To John chapter eleven, please. John chapter eleven. And we'll read verse thirty-five, which we were speaking on last Sunday. Verse thirty-five of John chapter eleven. Jesus wept. Then said the Jews, Behold how he loved him. And some of them said, Could not this man which opened the eyes of the blind have caused that even this man, Lazarus, should not have died? Jesus, therefore, again groaning in himself, cometh to the grave. It was a cave, and a stone lay upon it. Jesus said, Take ye away the stone. Martha, the sister of him that was dead, saith unto him, Lord, by this time he stinketh. for he has been dead for days. Jesus saith unto her, Said I not unto thee, if thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God. Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead was laid, and Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me, and I knew that thou fearest me always. But because of the people which stand by, I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent me. When he thus had spoken, he cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth. And he that was dead came forth, bound hand and foot with grave clothes. And his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus saith unto them, Loose him, and let him go. Then many of the Jews, which came to Mary and had seen the things which Jesus did, believed on him. Last we were speaking on the sickness of Lazarus and then the saddened sisters. And today I want to speak upon the Savior. We may not get to the schemers at the end of the chapter. Let me take that up next week. How the Lord Jesus on this occasion manifested his deity. To find them weeping, as we read in that verse, Jesus wept. He's showing his humanity. He was a man, a sinless man. Now he displays his deity. His humanity, he wept. His deity, Lazarus, come forth. There he had the dual personality of the Lord Jesus. On another occasion, when he was out with the disciples on a stormy sea, We find him sleeping, not weeping. He was sleeping in the hinder part of the boat. There he is tired, his humanity. Then when he was awakened, you see a man manifesting his deity. He says, Peace be still. And he calmed the sea. And that's true of the Lord Jesus, not only son of man, but son of God. On this occasion, he deflates his deity. when he shows his power over death. He says, take ye away the stone, well, that need not be. It wasn't necessary. The Lord could have moved that stone with his word if he so desired, but he didn't. He could have commanded Lazarus to come forth leaving the stone where it was. He had that kind of power, but he didn't. He said to others, here is where man has his responsibility, his own, not to stand idly by. And he said to them, Throw ye away the stone. His mighty power does not relieve us of our responsibility as Christians. Lazarus come forth. He calls them by name. Uncertainly there were many people buried in that area and the tombs and so on. And at G. Al-Mudi once said, had Christ just used those two words, come forth, everybody would have come forth in the cemetery. But no, he called them by name Lazarus. Likely a lot of other people in that area who were buried were not Christians. And it wasn't time for them to come forth. He'll call them out. in a day to come. But on this occasion, he was interested in one person, Lazarus come forth, and he came forth. How remarkable. The day is going to come when he's going to call everybody forth, and if you want to find a text for that, you can find it over in the John five, twenty eight, twenty nine. Marvel not at this, for the hour is coming, and the with all that are in the grave shall come forth, and shall come forth, they that have done good unto the resurrection of life, and they that have done evil unto the resurrection of condemnation. There are two resurrections in the future, the resurrection of the righteous, and the resurrection of the unrighteous. And so it simply means this. that every human being that dies is bound to hear and respond to that voice. When Christ shall come, as we'll be speaking next week, and when he sounds the notes, come up hither, all who are in their grave, to Christians, all born again once, all washed in blood, the faithful of the Old Testament will come forth responding to his command. And then a thousand years later, before the great white throne, all unconverted from Cain on to that time, are going to hear that voice and come forth to stand before him at the great white throne, not to be pledged with about salvation that day's past, but to be shown and convinced that their eternal judgment that they're going to enter into the lake of fire is justified. They had a chance. They missed it. And so you see the Lord Jesus on this occasion, and this is His greatest miracle, I presume, you find in your Bible. Supernatural power. Not natural for water to be turned into wine by the sound of a word. That's not natural. Not natural for leprosy to yield to the voice of a man. Ordinary men, not natural for a blind person to all of a sudden get his eyesight. These things are not natural. So the Lord Jesus was supernatural. He manifested his power. He did turn the water into wine. No one else could. He did cause the leper to be cleansed. He did give eyesight, showing he was supernatural. In other words, Christ made it to happen. A watchmaker can make a watch, and he so makes it that it turns clockwise. Now, if he so desires, he can stop that watch, so he can reverse it. He can turn it back. That's no miracle. No law has been broken when a watchmaker can do that. But a miracle is... when it's something contrary to nature. And that's where the Lord Jesus comes in. It is a dead man, dead four days, contrary to nature. And he raised him from the dead. God can break the laws of nature. He has the power to do it. Nature, on this occasion, that takes its course and allows us to die. but he reversed the laws of nature and bathed them from the dead. You have a couple of instances of that in the Old Testament. You remember Joshua, he commanded the Son to stand still and stood still. That was God's power and affirmation. Can you imagine the sun standing still, wouldn't that interfere with all the machinery of our solar system? It's good still. And yet our solar system operates smoothly. Then on another occasion Isaiah thirty-eight, God told Isaiah to tell Zechariah if he wanted an evidence that his life was going to be extended, he said, I'll turn the degrees. turned the sun back ten degrees the light of the sun and he did it reversing the laws of nature only god can do that the lord jesus demonstrates that on this occasion when he reversed the law of nature and he raised a dead man from the grave you'll notice too on this occasion How he speak with a loud voice, a loud voice. When he raised a little girl, a age twirled from the dead. She had just died. Likely her body was still warm. And he said, confirming this young lady, to light that shumai, and shiru. Thought she had just died. Some would try and say life was already in. No, she had died. He came to the young man on the way to the cemetery. He had been dead a few hours. And he just said, young man, arise. But when he comes to Lazarus, he uses a loud voice. Why? Because of the nature of this man. Dead, poor days, and dropped, stinging. And in this occasion, he uses a loud voice. I often think God speaks softly to some people. He speaks gently through the gospel. And they respond, except Christ, they're saved. Some people get saved when they're quite young. Others, I remember some older ones, that got saved. My, how simple it was. They weren't sitting under a thunderous gospel message. But they passed from death unto life just like a breeze coming through a sick window, window where a room within a sick person, just like the breeze coming in through the window and panning the face of the sick station. Some accept Christ just like that. It just seems so simple. They take it in. But some are more difficult. We get along in life. and they become hardened and the Lord speaks a little louder. He tries to reach them. Sometimes they get to the point where he has to use a loud voice. And that's not pleasant. He can use a very loud voice. He can use circumstances. He can snatch a loved one from our side. He can bring us down on our back, take the faith with death, before we'll awaken to our circumstances, our situation, and get saved. So the Lord has various tones of voice in which he reaches the hearts of men and women on this occasion. He used a loud voice. I hope he won't have to use it in your case. because that voice has got to be heard. And he loves when his voice is heard in a gentle tone and not forced into resort to harsh means and methods of bringing some people to Christ. He proved, the Lord Jesus proved that he was the Son of God. I don't know whether you know of Homer's Odyssey. And in that book, he tells about Goliath's And here's a man, he was so strong and powerful, he made a bow and arrow, and that bow was made of such material that he was the only one who could take that string and bend that bow. He went into the army of the government back in those days, he was gone for twenty years. And the hardships of war and of what he went through, He wasn't the same man. He finally returned. And his own wife didn't recognize. His features, everything about him changed. And he tried to tell her he was. She didn't believe it. He said, bring me my bow and arrow. And the bow and arrow was in the house. She went and got it. And he took it and he put his fingers on the string and the bow and he pulled it back and he sent that arrow tying to a great distance. She fell at his feet. She invades him. She says, You are my dear husband. You have proved it. He is the only one who could have done that with the bow and arrow. That's what happened on this occasion. His works prove who he was. Notice what you have in verse forty-five. Then many of the Jews which came to marry and had seen the things which Jesus did believe on him. They were convinced. Prior to this, they were not convinced. But when he performed this miracle, they were convinced and they believed on him. Just like that man when he used that pronoun, no one else could use. His wife was convinced he is. My dear husband. And all the Lord does today, certainly he gives you evidence to believe. In fact, in those days he performed those miracles. And people who were hard in heart finally were convinced and they believed on him. Have you not seen some miracles in your life? I have. People reached for the gospel. Their lives changed. They were not the same individuals. Homes have been re-established. Homes have been united. It's the power of the gospel. Every day you see evidences of God. Look out for the landscape today at this time of the year. Who's the one behind the lovely flowers you see all over the land? And the trees blossoming into light. Man could not do that. That's the law of nature, as God ordained in the beginning, it's working. A few weeks ago, the trees were dead and dry and even bittered in some cases. Today, they're blossomed out a picture of light and eventually fruit. That's a miracle. Through the miracle that happens when God speaks to a human being of that man or woman, receive the message and their life changes. That's a miracle. No human being can do that. I may get you to join a church or some other preacher may get you to join a church, but that's not giving you life. Only one can give you life. You need to become a new creature in Christ Jesus and the new birth is a miracle. We're born from above. We become new creatures in Christ Jesus. So you find on this occasion how the Lord brought Lazarus forth out of the tomb, having been dead four days. Lazarus lying there in the tomb speaks of man dead in sin, just yesterday. All of us were born into this world, dead in trespasses and in sins, the Bible says. Then Lazarus watered. Here is man deep in sin. Dead in sin? Yes. Now deep in sin. I hope we haven't got any here this morning or that deep. You're down in the gutter. You know something that is very dark and deep and dreadful, light of sin. You hear that some people who go down pretty deep, their light is a stretch. But there are those who are not so deep. They are more respectable, but they're dead in sin, just to say. But here's Lazarus' daily lives. Yes, dead. Many dead in sin, religious, respectable, and so on. But when he was at that point of rotting, he was deep, like those who are deep, for instance. But then we find that he's raised. not only resting, not only rotting, but he's raised, raised by the power of the Lord Jesus Christ. Lazarus came forth. What a transformation. There is a body decomposed, wrapped around with three hundred feet of linen, hands and feet bound, and his feet bound also. And all of a sudden inside that linen, life takes place. That's a miracle. And only the Lord Jesus Christ could perform that miracle. Now you notice what the Lord says. We mentioned a while ago how he uses others. He said to others, Loose them, and let them go. Well, Lord, you raised them from the dead. Why didn't you also get them outside that mask of filthy clothes, stinking old clothes? You could have done that if we had spoken word and not allow us to do that. The Lord says, you lose. They had to roll away the stone, and he says, now, lose them. I've done that. I've given them life. Now you can do the other. You can lose them. Take those sandwiches. All that linen. off that body. And I'll assure you, Lazarus, that when he got that linen off his face, he that said, hurry up, folks, and get this smelly stuff off me. He need to be loose. He need to be loose. You know, after people get saved, they need to be delivered from some of the bondage of the old, stinking life they once lived. Loose them and let them go. They need liberty. After you get saved, you look back upon the things that bound you, things that held you. But now you're free from that. You're at liberty. Now Lazarus can use his hands, he can use his feet, he can use his mouth. All the linen's been taken from him. Before that, he couldn't walk, he couldn't handle, he couldn't speak. And if you're not born again, you can't take one step to glorify God, nor do one thing to please him, nor say one word to honor him. Sin has you bound. You have no witness for Christ, and your hand cannot do a thing to please him, but after you're saved. It's a different thing. Now you can witness, and you can walk, and you can work. All is taken off. All that came off Lazarus' mouth, his hands, and his feet. How nice to see a person saved and then they manifest divine light in their witnessing for him using their mouth. Working for him using their hands and walking in his paths using their feet. Light and then liberty. You have that liberty. The Lord wants to set you free this morning if you're a Christiliter born again. He wants to give you life, first of all. Then he wants to give you liberty from things that bound you before you were saved. I don't think they took this linen off a little bit at a time. Finding one end of the linen and giving a little few tugs and unwinding a few feet. and then waiting a while and unwinding some old lads were spinning around inside there till finally got all the linen off. How they got off in a hurry, I don't know, but I believe they did. Not a little at a time. And some people, when they get saved, they've got some habits and they say, well, I know I'm saved, but I'm going to give up some of my old habits just a little at a time. Just a little at a time. When I was thinking of this yesterday, I thought of an experience we had up in Augusta. You've heard me mention the name of Colonel George Hines, prosecutor and attorney for the Superior Court of the Augusta District, and his brother, John Hines, professor of mathematics at Richmond Academy. Both were highly educated men. They got the highest marks out of the University of Georgia, George Hines. Well, both of them were trained in the series of meetings we had there, and John Hines, professor of mathematics at Richmond Academy. When I was preaching one night, I said, some of you got saved. And I said, your zone about this business of giving up some of your old habits in a mathematical way. I said, for instance, you've been smoking fifty cigarettes a day. And you concluded, well, I'm going to stop one of the days. Forty-nine, forty-eight, forty-seven, and finally I'm going to get rid of this habit. We come up after the meeting, he says, you rascal. I say, what's wrong, John? He said, I had just planned that. I had just planned that. Of course, being a mathematician, I guess that's the kind of way he thought. But there's nothing, my friend, when God saves you and gets rid of these things all at once. Maybe you've heard of the man that And his wife, who bought a dog, and the dog had quite a long tail. And when they got the dog, the wife said, no, I want that tail cut off. Well, I'll take care of it. So one day, a couple of days after, had the dog, she went out to the dog. And then after a few minutes, she heard a yelp. Well, she got that to the end of the tail. Of course, he didn't bring the dog in the house. So the next day he heard another yell. And the next day he heard another yell. And when he came in the third day, she says, what's that dog yelling for every time he goes, well, he said, I'm coming off at church. I thought you did that three days. Well, he said, I'm just cutting off a little at times so it won't hurt so much. Well, I'll tell you, it's a painful business when you get saved. And you go about this business of a little at a time trying to get up those old habits. You ever seen people go down swimming? I've seen watch them lots of time. And they first go over and their first act as they took their toe in the water. They draw bags. And they let sink for a while. And then they weighed in about maybe a foot and they stay there a while. And then they go into the knees and they stay there while. And then they start flipping some water up on their bed and shit. And then after about a half an hour, finally they get in. Somebody else comes along and they come running down at the beach and run right in and drive in all over. That's the way I like to do it. I hate this slow process of getting in to swim. And friend, the best thing you can do when you get there is take the paddle. Take the plug. I'm saved out and out for Christ. That's what they did in the New Testament. It wasn't this business. Well, it'll take a year for some people to know I'm saved. I'm going so slow about this thing. Let the people know that, hey, you got saved. The moment the Lord saved that demoniac, he read home and told his friends, I'll take things the Lord had done for him. There's no better thing you can do in life than to nail your colors to the mask when you get saved and let the world know who you belong to. The unsaved don't mind letting the world know who they belong to. Should you be ashamed to let the world know who you belong to? All these habits, these habits. The poor old lad, as I tell you, I know they couldn't have worked fast enough to have got those old sneaky smelly lemons off his body. He wanted through with them. And friend, don't try to wash those lemons either. Be through with them. Get rid of them. Take your stand for Christ. When you accept the Lord Jesus, take your stand. And so that's what happened. The Lord said, lose them and let them go. There are three or three ways in which the Lord can get rid of those habits. He likes his word, his word, when it's preached in the gospel and you accept the Savior and now I'm saved. And I'm going to let the world know it. I'm going to let those people in the office know it. My family's going to know it first of all. But maybe that doesn't work, which it doesn't in many occasions. The Lord says, I'll use some circumstances. And some of those circumstances may be rough. And he'll make you give them up. Maybe you'll go to the doctor and you'll have a bad cough. A man told me this in the last month. And the doctor said to him, and he smoked? Yes, for a bit. He said, stop it if you want to live. And he stopped. circumstance can make you stop sometimes. God can do it. Well, I'm not saying a Christian can't smoke. Some of them do. You say, well, give me a verse in the Bible that tells me to stop smoking. You give me one to tell you to stop. It's not there. I know our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit. And God says, if you defy that temple, I'll destroy you. And you can't tell me that these habits don't defile that body you've got. For about, I've gone through hospitals one in Toronto. They had the pictures of hearts and lungs of people who smoked, young people, when they started, and people who only smoked lightly, then heavier, then heavier. And when I saw the heart and lungs of people who had been smoking for fifty some years, it was awful. It started out with little blue spots. And then they get larger and more numerous. And it was an awful looking heart and lung for the person who had been smoking heavy for many years. You can't do it without injuring your body. If you want to pay the price, that's up to you. And I know one thing. God can, if he so desires, make you stop some of those habits. I stopped in order to be in shape to play hockey. The coach, when we started training, had to go and run around the arena early in August. The coach says, no cigarettes. And I used to smoke one. When I did, I used to have drunk cider. And we, when I got saved, just about a week after, week or two, after we were through our training, through the schedule, this is getting into the latter part of April, put all our equipment in the lockers, and we took them out of the lockers all there. I got saved. And when I got saved, I didn't go back. I thought, well, I've been without smoking now since last August. I'm not going to go back. I'm saved now. I really had no desire to go back. And I've never touched one sin. And I've never had wrong kinds of sin. It does work. And if you don't believe it, try. How better off you'll be. The Old Testament Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were thrown into a fiery furnace. Their bodies were bound up. They put their head bandaged over their head. Their feet were bound. Why? Because they wouldn't worship Nebuchadnezzar's idol. Nebuchadnezzar says, throw them into the fiery furnace. I'll see that they do bow to my idol. And when they threw those three young men into that fiery furnace, they had been heated seven times hotter than usual. When they threw them in, the men who heated that furnace got burned to death. But when they threw those three young men who were loyal to God into that fiery furnace, the king was looking on, and he was shot to death. Why, he says, I see four walking in that fire. And the smell of fire, nothing happened to them. All the fire did is get rid of those bandages they had and those ropes they had bound with. And he says the fourth one is like the son of man. Imagine a heathen king seeing those three people, young men who were loyal to their God and wouldn't bow to him. They got their liberty in the fiery furnace. and there was one walking with them, and he was the Son of God. But I don't know about you, you can read that yourself over in the fourth chapter of Daniel, if you want to read it when you go home. Here is a circumstance that got rid of their bondage and that which bound them. They got the liberty and they got the companionship, a divine companion. Friend, I'll tell you this, when you take your stand for Christ, you're going to get your liberty. from some of these habits and you're going to have the divine companionship in a very conscious way because you've done something for him. Now we'll get further to this. The Lord Jesus, He delivers from death and He wants us set loose. How does this apply to us today? He delivers us from death, by his power. He delivers us from death sting by his blood. He delivers us from death fear by his grief. He delivers us from death dread by repristening its sleep. The Bible doesn't speak of Christians in the term that speak for them an unscathed person dying. The Lord said on this occasion, Lazarus sleepeth. Lazarus sleepeth. When Christians pass away, the Lord speaks of them as being asleep. That ugly word is not used. They're sleeping. And you remember what the Lord says to the Apostle in First Thessalonians, Paul, fourteen. If we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so then that sleep in Jesus, sleep in Jesus. Will God bring with us? And over in Acts chapter seven and sixty, here is Stephen being stoned to death. And after they'd stoned Stephen, pummeling that poor body of that faithful witness for Christ, pummeling it with stones. Stephen looked up, he says, Lord, lay not disdain to their charge. And when he had said this, he fell asleep. Those who were saved, when they passed away, God says they're just asleep. And God's going to wake them up on the resurrection morning. So he delivers us from death, dead, by rechristening up sleep. You know, when you stop to think of this, how wonderful. After all, when a child of God is facing death, he knows what it's only going to be, just to sleep in Jesus, and I'll awaken in the morning. A bright morning. A morning without a cloud, a day without a night. And it's lovely. Many have thus expressed it. No dread, no fear, just falling asleep in Jesus. Blessed sleep from which none ever wait to weep. He delivers us from death, hopelessness by his resurrection as we speak next Lord's day. He delivers us from death's loneliness. By his presence, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. For thou art with me. Know I wish you all way even unto the end of the age. So I wish you. And he will deliver all his people, every one of them. from the very presence of death. For the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. And when the Lord comes at the end of these laws of nature that bind us now, that's the end of it. And Christians will be raised into his likeness and will be written and likened forever, painless, age-less, sin-less, just like him, no taint of sin. And those three Hebrew children, it said, there wasn't even the smell of death. These smell of fire were on them. That will be the happy day when Christians, all the smells of this poor world that's related to the old nature gone and gone forever. Fair as noonday, and beautiful and freshest spring. Such will be the morning of the resurrection of God's beloved people. You have a text we were going to read it last week but didn't in reference to that nastiest word in the world, death. It's over in Matthew six and twenty eight. There be some of you standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. Who was he referring to? Peter, James, John. They're the ones that were standing there. They were not going to taste the death until they had seen something. The Son of Man coming in his power and glory to reign. What did they see? Did they actually see the kingdom as it will be in the future? No. In verse one of the next chapter, chapter seventeen of Matthew, he gives them a picture of the mountain transfiguration. And here is the Lord Jesus on top of that mountain, all his resplendent glory. And beside him Moses and Elijah. Moses speaking of the saints who are going to die and be raised. Elijah speaking of the saints who don't experience death because Elijah was caught to heaven without dying. And there's a beautiful picture of the coming glory of the kingdom of Christ. And Peter, James, and John saw it in vision. So the Lord said, there are some standing right here and you're going to see a vision of things to come. before you die, and they did. Isn't it wonderful to know one of these days he's going to come, and there may be a number sitting right here this morning who will not taste of death. If Jesus were to come at this moment, all of those who are born again will be caught up, and the few who are not able to be left sitting in those seats out there. And you'll wonder then, where did they go? Where'd the preacher go? Well, I'll tell you, I'll go up through here, and I'm not going to hit the cement either. The Lord will take me out of here, and I'll be gone. And so will everyone here who is born again. Change in a moment in the printing of an eye. Your Bible teaches that. What a shock for this world when Christ comes for his own. and takes his own up. And just as soon as he came nineteen hundred years ago, he's going to come again this time. He's going to come to take up those whom he died for when he was here nineteen hundred years ago. And just as soon as he went to heaven, we're going to heaven. God used to trouble me when I was a boy. Many a time I'd go to bed thinking about the Lord's coming. And we had a big upstairs of our house, four bedrooms, A mother and father slept on the other side down the hall. And some nights I'd wake up thinking about the coming of the Lord. Everything was so still and silent, I thought the Lord must have come. The Lord must have come. I tell you, that gripped my heart. If the Lord's come, I'm left. Mother and father are gone. My three sisters are gone. And my young brother's gone. But I'm the only one left. And I'll tell you right now, a few or four times, I recall I got out of my bed and tiptoed down that hall. My father used to snore pretty loud. And when I heard him snore, and I was back, got into bed. The Lord hadn't come yet. I was relieved. But that's going to happen one of these days. And there'll be no second chance. The Lord is coming in a moment in the twinkling of an hour. the last shout. For the trumpet will sound, and all who are born again are going up to meet Christ in the air, and so be forever to the Lord, those not saved, left behind for the dark, dreadful days that are to come. Now, if you think we're living in dark days, and I do have some material here I was going to give you, but I haven't time. The gloomy outlook of this world, not by preachers, but by statements, and they're about to throw up their hands, this world seen today is hopeless. Well, if you think it's hopeless now, what will it be like when all Christians are taken to heaven? Nothing but sinners left behind. It'll be a pretty rough place. All divine influence comes. Christ said, you are the thought of the earth. When thought is gone, the preservatives have left the corruption behind. She says, you are the light of the world and the light goes darkness. That's the kind of world you'll be in if Jesus Christ were to come today. But how wonderful. Here you sit listening to the gospel. Jesus Christ hasn't come yet. But the one who raised Lazarus, can perform a miracle in your heart this morning and give you spiritual life. He gave Lazarus physical life. He can give you spiritual life. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved, saved and know it. Ready for death, ready for the coming again of the Lord Jesus Christ. God help you right now to make that all-important once in a lifetime decision Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Shall we pray? Our Father in heaven, we come to thee. We ask thy blessing on thy word. How grateful for we are for those here this morning who are saved and waiting for the coming of the Lord. We pray for those who are not waiting for judgment. Holy Father, may such come to Christ and come this morning. It could be today or never. We ask it in our favor's name. Amen.