The resuscitation of Lazarus represents our freedom from death both for time and for eternity. John 11:41-43

John 11:41 And so they removed the stone. And Jesus raised His eyes, and said, "Father, I thank Thee that Thou heardest Me.

 

Verse 41 - they obeyed Jesus Christ. “Then they took away the stone” - they lifted up and hauled it away, a)irwagain.

           

Now we see what the Lord can do, verses 41-44.

           

“And Jesus lifted up his eyes” - aorist active indicative of a)irw. They lifted up the stone and hauled it off, that takes muscle. But Jesus lifted up His eyes - same aorist active indicative. They used their muscles; Jesus used spiritual power.

           

“and said” - aorist active indicative of legw. Jesus Christ has the words of Bible doctrine, the words of divine viewpoint in His human soul.

           

“Father,” the correct address is prayer, and Jesus is speaking from His humanity; “I thank thee” - present active indicative of e)uxaristew[e)u= well; xarij= grace] which means good grace. “Father you have graced me, I thank you.” Basic thanksgiving, the recognition of grace.

 

Isn’t it interesting that the perfect God/Man depended on grace, like we must. We live in the same plan, except we have rebound because we sin.

 

Grace for us is all that God is able to do on the basis of the Cross.

 

Grace for Christ was all that God was able to do based on the fact that He was willing to go to the Cross.

           

“that thou hast heard” - aorist active indicative of a)kouw. This is basic confidence based on doctrine.

 

In eternity past God the Father knew what Jesus would say in His humanity, and the humanity of Jesus is now saying it. Recognition of the doctrine of divine decrees.

 

We are all believer priest because we are in union with Christ. He is our High Priest and we are His kingdom of priests. When we pray we must know that God heard that prayer in EP and entered one of the four possible responses to that prayer in the divine decrees.

 

There are four responses because every prayer has two parts, of which each can be answered as yes or no. The two parts of prayer are the request itself and the desire behind that request.

 

For instance, you may desire companionship so you pray for God to bring you to your right man/woman. If God doesn’t bring your right man/woman but rather brings a best friend then God has said no to the request and yes to the desire.

 

 

 

Request                      Desire

Yes                     Yes       

Yes                     No

No                       Yes

No                       No

 

Since the Lord had a perfect prayer life every response by God the Father to the requests of His humanity was yes, yes.

 

John 11:42 "And I knew that Thou hearest Me always; but because of the people standing around I said it [thanks for gracing Me out by hearing Me in EP], that they may believe that Thou didst send Me." 

 

The verb for “I knew” is the pluperfect of oida which means to inherently know. Christ inherently knew that God hears Him because of the years of doctrine in His soul.

 

Therefore, doctrine is needed to have a better and more affective prayer life. More doctrine will increase your inherent knowledge base and thus will increase your faith. You will know, that God the Father has heard you and will respond.

 

What is important in this event is not the muscles that have moved away the stone, but the doctrine in the soul of the one with positive volition which he is putting into action.

 

The end of verse 42 states why He prayed aloud. It was so that others that are standing around, helpless to do anything for Lazarus, would hear it, so that they would believe that He was sent by God the Father.

 

It’s one thing for Him to do this Himself, it’s another thing for Him to audibly thank the Father for hearing His prayer. This shows the crowd that He was sent by God and that He did not come to them as anything else but a man (body and soul and spirit) sent from God to set them free.

 

John 11:43 And when He had said these things, He cried out [this means to shout a command] with a loud voice, "Lazarus, come forth." 

 

He shouts a command of three words. He starts with the vocative Lazarus to prevent all the dead in the graves in the area from coming forth.

 

The literal translation is, “Lazarus, here outside!”

 

John 11:44 He who had died came forth, bound hand and foot with wrappings; and his face was wrapped around with a cloth. Jesus said to them, "Unbind him, and let him go."

 

The critical Jews called it a)poqnhskw[to die violently] but we now have what it really was, the perfect active participle of qnhskw. Lazarus died in bed!

 

“Loose him” - aorist active imperative: luwmeans unwind him;

 

Unwinding him is analogous to the freedom that Christ has provided.

 

To the believer, death no longer has any power over Him for he has eternal life.

 

Added to this is the freedom from temporal death for the positive believer. This is freedom in time from the trappings of the cosmic system and the OSN.

 

Both of these are represented by Lazarus walking from the grave and being unwound from his wrappings.

 

Also, the Jews would wrap the face of the dead with a face cloth. This small wrapping was separate from the others. Taking this off is analogous to the believer who can now see.

 

Again, this includes salvation as well as the spiritual life in time. At salvation we see the Lord as Savior. This removes the veil that lied over our eyes as unbelievers.

 

And now, with an unveiled face we can look into the word of God and see the glory of God. The positive believer is transformed from the glory of God in the word to glory in his own soul - which is a clear understanding of the essence of God and how that essence functions in the Church-age.

 

2 Cor 3:18

But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit.

 

 

This is the meaning behind the removal of the face cloth.

 

Notice also that Lazarus couldn’t unwrap himself. The Lord gave the command to unwrap him, but also, the Lord didn’t do the unwrapping.

 

This is because for most of the believers in human history, the gospel will not come from the lips of the Lord, but it will come through those whom the Lord gives as evangelists, pastors, and all believers who operate in their ambassadorship.

 

2 Cor 5:20

Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were entreating through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.

 

The next command by the Lord is to let him go.

 

“and let him go” - aorist active imperative of a)fihmiwhich means ‘permit him to go [and have his own private life].’

 

The problem here is that here if a person brought back to life and he is going to be bugged to death! So permit him to depart in privacy.

 

This is the freedom to walk by means of the Spirit, to walk in a manner worthy of your calling as a believer priest without interference from others.

           

Therefore, Lazarus is an illustration of salvation with emphasis on positional truth being applied in life which results in experiential truth.

 

Being loosed from death clothes represents our freedom from sin and the second death.

 

Zech 3:1-7

Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. 2 And the Lord said to Satan, "The Lord rebuke you, Satan! Indeed, the Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is this not a brand plucked from the fire?" 3 Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments and standing before the angel. 4 And he spoke and said to those who were standing before him saying, "Remove the filthy garments from him." Again he said to him, "See, I have taken your iniquity away from you and will clothe you with festal robes." 5 Then I said, "Let them put a clean turban on his head." So they put a clean turban on his head and clothed him with garments, while the angel of the Lord was standing by.

 

The next part is about living in those clean garments. Not by works, but by simply following in the ways of the Lord.

 

This is the other freedom that Lazarus represents - the believer that has broken the maturity barrier and entered into the super-grace life.

 

ZEC 3:6 - 7 And the angel of the Lord admonished Joshua saying, 7 "Thus says the Lord of hosts, 'If you will walk in My ways, and if you will perform My service, then you will also govern My house and also have charge of My courts, and I will grant you free access among these who are standing here.

 

We share the life of Christ, eternal life. Lazarus was bound and when he was loosed this depicts the principle of maturity through Bible doctrine - metabolizing doctrine and being released through the privacy of living one’s life as unto the Lord.

 

This is the concept of Galatians 5:1.

 

 

 

GAL 5:1

It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery.

 

Later on in 12:1,2 we see Lazarus feasting, a picture of the believer benefiting from doctrine after he reaches the ECS stage.

 

In 12:9, 11 we see Lazarus witnessing, a picture of the believer producing on the basis of Bible doctrine.

           

Verses 45 and 46, we have the crowd again: response and reaction.

 

John 11:45 Many therefore of the Jews, who had come to Mary and beheld what He had done, believed in Him.

 

Then many of the Jews which came to Mary” - they came to comfort Mary, not Martha. Projplus the accusative, they came face to face with Mary. It was the life of Mary which drew the crowd, not the life of Martha. Martha was great in the kitchen but Mary was a grace lady. The dynamics of the grace lady are fantastic. Martha was too busy to learn doctrine and it was the grace lady who drew the crowd of mourners to the place of the seventh sign.

            “and beheld” - aorist middle participle of qeaomai. These are unbelievers so far so they can’t o(raw, [panoramic view] and they can’t even blepw[get a glance]. All they can do is qeomaiwhich means to get the point.

 

It means perception, to discern with the eyes, to relate what is observed to something in the soul. So we translate this, “having themselves perceived.”

           

They perceived for themselves what Jesus did and the believed [pisteuo = non-meritorious faith].

 

John 11:46 But some of them went away to the Pharisees, and told them the things which Jesus had done.

 

“But some of them.” The word of is e)k, out from among them. This is the reaction crowd, negative at the point of God-consciousness; they will be negative at the point of the seventh sign. Even a miracle does not change negative into positive volition.

           

They went out from this crowd to be face to face with the Pharisees so they could relate to them what Jesus had done.

 

They related the works of the Lord to the Lord’s enemies without ever relating it to themselves.

 

Therefore, telling people about the Lord or the word of God doesn’t mean anything unless you have first related it to yourself.

 

This is why we have to establish our priesthood before we can be effective ambassadors.