John
11
- Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was
from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.
- This Mary, whose brother Lazarus now lay
sick, was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with
her hair.
- So the sisters sent word to Jesus, "Lord,
the one you love is sick."
- When he heard this, Jesus said, "This
sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God's glory so that God's Son
may be glorified through it."
- Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.
- Yet when he heard that Lazarus was sick,
he stayed where he was two more days.
- Then he said to his disciples, "Let
us go back to Judea."
- "But Rabbi," they said, "a
short while ago the Jews tried to stone you, and yet you are going back there?"
- Jesus answered, "Are there not twelve
hours of daylight? A man who walks by day will not stumble, for he sees by
this world's light.
- It is when he walks by night that he stumbles,
for he has no light."
- 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."
- His disciples replied, "Lord, if he
sleeps, he will get better."
- Jesus had been speaking of his death, but
his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.
- So then he told them plainly, "Lazarus
is dead,
- and for your sake I am glad I was not there,
so that you may believe. But let us go to him."
- Then Thomas (called Didymus) said to the
rest of the disciples, "Let us also go, that we may die with him."
- On his arrival, Jesus found that Lazarus
had already been in the tomb for four days.
- Bethany was less than two miles from Jerusalem,
- and many Jews had come to Martha and Mary
to comfort them in the loss of their brother.
- When Martha heard that Jesus was coming,
she went out to meet him, but Mary stayed at home.
- "Lord," Martha said to Jesus,
"if you had been here, my brother would not have died.
- But I know that even now God will give you
whatever you ask."
- Jesus said to her, "Your brother will
rise again."
- Martha answered, "I know he will rise
again in the resurrection at the last day."
- Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection
and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies;
- and whoever lives and believes in me will
never die. Do you believe this?"
- "Yes, Lord," she told him, "I
believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who was to come into the
world."
- And after she had said this, she went back
and called her sister Mary aside. "The Teacher is here," she said,
"and is asking for you."
- When Mary heard this, she got up quickly
and went to him.
- Now Jesus had not yet entered the village,
but was still at the place where Martha had met him.
- When the Jews who had been with Mary in
the house, comforting her, noticed how quickly she got up and went out, they
followed her, supposing she was going to the tomb to mourn there.
- When Mary reached the place where Jesus
was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, "Lord, if you had been
here, my brother would not have died."
- When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews
who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and
troubled.
- "Where have you laid him?" he
asked. "Come and see, Lord," they replied.
- Jesus wept.
- Then the Jews said, "See how he loved
him!"
- But some of them said, "Could not he
who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?"
- Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the
tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance.
- "Take away the stone," he said.
"But, Lord," said Martha, the sister of the dead man, "by this
time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days."
- Then Jesus said, "Did I not tell you
that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?"
- So they took away the stone. Then Jesus
looked up and said, "Father, I thank you that you have heard me.
- I knew that you always hear me, but I said
this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that
you sent me."
- When he had said this, Jesus called in a
loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!"
- The dead man came out, his hands and feet
wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them,
"Take off the grave clothes and let him go."
- Therefore many of the Jews who had come
to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, put their faith in him.
- But some of them went to the Pharisees and
told them what Jesus had done.
- Then the chief priests and the Pharisees
called a meeting of the Sanhedrin. "What are we accomplishing?"
they asked. "Here is this man performing many miraculous signs.
- If we let him go on like this, everyone
will believe in him, and then the Romans will come and take away both our
place and our nation."
- Then one of them, named Caiaphas, who was
high priest that year, spoke up, "You know nothing at all!
- You do not realize that it is better for
you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish."
- He did not say this on his own, but as high
priest that year he prophesied that Jesus would die for the Jewish nation,
- and not only for that nation but also for
the scattered children of God, to bring them together and make them one.
- So from that day on they plotted to take
his life.
- Therefore Jesus no longer moved about publicly
among the Jews. Instead he withdrew to a region near the desert, to a village
called Ephraim, where he stayed with his disciples.
- When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover,
many went up from the country to Jerusalem for their ceremonial cleansing
before the Passover.
- They kept looking for Jesus, and as they
stood in the temple area they asked one another, "What do you think?
Isn't he coming to the Feast at all?"
- But the chief priests and Pharisees had
given orders that if anyone found out where Jesus was, he should report it
so that they might arrest him.
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