Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: Hey, guys, this is Naim, and you've reached the Mosaic Church Podcast. So excited that you're part of our listening community and love for you to be even more connected. So check out our website. There's more content there and there's more opportunities for you get connected in our ministries and events as well. Also, love for you to share this content. If this is blessed to you. I know that God wants to use you to bless other people with it, so share this podcast you will. Lastly, would you consider supporting this ministry? This is made possible by other people's generosity, and I'd love for you to pay it forward. Join us to reclaim the message and the movement of Jesus together. So would you consider giving to this ministry? I know that God is able to do immeasurably more through us when we come together. Thank you so much. God bless you. Enjoy.
[00:00:57] Speaker B: I'm not quite sure I can live up to that. I don't even know what that means, hardly. But anyway, we'll. We'll see if there's some magic in me today. I don't. I don't know. I don't know. But, hey, I'm Mike. I am one of the pastors here this morning. This morning. And we're so glad you're here. It's spring break, and people are everywhere, but you're here, and we're so thankful for that. And it's. It's a special morning. If you don't know this is Palm Sunday. Your calendar probably tells you that. Maybe some of you have no idea what that even means. But. But it's that time of year in the Christian life when we celebrate that Jesus is headed to Jerusalem, we celebrate him heading to Jerusalem, and he's going to be crucified. And so there's a lot of things that we remember this week, and. But Palm Sunday was the Sunday that Jesus rode into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey, and there were all these people waving palm branches, and so it was a huge celebration. So we want to do something a little different here at Mosaic this morning, something that we don't normally do. In the back of a seat in front of you or laying next to you on the seat, you'll probably find one of these little communion cups. And at Mosaic, we don't normally celebrate communion together. It's typically on either side of the stage, and you can celebrate or recognize it on your own. But this morning, we're gonna do it together at the end of the message. So just locate that, set it aside, we'll come back to it in just a little bit. But this morning, what I wanna do is I wanna move us forward with the last miracle in. In the Gospel of John. We've been looking at. And we've been looking at these headlines. And so today's headline is Lazarus lives. Right? That's a huge one. That's a huge one. But I'm loving this. This news story kind of thing, because I just. Every morning when I wake up, one of the first things I do in addition to reading scripture, okay, in addition to reading scripture is read the news. And I'm gonna check out the news. But now, I don't mean the news like the newspaper. I mean, I really don't recognize how this was ever a thing. All right. How could. This thing is so big. This is so big. And, you know, it cost me $4 to buy this worthless paper. I look at this, and it's so big, but the. The words, there's so little, and I can't make them bigger. So how was a newspaper, everything, you open it up to read it so you can actually see the whole thing, and half of it just falls out on the floor.
I definitely think newspapers rank right up there with typewriters, all right? And the telephones that stick on the walls with very long cords, things like that, I just.
That's where they belong. But this concept of the news, I just love it because I love to see what's going on around the world, in the state next door, wherever. It's more than ever, what's happening in places, even halfway around the world are affecting us. Did you see the headlines this week? The tariffs, the stock market, it's all going crazy. But I love the headlines. But what we've been reading and what we've been seeing the headlines of are the miracles that we find in John. John says there's a bunch of miracles that point to the fact that Jesus is the messiah, the redeemer, the rescuer of life. And it's so cool to read about these stories over the past couple weeks. Haven't you enjoyed the stories we've looked at? It's so cool to read about how other people and people's lives are changed. But could you imagine if the headlines weren't about other people? They were about you. Have you ever. Have you ever thought about that? What if the headlines were about you, not somebody else, but you? What if instead of reading about someone else's miracles, you were actually reading about yourself?
Why. Why is it so easy to believe that it could happen to him or her? But not me. Why do we think that way? Is it because you think God doesn't love you very much? Is it because you think that you don't deserve it? You've done some ridiculous things in your life, and. And you're like, I don't even deserve it. Do you think it's because he's run out of miracles? Like, none left?
Is that why you don't think it can happen in your life?
How can it happen to me? That's the question this morning. What do I need to do for it to happen to me? Because God does want you to experience miracles in your life. And that's what we're gonna do today. That's what we're gonna find this morning as we dive into this gospel of John's writing. And this story, the big news of today, that Lazarus lives, how we can experience miracles in our own lives.
But. But I gotta tell you, not only do I like to read the news, I also like to listen to the news on the radio when I'm driving from home to here or. Or anywhere. And so I'm flipping between the channels in my truck, I'm listening to Fox News. And some of you roll your eyes to the right because that's where. Where they should go. And. And if a commercial comes on and I'm changing it to cnn, some of you roll your eyes to the left or I'm listening to cnbc, CNBC or msnbc. But they all have this slant, right? They. They all give you news, elements of the news that's happening in the world. But they all have this way of looking at it. They all have something more that they want to say to you. Well, that's kind of like the Gospels, the four gospels that are part of scripture. They all have this news in them, these historical accounts, but. But not like these crazy news channels. They want you to understand something, and they share what they saw from their perspective, from their perception.
So if you missed some of the backstory on John, this gospel we're diving into, which is where we've seen all of these six miracles take place. John was with Jesus as a disciple. He was actually one of the first disciples that Jesus called, and he called him into this group. And John witnessed. He. He was an eyewitness to everything that Jesus did as he ministered in the area and as he went through the area. And he wrote this gospel, this historical account. It is a historical account, but he did it in an incredibly creative way. It's a colorful, spiritual way. He. He. He intertwined into this Gospel things that cause us not only to read and to see historical things, but to have these spiritual encounters. Now, that's different than Luke. Luke says, I want you to know the facts. Luke was probably, we believe, was a doctor. He was a gentile doctor that at some point was affected by what Jesus was teaching and what Jesus was doing. And. And then he came to the point where he said, you know, somebody's got to write this down. We need a chronological account of all the things that Jesus did, because this is important. And that's what Luke did. He wrote a chronological event starting with the birth, the conception of Jesus, all the way through his crucifixion, chronologically in order. Give me the facts. That was Luke. He interviewed the disciples because he wasn't with Jesus. Matthew was with Jesus. Matthew was another one of the disciples. And he wrote his gospel from this Jewish perspective. And then we have Mark. Mark was not an eyewitness, but he was a disciple of Simon Peter. And Mark wrote a gospel that was like an epic story of where Jesus sweeps in and he defeats Satan and he casts out all the demons that were there trying to steal life from the people. But with John, with John, it's more like. It's more like an Academy Award winning movie. And in John, as you read it and the dramaticness of it, you just expect there to be music playing in the background or something, maybe music from Wicked or one of the epic Disney films. And that music just seems to. The way he articulates things just seems to make everything so dramatic and powerful. And today a dead man is coming back to life.
And. And this, according to John's Gospel, is the seventh sign that points to the fact that Jesus is the Messiah. And it's the miracle of miracles that he does while he's here, bringing someone back to life, someone who had been dead for days. And. And this same miracle will happen just one more time in the history of the world.
But that's next week's story. So make sure you're back here next week to hear the Easter story.
But this morning, after hearing about all these miracles, after hearing about all the things that Jesus has done in the lives of other people, has it made you want to see a miracle in your own life? You see, that's what John's trying to say. He's trying to say, look, this guy Jesus, he is the Messiah. I want you to have no doubt that he is the Messiah. And all these amazing signs and miracles prove it. But the other part is, if it could happen to them, it can happen to you, it can happen to you. And in this story, there's the key to unlocking a life where miracles can happen. So this morning, I want to tell you this story.
A lot of times we just read the Scriptures, but I want to do something a little more than that this morning. If you want to see the scriptures, you can jump into the Mosaic app. They're there. You can look at John, chapter 11 in your Bible app. There'll be a few verses on the screen behind me as we go through that I'll allude to, but I want to tell you the story.
And, and when I get finished, if the story is still just words on a page to you, if. If it doesn't come to life, then I'm not been very effective at helping you see anything more than the priest and the Jewish leaders were seeing, because that's why they missed it. That's why they missed Jesus as the Messiah. Because to them, what they were reading, the. The passages that we call the Old Testament, they had manuscripts, they had documents that talked about and foretold of the Messiah that was coming. But to them, it was just words on a page. They. They thought, yes, someday it's going to happen someday, but couldn't be today, and it couldn't be like this. And they totally missed the fact that the Messiah was in their presence.
They almost like it was a fairy tale.
But John wanted us to know, especially with this miracle, that it was more than just words on a page. So I want to tell you this story.
I'm going to tell you this story. And all good stories start like this, right? There once was a man named Lazarus. There once was a man named Lazarus who became very sick. Now, Lazarus lived in a time and a place in the world where the average life expectancy was about 35 to 40 years old. And that's if you made it through adolescence. But when.
When we learned about Lazarus, we learned that he's very sick. He's probably close to that age.
And the Scriptures say John says that he was very sick. Now, you should hear that not as just sick, but maybe today it might even translate like when you hear stage four. All right, Stage four, It. It's not weeks. It's probably more like days. Like every day hereafter is a miracle. Now, Lazarus had two sisters. They were really great sisters. One of them's name was Martha, and the other's name was Mary Martha. If you drill down on her personality, you would probably find that Martha was a thinker. Okay? That was just the way she did life. She processed things. She. She organized things. She thought through things. She focused on details. We know from Scripture that she focused on cooking and cleaning and making sure that everything was in order. And while Lazarus was lying there so sick, she was probably the one that was making sure every need he had was met. She was checking his temperature, she was checking his breathing.
But then there's Mary. Mary, on the other hand, if you explored her personality, she's a feeler. She's. She's a feeler. She's that person that at the end of every love story is tucked away in the corner, just weeping, weeping and crying. You know anybody like that? Anybody that's a feeler? She was most likely the one that sat there next to Jesus on the bed while Martha's running around doing all these things. She's just rubbing his arms, she's wiping his. His brow with a wet, cool cloth. She's just talking to him, trying to distract him from all the things that he's feeling. But that was Mary and the family. They lived in this village called Bethany. Now, Bethany was just a couple of miles outside of Jerusalem. You could. You could get to Jerusalem, walking easy in about two hours. It was a village where most of the people were actually pretty wealthy, and Lazarus and his sisters were probably pretty wealthy. They lived just outside the city, down by the river. It was the town that helped supply all of the things that they needed up in the city. It was a place where things were grown and. Or things were manufactured and made, and they were then sent to the city. And so the inhabitants of Bethany were probably pretty wealthy and probably had houses and homes that were bigger than the average person during that time.
And so what we learned, what we expect, is that on one of Jesus's many times traveling back and forth to Jerusalem, it's safe to say that he stayed with Lazarus and his sisters on multiple occasions. Probably they. Lazarus and his sisters, maybe even left their home and traveled some with Jesus. And they saw some of the miracles and some of the healings and heard the stories that Jesus and the teachings that Jesus was telling. And. And it's obvious that they became the closest friends, because John reminds us over and over that there was a great amount of love between these people. They believed that Jesus was more than just a prophet. So many people said, I believe he's a prophet, but they believed he was more than that. They believed he was the Messiah. And for that reason, they probably also financially supported his ministry.
And so when Lazarus got sick, very sick, and they were starting to Lose hope. They did what probably all of us would have done, knowing that Jesus could heal. They pulled the friend card. They pulled the friend card and sent Jesus a message and said, jesus, we need you here. We need you here because Lazarus is very sick. Can you come?
So Jesus, when he got the message about Lazarus, he was roughly 20 miles away from Bethany. And even though he felt burdened by what they must have been going through with Lazarus being so sick, he told the disciples, yeah, we're going to stay for two more days here, and then we'll go back and we'll check on Lazarus. And so two days passed, and Jesus said to his disciples, okay, let's go back to Bethany and check on Lazarus. And of course, the thinkers said, no, the reason why we're 20 miles away is because the last time we were there, you said some things that, that stirred up the Jewish leaders.
They started throwing stones at us, and we had to retreat to here to save our lives.
But Jesus told them, no, we have to go back. We have to go back because Lazarus has already died.
And so, reluctantly, they agreed. They packed up their stuff, all of them, except Thomas. Thomas, you remember, was the pessimistic one. The one who's glass was always half empty or less than half empty. And so Thomas muddled under his breath at some point, yeah, great idea, let's go back so we can all die.
But Jesus convinced him. They packed up their stuff. They headed back to Bethany. And when they were getting close to Bethany, they started to pass people on the road. Eventually, they grabbed somebody who was coming towards them and said, hey, do you know anything about what's going on with Lazarus? And what they learned was not only did they not make it in time, but Lazarus had actually been in the tomb for four days already, which probably means that he'd been dead for five. Martha and Mary, they had grieved bitterly. They were so sad.
And not only had Lazarus died, but Jesus never showed up. Even though they sent him a message, he never showed up to heal him.
And so not only were they sad, but they were probably a little bit hurt.
Lazarus body, because he was dead, had already been washed. It had been anointed with oil. It had been wrapped just like the Jewish custom said. And they had put his body in a cave that was to be his tomb. That was his tomb.
People had already brought multiple meals into their home. They had shared the meals together. They talked about Lazarus. They had remembered what a great guy he was, how young he was, how compassionate, how kind he was.
They'd already had the funeral already? Had the funeral. Scriptures were read, kind words were spoken, hugs were shared, tears.
So many people, so many Jewish people were still there with Martha and Mary because he was such an important part of the community. And they wanted to be there for one another and for Mary and Martha.
But when Martha heard that Jesus was on his way, she went to find him. She went out into the street, and when she got there in front of him, she was very respectful.
But she looked at him and she said, if you had just been here, Lord, you could have healed him.
But then the thinker kicked in and she said, but it was probably too late by the time you even got the message.
Jesus hugged her and said quietly, your brother will rise again.
And she said, I know, I know. I believe in the resurrection of people at the last day, just the way our Jewish leaders tell us.
But Jesus looked at her straight in the eye. And this is one of those spiritual encounters that John calls us into. Jesus looked her in the eye and said, no, Martha, I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, even when they die here on earth, will never die because they will be with me.
And he asked her if she believed, do you believe me?
Honestly, Martha's answer was a little less than what Jesus had hoped for. What it communicated to him was that her belief was limited.
So in a few moments, after a few moments when everything became a little awkward, Martha went back to their home and she pulled Mary aside and said, mary, Jesus is close by. As soon as Mary heard that, off she went. She ran to where he was. And just as you would expect from a feeler, with tears streaming down her face, she ran up to Jesus and fell at his feet. And she said the exact same thing that Martha did. If you had been here, you could have healed him.
Jesus was so overwhelmed by the sadness and the grief of his friends.
And as he asked them where the tomb was, he burst into tears.
Some of the people watching all this took place said, surely if he'd have been here a little sooner, things could have been different.
When Jesus and Mary finally stopped weeping, together they headed back to Lazarus home, where they met Martha. And together, this group of people headed back outside the city to the tomb, to the place where the caves were that were tombs, to Lazarus Tomb. The stone had been rolled over the face of it, and it was tight.
Then Jesus did what nobody expected.
He looked over at Martha and Barry and he said, have them roll the stone away.
Martha's jaw dropped.
She said, no way. No way. After four days, in a Middle Eastern desert tomb.
The smell, it's going to be awful.
But Jesus said to them, there another one of those places where there's this spiritual encounter that happens. But Jesus said to them, if you want to see the glory of God, you have to trust me.
So with Martha's approval, they rolled the stone away. The smell, it was bad. It was bad. Then Jesus looked up and this is what he said. He said, thank you, Father, for what I know you're getting ready to do here today.
By your power, this man will live again here, because I know your will. I'm saying this so that the people standing around will know that you and I are one.
And so when they see this, they will believe that you sent me and that I am the Messiah. And then with a loud voice so that everybody could hear, he said, lazarus, come out.
It seemed like an eternity, but it was just like one minute.
Lazarus came walking through the doorway of that tomb.
Still wrapped with linen cloths around his face and head, he walked out of the tomb.
It was incredible. Unbelievable.
Then Jesus said, somebody help the poor guy. Help him. Take away the grave clothes.
Set him free.
Now that's a story, right?
Not just words on a page. Not a fairy tale or a myth.
You remember the name of the village, right? Bethany. They lived in the village of Bethany.
And over time, over time, the name has changed. If you pull out your phone and you open up maps and you look for Bethany in Israel, you're not going to find it anymore. Because over time, the place became known as. Not as Bethany, but as the place where Lazarus was raised from the dead. It was known as the place where there was Mary and Martha and their brother Lazarus, who died and he came back to life. It was the place where out at the tombs, out at the caves, this man came walking out and his name was Lazarus. Generation after generation, these stories continued to take place until now. Today, this town is no longer called Bethany. It's called Al Azariah, which means the place of Lazarus. This is a story of what can happen when you put your trust in Jesus. Jesus, standing there in front of the tomb, he looked at every last one of them and he said, if you want to see the glory of God, you have to trust me.
Why? Because trust creates belief, and belief resurrects life. If you want to have a life that is alive, you've got to trust that Jesus can resurrect it. If you want to have a life that's moving forward, you've got to believe that Jesus can move it forwards. If you want to get out of that funk that you live in. You've got to believe that Jesus can raise you up from that. If you want to get out of the depression that causes you to just want to sleep all the time, you've got to believe that Jesus can raise you up out of it. If you want to move out of that job, that that's toxic. If you want to move out of that relationship, that is just poison.
If you want to get out of maybe even that apartment where nothing but destructive things happen, except when you're tucked away in your room, you've got to believe that Jesus wants you out of it more than you want yourself out of it. Or maybe it's a little more positive thing. Maybe it's that you're looking for the person to do life with. Jesus wants you to find life in that. Or maybe it's, it's your marriage, you want it to be filled with life again. Or, or maybe, maybe it's, you want a group of friends that speak life into you. You've got to believe that Jesus wants you to find them. If you don't trust, you will never believe. And belief is what drives you to pursue a miracle in your own life. Trust is why Martha and Mary sent word to Jesus, we need you. We need you. You're the only one who can turn this thing around.
But even their belief was limited. Did you catch that? Did you see that in the story? Even their life, their belief was limited.
We need you to come and heal Lazarus before he dies, before he passes. We need you before. And then he dies and everything changes. They meet him in the street. If you had just been here in time, you could have healed him. But now he's dead and it's too late.
Is it really too late?
Is it ever too late with Jesus, Martha, Mary, you gotta think bigger. You've got to believe bigger. Don't let a little thing like death, it's variable.
You've got to believe even when you've lost all hope.
Trust me, if you want to see the glory of God, you have to trust me. That's the message in this story that John wants to communicate to us. So here's, here's my question for you.
Anybody want a Lazarus story?
Anybody need a Lazarus story in your life? What do you have to do to have a Lazarus story? Let's get practical for just a minute. What do we have to do to experience a Lazarus come out moment? I mean, honestly, we just have to respond like Lazarus did, right? We just. He just responded like he had nothing to lose and everything to gain. And he followed the sound of Jesus voice right out of the tomb. That's what he did. Because trust creates belief. And what you believe can change your future.
So have you said Jesus? You know, I don't totally get this.
This grace, this forgiveness stuff, it doesn't make sense in this world. It doesn't even connect in this world. It's so countercultural.
But you know what?
I'm going to give it a shot. I mean, even though my life is a total disaster.
Okay, let's do this.
Let's trust Jesus. Rescue me.
That's what this story is about. John was intentional in his gospel to put this spiritual question, do you trust me? Right at the height of the most emotional time, the time of crisis, as if to say, when life is at its worst is when you need Jesus the most.
Trusting Jesus is not just about securing your afterlife, eternity. It's about living your tomorrow in the power of the life of Jesus. That's why the chapter right before John 11, where we find this story of Lazarus, there's John, chapter 10, verse 10, which you may know or may not know. It's where Jesus says, yeah, I know there's an enemy in this world and he wants to take everything from you.
But Jesus says, but I have come, that you may have life and have it to the full. Do you trust me?
This world is not a perfect world place like the next one will be. And to deal with this world while I'm a part of it, I need the power of Jesus in my life. I need for him to be working in my life, resurrecting it, making this life as good it can, as it can possibly be.
But maybe you've done that already. Maybe you've. You said a long time ago, I trust you. I trust you. Here's my life. I'm with you. I don't understand the forgiveness and the grace, but I'm going to go with it. I'm going to put one foot in front of the other. I'm good with that. Maybe you did that a long time ago.
Maybe what you need to do to have one of these Lazarus stories is to trust again.
It's to trust bigger, to trust without limits. Maybe you put some limits on what God can do, and maybe today what you need to do is to remove that and to trust.
Let go of the idea that there's only so much that God could do or would do in our lives and believe that he wants to change your life, even resurrect it. If that's what you need. So can I pray for you this morning? Can I pray that God will just continue to move in your life no matter where you are? We're all at different places in our faith journey, and God is calling us to trust him in that. So would you pray with me? Father, thank you so much.
Thank you for the fact that you want to come in and move and change our lives, restore our lives, resurrect our lives.
And, God, we just want to confess this morning that sometimes we don't believe as deeply as we should, or maybe as big as we should.
But, God, we know that you want to move into our lives and you want to change things.
You want to make this life in an imperfect place really good.
So, Father, we just want to say, would you just invade our lives this morning?
Would you help us to believe and to trust you the way you want us to, a way that allows us to give you everything and to believe that miracles can happen not just in other people's lives, but they can also happen in our lives.
God, we need a miracle.
We need you.
Amen. Thanks for listening to this message from Mosaic Church in Charlotte, North Carolina. For more audio and video content, Visit us at MosaicChurch TV.
