One desperate day Mary and Martha sent a message to Jesus: “He whom you love is ill.”
On receiving the message, Jesus made the statement that Lazarus’ illness would not end in death, but that God would be glorified through it. God has a plan and intention in everything. His plan is not tailor-made to ensure we avoid trial or distress, and this story is an illustration of that. God is not the author of evil. Trouble entered the world because of or sin, which opened the door to the source of all evil. But God takes up the web of our disaster and weaves it into something which instead brings our deliverance. He uses the materials at hand — sickness, blindness, poverty, injustice — and turns them to gold. So here God starts not with Lazarus’ healing, but with his death. Yet he is going to use that tragedy to fashion a greater triumph.
When you go to a planetarium, you can see the nearer constellations. Then the cameras will draw back the perspective so that suddenly what you saw previously as dominating the whole canvas is now only a small part of the enormously bigger universe. That’s the difference between seeing with our eyes and seeing with the eyes of God. Jesus refused to live within the limiting perspective of the sisters or of his mother or his brothers or his disciples. He lived within the limitless perspective of his Father.
All we see, especially in times of crisis or suffering, is our need. But what God does is determined by the strategy he has birthed in his eternal counsel. There is always human suffering. And if that suffering is yours, and you are asking God to help you, never doubt that he will come through for you. But remember he will answer out of his loving and merciful plan for you. That plan is always for your best, even when it does not seem so to you.
Everyone else in the story — the sisters and the disciples — were consumed with the sickness and death of Lazarus. But Jesus had his eyes on something else. He knew that the resurrection of Lazarus would precipitate his own death, and thus his resurrection. How do we know this? Because it’s made clear at the end of the story. It was as a direct result of the resurrection of Lazarus that the Jews determined not just to arrest Jesus, as they had previously planned, but to put him to death.
So what is the story really about? For the sisters, the story was initially about the healing of Lazarus. That was what they came to Jesus for. For the disciples — and in the end, the sisters also — the story was about Lazarus’ resurrection. But neither, in truth, was the real story. Only Jesus knew what the real story was. The real story was about his coming death and resurrection, the triumph of God over sin and death, and the inauguration of God’s kingdom on earth. All of it precipitated by the miracle at Bethany.
If you’re in trouble today and wondering where God is, take a step back and look up at the universe of God’s wonderful and perfect plan.
CONSIDER PARTNERING WITH DAVID & ELAINE CAMPBELL IN HELPING TO SUSTAIN THEIR ACTIVE MINISTRY.
AWAKENING MINISTRIES // FOUNDATION of FAITH Project
Foundation of Faith Project is strengthening generations in faith and bringing beautiful changes to the communities around them. Through teaching, mentoring and coaching, many are finding out who they are and who they are destined to be. They are bringing more to their world. David Campbell is the key leader in this initiative and you can support him financially directly through Awakening Ministries.
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