“Unbind Him, And Let Him Go” | John 11:32-44
The question I was asked before last Sunday is what is the difference between a preacher and a teacher?
On this All-Saints Sunday, my question is: What is a saint?
In his book Servants, Misfits & Martyrs: Saints & Their Stories, Rev. Dr. James Howell, a friend of mine, wrote this about saints: “These friends of God are not superhuman. Saints do not possess an extra layer of muscle. They are not taller, and they do not sport superior I. Q’s. They are not richer, and their parents are not more clever than yours or mine. They have no bat-like perception that enables them to fly in the dark. They are flesh and blood, just like you and me, no stronger, no more intelligent. And that is the point. They simply offer themselves to God, knowing they are not the elite, fully cognizant that they are inadequate to the task, that their abilities are limited and fallible.”
Being a Saint isn’t based on our ability but on our availability! A Saint is one who has trusted in the Gospel and is finally redeemed 100% by mercy and God’s determination to win us in the end!
There is no doubt in my mind that Jesus could have healed Lazarus without even being on the scene as He had the nobleman’s son in John 4. But the need of this sign, “The glory of God,” was so great that the suffering of His friend became a service to God—a symbol of the death and resurrection that would provide salvation for the world.
The weeping of Jesus [Verse 35]—is the shortest verse in the Bible by the way; for those of you looking to memorize Bible verses—was a sign of His humanity, but more than that it was one of the highest expressions of His deity, a cry of involvement in all the struggle between good and evil for the souls of men.
Jesus ordered the stone removed—offered a short prayer of thanksgiving (for the benefit of those standing near enough to hear Him)—and then cried out in a tone of voice probably not spoken anywhere else in the Scriptures: “Lazarus, come forth!” By doing this Jesus demonstrated what He had been telling the Jews who had been working so hard to arrest Him—that God was His Father—that God had given both power and authority into His hands—that he had power within Himself to raise the dead and give new life, because He was both the giver and the sustainer of that life.
Tourists can visit Lazarus’s tomb in Bethany. It is of the sliding stone—not rolling stone type—so not into a hillside, but down into the ground. Picturing the stone on the floor being shoved aside, and then Lazarus coming not out but up: raises the hair on the back of my neck! There’s something profound with Jesus’ words: “Unbind him, and let him go.” Yes, Lazarus would have been wrapped in cloth, but there is also something about the resurrected life that is a being unbound—being liberated—being freed to be your true self—set free to follow Jesus.
Let me close with an interesting story. A woman named Ella Wilcox once witnessed a woman sitting quietly by herself sobbing very noticeably in the middle of a train car. At first, Ella was a little bothered by the persistent weeping, but then she noticed another passenger in the car; an older gentleman who was sitting near the rear of the car. He was telling funny stories to the passengers sitting around him. Everybody smiled and chuckled along with the old man. After a while, some of the other passengers in the car started moving. They were getting up from their seats in the front, near the crying woman, and gravitating toward the back near the man telling the funny stories. Out of this experience, Ella Wilcox wrote these well-known words: “Laugh, and the world laughs with you. Weep, and you weep alone.”
When you are weeping you may feel alone, terribly alone, but you aren’t. There is One who weeps with you. There is One who will one day wipe away every tear from your eyes. This One has power over life and death. This One is Jesus Christ and He has the power to call you forth from your tomb of tears and give you life once again—just as He has done for these Saints that we have honored today!
Thanks be to God!
Eastman First Methodist Church 