John11

¹A man named Lazarus was sick. He lived in Bethany with his sisters, Mary and Martha.

²This is the Mary who later poured the expensive perfume on the Lord’s feet and wiped them with her hair. Her brother, Lazarus, was sick.

³So the two sisters sent a message to Jesus telling him, “Lord, your dear friend is very sick.”

⁴But when Jesus heard about it he said, “Lazarus’s sickness will not end in death. No, it happened for the glory of God so that the Son of God will receive glory from this.”

⁵So although Jesus loved Martha, Mary, and Lazarus,

⁶he stayed where he was for the next two days.

⁷Finally, he said to his disciples, “Let’s go back to Judea.”

⁸But his disciples objected. “Rabbi,” they said, “only a few days ago the people in Judea were trying to stone you. Are you going there again?”

⁹Jesus replied, “There are twelve hours of daylight every day. During the day people can walk safely. They can see because they have the light of this world.

¹⁰But at night there is danger of stumbling because they have no light.”

¹¹Then he said, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but now I will go and wake him up.”

¹²The disciples said, “Lord, if he is sleeping, he will soon get better!”

¹³They thought Jesus meant Lazarus was simply sleeping, but Jesus meant Lazarus had died.

¹⁴So he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead.

¹⁵And for your sakes, I’m glad I wasn’t there, for now you will really believe. Come, let’s go see him.”

¹⁶Thomas, nicknamed the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, “Let’s go, too—and die with Jesus.”

¹⁷When Jesus arrived at Bethany, he was told that Lazarus had already been in his grave for four days.

¹⁸Bethany was only a few miles down the road from Jerusalem,

¹⁹and many of the people had come to console Martha and Mary in their loss.

²⁰When Martha got word that Jesus was coming, she went to meet him. But Mary stayed in the house.

²¹Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if only you had been here, my brother would not have died.

²²But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask.”

²³Jesus told her, “Your brother will rise again.”

²⁴“Yes,” Martha said, “he will rise when everyone else rises, at the last day.”

²⁵Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in me will live, even after dying.

²⁶Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die. Do you believe this, Martha?”

²⁷“Yes, Lord,” she told him. “I have always believed you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one who has come into the world from God.”

²⁸Then she returned to Mary. She called Mary aside from the mourners and told her, “The Teacher is here and wants to see you.”

²⁹So Mary immediately went to him.

³⁰Jesus had stayed outside the village, at the place where Martha met him.

³¹When the people who were at the house consoling Mary saw her leave so hastily, they assumed she was going to Lazarus’s grave to weep. So they followed her there.

³²When Mary arrived and saw Jesus, she fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if only you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

³³When Jesus saw her weeping and saw the other people wailing with her, a deep anger welled up within him, and he was deeply troubled.

³⁴“Where have you put him?” he asked them. They told him, “Lord, come and see.”

³⁵Then Jesus wept.

³⁶The people who were standing nearby said, “See how much he loved him!”

³⁷But some said, “This man healed a blind man. Couldn’t he have kept Lazarus from dying?”

³⁸Jesus was still angry as he arrived at the tomb, a cave with a stone rolled across its entrance.

³⁹“Roll the stone aside,” Jesus told them. But Martha, the dead man’s sister, protested, “Lord, he has been dead for four days. The smell will be terrible.”

⁴⁰Jesus responded, “Didn’t I tell you that you would see God’s glory if you believe?”

⁴¹So they rolled the stone aside. Then Jesus looked up to heaven and said, “Father, thank you for hearing me.

⁴²You always hear me, but I said it out loud for the sake of all these people standing here, so that they will believe you sent me.”

⁴³Then Jesus shouted, “Lazarus, come out!”

⁴⁴And the dead man came out, his hands and feet bound in graveclothes, his face wrapped in a headcloth. Jesus told them, “Unwrap him and let him go!”

⁴⁵Many of the people who were with Mary believed in Jesus when they saw this happen.

⁴⁶But some went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done.

⁴⁷Then the leading priests and Pharisees called the high council together. “What are we going to do?” they asked each other. “This man certainly performs many miraculous signs.

⁴⁸If we allow him to go on like this, soon everyone will believe in him. Then the Roman army will come and destroy both our Temple and our nation.”

⁴⁹Caiaphas, who was high priest at that time, said, “You don’t know what you’re talking about!

⁵⁰You don’t realize that it’s better for you that one man should die for the people than for the whole nation to be destroyed.”

⁵¹He did not say this on his own; as high priest at that time he was led to prophesy that Jesus would die for the entire nation.

⁵²And not only for that nation, but to bring together and unite all the children of God scattered around the world.

⁵³So from that time on, the Jewish leaders began to plot Jesus’ death.

⁵⁴As a result, Jesus stopped his public ministry among the people and left Jerusalem. He went to a place near the wilderness, to the village of Ephraim, and stayed there with his disciples.

⁵⁵It was now almost time for the Jewish Passover celebration, and many people from all over the country arrived in Jerusalem several days early so they could go through the purification ceremony before Passover began.

⁵⁶They kept looking for Jesus, but as they stood around in the Temple, they said to each other, “What do you think? He won’t come for Passover, will he?”

⁵⁷Meanwhile, the leading priests and Pharisees had publicly ordered that anyone seeing Jesus must report it immediately so they could arrest him.