John 11

¹Now a certain man was ill—Lazarus from Bethany, from the village of Mary and her sister Martha. ²(This was the same Mary who anointed the Lord with perfume and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was ill.) ³So the sisters sent word to him, saying, “Lord, look: the one you are a friend to is ill.”

⁴When Jesus heard it, he said, “This illness is not for the purpose of death, but for the sake of the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.” ⁵Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus with a deep, sacrificial love. ⁶So, when he heard that he was ill, he stayed in the place where he was for two more days. ⁷Then after this he said to the disciples, “Let us go into Judea again.”

⁸The disciples said to him, “Rabbi, just now the Judeans were seeking to stone you, and you are going back there?”

⁹Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? If anyone walks during the day, he does not stumble, because he sees the light of this world. ¹⁰But if anyone walks during the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.” ¹¹He said these things, and after this he said to them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going so that I may wake him up.”

¹²The disciples then said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover.” ¹³Now Jesus had spoken about his death, but they thought he was talking about the restfulness of literal sleep. ¹⁴Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus died. ¹⁵And for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may trust. But let us go to him.”

¹⁶Then Thomas, the one called the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, “Let us go as well, so that we may die with him.”

¹⁷When Jesus arrived, he found that he had already been in the tomb for four days. ¹⁸Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, about two miles away. ¹⁹Many of the Judeans had come to Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother. ²⁰So when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went to meet him, while Mary sat in the house. ²¹Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. ²²But even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you.”

²³Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”

²⁴Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.”

²⁵Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who trusts in me, even if he dies, will live; ²⁶and everyone who lives and trusts in me will never die—not into the age to come. Do you believe this?”

²⁷She said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.”

²⁸After she said this, she went away and called her sister Mary, saying secretly, “The Teacher is here and is calling for you.” ²⁹When she heard this, she got up quickly and went to him. ³⁰Now Jesus had not yet entered the village, but was still in the place where Martha had met him. ³¹When the Judeans who were with her in the house consoling her saw Mary get up quickly and go out, they followed her, assuming she was going to the tomb to weep there.

³²When Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” ³³When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Judeans who had come with her weeping, he groaned with indignation in his spirit and was deeply agitated. ³⁴He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.”

³⁵Jesus shed tears.

³⁶So the Judeans said, “Look how he loved him!” ³⁷But some of them said, “Could not this man, who opened the eyes of the blind man, have kept this one from dying as well?”

³⁸Then Jesus, groaning with indignation within himself again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. ³⁹Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the deceased, said to him, “Lord, by now he reeks; it has been four days.”

⁴⁰Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you trust, you will see the glory of God?” ⁴¹So they took away the stone. Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. ⁴²I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the sake of the crowd standing around, so that they may believe that you sent me.” ⁴³When he had said this, he shouted with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!”

⁴⁴The man who had died came out, his feet and hands bound with burial strips, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”

⁴⁵Many of the Judeans, therefore, who had come to Mary and saw what he did, trusted in him. ⁴⁶But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. ⁴⁷So the chief priests and the Pharisees convened the Sanhedrin and were saying, “What are we doing? For this man is performing many signs. ⁴⁸If we let him go on like this, everyone will trust in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our Place and our nation.”

⁴⁹But one of them, Caiaphas, being high priest that year, said to them, “You know nothing at all! ⁵⁰Nor do you consider that it is to your advantage for one man to die for the sake of the people, rather than for the whole nation to be destroyed.” ⁵¹(He did not say this on his own; but being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus was about to die for the nation— ⁵²and not for the nation only, but so that he might also gather into one the scattered children of God.) ⁵³So from that day on, they conspired to kill him.

⁵⁴Therefore Jesus no longer walked openly among the Judeans, but went away from there to the region near the wilderness, to a city called Ephraim, and there he stayed with the disciples. ⁵⁵Now the Passover of the Judeans was near, and many went up to Jerusalem from the country before the Passover to purify themselves. ⁵⁶They were looking for Jesus and saying to one another as they stood in the temple, “What do you think? That he will not come to the festival at all?” ⁵⁷Now the chief priests and the Pharisees had given orders that if anyone knew where he was, they should report it so that they might arrest him.