Today's daily lesson is from John chapter 11 verse 39:
Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days.”
Many of us know someone we have thought at times we might as well give up on. They are on a collision course with spiritual and/physical death and there's no way in the world they are ever going to change.
The good news is we have a savior who has overcome the world -- and death also.
When Jesus came to the tomb of Lazarus he ordered that the stone covering Lazarus's tomb be rolled away. Lazarus's sister Mary protested because Lazarus had already been dead four days -- past the time when the spirit was said to have left the body. To Mary all hope for her brother was gone.
Yet Jesus would not allow Mary's grim presumptions to be the last word about Lazarus. Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?” and then they rolled back the stone.
Saint Irenaeus said, "The glory of God is a human being fully alive." It is a person as good as dead, who is now suddenly and gloriously alive. It is a person dead in sin and grief who is suddenly a living, breathing, walking, and joyous sign of resurrection.
There are people reading this with a Lazarus in mind. I say to you, don't count them out just yet. Because Jesus still has the power to make Lazarus rise.
I don't just believe it; I've seen it.
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