God Loves us!! (John 10-12)

John 11:28-37 (ESV)

When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary, saying in private, “The Teacher is here and is calling for you.” And when she heard it, she rose quickly and went to him. Now Jesus had not yet come into the village, but was still in the place where Martha had met him. When the Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary rise quickly and go out, they followed her, supposing that she was going to the tomb to weep there. Now when Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus wept. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man also have kept this man from dying?”

This might be one of the most personal passages in the Gospels about Jesus.   It shows not only His earthly relationship with others and His earthly emotions, it demonstrates His deity, at the same time.  Jesus came to the earth as fully God and fully man.   Here we read about Jesus being able to heal (as God) and His ability to weep (as man).  Mary, in her knowledge of Jesus, knew that if Jesus had been there He could have healed her brother Lazarus.   She acknowledged His deity.   Jesus loved Martha, Mary and Lazarus and wept over this situation.  There is much speculation as to why He cried.   Did He do so because of Lazarus’ death (after all, He knew He was about to raise him from the dead)?   Did he weep because He saw the unbelief of everyone who stood by?  Or, did He weep because He saw the pain of death on the faces of those He loved?   Jesus came to defeat death.   This was a picture of Jesus seeing what death does and His weeping was over all these things.  He wept because of their unbelief.  He wept because of the pain He saw in death.   Jesus shows us both His humanity and His deity in this response to death.   We serve a God who not only sees the need to send His Son to defeat death, but also a God who is moved to weeping by the pain of death.