Costly Friendship - Wk 11
March 20, 2022

90 - Life of Jesus

Week Eleven - “Costly Friendship”
John 11


What constitutes friendship?

Jesus told his disciples, “I no longer call you servants…I call you my friends.” (John 15:15)
*One of those suggests a hierarchy or servitude, the other suggests

_.

1 Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2 (This Mary, whose brother Lazarus now lay sick, was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair.) 3 So the sisters sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one you love is sick.”
4 When he heard this, Jesus said, “This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.” 5 Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. 6 So when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days, 7 and then he said to his disciples, “Let us go back to Judea.”
8 “But Rabbi,” they said, “a short while ago the Jews there tried to stone you, and yet you are going back?” —John 11: 1-8

Map - First Century Palestine.jpeg

Jerusalem and Bethany were less than two miles apart in the hill country


Dilemma: Jesus’ really good friend is sick, and his sisters, whom Jesus is also really close with, are hurting - if he goes, there will be trouble, but if he doesn’t go, he will be ignoring his friends.

9 Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Anyone who walks in the daytime will not stumble, for they see by this world’s light. 10 It is when a person walks at night that they stumble, for they have no light.”
11 After he had said this, he went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”
12 His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.” 13 Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.
14 So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, 15 and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”
16 Then Thomas (also known as Didymus) said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.” —John 11:9-16


  • vv. 17-37 - the first thing Jesus does when he gets to Bethany is comfort Mary and Martha
  • v. 35 - Jesus wept - part of comforting is sharing grief
  • vv. 38-44 - Jesus calls Lazarus out of the grave

45 Therefore many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him. 46 But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. 47 Then the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin.
“What are we accomplishing?” they asked. “Here is this man performing many signs. 48 If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and then the Romans will come and take away both our temple and our nation.”
49Then one of them, named Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, spoke up, “You know nothing at all! 50 You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.”
51He did not say this on his own, but as high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus would die for the Jewish nation, 52 and not only for that nation but also for the scattered children of God, to bring them together and make them one. 53 So from that day on they plotted to take his life.
54 Therefore Jesus no longer moved about publicly among the people of Judea. Instead he withdrew to a region near the wilderness, to a village called Ephraim, where he stayed with his disciples. —John 11:45-54

Bringing Lazarus back to life effectively signed Jesus’ death warrant.


Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.
—John 15:13

  • Jesus wasn’t using hyperbole. The same thing He had already done for Lazarus, He was about to do for all of us.

Love costs something. Friendship costs something.

I no longer call you servants…I call you friends. —John 15:!5

Jesus reframed friendship.
It’s not about equality, it’s about

. It’s about putting the needs and wants of someone else ahead of your own, not because you have to, but because you .