This week’s devotions are based on the message: “Overcoming Death” Week 5 of Signs (LISTEN HERE)
He’s just asleep.
When you lay down at the end of tiring day, I would say there is an expectation that you will wake up in the morning. Perhaps if you are really tired you wake up with the help of an alarm or someone else in your home shaking you awake.
We get what sleep is.
We also understand (perhaps not fully) the value of sleep, especially when we are sick. When your body is fighting a virus or infection and you feel crummy, you want to sleep. In fact you know that sleep again is an important part of the healing process.
Sleep is a valuable daily asset as well as a healing asset.
So, it makes sense that the disciples were confused why Jesus would want to wake Lazarus up. “Let him sleep,” they thought.
John 11:11 After he had said this, he went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”
12 His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.” 13 Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.
But Jesus was something referring to something more permanent: Death.
14 So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, 15 and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”
16 Then Thomas (called Didymus) said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”
The disciples didn’t understand what Jesus meant by waking Lazarus. They thought they were going to Jerusalem to die like Lazarus was.
But they weren’t. They were going to learn something more about Jesus as the Son of God.
The difference, obviously, between sleep and death is that death is not something you wake up from. Although the Jewish culture had hope for the first three days of a resuscitation, the reality was no human being was going to wake up from the dead.
Jesus wanted to help his disciples see life and death through his lens, not their own. From the disciples perspective, Lazarus was either getting better and going to wake up or dead and would not wake up. Jesus wanted them to believe that there was another possibility: Lazarus was truly dead AND he would wake up from the dead!
By this miracle Jesus was going to help his disciples see and believe that with him, there is experience beyond death. He wanted them to believe that to him death was like sleep and raising the dead was like waking a person up…no problem.
He challenges us to do the same. Following Jesus is moving beyond a human, worldly perspective and seeing the world through the same lens Jesus does as the Son of God. Another human being wouldn’t wake up Lazarus, only Jesus, the Son of God can.
No person will wake us up from death…only Jesus can and will.
Believe he can and will…just like he did Lazarus…and a short time later, himself!
Apply: How does your perspective of death change when you realize that when you die, Jesus will be the one waking you up?
Prayer: Lord Jesus, thank you for being the Son of God, our Savior. Lead me not to fear death, but to look forward to the day when the sleep of death is ended by awaking to the glory of your presence. AMEN.