Section 2
behind this event. Later, I came to understand that this was not simply a story but an event accomplished by the Lord Jesus to establish the principle of life. What is the principle of life? The principle of life is to change death into life. In each of the nine cases recorded from chapters 3 through 11, the principle is to change death into life. This is especially clear with the case of Laz arus. Lazarus was dead and had been buried for four days. He even smelled. He was full of death from top to bottom and from the inside to the out side. In every layer and corner of his being there was nothing but death. As the record of chapter 11 tells us, when the Lord Jesus learned that Lazarus was sick, He did not go to see him. He waited until he was full of death, until he was dead and buried. Then He came to raise Lazarus from the dead. If we apply the principle of life to that case, we see that Jesus changed death into life.
This principle applies not only to the last case, that of Lazarus, but also to the first case, that of Nicodemus. Do you think that Nicodemus was not a person full of death? Because he was full of death, the Lord told him that he needed to be born again so that he might have the eternal life, which is God Himself (3:3, 5-6). In a sense, Nicodemus was living, but in the eyes of God, he was a living