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| John 11:41a |
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Lesson # John 11:41a Study Material - John 11:41a You must be in fellowship prior to your Bible study, so that the spiritual information you receive can become a source, of blessing to your soul and produce spiritual growth. John 11:41a 41 Then [oun] they took away [airo] the stone [lithos] from the place where [hou] the dead [thnesko] was [en] laid [keimai] . And [de] Jesus [Iesous] lifted [airo] up [ano] his eyes [ophthalmos] , and [kai] said [epo] , Father [pater] , I thank [eucharisteo] thee [soi] that [hoti] thou hast heard [akouo] me [mou] . KJV-Interlinear John 11:41a 41 And so they removed the stone. And Jesus raised His eyes, and said, 'Father, I thank Thee that Thou heardest Me. NASB Past prophets requested and were granted the power to perform miracles. Elijah and even Elisha raised the dead, but not of their own power. They requested of God and by their entreaty same was given to them by God. Jesus Christ performs His miracles, and by miracles I mean that anything He did which is far beyond human ability, is considered to be a miracle. We as humans cannot duplicate anything Christ did, even in our current day of technological advances. Even if our technology advances to ten times what it is today, or even a hundred times more, we still could not duplicate anything Christ has done. Mankind will never be able to duplicate His miracles, in truth. This does not include the duplication or the appearance of miracles, by magic, which is only deception and slight of hand stuff. Jesus Christ performs His miracles by means of authority. He commands all of the components of this universe. But here He will not do anything in His own name, but in the name of the Father, to whom is our ultimate reconciliation. We can only be reconciled to the Father, by means of Christ. As we have studied before this means that we cannot define our own approach to God. We either go through Christ or not at all. Why restate this? It seems so obvious by now. Well, when Lazarus is raised, there will be those who will not believe, they will run off to the Pharisees to report the event. But not report it as a miracle, but as just another 'miracle' which He has used to sway the people into rebellion, or so they would imply. Now we have a scene here. We are all standing around a tomb. You have probably seen them on the Discovery channel or the National Geographic channel, or some such historical show, where holes in hillsides or rock walls of mountainsides are used as tombs for the dead. Sometimes they are quite deep and the people are carried far into the cave and the dead are laid to rest way back in the back. Other times the cave is relatively shallow, and you can see within the entire cave from just outside its opening. That is what we have here. A stone is rolled in place over the opening for a variety of reasons. For privacy, for respect, but certainly it is rolled over the cave entrance to seal it and to prevent obnoxious odors from escaping. The obnoxious odors are the stench of a dead and decaying body. The stone was removed and what happened then. Lazarus came running out immediately? No. The stench of a dead man came rushing out. Now folks really do have something to cry about. You can just see the crowd reaction when the smell hit them. They would make the obvious comments, gag, immediately move backward. That kind of stink just does not wash out. It gets into your nose and won't leave for a long time. Now why do we know that this happened? Because Martha has already given us the heads up that it (the stink) was going to come out. Because we know that Lazarus has been dead for four days. Because we know that Lazarus was in that cave. We know that there was no air conditioning inside that cave. We know that he who had died (Lazarus) was inside per verse 44, still bound hand and foot with his burial wrappings. A dead and decaying body was inside that cave. Why wouldn't Jesus simply make the stink go away or prevent it from coming out? You would think that the stink would offend folks! But Jesus purpose here is not to prevent folks from being offended. Offense is a superficial and generally a self righteous concept. Long ago I had lots of folks sign off of the Bible study when we went over such things as the animal sacrifices. I've had people sign off of the Bible study when we studied circumcision. People get offended easily. When things are all rose petals and sweetness people like the study, but when we throw in a few hells and dams, or study things like when David kills everyone who can urinate against the wall (one way of identifying male types), then folks become offended, and that is unfortunate. They hopefully will be confronted by something in life that will make them less sensitive. The stench rolls out of the cave like a storm. Ever thrown some rotten meat into the garbage and put the lid on it, then perhaps a few days later, having forgotten it was in there, you lifted the lid off. The stink just hammers you, and you know your reaction - 'Oh, yuk! Gross! Put that lid back on it quick!!!' Or something like that. Perhaps your language is a bit more colorful. No matter. You get the idea. It gets your attention. That is the point. The stench came rolling out and there is no doubt that a dead man resides within. No doubt! Jesus is even going to pray a short prayer, which will take a little more time, which will allow the stench to reach even those in the next county, so to speak. There is no doubt that Lazarus is dead. No tricks. No magic. Dead is dead, is dead. Now Jesus has every ones attention. Why, in the world would He have that cave opened up? 
Now is the time to post a prayer. End Of Lesson Study to show thyself approved (mature) unto God, a workman that needs not to be ashamed, rightly dividing (studying/discerning), the Word of truth. |
