John Ch 11 v37:
But some of them said, ‘Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man also have kept this man from dying?’
This statement is helpful, as it directly associates what is about to happen as being a continuation of what Jesus was giving clear sight on.
A man who had never seen being given sight was by all accounts an incredible miracle, and to have healed Lazarus from his illness was deemed a lesser miracle than this.
But they were not expecting Jesus to raise Lazarus from the tomb!
Now we know that Lazarus was not the first person that Jesus had raised from the dead, as Luke & Marks gospel inform us about Jairus daughter and the widow of Nain respectively.
John in his gospel is intentional in presenting Spiritual truth and Revelation and so the inclusion at this juncture is to give clearer sight of what happens after Lazarus is raised from the dead! The miracles do not cease, but the greatest miracle of all is solely and entirely honed in on from Ch 12 right to the end of his gospel. In fact we could split Johns gospel into two halves & label the first Jesus leading up to a resurrection & then the second as Jesus heading towards his own resurrection. Clearly, Lazarus being raised from the dead is generic truth unto all believers in Christ and his resurrection: Seated together in heavenly places.
Therefore, we ought to be ‘seeing’ within this central pivot and turning point of Johns gospel a distinction between the old and new covenant, the miracle of resurrection life greater than the power of sin and death, due to the name of Jesus!
Philippians Ch 2 v8-11
https://www.crosswalk.com/faith/spiritual-life/ways-you-have-power-in-the-name-of-jesus.html
https://www.compellingtruth.org/power-in-the-name-of-Jesus.html
Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay against it.
This is full of prophetic realities concerning the distinction between life and death. And HIS life was resurrected to make that distinction.
Jesus died so that the stones in the pharisees hands could be rolled away, from a women caught in natures night. Not so she could continue living a life in the darkness but rather having been lifted up on her behalf, she might live a life in the light of day. The organic life that a garden represents.
Jesus said, ‘Take away the stone’.
This is full of prophetic realities concerning the distinction between life and death.
Jesus said to Martha, ‘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’.
Right here we have much to consider, what is the glory of God & how do we see it?
Furthermore, what were they seeing as Jesus looked up and spoke to his Father?
What was Jesus seeing as he gave his Father thanks?
Seeing the glory of God: Jesus lifted up his eyes and seeing his Father said: ‘Father, I thank you that you have heard me’.
What had the Father heard?
‘Take away the stone’? Take away the stone that confines a man or a women to the fall of sin and death: That place where man fell too due to digesting a lie concerning the sharing nature of God – God had not withheld from man a knowledge that was to be desired. Take away that which prevents a man or a women from walking with God in the cool of the day.
Communion defined the fellowship of the cool of the day, in the garden of Eden. The voice of the Lord and the voice of truth.
How was the Father going to take away the stone: Believing what Jesus has told us, believing that in himself he would move the stone away!
‘Father, I thank you that you have heard me’? What had Jesus been praying to his Father & what was being answered here?
‘Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name’
Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever, Amen.
John Ch 11 v4: But when Jesus heard it he said, ‘This illness does not lead to death. It is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.
Jesus knew as soon as he heard that his friend was ill that it was the answer to his prayer unto his Father & that is why Jesus allowed Lazarus to die, as he knew he was going to raise him from the grave, so that his disciples would come to understand their inheritance through the Son: Seated together with Christ in heavenly places.
‘I knew that you always hear me, but I said this on account of the people standing around, that they may believe that you sent me’.
As Jesus was seeing his Fathers face, giving him thanks and declaring for their benefit that he always hears his sons prayers.
Jesus has always wanted the stone moved away: Legalism, the covenant on stone. As due to sin in mans heart it has not been able to reveal the relationship of Father & Son.
Had Adam obeyed the commandment of life, during his moment of temptation, he would have received Christ.
Masculinity is the backbone of creation – the Father & the Son.
Being resurrected from the dead is sonship. Ephesians Ch 2: We would see Jesus – A pharisee whose eyes saw the glory of God – ‘But rise’, but you were dead in your trespasses and sins. A pharisee whose stone the Lord replaced with sonship and suffering that others might see the glory of God: Father & Son.
When Jesus cried Lazarus it was not just divine authority and loudness, it was personal. It was Jesus knowing that his Father had allowed Lazarus to die to answer his prayer that others might ‘See the glory of God’. Jesus loved Lazarus and when he was being called out of the tomb, it was God calling a man to walk towards him in the cool of the day.
– That others might see.
– This follows the man born blind
– This is a greater miracle as it is a sight being granted despite the law of sin and death.
– Who has sinned this man or his parents? Why did Jesus allow Lazarus to die.
– That the stone is rolled away! Inorganic & dead – no rise, a stone doesn’t respond to the light of life, to Father & Son.
– But the divine and supernatural miracle is that the Son has come with all his authority to move the stone away. The father hears his son – Tis Finished the Messiah dies, Cut off for sins ‘but’ not his own.
John Ch 11 v40-41 – John Ch 12 v28
Masculinity is the backbone of creation – the Father & the Son. Creational truth and gospel truth. Does it diminish femininity, God forbid, it actually magnifies it in context.
It is not a surprise that the C of E will also change the text of scripture and its pro nouns to align with the Spirit of the age which its two key archbishops are aligned with.
And it is being done in the name of good due to past evil. Such reasoning shows a complete lack of who Jesus was and is in respect to his humanity, the second man, and the redeemer of the fallen kind of masculinity. But when you have no comprehension of that which is an abomination to the Lord, then how can you define the man of sin: in the last day good will be called evil and evil good – the erosion of sound doctrine.
‘Our Father who art in heaven’ the beloved John was a son of thunder, but he would not dare nor even desire to change the hallowed’ness of His sacred name, knowing that the sacrificial death of Jesus at calvary was a true demonstration of masculinity in all its unfallen majesty.
Mark Ch 5 v17:
On one of those days, as he was teaching, Pharisees and teachers of the law were sitting there, who had come from every village of Galilee and Judea and from Jerusalem. And the power of the Lord was with him to heal them.
This occasion held the capacity to ‘move the stone away’, and had they heard the Father answer his Son, then they would have been healed, resurrected from the dead unto life & life eternal.
When Jesus saw their faith! Jesus responded to a man being lowered through a roof unto him by his friends by taking the roof of the reason he had been sent by his Father from heaven:
‘Man, you sins are forgiven you’.
This was a stone moving moment, this was an opportunity to ‘rise’ and walk with God in communion in the cool of the day.
It was not a heavy burden but rather a sweet corn on the Sabbath light.
But the scribes and the Pharisees began to question, saying, ‘Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?
Where they right to have such questions? Was it a legitimate question to have?
They were scholars of the law, steeped in Rolling Stones over roof tops! The heavens were sealed by the hand that had written, from heaven, the commandment on stone.
Who, Who, Who! Their question got right to the heart of it as God is never alone! He is Father, Son & Holy Spirit.
They did not know the Lord’s Prayer nor the power and the glory of Thy name.
Now this is entirely an aside thought, but it is not inconceivable that this paralytic had been a stone mason, who with the other men had worked on great structures of stone. Is it conceivable for edification to consider whether this mans injuries could have been sustained through neglect of the other men on the building site – could this paralytic have had to forgive these men and not resist their faith in bringing him to Jesus.
Well the main emphasize is on their faith, but what is not open to debate is that the Lord’s Prayer opens forgiveness from heaven unto all men and women who forgive others their trespasses and sins against themselves
The Lord’s Prayer is a revelation concerning an open heaven to those who receive their healing through the power of the Lord:
Power:
1 the ability to do something or act in a particular way
2 the capacity or ability to direct or influence the behavior of others or the course of events
The Lord’s Prayer has contained within its whole structure Sonship, it starts with ‘Our Father and ends with the Father only being able to act according to how he has revealed himself through his Son: Father forgive them!
Spiritual perfection is a pursuit of his nature, a nature that loved his enemies and forgave men their trespasses against himself.
The Lord’s Prayer is a teaching that must contain the forgiveness of sins: Sonship and the entering into his character is impossible without a nature that forgives sin.
Oh the scribes and the Pharisees, teachers who believed in the resurrection, but did not understand that it was from the law of sin and death!
And why could they not see? They could not hear that Jesus is the divine and beloved Son of God.
Oh thank God for a Pharisee who had his blind eyes opened by a light that came to him upon the road to Damascus.
Oh thank God he wrote, that Sonship was a law of life that had delivered him from the law of sin and death.
Oh thank God for Jesus, Thank You Father that you have heard me.
The wonder and the miracle of Jesus becoming sin who knew no sin that you and I might inherit the righteousness of God, by faith in his work at Calvary: It is Finished.
Paul was an utterly defeated man on that Damascus Road, all his learning and effort in what had been engraved on stone had profited him nothing in respect to walking with God in the cool of the day, he was an abject failure a scribe and Pharisee who was confronted with bondages of sin and death over all his thoughts and motives: Paul was bound man head to his toes – needing to be lead by others.
But rise.
And straightway he preached Christ: The Who every scribe and Pharisee needs to hear and know.
The immediacy is the power of the gospel! Not chain and ball at a scribes desk learning penance, but walking with the cool of the day: I thank God through Christ Jesus: Thank you Father you have heard me: Man your sins are forgiven.
How was the work done? Brother Saul: the plurality of mans sins being forgiven through Gods Son. Ananias shared the name of Jesus with him in obedience and Saul proved that this is the very Christ!
The power of the gospel is in his name, to everyone who believes their sins forgiven.
Paul was able to prove it, as he got up out of a dungeon of guilt and condemnation because the love of God IN Jesus Christ is great that the devil, darkness and death.
PRAISE THE LORD.
Lazarus come forth – a word of love spoken in love unto a man he loved.
No wonder Mary worshipped him as she did, she heard the sound of the voice that raised love above bondage of sin, sickness and death.
I am on a different time zone for next two Sundays so unsure on times I’ll post etc
eternalrays 