A Fourth-Day Man: Death UndoneIsampula

We continue the story from John 11. The Scripture tells us that after Jesus hears Lazarus is sick, He stays two more days before beginning the journey to see him. Here is the second enigma: God’s apparent delays are only from our human perspective. He seems to be showing us that He is in control of the situation. He is sovereign. He is authoritative over all realities in heaven and on earth—including death. He holds the whole world in His hands, and any delay is purely from our limited viewpoint.

C.S. Lewis writes about his wife’s death in the short book “A Grief Observed.” He explains from his own experience that when everything is going well in your life— when you turn to God, He receives you with open arms. But it sometimes seems when you really need Him, when you are desperate, all you find when you knock on heaven’s door is a door bolted from the inside. In John 11, Martha and Mary are feeling this way. Many in our COVID-stricken and upended world feel this way now. Perhaps you are also.