Sunday Message - Die a Little

Gregg DeMey

Transcript

Gregg DeMey : 
All right, friends, you can have a seat. We're going to go to God's word now and during this 40-day season of Lent, we are doing a deep dive into the Gospel of John, chapters 11 and 12, the part of the Gospel where Jesus and his friend Lazarus have a most significant interaction during this season. We are keeping the curtain over the window. It doesn't seem like such a burden this morning, because it's like last time I checked it was snowing outdoors. But we are keeping things on the darker side in here, so that when the light breaks on Easter Sunday morning, our level of gratitude and thanksgiving will hopefully be at an all time high. That does not mean, however, that the grace and the light of God is not at work every step along the way in between, because it is our theme this Lenten season.  I tried to sum up in this little paradoxical phrase, Die a little, Live a lot. 

Do you know what a paradox is? I mean, it's something that seems absurdly wrong, but might possibly be true, something that kind of seems backwards, but that you're suspicious this actually might be true on a deep level, and I humbly submit that one of the paradoxes that emerges again and again in God's word is that we are to die a little in order to live a lot. One example of this is, if you've ever been in a long-term relationship with a friend, with a with a spouse, you need to if that relationship is going to work for more than a few years, if it's going to work for decades, you need to learn to die to yourself a little bit in order to for that relationship to flourish. 

We have about like 50 couples going through Alpha marriage right now, my observation is, if you're going through Alpha marriage, you are learning to die a little bit more so that you can live more in your marriage. If you want to be a good student, any kids in the room, like if you want to learn more math, if you want to learn a foreign language, if you're a grad student, if you're studying to be a doctor, you're going to have to memorize so many Latin terms in anatomy and physiology, like your brain is going to have to die a little by studying hard in order to live a lot into your chosen area of interest. I love Spring flowers. I just saw some crocuses for like the first time this last week, the way spring flowers work is that a seemingly dead bulb goes down into the ground. Anybody ever planted daffodils or tulips? I mean, the thing you put in the ground just looks dead, but then it erupts this time of year into the first signs of life. This paradox all over creation is being illustrated that dying a little leads to living a lot. 

Now, last week, Pastor Mo Pacheco from Grace inGarfield shared this kind of bad news message that Jesus shared with his disciples, that their friend Lazarus had really just died like physically died and died too young and not just died a little. Lazarus had all the way, died from this mortal life. And now the question, hopefully that you were left lingering with, if you heard that message, was like, What will Jesus do next? Now that one of his like besties, if I can put it that way, like has died, What will Jesus do? We are going to pick up the story at John 11, verse 17. Jesus was not there when Lazarus died, but when Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had been in the tomb four days already, and now, Bethany, the town where Lazarus lived, was less than two miles from Jerusalem, and so many of the Jewish people of the region had come to see Martha and Mary, Lazarus siblings, to console them over the loss of their brother. 

So when Mary heard that Jesus, when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went out to meet him, but Mary was sitting in the house. So Jesus has these great friends, Martha, Mary and Lazarus, John, 11 several times points out that when Jesus was arrived, Lazarus had been in the tomb for four days. I'm not 100% sure why the Bible repeats that little detail. We do know from church history that by a couple 100 years after this, it was the prevailing Jewish view that when a person died from this life, their soul lingered nearby for three days before. Are finally departing. So perhaps, perhaps that little detail is to say that, like, the three days had expired, and it was on the fourth day, and Lazarus was not only dead, but like super dead, if I can put it that way, like no doubt, no soul still lingering, according to anybody's view, like Lazarus is gone and Jesus meets these two sisters, who are also close friends, Martha and Mary. And we know from a different account in the Gospel of Luke chapter 10, that those two sisters had very different personalities. It seems like Martha was, I mean, kind of a type, a extrovert and hard worker, and Mary was maybe on the gentler, quieter, more introverted, kind of listen and linger, kind of side of things in Luke chapter 10, Jesus is at their house teaching, and Martha is like working hard, preparing A meal, making all the arrangements for everybody. And Mary, bless her, is like sitting in the room where Jesus is teaching, just taking it all in. 

And Luke records that Martha burst into that room and is like, Jesus, can you tell my sister to give me a hand? Because, like, I'm doing all the work. And Jesus says to Martha, on that occasion, actually, your sister,Mar,y has chosen the better way here. So in this scene, maybe you'll not be surprised that their two personalities, in the way they deal with their brother's death and engage with Jesus are similarly at work. Now, as we continue to read John chapter 11, I'm going to ask you to be as the congregation, to be the voice of the two sisters so the Gospel says. Then Martha said to Jesus, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now, I know that whatever you ask from God, God will grant you. And then Jesus replied to Martha, Your brother will rise again. And Martha said, I know that he will come back to life again in the resurrection at the last day. 

So remember, Martha is kind of like the extroverted type, a a little more pushy one. She like leaves the house and like addresses Jesus. And I kind of imagine her like pointing a couple fingers directly at Jesus' chest. Like, if you had just been here a few days sooner, my brother would not have died. And Jesus says, Your brother will rise again. And at this point, this is not in the gospels, but like, given her personality, I imagine Martha like rolling her eyes a little bit and maybe thinking to herself, like, great, Jesus, if I had wanted a greeting card, I would go to the Hallmark store, right? Because there's things like that you would say at somebody's wake or funeral, and I would not encourage you the next time you're at a wake to just kind of be like, hey, they're going to rise again. And Martha, maybe, with an eye roll, is like, of course, he'll rise again.

My dead brother, we're all hurting here right now. Jesus, the gospel continues. Jesus said to her," I am the resurrection and the life." That is no greeting card statement, brothers and sisters," I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live even if he dies, and the one who lives and believes in me will never die". Do you believe this? Martha? And she replied, "Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God who comes into the world." Now that is quite something to say. I am the resurrection and the life. And around the Gospel of John, if you would read the whole Gospel, Jesus frequently is making statements like, "I am the good shepherd, I am the light of the world. I am the bread of life, and here I am the resurrection and the life." And if you've been to Sunday school or remember the stories of Moses, maybe you remember that Moses at the burning bush asked God, like, "What is your name? Who should I say? Is sending me to set the Israelites free? And God says, from this burning bush, I am that I. Am." And when Jesus makes these statements, he is claiming to be for our benefit and everybody's benefit that He is God, sometimes I wonder, what must human death be like from God's perspective? Like, if God is the I Am that I Am, and the past and our present and the future are all held and visible and are the eternal present to God. What is our mortal death from God's point of view? I mean honestly, not the grievous tragedy and darkness and weight that we feel because God is the God of the living and not the God of the dead, because He is the eternal Now and those who have gone before us, even though it's hard for us to accept by faith sometimes, and it's hard for us to feel and experience, those who have gone before us are even now living in the eternal presence of God in a way that we cannot imagine our guess yet. So Lazarus is still equally alive in Jesus point of view. And Jesus says, However, I'm the cure for death. If I can paraphrase him, I'm the cure for death. 

Now, if somebody like showed up, if I showed up and said to you, I am the cure for rabies, like that would be kind of a loony thing to say, right? Not just I have the cure for rabies, like I am the cure for rabies. But the thing about saying that is it would be kind of a hard hypothesis to prove true or false, because when's the last time you met somebody who had rabies? Hopefully not very recently, right? However, like, if I said I am the cure for cancer, like that would be quite something to say, but you could pretty easily test if I'm lying or if there's a little bit of truth in there. I mean, I don't have a medical degree, so I'm not going to cure you with, like, a good prescription or chemotherapy, and would become alarmingly quickly, like I have no power to cure anything, much less cancer. Jesus' statement is so much stronger than I am the cure for cancer. Jesus is saying, I am the cure for death, I'm the cure for everything. And just like the cancer example, like there's a way to see if this is true or false, because Lazarus is dead for four days. He's super dead. And what's going to happen next? Like, this is a what kind of person says that, right? Like, what kind of person would say, I'm the cure for rabies? What kind of person would say I'm the cure for what kind of person would say I am the cure for death? Jesus is that kind of person, and he asked Martha if she believes this. This incredible statement from Jesus mouth. And she says, like, Yes, Lord, I believe she's she is all in and she says, I believe that you are the Christ. Now please notice with me for a moment that word the Christ means the anointed one, the Chosen One, the Messiah. What is it to anoint a person? We don't do so much anointing. I mean, when Charles was crowned king of the United Kingdom, one of the things that happened was he was anointed, and the Crown went on his head. Like to be anointed means to be marked with oil or water or something else, and to be anointed means you're chosen and set apart and signified for something significant. If I can put it this way, when anyone is baptized, they are anointed by God to be one of his chosen family members. Yeah, anointed by God to be one of his family members. Sometimes weird things can anoint you, like like in the Harry Potter books, Harry Potter is anointed by like a curse and a scar, but he is like set apart from that moment to do something good and sacrificial in the world. And Jesus, on an occasion in the gospels, points out how the tears of a broken heart. Hearted repenting person were poured out on his feet and were anointing him for his death. Oil can anoint, water can anoint, tears, can anoint. And Jesus is the one who is anointed by God to be our Savior. Please hang on to that thought for just a moment. When Martha had said this, Martha then went and called her sister Mary. Mary was in the house once again, no big shocker, and said to her privately, if you would, the teacher is here and is asking for you. And now, when Mary came to the place where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said to him, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. And when Jesus saw her weeping, and the people who had come with her weeping, he was intensely moved in spirit and greatly distressed now, even though Mary was in the house and Jesus had to, like summon and call her out to meet her in her grief, Mary and Martha, the sisters, are 100% on the same page, And the same words come out of their mouth. Mary also says, maybe just with a trembling finger, Jesus, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But Martha's reaction comes with more tenderness and emotion and tears than her strong willed sister, and Jesus feels it too. Jesus is moved in spirit and greatly distressed the Greek New Testament. Word for this literally means that Jesus, like, physically shuttered. He was like feeling it so strongly, the sorrow and the grief that these sisters had for their now dead brother. And then Jesus asked, Where have you laid him? And they replied, Lord, come and see. And Jesus wept. Thus the people who had come to mourn, said, Look how much Jesus loved him. But some of them said, This is the man who caused the blind man to see. Couldn't he have done something to keep his friend Lazarus from dying when Jesus sees Mary and this whole company of friends. I mean, this must have been a great family. There's like, tons of folks from Jerusalem, tons of friends around when Jesus sees this whole company of people weeping at Lazarus tomb, Jesus loses it. Have you ever been to a place where you're like, I just need to get to the bathroom because I'm about to lose it, or, like, I need to get back to my car. Like Jesus does not make it back to the car, like he's out there with everybody, and Jesus loses it too. We should remember for a moment that the immediate cause of Jesus' Tears was not that Lazarus was dead, like when he first heard the news that Lazarus had died, he did not cry.

I mean, for many of us, when we get the phone call or hear the news like that is enough to reduce us to tears just the shocking reality that didn't make Jesus cry. When Jesus came to Bethany, came to the house, saw Mary and Martha, that in itself, was not what brought Jesus to tears, even though, for some of us, going into the places where maybe our departed loved one, their room, seeing their closet can that's not what brought Jesus to tears. It's when he is in the company of those who are mourning, kind of without hope, with broken hearts in this broken world. It is then that Jesus weeps. Jesus weeps as the word of God, who is there as God in the beginning, and who, through all things were made, he knows more than anyone there that day that this is not how things are supposed to be. This is not how things were created to be. And when Jesus sensed the brokenness and the broken hearts of this town and these friends Jesus, hearts breaks to what a friend we have in Jesus, he is not afraid to enter in. And if I can put it this way, in. His weeping, Jesus anoints the brokenness of the world with his own tears.

It's the shortest verse in the Bible. Jesus wept. John, 1135, I was very proud. When I was, like, five years old, I was like, I memorized a verse today, Jesus wept. Little did I know how absolutely profound these two words are and the volumes that they speak to the heart of God for his broken, troubled people like us, Jesus wept in Jesus, God enters into our sorrow and grief. God isn't out there at a distance like that horrible old Bette Midler song. Anybody remember that song from a distance? It's a terrible song on multiple levels. In Jesus, God enters in not at some cosmic distance, exactly the opposite, like you before he was born to the light. Jesus was in his mother's womb for months and months and months Jesus entered in. Jesus grew up with siblings who did not understand, maybe, like some of you, Jesus had friends who did not understand, and ultimately, kind of turn their back on him for a while, God in Jesus weeps at the graveside. Jesus understands God cried tears, and those tears are much more powerful than ours. Jesus' tears anoint the trouble of this life and demonstrate that there's redemption, even for the things that are so utterly broken and troublesome right now. Do you ever struggle to believe that God actually enters in to your life, and not just like the big, dramatic, epic moments, but even like the small, seemingly superficial or private moments. Do you ever struggle to imagine that your little triumphs and causes for gratitude, that God is right there, actually celebrating and receiving your Thanksgiving with wide open arms? Do you ever struggle to believe that God's is interested in your small failures and defeats and the sins that weigh you down. Do you struggle to believe that God's interest in love extends all the way down to the minutia of your life, if your faith ever struggles to stretch that far, remember these two words of the gospel. Jesus wept. Jesus is all in Jesus is all in with us. Jesus is all in with you. And those two words say so much about how deep God's love goes down to the lowest places of our humanity. When Jesus enters in, as he does here with his friends and these broken hearted mournings, what might happen next? When Jesus enters in, what might happen next? You're going to have to come back next week to find out. Here's my question for you. In the meantime, in the season of Lent, given that Jesus enters into all all of human life, are you willing to enter in to Jesus life and Jesus story, and make the journey between this scene and the upper room and the cross and What happens on Easter Sunday morning, Jesus, who sheds tears for people like us. Do you want to walk with him every step of the way this year? Are you willing, possibly to even push aside some of the things that would be obstacles or would be distractions so that you can give a little more of yourself to the scriptures and prayer this season of Lent, so that the spotlight can be on what Jesus says and Jesus does. Do what you see in Jesus' example right here. Does it motivate in you some kind of well of gratitude that you'd like. Like Jesus, you did that. You are doing that for me as much as I can. Lord, I want to do that for you. I'm seeing a little bit of nodding, but not enough. Like God, look on this congregation right now and see in our heart of hearts, this prayer and desire that we want to keep close company with Jesus in these days right now, here's what I promise you, as we walk with the Lord, even in just these two chapters of the Gospels, God will do amazing things, because when Jesus enters in, the impossible becomes real. When Jesus enters in, trouble becomes totally undone. When Jesus enters in a little bit of death becomes a whole lot of life. And the paradox is proven true because of the amazing work of Jesus that when we die a little and go with him,
real life and living a lot becomes possible. Amen. Will you pray with me a moment,

Lord Jesus, we worship you because you are 100% God, and we honor you that amazingly, you poured yourself out and became nothing to become one of us in order to know us fully and live this human life from the inside Out. Lord Jesus. We thank you that you are not distant, but you are here with us through your spirit even now. We thank you that you enter into our tears and laughter, into our weeping and joy, that you enter into our valleys and high places, that you enter into the dying and rising because of all that, we put our faith and trust our past, present and future into your hands again and ask that you will receive us and treat us with the grace and mercy that you are so renowned for. In Your name, we pray, Amen.