Funeral Sermon John 11

When Jesus Came To The Grave

We gather today in grief. There is no way around that, and there is no reason to pretend otherwise. Something has been taken from us, and the space that person occupied in our lives is now empty. Grief is not a sign of weak faith. It is a sign of real love. And if you came here today carrying a heavy heart, you are in exactly the right place, because the passage we are about to hear from the Gospel of John shows us that Jesus himself came to a grave, and he did not stand there unmoved.

Open your Bible, or follow along on the screen, to John chapter eleven, beginning at verse seventeen. We will read from the Christian Standard Bible.

John 11:17-44 records the death and raising of Lazarus, a man Jesus loved. Lazarus had been in the tomb four days when Jesus arrived in Bethany. His sisters, Martha and Mary, were surrounded by mourners. Both sisters, at different moments, said the same aching thing to Jesus: "Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn't have died." That sentence carries everything grief ever wants to say. Where were you? Why didn't you stop this? Could you not have done something?

Jesus did not rebuke them for asking. He received their grief. He walked toward it.

The Conversation At The Edge Of Sorrow

Martha came out to meet Jesus first. What follows in verses twenty through twenty-seven is one of the most remarkable exchanges in all of Scripture. Jesus said to her, "Your brother will rise again." Martha answered with the language of orthodox theology: "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day." She believed the right doctrine. She had the correct answer. And yet her brother was still dead, and the tomb was still sealed, and the answer felt very far away.

Jesus did not correct her theology. He stepped inside it and transformed it. He said, "I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me, even if he dies, will live. Everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?"

Notice what Jesus did. He did not say, "I will bring about the resurrection." He said, "I am the resurrection." The hope Martha was placing in a distant future event, Jesus placed in a present person. Himself. The resurrection is not simply something that will happen one day. The resurrection is someone who was standing in front of her, and who is present with us now through his Spirit and his word.

Then Jesus asked her the question he asks every person who stands at a graveside: "Do you believe this?" That question is still open. It is open today.

The Tears Of The Son Of God

Mary came to Jesus next, and she fell at his feet weeping. The mourners who had followed her were weeping too. And then we reach one of the most important verses in the entire Bible. Verse thirty-five: "Jesus wept."

Two words. The shortest verse in Scripture, and one of the deepest.

Jesus already knew what he was about to do. He knew Lazarus would walk out of that tomb. He knew the story was not over. And he wept anyway. He did not weep because he had lost hope. He wept because grief is real, because death is an enemy, and because the people he loved were in pain. His tears were not a performance. They were the tears of a God who enters into human suffering rather than watching it from a distance.

Some of the bystanders said, "See how he loved him." That is still the right response. When you look at Jesus standing at that tomb, weeping with those who wept, you are seeing the love of God in human form. You are seeing a Savior who does not require you to have it all together before he draws near. He comes to the grave. He comes to the grief. He comes to you.

The Voice That Commands The Dead

Then Jesus moved from tears to action. He asked them to remove the stone. Martha hesitated. Four days was a long time. The situation was, by every human measure, beyond recovery. But Jesus said, "Didn't I tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?"

He prayed aloud, not because he needed to inform the Father, but so that the people standing there would understand that what was about to happen came from God. And then he cried out with a loud voice: "Lazarus, come out."

And Lazarus came out.

There is a reason Jesus called Lazarus by name. The early church father Augustine once observed that if Jesus had simply said "come out," every tomb in the world would have emptied. That day, one man walked out. But the day is coming when that voice will speak again, and every grave will give up what it holds.

This miracle was a sign. It was a preview. Lazarus would die again one day. But what Jesus demonstrated at that tomb was the authority he holds over death itself. And three days after his own death, he would demonstrate it permanently, walking out of his own tomb under his own power, the firstfruits of all who would follow.

The Gospel That Stands At This Graveside

The reason we can gather today with any hope at all is not because death is not real. It is real. The reason we can gather with hope is because Jesus Christ died for sin, was buried, and rose from the dead on the third day. He took the penalty that sin earns, and he broke the power that death holds. He is, as he told Martha, the resurrection and the life.

For those who have placed their faith in Jesus Christ, death is not the end of the story. It is a doorway. The apostle Paul, writing to believers, called it being "away from the body and at home with the Lord." For those who trust in Christ, to die is to arrive.

If you are here today and you have never placed your personal trust in Jesus Christ, I want to speak to you directly and honestly. A funeral has a way of making the questions of eternity feel very close, and they are. The same Jesus who stood at Lazarus's tomb is the Jesus who died on a cross for your sin and rose again. He is not asking you to clean yourself up first. He is asking you the same question he asked Martha: "Do you believe this?" Faith in him is the only ground of hope that holds when everything else gives way. If you want to talk with someone about what that means, please do not leave today without doing so.

For those of you who are grieving deeply right now, I want you to hear this. Jesus wept. He is not indifferent to what you are carrying. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He is present in this room. He is near to the brokenhearted. You do not have to have the right words or the right feelings. You only have to come to him as you are.

A Word To Close

Martha said, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn't have died." She was right that his presence changes everything. And the good news of the Christian gospel is that for those who belong to him, he is always here. He promised he would never leave nor forsake those who are his. He is here in this room. He is the resurrection and the life. And one day, at his voice, every grave will give up its dead, and those who believed in him will live and never die.

Until that day, we grieve. But we do not grieve as those who have no hope.

Sources Consulted

D. A. Carson. The Gospel According to John. Pillar New Testament Commentary. Eerdmans, 1991.

Andreas J. Kostenberger. John. Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament. Baker Academic, 2004.

Leon Morris. The Gospel According to John. Revised edition. New International Commentary on the New Testament. Eerdmans, 1995.

Charles H. Spurgeon. "The Resurrection of Lazarus." Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon 2395. Available through The Spurgeon Center.

F. F. Bruce. The Gospel of John. Eerdmans, 1983.