The Miracles of Jesus

Raising Lazarus

Bethany near Jerusalem · Shortly before the cross · John 11:1-44

In Bethany near Jerusalem, Jesus' friend Lazarus fell sick and died. Jesus deliberately waited, arriving when Lazarus had been in the tomb four days. To the grieving Martha he declared, I am the resurrection, and the life, and asked whether she believed. At the tomb Jesus wept, sharing the sorrow he was about to overturn. Then he cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth, and the dead man came out still bound in graveclothes. This is the greatest of the public signs in John's Gospel, the seventh sign, and it set in motion the plot to put Jesus to death. Life given to Lazarus would cost Jesus his own.

The scene

Lazarus of Bethany, brother of Mary and Martha, fell sick, and the sisters sent word to Jesus. He loved them, yet he stayed where he was two more days, until Lazarus had died. When he finally came, the grave had already held his friend four days, long enough that hope was gone and decay assumed. Martha met him on the road, honest in her grief.

It is the ache of every believer who has watched death come while heaven seemed silent: if only you had been here.

What Jesus did

Before he went to the tomb, Jesus lifted Martha's eyes from a past he might have changed to a person standing in front of her. He did not merely promise a resurrection on the last day; he claimed to be it.

At the grave, surrounded by mourning, the Lord of life did not stand aloof from human sorrow. In the shortest verse in the Bible, John shows us God in tears.

Then he commanded that the stone be taken away, prayed aloud so the crowd would know the Father had sent him, and called into the tomb.

What the sign reveals

This sign reveals that resurrection is not first an event but a person. Martha believed in a resurrection at the last day, a doctrine held at arm's length. Jesus stood in front of her and said, I am the resurrection, and the life. Eternal life is not a thing he distributes from a distance; it is bound up in himself, so that to have him is to have life and to be joined to him is to be beyond the final reach of death.

It reveals that Jesus is fully God and fully man. He weeps real tears at a real grave, entering our grief without pretending, and then he speaks a word that only the Author of life could speak, and a four-day corpse obeys. The same person who trembles with sorrow commands the dead. John gives us both in the same scene, so we will not divide them.

And it reveals that his delay was love, not neglect. He waited so that the miracle would be undeniable, four days dead, not merely fainted, and so that a deeper faith could be born in those he loved. What felt like abandonment was mercy preparing a greater glory.

The command itself is worth pondering. Jesus cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth, and it has been said that had he not named Lazarus, all the dead would have risen at such a word. He does not whisper a spell over the grave; he calls, publicly and by name, so that the crowd will know the Father sent him. The voice that will one day empty every tomb was heard that afternoon in Bethany, calling one man out of the dark.

Its place in the Gospel

In John's Gospel this is the seventh and climactic sign, the last and greatest before the cross. Everything has been building toward the claim it makes plain: that Jesus holds life and death in his hands. It answers the earlier signs and prepares for the greatest sign of all, his own resurrection.

It is also the hinge of the plot. Precisely because Jesus gave life to Lazarus, the authorities resolved to take his. The raising drew crowds, and the crowds frightened the leaders, who from that day plotted his death. John wants us to feel the terrible exchange: Jesus knowingly gave life to his friend, and it moved the machinery that would kill him. The tomb of Lazarus opens toward the tomb of Christ.

That Bethany lay close to Jerusalem sharpens the point. This was not a quiet miracle in distant Galilee but a public, unavoidable sign at the doorstep of the city that would crucify him within days.

How it meets us

Martha's words are ours whenever grief comes and God seems late: if you had been here, this would not have happened. Jesus does not rebuke the honesty. He receives it, and he answers not with an explanation of the delay but with himself. The question he presses on Martha he presses on every reader: Believest thou this?

Jesus wept tells us that faith in the resurrection does not forbid us to grieve. The one who was about to raise Lazarus still cried at his tomb. Christ does not meet our sorrow with a lecture on why we should not feel it; he enters it. You are permitted to weep, and you weep beside a Savior who weeps with you and will yet wipe every tear away.

And his call, Lazarus, come forth, is the pattern of every conversion. He calls the spiritually dead by name and commands them into life, and they come, not because they were strong enough to answer but because his voice raises the dead. If you feel bound and buried, he still calls. Come and meet him.

Notice, too, what Jesus gave to others to do. He raised Lazarus himself, but he told the bystanders to take away the stone, and afterward to loose him and let him go. The miracle was his alone; the removing of stones and the unwrapping of graveclothes he shares with his people. We cannot give life, but we can roll away what keeps others from Christ and help free those he has raised. That is much of what the church is for.

Where it points

Lazarus came out still wearing his graveclothes, bound hand and foot, and had to be loosed. He was raised only to die again one day. His raising was a sign, powerful but partial, pointing to a resurrection of a different order. When Jesus rose, the graveclothes were left behind folded in the tomb, for he rose into a life that death can never touch again.

The sign points, too, to the cost. Jesus gave life to Lazarus knowing it would send him to the cross, and there he laid down the very life he had power to keep. He is the resurrection and the life not only because he raises others but because he himself passed through death and out the far side, defeating it from within. His empty tomb is the ground under Martha's question and its answer.

There is a poignancy in the crowd at Bethany. Some who saw Lazarus walk out of the tomb believed, and some went straight to report Jesus to those who wanted him dead. The clearest sign did not compel every heart, which tells us that faith is finally a matter of the will and not only the evidence. The empty tomb of Christ meets the same divided response, and the same question waits for each of us.

Everything this sign promises is secured and displayed at the resurrection of Jesus.

Can these things really happen?

Many honest readers ask whether miracles can happen at all. Since the Enlightenment, some have argued that the laws of nature rule them out, that a report of a wonder is always less likely than a mistake or a legend. Christians answer that the laws of nature describe how the world normally runs; they do not forbid the God who made it from acting within it. A miracle is not nature breaking down but its Author drawing near. You do not have to settle that question before you read; you only have to read honestly and ask what best explains the witness before you. We look at this more fully in miracles and the laws of nature.

Frequently asked questions

What is the meaning of the raising of Lazarus?

It reveals that Jesus himself is the resurrection and the life, not merely a worker of wonders. By raising a man four days dead, he showed authority over death, and by weeping at the tomb he showed he shares our grief. It is John's climactic sign and the event that set the plot for the cross in motion.

Where in the Bible is the raising of Lazarus?

The account is found only in John 11:1-44. It takes place in Bethany, a village near Jerusalem, shortly before Jesus' final Passover and crucifixion, and includes the great declaration I am the resurrection, and the life, and the shortest verse in the Bible, Jesus wept.

Why did Jesus wait until Lazarus had died?

Jesus deliberately delayed so that Lazarus was four days in the tomb, beyond any doubt truly dead. He said the sickness was for the glory of God, so that a fuller faith could be born in those who saw it. The delay that felt like neglect was love preparing a greater display of his power over death.