God’s mysterious ways

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What comfort might you take from this short verse in today’s reading: ‘Jesus wept’ (v 35)?

Bible passage

John 11:28–44

28 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.’ 29 When Mary heard this, she got up quickly and went to him. 30 Now Jesus had not yet entered the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him. 31 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.

32 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.’

33 When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. 34 ‘Where have you laid him?’ he asked.

‘Come and see, Lord,’ they replied.

35 Jesus wept.

36 Then the Jews said, ‘See how he loved him!’

37 But some of them said, ‘Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?’

Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead

38 Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. 39 ‘Take away the stone,’ he said.

‘But, Lord,’ said Martha, the sister of the dead man, ‘by this time there is a bad odour, for he has been there four days.’

40 Then Jesus said, ‘Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?’

41 So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, ‘Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42 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.’

43 When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, ‘Lazarus, come out!’ 44 The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth round his face.

Jesus said to them, ‘Take off the grave clothes and let him go.’

Word Live 136

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In 1773, English poet and hymnwriter William Cowper wrote the hymn ‘God Moves in a Mysterious Way’. It proved a popular hymn but also gave to the English language an enduring expression we still use today. God’s ways of sovereignly working in our lives can often seem deeply mysterious. Today we arrive at the culmination of the Lazarus story, and we read the extraordinary words ‘The dead man came out’ (v 44). Dead men do not ‘come out’; they do not speak or walk or live or breathe. And yet that is what we see here. What a mystery!

At this stage in the story, John shows us Mary, who expresses confusion as well as doubt and pain. While Jesus doesn’t share her confusion or doubt, he does share her pain. The shortest verse in the Bible profoundly points to the pain felt by Jesus at this moment of deep sorrow for Martha and Mary: ‘Jesus wept’ (v 35). 

These two simple words can be of huge comfort to us. God may indeed move in mysterious ways. He is, however, not indifferent to our pain and our situations. The wonder of the incarnation of Jesus – God entering into humanity and becoming human – tells us that God is neither indifferent nor distant. In the mystery of our pain and our lives, God is present.

Author
Richard Ellwood

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