THE REFORMED WITNESS HOUR
"I Am the Resurrection and the Life”
Rev.
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prca.orgDear radio friends,
In
John 11:25, 26
Jesus spoke some of the most
beautiful words that have ever been spoken.
Jesus said unto her (that is, unto Martha), “I am the resurrection, and
the life: he that believeth in me,
though he were dead, yet shall he live:
and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this?”
We have been following the “I AM’s” of Jesus, sayings in which
He identifies who He is and what He has done for us. We come to the fifth of those found in the
Gospel According to John, Jesus’ words, “I am the resurrection and the
life.”
Really these words of our Lord are too beautiful for human
explanation. It seems to me that any
exposition of mine can only spoil them.
If ever I felt inadequate, it certainly is now! Would it not be better just to let them stand
there as they are, as they have stood throughout all the ages and will continue
to stand, world without end?
Jesus is the resurrection and the life! Did you hear that? Did you hear that, you who grieve over the
death of a dear loved one, a husband, a father, a brother, a sister, a young
man in the Lord Jesus Christ: “I am the
resurrection and the life. He that
believeth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And whosoever liveth and believeth in Me
shall never die.” Do you hear those
words?
Do you hear those words personally, as you are a child of God in
the midst of this world of sin and death, as you struggle against your sin and say,
“When will that ever be over? It’s always with me.” You grow with the Lord and you grow with the
knowledge of sin, of your own sin. Will
it ever be over?
Did you hear His words?
Perhaps you are going through cancer.
Perhaps you stand before the very door of death itself, the dark,
horrible door of death, the enemy, the last enemy, a frightening enemy.
Do you hear what Jesus says?
“I am the resurrection and the life.
He that believeth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live!” Do you desire, do you need, comfort? Do you look for inward peace? Are you looking for strength and
confidence? Then, by grace, through
faith, you must know Jesus. You must
know Him personally, by grace. You must
not know Him vaguely and indefinitely.
But you must know Him personally, in all of His self-sufficiency and in
all of His wonderful satisfying truth.
For Jesus is the resurrection and the life, and all who belong to Him
and by faith believe in Him will never, can never, die. Do you believe this?
Jesus is standing before Martha.
He says, “Be-lievest thou this?”
Let me give a response of another man:
“Yea, Lord, I believe. Help Thou
my unbelief.”
Jesus’ words, here, are marvelous. As I said, they were spoken originally to
Martha, who was the sister of Lazarus, who had died. Jesus had come to raise him from the
dead. Martha had come out in all of her
despair and hopelessness when she had heard that Jesus was approaching. As she meets Him and talks with Him, Jesus
speaks these words to her ears: “I am
the resurrection and the life.”
When you read
John 11,
you see that our Lord Jesus Christ has
arranged all of this in His tender care—He has arranged this entire scene
exactly just so, for this is who He is.
He must now reveal Himself to us as to who He is. When Jesus said in
John 6,
“I am the Bread of
Life,” He said that at the appropriate, the right, moment. He said that when men were trying to stuff
their miserable life with the bread of this present world, a bread that could
not satisfy. He said, “I am the Bread of
Life, I alone can satisfy the soul.”
When Jesus said, “I am the Light of the world,” He said that when men
were going about lighting candles, thinking that their candles could make light
in darkness. When Jesus said, “I am the
Good Shepherd,” He said that in the context of false shepherds, who wanted to
lead the people of God astray in their own paths. He said it at an appropriate time: “I am the Good Shepherd. I give My life for the sheep.”
Now it is time for Jesus to reveal this wonderful truth about
Himself. But He must do so at the right
time. And He does. For He does reveal Himself as the resurrection
and the life as He stands before the horrible reality of death, the horrible
reality of the death of one whom He loved—Lazarus.
Our Lord, then, as I have been saying, has arranged this
moment. He arranges the lives of His
children to prepare them exactly to hear the word that they need to hear of
Him. Our Lord, you might remember in
John 11,
had deliberately waited for Lazarus to die before He would come. He had told His disciples that this sickness
of Lazarus was not unto death but for the glory of God (v. 4). He was not saying to them that Lazarus would
not die. But He was saying that the
purpose of Lazarus’ death was that it would reveal, through Jesus, the glory of
God in His Son.
We need to understand that, that the Lord has arranged this in
order that He might reveal to us who He is.
When the Lord did arrive, it was Martha who ran out to meet Him. And with words bursting with emotion, out of
a broken heart, she said, “Lord, if Thou hadst been here my brother had not
died.” Then she held out some hope. She went on to say (v. 22), “But I know, that
even now, whatsoever thou wilt ask of God, God will give it thee.”
The Lord responds to those words in the following way (v.
23): “Jesus saith unto her, Thy brother
shall rise again.”
Then Martha responds to that (v. 24): “I know that he shall rise again in the
resurrection at the last day.” Martha
understood Jesus to mean that there is a coming resurrection of the dead at the
end of the world. That truth had been
revealed to Martha and to all of the Old Testament saints.
Job 19
and in
Psalm 17
—from those and other
passages the Lord had made abundantly plain that there would be the
resurrection of the body at the last day; that in our flesh, even though it
would be decayed and destroyed by worms, yet in our flesh we would see
God. Yes, they knew there would be a
resurrection of the body at the last day, at the end of the world.
But Jesus says to Martha, “No, Martha, no, no. That’s not the only thing that I had in mind
when I said that thy brother shall arise again.
I’m not talking only about a future blessing. I am come to reveal to you something that is
true right now, something that is true about Me and true about all those who
belong to Me. I am the resurrection and
the life. Martha, your comfort is not
first, nor even primarily, in a future hope of the resurrection of the
body. But your comfort is Me right
now! You need to know that I am
the resurrection and the life.”
He means to direct our faith to Him and what He is for us. He means more than just that He is able to
give us life and resurrection. He can
and does do that. He means more than
just, “I am come to earn life and resurrection for you.” He did do and has done that. But He says, “I am the resurrection and the
life. I who stand before you, Martha
—that is who I am. And because that is
who I am, all those belonging to Me shall never die. All those belonging to Me, who are in Me,
have been raised, and now are victorious over death.”
Jesus is the resurrection and the life. In Him is the victory over death, and in Him,
our Savior Jesus, is life eternal. The
life of which He speaks is fellowship with God —for that is life. Life is not, first of all, a biological
existence upon this earth. But life has
to do with one’s relationship with God.
If one does not stand, according to the Scripture, in loving
relationship with God, he is dead! No
matter how much biological life he may have.
And in death he shall enter into the realm of the dead, that is, hell,
where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.
No, life is the intimacy of love with God. Jesus would say in
John 17:3,
“And this is
eternal life, that they might know thee the only true God.” God is life. God has life in Himself as the triune
God. He enjoys a blissful, sacred,
wonderful, tranquil life within Himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. According to
Deuteronomy 32:40
He says, “I
lift up my hand to heaven, and say, I live for ever.” God is life. And life for us is to know God, to belong to
God, and to be with God in faith.
Jesus says, “I am the life and I am the resurrection, that is, I
am the One who has destroyed death. I am
the One who has destroyed all that would stand between you and life with
God. Sin and guilt—I have destroyed this
in My cross. I am victorious. I am able to raise dead sinners into living
presence with God.”
What was Jesus saying to Martha?
What is He saying to you and to me?
He is saying this: “Look on
Me. You who are in the midst of death;
you who are broken with grief and ruin and sorrow and despair; you who know the
guilt of your sin—I am the resurrection and the life. In Myself, on the basis of My cross and My
atoning work at
For that is the glorious consequence. “I am the resurrection and the life”—does He
possess this only for Himself? No. “He that believeth in me, though he were dead,
yet shall he live.” In other words, He
is this for us! By belonging to Him, we
are given a life that shall never die.
“He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me
shall never die.” He was saying that the
believer is immortal. He was saying that
by grace, when we belong to Jesus Christ, we shall live forever. That in Jesus Christ, through faith, we
possess life that is over death, that is eternal.
That is what it means to belong to Jesus Christ. To belong to Jesus Christ is no common
thing. It is no “ho-hum” thing. It is no decision that you have made. It is the power, it is the mighty
power of God’s living grace, to translate you from death to life eternal, to
bring you out of the realm of eternal destruction and ruin and to bring you
into the realm of eternal bliss and glory.
“Whosoever liveth and believeth in me, though he were dead, yet
shall he live.” The Lord is picturing
the believer, first of all, at the moment of his death. He is saying that, united to Him, the
resurrection and the life, at the moment of death we shall live. “He that believeth in me, though he were
dead, yet shall he live.” Do you believe
that? Do you understand that? We shall live with God in glory. Our bodies will be raised at the last day, and
those bodies shall be made like unto the glorious body of Christ. This is our hope. This is reality. In Jesus Christ, the resurrection and the
life, death has been changed to the portal, to the door, that enters into life
eternal to be with Jesus in heaven. We
see that by faith. Look upon Jesus by
faith. Oh, physical death is so horrible
of itself! We see it working, perhaps,
through pain and cancer and sorrow, in our dear, dear loved one. And there is nothing we can do. Perhaps we see it come suddenly in a heart
attack. And, again, there is nothing
that we can do. That death separates,
takes away from this life, tears apart our loved one, brings us down with waves
of grief.
Yes, we grieve before death. So did Jesus. In
John 11:35
we
read: “Jesus wept.” But in the face of that, Jesus said, “I am
the resurrection and the life: he that
believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live”—right now he shall
live with the Father. And the body, too,
shall live and be raised from the dead.
It will happen. You shall awake
in glory in the moment of death, believer.
You shall see Him. And it shall
be the simplest, most profound, most glorious moment imaginable. You shall stand before Him and you shall be
satisfied. You shall be filled with His
glory and you shall be at rest and peace.
Then, in that great day, that great day of all days when Jesus
Christ returns, our bodies, too, shall be lifted from the grave—the body that
through old age was wrinkled and slowly lost its strength; or that body that
was consumed by cancer; or that body of a young man that was broken in a
fall—we shall be raised and we shall be like Jesus.
But Jesus is saying more.
He is not only saying that at death we enter into heaven and have the
hope of the resurrection of our body at the last day. What Jesus is saying is that whosoever liveth
and believeth in Him shall never die. He
is saying that the ones now made alive by Him have an imperishable life. He is saying that when, by faith, through
grace, we are in Jesus Christ and He is our faithful Savior, we cannot
die. Oh, yes, the present body, that
shall die and go to the grave. As a seed,
it must be sown in the ground for the great day of the resurrection. Oh, yes, this present body, this present
corruptible flesh, cannot see God, cannot walk with God in heaven. Yes, we shall die physically.
But Jesus is saying, “I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me shall never die. I have made you alive. I have brought you from the realm of
spiritual death, eternal death. And I
have brought you from the guilt and the bondage of your sin. And I have made you alive in Me.” That is His work.
We did not make ourselves alive in Jesus. Can a dead man make himself alive? Can a dead man will to live? No!
Look at Lazarus. Did Jesus stand
before the grave of Lazarus and say, “Lazarus, I am willing if you are. Just let Me know. Scratch on the inside of the rock. Do something—just a little indication. And I will give you enabling grace, dependent
upon your will first to choose Me. Then
you will come out of the grave.” Is that
what Jesus said? Of course not! Lazarus was dead.
Remember that! Your
salvation is entirely, wholly, of God’s grace.
Salvation is when Jesus, the resurrection and the life, speaks, as no
mere man can speak, His living word in our heart. And He breathes into our dead, sinful hearts
everlasting life. Faith is a gift of the
living Savior. Do you believe this?
The gospel is distinctive.
The gospel is antithetical. Jesus
is the resurrection and the life not for all.
For those who believe in Him, by the grace of God, but not for
everybody, not even in that day of Martha, Mary, and Lazarus. We read, “Many of the Jews which came to
Mary, and had seen the things which Jesus did” did not believe. They said, “We are going to deny everything
we just saw and everything we just heard.
We don’t believe in this Jesus.”
There are many who continue in sinful ways, who mock this gospel, who
ridicule it, who say, “Well, that’s a nice story. Maybe we’ll come and hear that nice story
again sometime.” If you continue in that
unbelief, you will be consumed by Jesus Christ.
Repent and forsake your sin.
Do you believe this, by the grace of God? You see, that is very personal, is it
not? Jesus does not say, “Does your
minister believe this? Does your Dad,
does your Mom, believe this? Does the
person over there believe this?” He
says, “Do you believe this?” You see, it
is so very personal. That is the work of
Jesus—so very, very personal. He gives to
me to believe that I am righteous in His work. And by His Holy Spirit and by His grace I am
alive. And in Jesus I shall not die, but
I shall live and tell the wonders of the Lord.
And in death I shall go to be with Him and stand before Him in all of
His beauty, entirely by His grace.
But it is personal. Do
you believe this? When you, as child of
God, stand before death, you cannot be silent.
Though our grief in the death of our loved one is great, and though our
fear over our own death may also be consuming and great, yet the work of God’s
grace convicts our soul and gives us to say, “Yea, Lord, I believe that Thou
art the Christ, the Son of the living God.
Yes, Lord, Thou knowest that I believe, Thou knowest all things. You know that I believe, Lord, because You
put that faith there. I know that Thou
hast put that faith there, for I believe in Thee and I embrace Thee by faith.”
So the wonderful words of Jesus stand true, and stand true
throughout all ages, world without end.
Hear them and embrace them: “I am
the resurrection, and the life: he that
believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me
shall never die. Believest thou
this?” “Yea, Lord, we believe!”
Let us pray.
Father, we thank Thee for Thy precious Word. Write it upon our hearts. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Last modified: 4-Apr-2007