Week 6: The Final Passover: The Ultimate Sign (John 11:1–12:19)

John 11:1–12:19

This is a pivotal section in John’s Gospel. Everything changes as Jesus performs his final and ultimate “sign” in this Gospel, raising a man from the dead. This incredible miracle (recorded only by John) foreshadows Jesus’ own resurrection1 and significantly escalates Jesus’ conflict with the Jewish leaders. The raising of a man from the dead triggers the Jewish leaders’ determination to have Jesus arrested and put to death.

In John 11:1–12:19 Jesus raises a man from the dead, prefiguring his own death and resurrection and stirring the Jewish leaders to pursue his arrest and death.

Read through the complete passage for this study, John 11:1–12:19. Then review the questions below and write your notes on them concerning this phase of Jesus’ ministry. (For further background, see the ESV Study Bible, pages 2045–2048; also available online at www.esvbible.org.)

Jesus’ ministry was full of friendship. It is clear that Jesus had a unique and special relationship with three of his disciples: Peter, James, and John. Jesus appears to also have a strong bond of friendship with the characters featured in John 11—Lazarus, Mary, and Martha: “Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus” (John 11:5). How does this expand your portrait of Jesus? What do you make of the fact that ordinary people can have a friendship with the Son of God?

In 11:4 Jesus teaches two life-changing truths. First, Jesus knows the future. Second, God has bigger purposes for human suffering than humans are able to see. How could these statements by Jesus transform your approach to life’s difficulties?

John states that after Jesus heard Lazarus was ill, “he stayed two days longer in the place where he was” (11:6). Instead of immediately going to Lazarus, Jesus waits. How does John 11:5 and the rest of John chapter 11 further clarify why Jesus didn’t immediately go to Lazarus?

According to John 11:14–15, why is Jesus glad that he wasn’t there when Lazarus died? What do these two verses, along with 11:4, teach us about the point of this sign that Jesus is performing?

Before raising Lazarus, Jesus engages with Lazarus’s sisters, Martha and Mary. Jesus interacts with Martha and Mary very differently. How does Jesus respond to Martha, and how does he respond to Mary? What does this teach us about Jesus?

What does Jesus do immediately before raising Lazarus from the dead? How does Jesus raise Lazarus from the dead? What can we learn from this scene about the power of prayer and the power of God’s voice?

After raising Lazarus, the opposition against Jesus intensifies. “So from that day on they made plans to put him to death” (John 11:53). Caiaphas, the high priest, was involved in the discussions about whether or not to pursue Jesus’ death. In 11:49–50, how does Caiaphas preach the gospel without knowing it?

After raising Lazarus from the dead, Jesus enjoys a special dinner with Lazarus and others (John 12:1–8). Judas expresses disappointment when Mary breaks the nard over Jesus’ feet. How does Jesus respond to Judas, and what is surprising about this response?

Why did the chief priests decide that they also wanted to put Lazarus to death? See John 12:11 and 11:48.

Jesus enters Jerusalem for the Passover, seated on a donkey and hailed by the people. This scene draws on a prophecy in Zechariah. Read Zechariah 9:9–17 to get a sense for the expectations that were in people’s minds as their “King of Israel”2 entered Jerusalem. Less than a week later, how did the people treat Jesus (see John 19:14–16)?

Read through the following three sections on Gospel Glimpses, Whole-Bible Connections, and Theological Soundings. Then take time to reflect on the Personal Implications this passage from John may have for your walk with the Lord.

DEATH BEFORE LIFE. Jesus repeatedly teaches that for something to really live, it must first die: “Truly, truly I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit” (John 12:24). The gospel works this way. To experience new life in Christ, one must first die to his or her old life. Lazarus’s story illustrates this. Jesus didn’t want to deal with Lazarus’s sickness; he wanted to deal with Lazarus’s death. Jesus’ resurrection power shows up in tombs, not hospital beds. John 11 should be read alongside John 3, where Jesus teaches Nicodemus the need to be “born again.” Following Jesus isn’t easy. We do not simply add Jesus to our existing life. Instead, Jesus calls men and women to die to their old life so that he can give us new life—resurrection life.

PERSONAL GRACE. Before handling Lazarus’s death, Jesus first interacts with Lazarus’s sisters, Martha and Mary. Jesus deals with the two grieving sisters very differently. Jesus gave Martha teaching, but he gave Mary his tears. Jesus knew Martha. He knew that she needed teaching—she needed to hear Jesus say, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live” (John 11:25). Mary needed something different—she needed Jesus’ tender sympathy (John 11:35). This is how Jesus deals with people. He knows us. He knows our story, our personality, our pain, and our unique needs. Jesus doesn’t deal with us generically. He deals with us in a wonderfully personal way.

PROPHECY FULFILLED. The Old Testament spoke of Israel’s Messiah, who would one day enter Jerusalem mounted on a donkey (Zech. 9:9; Ps. 118:25–26). Waving palm branches and shouting messages of acclaim, the people expected Jesus to take charge and bring them political deliverance from their enemies, the Romans. The people, however, had not read their Hebrew Scriptures closely enough. The prophet Isaiah wrote that the Messiah would be a suffering servant, who would lay down his life in order to bring life to his people, rescuing them from their deeper problem: sin. “But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed” (Isa. 53:5).

GOD’S TIMING. When Jesus heard that Lazarus was ill, “he stayed two days longer in the place where he was” (John 11:6). Instead of going to Lazarus immediately, Jesus waited. Why did Jesus wait? John 11:5 tells us it was because of love. Reading John 11:5 and John 11:6 together, we see that it was because of his great love for Lazarus that Jesus waited to help Lazarus. This is how God works. God’s timing is different from our timing. He sees things that we can’t see. He has plans that we do not yet understand. In the case of Lazarus, Jesus waited in order to do a greater work in and through Lazarus’s life—the greatest sign Jesus had yet performed in John’s Gospel. God’s timing is never off. He always knows what he is doing.

RESURRECTION. The Christian worldview teaches something unique: the bodily resurrection of the dead. Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, yet Lazarus would later die again. What Jesus teaches, however, is that he is “the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die” (John 11:25–26). Jesus’ teaching here expands upon teaching found throughout the Bible that both the righteous and the wicked will be resurrected, the righteous to eternal life and the wicked to judgment.

Take time to reflect on the implications of John 11:1–12:19 for your own life today. Make notes below on the personal implications for your walk with the Lord of (1) the Gospel Glimpses, (2) the Whole-Bible Connections, (3) the Theological Soundings, and (4) this passage as a whole.

1. Gospel Glimpses

2. Whole-Bible Connections

3. Theological Soundings

4. John 11:1–12:19

Take a moment now to ask for the Lord’s blessing and help as you engage in this study of John. And take a moment also to look back through this unit of study, to reflect on a few key things that the Lord may be teaching you—and perhaps to highlight or underline these to review again in the future.

Definitions

1 Resurrection – The impartation of new, eternal life to a dead person at the end of time (or in the case of Jesus, on the third day after his death). This new life is not a mere resuscitation of the body (as in the case of Lazarus; John 11:1–44), but a transformation of the body to an eternal state (1 Cor. 15:35–58). Both the righteous and the wicked will be resurrected, the former to eternal life and the latter to judgment (John 5:29).

2 Israel – Originally, another name given to Jacob (Gen. 32:28). Later applied to the nation formed by his descendants, then to the ten northern tribes of that nation, who rejected the anointed king and formed their own nation. In the NT, the name is applied to the church as the spiritual descendants of Abraham (Gal. 6:16).

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