“Identify with Christ”

Main point: We identify with Christ in his suffering and his resurrection.

Introduction

Today, we meet three characters who live in a village called Bethany: Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. Lazarus is sick and it doesn't look good. Finally, Lazarus comes to the point of death…Mary and Martha send for Jesus.

The story tells us that Jesus is only a couple of miles away. He hears the news, commits to going to see Lazarus, and then… waits 2 days before making the 2 mile trip to Bethany.

Mary and Martha knew Jesus could help. They send for him. The text tells us that Jesus loves Lazarus… and yet Jesus waits 2 days. And during those two days, Lazarus dies. Mary and Martha were devastated. 

Perhaps, In those two days of waiting, 

…they felt neglected. 

…they felt confused.

…they felt bewildered.

…maybe they even felt mad.

If I was in the shoes of Mary and Martha, I think I would have been pushed right to the limit of my trust in Jesus.

My question for us today is this: What do we do when hope is delayed?

What do we do with the 2 days of waiting - when we have made our need known to God and yet we don’t see God coming to meet us? What do we do while we wait for healing  -  when we are uncertain of the outcome. What do we do when those two days turn into two months or two years or two decades? 

What do we do when hope is delayed? What do we do when we are ground down to dust or when we sit and wait with the person we love as we see them ground down to dust. 

Those two days of waiting can grind us down into our most raw and most volatile states. It might even cause us to forget that even in these circumstances, even in the pain of the pit, God’s purposes can still be worked out. Not in glory, but in suffering. As we learn to identify with the sufferings of our Savior. But it doesn’t seem like it at the time.

Some of you know very well that those two days of waiting may grind us to dust. Until we have nothing left.

No words can comfort us.

No soothing self-talk breaks past the surface.

No glossy ideals about God's grand purpose for all things makes any sense to us.

We want to minimize our suffering. We want to make sense of the senseless situations we face. And these are good impulses. What is God doing while I sit here and wait? 

JESUS SPEAKS TO US

Jesus speaks words of comfort to us while we wait. They are the words he spoke to Mary and Martha while they were still crying. 

When there are no words…when we're at the end of our ropes. When kind words no longer bring us comfort.  When everything else is gone: It’s just Jesus left.

He looks at them and says: “I am the resurrection and the life…though you die, yet shall you live.”

Jesus stands at the end of the dark tunnel when nothing else is left and says to us: “I am the resurrection and the life…though you die, yet shall you live.”

Consider righteous Job, a man who lived a couple Milena before the time of Jesus, knew more than anyone else about loss and suffering. He was stripped of every worldly possession. All of his children died in horrendous accidents. His body was afflicted with boils from the top of his head to the soul of his feet. When he was pushed to the end of his limits and beyond, when Job had nothing left and was told to curse God and die, Job spoke with unwavering hope:

I know that my redeemer lives and that in the end he will stand upon the earth;

and after my skin has been destroyed,

    then in my flesh I shall see God,

When there is nothing left, Jesus stands before us and says: I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?