Raising Lazarus From The Dead

After 3 months off, I am back into the blogosphere!  To be honest, it was GREAT being unplugged for so long, but, I do realize that it is a fruitful way to communicate and so am committed to blogging long-term.

So, as promised Sunday, I am finishing Sunday's message here on my blog.  To review, I talked about the fact that sometimes in life our situations, ie, relationships, finances, ....even faith....can take a turn for the worse, as happened with Lazarus in John 11.  They can even "die", as was the case with Lazarus.  You may indeed have to file bankrupcy.  You may face a divorce.  You may even lose someone close to you.

But that doesn't mean its over.  God has a bigger, overarching plan. 

"This sickness will not END in death."

Our God is a God who specializes in bringing dead things to life.  (Romans 4) He usually lets them REALLY die, as in Lazarus' case, 4 days dead! But as the Abekani tribe, an Indian tribe in the Northeast say, "God is the one who is the power in the seed when the seed looks most dead."  He is the God of resurrection.  

And we are called the People of Resurrection. If we are about anything, it is the fact we believe in God's power to resurrect dead things.  But as we look at our lives, the dreams that have seemingly died, the death that can become a part of us, the pain, the heartache, we have to remember 3 things:

1. Jesus does indeed CARE about our pain.  We see this here in the story of Lazarus.  It says He "was filled with anger" when he saw the people weeping and Himself wept.  Why?  I believe because He saw the pain and anguish death causes, that was the result of the fall of humankind.  Death came through sin.  Sin is the cancer of the universe that with death, will one day be overthrown and conquered by Christ. (I Cor 15)  But in the meantime, Jesus sympathizes with our suffering and pain.
2. He has the POWER to change things.  He IS the resurrection and LIFE! We tend to limit Him in our circumstances, but truly, in HIM is unlimited possibility.  If you just go through the Gospel of Mark, one gospel, one thing you cant help but notice is that WHEN JESUS WAS PRESENT, ANYTHING WAS POSSIBLE.  And that brings us to our last point.....how do we get Christ's Presence into our circumstances??....
3. We need to hear HEAR His voice.  Jesus shouted out to the dead man Lazarus, "Come out!" The dead man heard His voice and came out.  The Bible says in Romans 10:17 that "faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ." This is when you hear the Lord internally in a clear way that changes everything. You know that you know that you know in your "knower" that God has spoken to you.  We call that a "rhema" word, from the Greek.  

There are 2 keys to hearing God's voice:

• We have to get QUIET inside. You cant hear God with a noisy soul that is always going, going, going.  This is why we tend to hear God best in the early morning hours before we get a busy mind and heart.
• We have to EXPECT Him to speak.  God honors faith, and faith is expectation.  God loves when we come to Him with expectancy!

Love you guys and glad to be back!!

PB

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Comments

[lisa c moore]

i really needed to hear that today. thanks.

[Colby McClain]

Very wonderful, very useful PB. Good to hear from you again
-Colby