John 11:14-15

So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”

From Background Notes [BN] for August 4^th & 5^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

Doubts don’t get resolved through denial. We do not discover hope by saying that death isn’t real or that death is only an illusion. Death is quite real, and often leaves families at their wits end trying to make ends meet. As Christians we shouldn’t be in the denial business. Jesus wasn’t.

John 11:25-26

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

From Background Notes [BN] for August 4^th & 5^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

Overcoming doubt is the Christian’s lifelong journey in a world that either challenges faith or offers parodies of it. We need not fear doubt, but we must not be overcome by it. We might say, “When in doubt, ask questions. Ask questions to overcome doubt.” What we discover about doubt in ourselves applies equally to doubt in others — those who come into the orbit of our witness and into the hearing of the Gospel we proclaim.

1 Chronicles 10:13-14

Saul died because he was unfaithful to the Lord; he did not keep the word of the Lord and even consulted a medium for guidance, and did not inquire of the Lord. So the Lord put him to death and turned the kingdom over to David son of Jesse.

1 Chronicles 9:22-27

Altogether, those chosen to be gatekeepers at the thresholds numbered 212. They were registered by genealogy in their villages. The gatekeepers had been assigned to their positions of trust by David and Samuel the seer. They and their descendants were in charge of guarding the gates of the house of the Lord—the house called the tent of meeting.

John 11:17

On his arrival, Jesus found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days.

From Background Notes [BN] for July 28^th & 29^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

Then there is the arrival of Jesus in each generation since his ascension. He continues to come to us, even now. His promise to his disciples included the familiar words, “For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them” (Matthew 18:20).

John 11:14-15

So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”

From Background Notes [BN] for July 28^th & 29^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

Along that road was a deep gorge known as the Wadi Kelt, a dry river bed that knew water only during the rainy season, not unlike parts of the American southwest. The Kelt is very deep, marked by abrupt turns and jagged cliffs. One background for Psalm 23’s “The Valley of the Shadow of Death”…

John 11:25-26

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

From Background Notes [BN] for July 21^st & 22^nd  written by Pastor Bob Brown:

He is really asking her, “Do you believe me, the source of eternal life — of resurrection life?” He is not prepping her for a catechism exam, he is inviting her to receive from him the life that cannot be touched by death. “Jesus is bringing Martha a present power, not the promise of a future good.”

John 11:24

Martha answered, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”

From Background Notes [BN] for July 21^st & 22^nd written by Pastor Bob Brown:

Martha's original belief about resurrection was textbook Second Temple Judaism, recited nearly by rote. "Why, of course, Jesus, I believe in the last day kind of resurrection--don't we all?" What Jesus does is make this abstract tenet of faith into a living reality, embodied in himself.

John 11:23

Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”

From Background Notes [BN] for July 21^st & 22^nd written by Pastor Bob Brown:

Martha accepts the words of Jesus, but places their fulfillment in the future, "in the resurrection at the last day." John's term for resurrection is anastasis which…

John 11:22

But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask.

From Background Notes [BN] for July 21^st & 22^nd written by Pastor Bob Brown:

The idea that God will give to Jesus what he asks literally saturates the Gospel of John. One especially clear passage is John 3:34 where we read, "For he whom God has sent utters the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure.

John 11:21

“Lord,” Martha said to Jesus, “if you had been here, my brother would not have died.

From Background Notes [BN] for July 21^st & 22^nd written by Pastor Bob Brown:

The Jewish authorities at the time of Jesus believed that the soul lingered for three days after death, with the possibility of returning to the body. However, on the fourth day, the soul witnesses the disintegration of the body and knows that it must finally leave.

John 11:17 Wycliffe Bible (WYC)

And so Jesus came, and found him having then four days in the grave. [And so Jesus came, and found him having now four days in the grave.]

From Background Notes [BN] for July 14^th & 15^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

In the company of Jesus and each other, the disciples travel together for at least two days from Ainōn (see John 3:23), east of Jordan, to Bethany, two miles from Jerusalem.

John 11:17

On his arrival, Jesus found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days.

From Background Notes [BN] for July 14^th & 15^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

Going to Lazarus at this juncture might seem entirely useless. After all, they are going to a dead man. What they would encounter in Bethany was the beginning of a seven-day mourning cycle...

John 11:4-5

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.” Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.

From Background Notes [BN] for July 14^th & 15^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

Now in the case of Lazarus (and his sisters), the shape of this love looks complicated. After all, Jesus waits two more days before going to Bethany. But in his waiting, Jesus determines that Lazarus will become far more to the world than just a sick man made well.

1 Cor 15:3-4

For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures

From Background Notes [BN] for July 14^th & 15^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

The creed reminds us, that “His only Son our Lord” “suffered … was dead and buried … descended into the grave [death].” The human journey is a pilgrimage through life and into death. What the Good News of Jesus tells us…

Hebrews 9:27

Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment

From Background Notes [BN] for July 14^th & 15^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

Our suffering, loss, sickness, failure, and sadness are but the signs of mortality. This is a study about death, the inevitable human reality.

Genesis 3:4-5

“You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

From Background Notes [BN] for July 7^th & 8^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

As far as the humans in this story are concerned, they are dealing with a creature (wild animal), inferior to themselves, that they encountered in the garden God provisioned for them.

Genesis 2:24

That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.

From Background Notes [BN] for July 7^th & 8^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

The ancient texts of Genesis depict human men and women as naturally formed to be toward each other, and the degree to which they are able to live out the richness of that relationship rests with their awareness of each other as formed this way by God.

Genesis 1:31

God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning —the sixth day.

From Background Notes [BN] for July 7^th & 8^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

Scholars who interact with both science and theology suggest the anthropic principle, that everything about the earliest origins of the universe point to the sustenance of human beings in it. The world has been made for sustaining human beings, and human beings have been made for…

Genesis 3:9 KJV

And the Lord God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou?

From Background Notes [BN] for July 7^th & 8^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

“Where” is, then, the crucial word in the question, and it has to do less with location and more with condition.