Christ, the Resurrection and Life

Edward Griffin (1770—1837)
 

John 11:25
"Jesus said unto her: I am the Resurrection and the Life: he who believes in me, though he were dead yet shall he live!"

There are certain expressions in the Scriptures which seem to contain a sermon in themselves, and cannot be dilated or put into different words without losing much of their fullness and force. Like the bow in the clouds, they display a beauty formed of different shades, which charm the eye more than the shades separately viewed. Hence when we analyze the compound thought, and in a sermon give you the ideas one by one, we do not increase the pleasure of the first impression. The mind turns from the exposition and delights to dwell on the text itself.

Such, I apprehend, is the character of the text which I have just read in your ears. I know not in what manner I can expand it without weakening its force. I expect that after I have done, my spiritual hearers, forgetful of the sermon, will still be dwelling on the text, and repeating over and over again, "I am the Resurrection and the Life: he who believes in me, though he were dead yet shall he live."

The occasion on which these words were spoken was as follows. There was in Bethany, about two miles east of Jerusalem, an interesting family who received Christ as the Messiah, and whom he and his disciples very tenderly loved. This family consisted of Lazarus and his two sisters, Mary and Martha. This was that Mary who at a former time, when her sister had received Jesus into her house and was providing him a supper, sat at his feet and heard his words; and who afterwards, a few days before his death, anointed his feet with ointment and wiped them with the hair of her head. And this was that Martha who, after she had hospitably invited Jesus to her house, complained to him that her sister had left her to serve alone. Martha, while she was truly pious, appears to have been ardent, resolute, active in domestic business, and full of words. Mary was doted, humble, affectionate, and heavenly minded. She was the more interesting character, and appears to have been more dear to her neighbors and to Jesus. Lazarus was a very worthy, pious man, and tenderly beloved by Christ and his disciples.

It happened at a time when Jesus was in the country on the east of Jordan, that Lazarus fell sick. His sisters, who doted on him, seeing him at the point of death, despatched a messenger to Jesus, saying, "Lord, behold he whom you love is sick." They had no doubt that their Messiah could save his life. Jesus delayed returning that he might have an opportunity to give a striking proof that he was "the Resurrection and the Life." He stayed two days in the place where he was, and then told his disciples that Lazarus was dead. They were so affected that they said one to another, "Let us go that we may die with him."

When Jesus arrived at Bethany, he found that Lazarus had lain in the grave four days. The two afflicted sisters were at that time in the house, with numerous friends who had come from Jerusalem to comfort them. Martha, having secret information that Jesus was near the town, went out with all her natural eagerness to meet him; but Mary abode still in the house, silently pressed with her grief.

John 11:20-38, "When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went out to meet him, but Mary stayed at home.

"Lord," Martha said to Jesus, "if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask."

Jesus said to her, "Your brother will rise again."

Martha answered, "I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day."

Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?"

"Yes, Lord," she told him, "I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who was to come into the world."

And 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." When Mary heard this, she got up quickly and went to him.

Now Jesus had not yet entered the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him. 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.

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."

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

"Come and see, Lord," they replied.

Jesus wept.

Then the Jews said, "See how he loved him!" But some of them said, "Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?"

Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance."

And Jesus lifted up his eyes and addressed his heavenly Father. O what a countenance was there! Could a painter draw it to the life, would it not be what one never saw before? What a trembling, solemn moment was that to the sisters' hearts. Look to that spot, you ends of the earth. You who wish to learn the power of our Jesus to pluck the prey from the very jaws of death—you who wish to see him attack death in his stronghold, in the sepulcher itself—you who would learn whether he can rescue the prey shut up four days in the grave; turn your eyes hither!

John 11:43-44 When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!" The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them, "Take off the grave clothes and let him go."

Methinks I see him fall into his sisters' arms. I see their arms strained fast around their brother's neck, and their tears of transport streaming upon his cheek. I see a sister on either side leading a brother home, triumphantly repeating, "I am the Resurrection and the Life! He who believes in me, though he were dead yet shall he live!"

What blessed words are these! One could dwell upon them forever. What a glorious hope has Jesus brought to our world by coming among the dead to be "the Resurrection and the Life!"

After this specimen of his power to raise the dead, who will ever despair? They have no cause to despair who have long been spiritually dead, shut up in the darkness of the sepulcher, with a great stone upon it—bound with grave clothes and covered with putrefaction. Where can you find a wretched sinner that is conscious of worse than this? Yet with all this he need not be discouraged. All this, and less than this, may well drive him to despair of help from himself; but all this, and more than this, (if more could be,) should not dishearten him from looking with confidence to the Savior of the world. In Christ, (let it be distinctly realized,) there is an overflowing supply for all our needs. "He who believes in me, though he were dead yet shall he live!"

The work which Christ came to accomplish was a most difficult, and to the eye of sense an impossible task. It was nothing less than to raise the dead! He saw a world completely sunk under the dominion of a three-fold death, and utterly and forever lost.

First, he saw them, by the apostasy of their first father, plunged into spiritual death—"dead in trespasses and sins." Dreadful state! More loathsome than the grave of Lazarus. Every holy principle extinct—their souls dead to every emotion of love to God—to every impulse of gratitude; as insensible to mercies, to divine love and beauty, as the bones that are moldering under the clods of the valley—and doomed by the law of God to an eternal abandonment to such a state.

Secondly, he saw them condemned to temporal death—their bodies filled with disease and pain, gradually wasting into food for worms, preparing to expire in agonies and to rot in the grave. He saw decay and death wither on all the enjoyments of man—on his father and mother, on his wife and children, on his houses and lands, on the very fabric of nature, which for the sin of man was doomed to dissolution.

Thirdly, he saw them actually consigned by the sentence of the law to eternal death. O the insupportable ignominy! to be judged unworthy to live in the light of heaven—unworthy to share in the love of infinite Love itself—unfit for the society of holy beings, and fit only to be company for devils and fuel for the flames! He saw them condemned to welter under the wrath of the Almighty to all eternity!

Thus he saw the world sunk under the dominion of a three-fold death. And from this state no finite power could redeem them. Nor had they ability to redeem themselves, any more than Lazarus had to tear off his grave clothes and come forth.

In that hour Jesus saw and pitied us and hastened to our relief. He came to destroy the works of the devil—to break this triple chain which bound the world to death—and in a three-fold sense to be "the Resurrection and the Life."

As these three kinds of death were entailed by the first Adam, and as the redemption by the second Adam was a redemption from the three; all these deaths, as well as the corresponding resurrections, are often thrown together in a sort of mystical confusion, and a transition is made from one to another in the same discourse, not easily understood by one unaware of all this. An instance of such a transition appears in our context. "Jesus said unto her, Your brother shall rise again.

Martha said unto him, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day;" referring to the resurrection of the body.

"Jesus said unto her, I am the Resurrection and the Life: he who believes in me, though he were dead yet shall he live; [referring to a resurrection from a three-fold death,] and whoever lives and believes in me, shall never die," spiritually and eternally.

The second Person in the Trinity, having undertaken this great work, was, in the subordinate character of Mediator, qualified to be "the Resurrection and the Life" by receiving power and authority to distribute life as he pleases. "As the Father has life in himself, so has he given to the Son to have life in himself;" and "as the Father raises up the dead and quickens them, even so the Son quickens whom he will."

Thus qualified, the Mediator proceeded in his work; the sum of which was to be "the Resurrection and the Life" in a three-fold sense:

1. He becomes "the Resurrection and the Life" by raising his people from the death of sin, to the life of holiness. This he does in a double sense:

First, by his death he rendered it consistent with the honor of the law to repeal the curse of abandonment pronounced on the race, and by his obedience he obtained the gift of the Spirit to our world.

Secondly, having received the administration of the Spirit, he sends out that divine Agent to quicken his people according to his own will: a strong proof of his proper divinity, whether the Holy Spirit be a divine Person or only the power of God; for it would be preposterous to suppose that a mere creature should direct God. He promised to send the Comforter to his disciples to testify of him. And when he got home to Heaven, he did send out the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost, by whose power three thousand were raised from death at once!

This great work of raising a world from the death of sin, he is accomplishing every day. It is the Spirit of Jesus who awakens every careless sinner, who convinces every awakened sinner, who converts every convinced sinner. Or in the language of Ezekiel, it is the Spirit of Jesus who breathes life into the dead body in which bone has come to its bone and the flesh and sinews have been gathered thereupon. It is to the power of Jesus alone that parents can look for the resurrection of their believing dead children—that ministers can look for the resurrection of their believing dead hearers—that believing sinners can look for the resurrection of their own souls.

He is not only "the Resurrection," but "the Life" also; and when he has raised his people from the death of sin, he continues to support their spiritual existence. This is not only directly asserted, but set forth by various figures. He is the Head to the members, and the Vine which constantly gives life to the branches.

The same truth is most delightfully illustrated by the vision of Zachariah. He saw a golden candlestick, with a bowl on the top for the oil. From the bowl seven golden pipes led to seven lamps. On each side of the candlestick was an olive tree, whose principal branch, through a golden pipe, constantly discharged oil into the bowl and fed the lamps, which of course never went out. Thus there is, as it were, a golden pipe laid from Christ to the believer's heart, through which flow constant supplies of life, light, and comfort.

Hence it is that the life and light of Christians continue to shine, notwithstanding all the damps and floods of the world, the flesh, and the devil, and continue, in the language of another, as great a miracle as a candle kept lighted from age to age in the midst of the ocean. By this unceasing operation, countless multitudes will be recovered from the death of sin to the perfection of holiness. And when the blessed assembly shall be displayed together, it will be such a multitude as no man can number, shouting and pointing to Jesus, and rapturously repeating his delightful words, "I am the Resurrection and the Life! He who believes on me, though he were dead yet shall he live."

2. Christ is "the Resurrection and the Life" by raising his people from eternal death, to everlasting life. The flames of their Hell were extinguished by his blood, which procured and sealed their pardon; and his meritorious obedience purchased for them the inheritance of glory. In him and in him only, poor sinners are complete. "There is now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus." Because he lives they shall live also. Jesus is the life of the world—the living bread which came down from Heaven, which if a man eats, he shall never hunger. He came that we might have life, and that we might have it more abundantly. The most abandoned sinner, who is condemned by the law to the lowest Hell, by faith in him may be acquitted of all his guilt!

Jesus is the last hope of an expiring race. Jesus is the only hope which anxious parents can have for their believing perishing offspring, and dying believing sinners for their own souls. There is the only hope for saints on earth, and the only security for saints in Heaven. And there is hope enough.

How many times every day do Christians lift their eyes to Jesus, and with every hope centering in him, call him their Resurrection and their Life. And how eminently will he thus appear when he shall display before his throne, in one vast assembly, the immense columns of human beings who were once the heirs of Hell, but were raised to life eternal by his mediation and power. Will not Heaven forever ring with the music of these delightful words, "I am the Resurrection and the Life! He who believes in me, though he were dead yet shall he live."

3. Jesus is, "the Resurrection and the Life" by eventually raising the bodies of his people from the grave. "As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." The apostle, in proof of the resurrection, quotes a verse from the 110th Psalm, purporting that Christ must hold the mediatorial government until all his enemies are put under his feet; and then alleging death to be an enemy, he brings his argument for the resurrection to a point by saying, "The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death!"

How precious is our Redeemer, viewed, in this sense, as "the Resurrection and the Life." What a joyous hope is this when we stand around the dying beds of our friends—when we commit them to the grave—when we contemplate those whom we tenderly loved, as masses of putrefaction or entirely dissolved. Jesus is "the Resurrection and the Life," and we shall see our believing friends again! And what a hope is this when we ourselves are entering the region of the shadow of death. We are not to be lost in eternal oblivion, but may look through the dark region to the light of a glorious resurrection.

Jesus has shed a cheerful ray on the precincts of the tomb and diffused a light through the womb of the grave. He will recover all his sleeping saints from the dust. In that glorious morning when the trumpet shall sound, they shall spring to light from every graveyard, and find death, their last enemy, destroyed! And when they shall awake and find this last foe dead at their feet, and themselves recovered to immortal life; when they shall look up and see the glorious retinue of their descending Savior and mark the strange commotions in Heaven and earth; then, as they are caught up to meet their Lord in the air, with what raptures will they sing as they ascend, "I am the Resurrection and the Life! He who believes in me, though he were dead yet shall he live."

In that day the whole fabric of the universe—the earth and the visible heavens—will be dissolved, and fall into that utter ruin to which they were consigned for the sin of man. There, then, will be the last opportunity for Christ to, appear "the Resurrection," though he will always be "the Life." Out of the ashes of the old, his power will raise new heavens and a new earth, while he pronounces, "Behold I make all things new!" And while the saints and angels come out to view the new worlds which the great Restorer has reared, every harp in Heaven will sound, and angels and men will fill the new heavens and earth with the hallowed song, "I am the Resurrection and the Life!"

And shall those lips which will then be vocal, now be sealed in silence? No! let us now begin the praise. Savior of men, let us delight to triumph in you, who are to us "the Resurrection and the Life." O let his name and his love be forever on our lips. Let our tongue cleave to the roof of our mouth before we forget him who restores our souls—who gives life to a perishing world! Amen.