WHEN the Lord arrived at Bethany the body of Lazarus had lain four days in the grave. For those four days the sisters had been mourning the loss of their beloved. brother. And not the least bitter ingredient in their cup of sorrow was the thought that He who could most and best help and comfort them remained absent. Why did He not appear to their relief? What made Him disregard the message sent Him? Could His love really be so great for them as they had supposed? Others had been blessed, strangers and sinners alike, all classes of sick and infirm. The widow's son and Jairus' daughter had been raised to life. But for those in Bethany there appeared neither word or deed.
Such doubts might unbelief suggest, but how dishonoring would they be to Him whose love is as unchanging as His power! His heart was with them all the while, carrying their sorrows, and at the proper moment He would come and give them back their brother from the very tomb. And while these sisters were waiting for the coming of the Lord, they had His own word to comfort their souls during the interval of His absence. They might not have known that Lazarus in his grave would even then hear the voice of the Son of God and come forth before their very eyes. But at any rate they had the Lord's own message sent by Him to sustain their souls: “This sickness is not unto death but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified thereby.”
In what way was this calculated to comfort their hearts? By lifting them above themselves and directing their attention to what they and we are so prone to forget, viz.—that our God and our Father controls and guides all things to bring about His own wise ends which include our ultimate and ineffable bliss. They were not to think therefore that they were the victims of a “fortuitous concourse” of untoward events, but on the contrary the chosen instrument in God's hands for the display of His glory.
It is such a consideration as this that ever imparts strength to bear and nerve to endure under similar circumstances. It gives what truly deserves the name of “solid comfort.” And it is to be observed further how closely the glory of God was bound up with their relief. For it was the quickening of dead Lazarus that was the occasion whereby God was glorified in His Son. Here was a man not only dead but corrupt: at the word of Jesus he issues from the, tomb perfectly restored to life and health. Who but One could so speak and bring it to pass? It was none other than the Lord from heaven; for the resurrection of Lazarus clearly marked Him out as the Son of God. But this very act, which so redounded to the glory of God and His Son was the very act needed to remove the burden from the hearts of Mary and Martha. To raise Lazarus from the dead was the most effectual way of wiping the tears from their eyes. And thus the one act ensured at one and the same time the high claims of God and the relief of the mourners.
But we are not to suppose that because the Lord did not hasten (as we might speak) to the help of Mary and Martha, that He was on that account insensible to their anguish of heart. There is enough in the scripture before us to indicate that the Lord entered into the sorrow in a far deeper way than they did or could. It was not His purpose to remove the sorrow, but He would fit them to bear it by assuring them it was for the glory of God, and also by the display of His tender compassion and perfect sympathy. He sent them His word from the first (chap. 11:4). And when He came He showed His loving interest which He had felt all the while. “When Jesus therefore saw her (Mary) weeping and the Jews also weeping which came with her, He groaned in the spirit and was troubled, and said, Where have ye laid him? They said unto him, Lord come and see. Jesus wept. Then said the Jews, Behold how He loved him Jesus therefore groaning in Himself cometh to the grave” (chap. 11:3-38).
How beautiful is this! Had they allowed themselves to suspect the Master? The groans and the tears were the answer. His tender question of the broken-hearted sister, Where have ye laid him? shows how gently the Lord lightened the burden of the sorrowing heart by causing her to see that His heart was just where hers was—at the tomb of Lazarus. To the widow of Nain the Lord said, Weep not. To Jairus He said, Thy daughter is not dead but sleepeth. In each case His purpose was to wipe away the tears. But in Bethany the Lord weeps with His saints. The grandest display of the power of the Lord to quicken the dead was accompanied by the greatest witness to His profound sympathy with the bereaved.
When both Mary and Martha see the Lord, they both express the same thought, “Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died.” Both were right in believing there could be no death in the presence of Jesus; but they both erred in common with many more of God's saints in assuming it would have been better for them if their sorrow had been prevented. If the Lord had come, they reasoned, they would have been spared their bereavement. But if so, they would not have seen the glory of God: as the Lord said to Martha, “Said I not to thee if thou wouldest believe thou shouldest see the glory of God” (John 11:4040Jesus saith unto her, Said I not unto thee, that, if thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God? (John 11:40))?
And at His coming they surely saw the glory of God. Lazarus came forth at the call of the Lord from corruption and the grave. What a triumph of the Lord's power was thus displayed in sleeping Lazarus! Jairus' daughter was raised from the bed, the widow's son from the bier, but Lazarus from the grave.
We can now see the gracious purpose of God in that which happened to this family. And what we see so distinctly portrayed in the history of these events might have been grasped beforehand by faith. But without blaming Martha and Mary for being weak in faith, let us remember we shall be more to blame in like circumstances than they, if we do not benefit by the record of what befell them and how God wrought by Christ for His own glory and their ultimate blessing.
The Thessalonian saints were similarly troubled about those who had fallen asleep before the Lord came. What sorrow would have been spared them, if the Lord had come from heaven before their loved ones passed away! But the apostle shows them that, when the Lord does descend from heaven with a shout, even those in the graves shall hear His voice and come forth. Therefore they were not to sorrow as those that had no hope. Their dear ones had not taken a leap in the dark. The power of the Lord would gather up to Himself both the living and the sleeping saints at His coming.
And while we like Mary and Martha at Bethany await the Master's coming, we have the unspeakable privilege of His present sympathy as well as the comfort of His word. For He is touched with the feeling of our infirmities. He Who wept and groaned at the sepulcher of Lazarus is not insensible to the tears and cries of His bereaved saints to-day.
May we therefore seek to meet our sorrows with the unalterable persuasion that they must inevitably work out the glory of God and that we also have with us in the midst of the trial none less than the Blessed Son of God Himself!
W. J. H.