamlines and eliminates the bits of the Torah that puts markers or cultural barriers between Jews and Gentiles.
I like how Bruce connects John’s explanatory aside in v. 2 to John’s Christian community: “The Evangelist [John], who records the incident later (John 12:3), had presumably told the story already (no doubt with other stories to be written down eventually in his Gospel) in the companies of Christians among whom he moved. So, on mentioning Lazarus for the first time, he says, in effect, ‘You will know whom I mean if I tell you that he was the brother of that Mary who anointed the Lord’” (comment on vv. 1-2). Bruce goes on to say that the story of anointing the feet of Jesus would not be soon forgotten but was memorable.
3-6:
These verses also set the scene for the rest of the chapter and even 12:1-7. Of course the two sisters would send word to Jesus that his good friend and their brother is sick. John uses the verb phileō (pronounced fee-leh-oh), yet in v. 5 he uses the verb agapaō (pronounced ah-gah-pah-oh). Both mean “friendship-love.” This natural interchange of the two verbs indicates that they are virtual synonyms in John’s Gospel.
“Lord”: it may not mean anything more than “sir,” in some contexts, but here, since Martha makes such a profound confession of faith (v. 27), it is best to go with “Lord.”
Then Jesus introduces a little paradoxical theology. A paradox places together two seeming conflicting ideas, but somehow they belong together. Jesus said that Lazarus’s sickness is not for death, but then Lazarus actually dies (v. 14). Jesus is simply saying that Lazarus’s sickness does not lead to a permanent death, because he will be resurrected. Then God and the Son of God will receive more glory.
“Son of God”: Let’s look into some more systematic theology (as I do throughout this commentary). Jesus was the Son of the Father eternally, before creation. The Son has no beginning. He and the Father always were, together. The relationship is portrayed in this Father-Son way so we can understand who God is more clearly. Now he relates to us as his sons and daughters, though, surprisingly, in John’s Gospel we are not called “sons,” but “children.” Only Jesus is the Son. In any case, on our repentance and salvation and union with Christ, we are brought into his eternal family.
6. Titles of Jesus: The Son of God
When Did Jesus “Become” the Son of God?
The Trinity: What Are the Basics?
The Trinity: What Are Some Illustrations?
The Trinity: Why Would God Seem So Complicated?
The Trinity: What Does He Mean to Me?
In v. 5 John needs to restate that Jesus loved the siblings because what he is about to do in v. 6 is startling. So when he had heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was, for two more days. Why the delay? This question has been answered in v. 4, the greater and more startling the miracle, the greater the glory. Mary and Martha will challenge Jesus and his delay (vv. 21 and 32). He will reinforce his purpose: he is the resurrection and the life. John’s readers must have recalled “for he himself knew what he was about to do” (John 6:6). It is time to trust when God does not arrive on your timetable. He has his own schedule.
Timing: Jesus crossed over the Jordan to where John had been baptizing in the early days (10:20). In 1:28, this location was probably Batanea, about 150 km northeast of Jerusalem. Lazarus was alive when Jesus heard of his illness (11:3-4). During the two-day delay, Lazarus died (11:11). When Jesus arrived outside Bethany, Lazarus had already been dead four days (11:17) (Mounce, comments on vv. 5-6). Carson adds that Jesus must have known of Lazarus’s death by supernatural means, en route (comment on vv. 5-6).
Why the delay? (1) Jesus wanted people to understand that Lazarus really was dead so they could witness of resurrection. (2) Jesus delayed because of the Jewish belief that a soul lingered three days wanting to get back into the body, so Jesus came on the fourth day to ensure that Jews would not believe it was a soul returning, but a true resuscitation. (3) Jesus journey to Jerusalem was self-determined. No one pinned him down, but he followed the Father’s will. He and no one else determined the right time (Mounce, comments on vv. 5-6). My take: I prefer the first and second explanations. I don’t believe Jesus gave in to Jewish popular belief.
7-10:
Jesus announces that he is ready to go back to Judea, the province that houses Jerusalem and Bethany. The disciples, thinking naturalistically, warn him about the recent death threat by the Jewish Jerusalem establishment 10:31, 39-41).
“Rabbi”: at this stage, this means “teacher” and was not an official office, as it will become in the second century.
1. Titles of Jesus: Rabbi and Teacher
Jesus replies that he is walking and working in the daytime. He will not stumble; he himself is the light, both a spiritual and moral light. Evidently he believes that the Father is guiding his steps and now it is the right time to return to Bethany, near Jerusalem. The opposite is also true. People who walk in darkness—the religious establishment in the immediate context—will trip in the darkness because the light is not in them. So he shifts the source of light from sunlight of this world to the inner light. Those who walk in darkness do not have the light that shines in the soul.
Jesus will repeat this imagery here:
35 So Jesus told them, “For still a brief time the light is among you. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness may not overtake you. And the one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going. 36 While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of the light.” (John 12:35-36)
And he already taught the light imagery in John 9:4-5:
4 We must work the works of the one who sent me while it is day; the night comes when no one can work. 5 While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” (John 9:4-5)
11-15:
Jesus plays with the ambiguity of language of sleeping and death, the beliefs of his day. Lazarus, their friend, is only “sleeping.” Then he announces that they are going to wake him up. That’s a positive development, say the disciples, again thinking naturalistically, because he will be made well. In other words, it is easier to heal a sick and sleeping man than it is to raise him from the dead, as they see things.
John informs his readers that Jesus was actually referring to Lazarus’s death, but they were thinking of the “sleep of sleep” or natural sleep. Then at their deficient thinking, he told them plainly that Lazarus had died. “Sleeping” is used eighteen times in the NT and four of them are literal (Matt. 28:13; Luke 22:45; John 11:12; Acts 12:6. The other times it is a euphemism or circumlocution of dying or death. Anyone who has seen a dead body in the casket sometimes get the impression that he could go up to the deceased and wake him up. But then it hits you. There is no waking him up by natural means. So from a spiritual point of view, it is as if Lazarus is sleeping, but from a natural point of view he really was dead. Jesus is glad—rejoices—for their benefit that they were not there. Now they can see the glory of God because Jesus is about to awaken Lazarus by supernatural means.
The purpose is that the disciples may believe. Mounce is right: “Jesus was not speaking of the initial faith but of the growth and maturing of the faith of his followers. While faith begins with a first step of commitment to the Lord, in another sense it is a progressive relationship. Faith grows as experience continues to verify the trustworthiness of the one in whom we have placed our trust” (comment on vv. 12-13).
Will Martha have this kind of maturing faith and trust, after his delay? What about Mary? What about you when the Lord delays?
16:
Finally, Thomas shows courage because he can sense trouble brewing in Jerusalem; this is it. No turning back. He is willing to die with Jesus. The Father controls the time of his Son’s death. Going to wake up Lazarus will provoke the plot to crucify the Lord, but Thomas may not realize that the Jewish establishment will also plot to kill Lazarus (12:9-11).
Experts in Aramaic tell us that t’ōmā means “twin.” In Greek the term is didymos (John 20:24; 21:2). Nicknames appeared often in the ancient world, Cephas (Kepha) Petros / Peter added to Simon.
The Meaning of the Names of the Twelve Apostles
I really like Borchert’s defense of Thomas’s courage:
That hopelessness of Thomas, however, was not the perspective of a coward. It was resignation in the face of the perceived possibility of death on his part. Thomas is not a flat, one-dimensional character in John. He appears as a real person with genuine personality characteristics. Here he recognized the imminent danger that was lurking in the south, but he was willing to follow and to die with Jesus (11:16). History, I believe, has treated Thomas rather superficially. Although he can be labeled as a doubter, I cannot help but ask, Who would cast the first stone in condemnation (cf. 8:7) of him? Surely one can sense that his realism also was linked with courage here. And one must never forget that Thomas offered the major confession of this Gospel following the resurrection (20:28). (comment on vv. 11-16)
GrowApp for John 11:1-16
1. Has God ever seemed to delay in answering your prayers? How did you respond?
RELATED
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12. Eyewitness Testimony in John’s Gospel
4. Church Fathers and John’s Gospel
3. Archaeology and John’s Gospel
SOURCES
For the bibliography, click on this link and scroll down to the very bottom:
Dr. Jim's Essential Bible Teaching 