Let's return together to our study of the Gospel of John. The Gospel of John going back to chapter 11, still dealing with some of the verses and passages prior to the actual arrival of Jesus in Bethany for the raising of Lazarus from the grave. A study of God's Word is something which we turn ourselves to with great diligence and intentional effort. Humorless, humorously, I'm reminded of the words of George Kirkpatrick who tells us by way of reminder, man has been given two ends, one to sit on and one to think with, and ever since then man's success or failure has been dependent on the one he uses the most. As we turn to the Scripture though we sit in the pews, let our minds be very engaged and active in the study of God's Word that our ways will be proved. John chapter 11, beginning at verse 5. Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister in Lazarus, so when he heard that Lazarus was ill he stayed two days longer in the place where he was. Then after this he said to the disciples, let us go to Judea again. The disciples said to him, Rabbi the Jews were just now seeking to stone you and you were going there again, Jesus answered, are there not 12 hours in the day? If anyone walks in the day he does not stumble because he sees the light of this world, but if anyone walks in the night he stumbles because the light is not in him. And after saying these things he said to them, our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep but I go to wake him. The disciples said to him, Lord if he has fallen asleep he will recover. Now Jesus had spoken of his death but they thought that he meant taking rest and sleep. Then Jesus told them plainly, Lazarus has died and for your sake I am glad that I was not there so that you may believe. Let us go to him. So Thomas called the twin said to his fellow disciples, let us also go that we may die with him. Lord bless the reading of his word and the hearing of his people. Before I get too far into this and it is not actually the point of the sermon but I feel that Thomas should be vindicated a bit. All of us tend to be remembered for perhaps the worst moment of our lives. It is how we are remembered or go down an infamy. I was rather astonished on a visit to West Point to find there a statue of Benedict Arnold and as I began to study up a little bit on Benedict Arnold he was an incredible leader who did remarkable things for our nation and there at West Point in particular. But when we hear the name Benedict Arnold we think of one thing, a traitor who on a particular day in whatever wisdom he had felt that the cause would be lost and it was good for the people here if he could hasten it so that the suffering would be lessened. But the cause not being lost is wisdom turned out to be folly and he is remembered as a great traitor. When I mentioned Thomas to you from the Bible you remember him as doubting Thomas. The one who would not believe that the Lord was raised unless he put his fingers into the very wounds of Christ and yet we read here of another part of Thomas's personality. Here they are convinced that Jesus is taking himself and them to be stone to death and Thomas without hesitation says to the disciples if he is going to die then let's all go with him and we will die with him as well. So I hope that this at least brings a little balance into our view of that disciple Thomas. When I was little there was a great emphasis put on industry in my life as I went into my teenage years you know as a kid turns around 13 or 14 especially little boys they get what my uncle called a case of the dropsy's as when you tell them to work they start by sitting down and they stay in that position until they are forced by hunger famine or weather to move from that position unless you somehow threaten them and then after they come out and they accuse you of having a case of the dropsy's which I actually thought was a disease then they come with the term your burning daylight and what burning daylight means is that time's passing and you're wasting every bit of it and the day is going to run out and you will not not accomplish anything and then there's one more day gone and for those mindful of the fact that we only have however many days gone is allotted to us to live the whole concept of burning daylight and wasting time should strike fear and trepidation into our souls as we realize that we have so much more yet to learn and so far yet to grow and we have just lost another day in our spiritual journey. Burning daylight is a term that describes wasting time or a necessary delay. If you have a destination you're going to and you're dragging your feet it can be said that you're burning daylight. We are selectively sensitive about our time though aren't we? We wait in line for a seat at a restaurant that's okay but waiting for the food to show up well that's not okay they're burning daylight when we are ready to be served our food. We might watch two hours of television or if you're the kind to use the internet you could watch two or three hours of a YouTube video or whatever it might be but is it okay to wait on God. When we make a request of God is it okay to wait on the Lord do we have the same patience and are we as content for idle time to pass by in our perception when we're waiting on God. Benjamin Franklin said does thou love life that do not squander time for that is the stuff life is made of. William Penn also time is what we want most but what alas we use worst and for which God will surely most strictly reckon us reckon with us when time shall be no more. Our use of time we can get very sensitive about our use of time and the use of time by those around us but what perspective do we have on God's use of time particularly when we pray out of great need we desire relief or we desire blessing or we desire a roadblock or impediment removed. We desire as it were a door to be opened to ministry we grow impatient and we wonder what we might be doing wrong or why God doesn't hear our plea or our request we grow impatient with God because we have a sense of accountability for time but our accountability to God for how we use our time does not conversely hold true that God would be accountable to us and even to assume such would be to place God under our judgment forgetting that his ways are above ours and that his wisdom is not the wisdom of this earth we get a sense of the incongruence of time management in the way the very first verse it was read today opens up now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus and we know that they have sent word to Jesus saying Lord the one whom you love is ill or is sick and so now we hear that Jesus had within himself a love for these people for this family he had a love for them so we then presume our instinct directs us to presume that his action will be to respond immediately for those who loves it tells us he loves them and so then we anticipate the next verse to say so he made great haste to go unto them that he might serve them or that he might be with them in a time of mourning or that he might help them in a time of great need but the verse following so when he heard that Lazarus was ill he stayed two days longer Jesus loves them so when he heard they had great need he didn't go for two days that does not work for our logic does it it doesn't fit in our understanding they called out to the Lord and because he loved them he didn't respond and he didn't go you see how that automatically from the very beginning doesn't fit our approach to the Lord in prayer Lord we have great need Lord my paycheck has fallen short or Lord I'm unemployed Lord my children have gone astray or they are leading a different life or they're not they're not growing up in the way that they were raised or Lord my boss is persecuting me or whatever it might be and we hope and it's right to hope and I'm not discouraging that that we that God would respond immediately to our need and often we might very well experience an immediate answer in time of crisis but what when what do we do when that does not happen how are we to interpret God's lack of action we might think Jesus is his response to be and congruent more puzzling however is the connection of love and delay he didn't delay in spite of love he delayed because of love he didn't delay because he was indifferent he delayed because of love he didn't delay because he was too preoccupied and had other things to do he didn't delay because he needed to attend a more important matters he delayed because of love he didn't delay for any reason except that he loved them how can we interpret the delay of God as an act of love and first kings verse 8 or chapter 18 the prophet Elijah the prophet Elijah is challenging the prophets of Bale challenging them to a contest to prove who is the true God and so in first kings 18 we find that he goes to King Ahab and Ahab agrees to send a 450 priests of Bale to a temple mount and there they would create a sacrifice I'm sorry it wasn't a temple mount up to a mountain where they would create an altar they would dig a trench around the altar and they would fill the trench with with water or that is at least what Elijah did and then on the altar they put a bowl and they had sticks but no fire and all day these priests called out to Bale that he would bring fire down upon it and as the day grew on they continued to call out they continued to cry out and all day their prayers weren't answered they even began to cut themselves to show to this Bale that they were earnest in their commitment to him and Elijah begins to taunt them and if you look again at the original languages which is rather humorous he he taunts them in a number of ways and at one time he even says perhaps Bale has gone to relieve himself and you just need to yell a little louder perhaps that's why he's not answering your prayer and all throughout the day there is no answer to prayer at long last Elijah calls for 12 barrels of water to be poured on the wood through the trench and all over the sacrifice and at the end of the contest in the right time God sends fire that consumes not only the sacrifice and the wood but the water as well God's delay and manifesting himself to the people until the very moment of this contest with the priest and prophets of Bale demonstrated the bankruptcy of Bale worship and the one true God God had abided with his people he had walked with them he had blessed them and they walked away from him and so in a time when it would most make the point to his people he makes his presence known for 48 hours Jesus delayed for 48 hours he delayed their plea and their call to them I'm sure it seemed as a lifetime and an eternity but we have to keep our perspective as Reverend Alexander McLaren of Manchester England pointed out do not forget that heaven's clock is different from ours and our day there are 12 hours but in God's day a thousand years what seems long to us is to him a little while there's another example of God's timing in the New Testament as well in Acts chapter 12 Herod has already executed James and for that he received great applause and appreciation from the religious leaders he was the brother of John you recall and now he has planned to kill Peter whom he's holding in prison but he's going to do it after the Passover Peter's friends met and they prayed seven days for Peter's release in Acts 12 verse 5 Peter was kept in prison but earnest prayer was being made for him to God by the church now Herod in verse 6 was about to bring him out but on that very night an angel came an angel came and to paraphrase it he basically struck Peter in the side and woke him up and says to him quickly get your cloak get your sandals it's time for us to leave after seven days in prison seven days where the church met and prayed and prayed and prayed that Peter would be released after seven days at the moment that Herod is about to send for Peter an angel appears to him and a great light shines in the prison cell he strikes Peter on the side and says quickly we need to depart and we might if we had been Peter say why didn't we come yesterday so that I could walk out now I have to run out why don't I have to go now and run why couldn't it have been yesterday it would have been a little more leisure but this is in the wisdom of God Peter appears at the door of his friends as they met for prayer and a servant named Heroda comes to the door and as she hears Peter knocking she asks who it is Peter says it is I and instead of opening the door she runs to tell people that Peter is at the door when God answers prayer are we even willing to accept and receive his answer before they call Isaiah reminds us before they call I will answer and while they still speak I will hear we sometimes perceive a delay in God's answer to prayer but the scripture is clear that before we even pray God has heard and while we are still speaking the prayer is being answered yes Jesus delayed two days but even the delay was an answer to their prayer the delay itself was an answer to their prayer it seems when our prayers are unanswered that God is indifferent that's how we perceive it or that he's busy or that we just don't matter but because he loves you he will answer to time when you have the most to benefit and your growth in him we're told in scripture all things work together for good for those who love the Lord and are called according to his purpose we should have confidence the confidence that the Psalmist had in Psalm 40 I waited patiently for the Lord and he inclined to me and he heard my cry so often delay is for a purpose often delay is for our opportunity first Peter chapter 3 verses 18 for Christ also suffered once for sins the righteous for the unrighteous that he might bring us to God being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison because they formally did not obey when God's patience waited in the days of Noah while the ark was being prepared here we have the image of Noah building an ark and the people being called to repentance and every day as they heard his mallet hammering the wood into place every day as they watched the ark take shape before their eyes they were hearing the call for repentance and yet in the days that the ark was being built before their very eyes they refused to repent God was being patient God was being patient but there was no repentance the visible arc is for them what we understand to be the patience of God second Peter 3 and count the patience of our Lord is salvation just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom wisdom giving to him do not mistake patience to be silence do not mistake the moments before dawn to be an eternal night for the night is darkest and the night is longest just before the sunlight rises again on a new day the resurrection of Lazarus was to the glory of God the resurrection of Lazarus was delayed because it served also strengthen the faith of his disciples with God time and eternity are the same are they not isn't time and eternity the same for the alpha and the omega the God who always was and always will be God is not burning daylight because he is daylight
verses 7 through 10 Jesus then said to the disciples let us go to Judea again the disciples said to him Rabbi the Jews were just now seeking to stone you and you're going there again the the delay is now over and just like the angel that came to Peter Jesus says it is now time for us to move and we're going to move quickly to Judea Jesus announces his plan to go to Judea he could have said let us go to the sisters to Mary and to Martha he could have said let us go to Lazarus our friend who has grown ill or he could have even said let us go to Bethany but he doesn't say either of any of those he says let us go to Judea because it was in Judea that he was last threatened to be stoned and the disciples instead of hearing a visit to family instead of hearing a visit to a friendly city they hear Jesus's intention to go back to Judea they probably presume that Lazarus was already recovered because they remind Jesus why should we go because by now certainly he's gotten better they probably imagine that Jesus is intending to re-engage his enemies while he is in Judea which is why Thomas then presumes that they will all die if they go back to Judea Jesus is using a travel motif or he's using the Jewish day to make a point the Jewish day had 12 hours and try to be careful now to follow this we are so locked stepped into there being our hours being locked into 60 minutes in an hour and that's because we all use watches and clocks and that's the way our day is ordered but in the days before mechanical timepieces it wasn't so the day had 12 hours the daylight was 12 hours some days were only as long as nine hours 48 minutes by hour standard but it was a 12 hour day other days in the summer might be 14 hours and 12 minutes by hour standard but still 12 hours in the day whether adjustable or fixed however the meaning remains the same when you walk about in daylight obstacles and dangers are easy to avoid at night however you can stumble you can fall or you can become lost in Ephesians 3 or rather Exodus 13 21 and 22 the Lord went before them as a cloud in the day and a pillar of fire at night to give them light so they could travel day or night Jesus means to take the journey in day he's planning to travel in day and he wants them to travel with him to move with him because it is still day the time allotted for his earthly ministry being fixed not the schemes of his enemies not the caution of his disciples can shorten them or lengthen them by a single moment he is as safe and the fathers will as walking in the daylight and his disciples are safe when they walk with him just as the Jews would travel in the daylight with God as a cloud so they were made able to travel at night because God provided light without light there was no travel getting lost in the desert getting injured by fall from a cliff or in a hole or being consumed by a wild beast in the night or your options for traveling when it is not safe in Isaiah 25 O house of Jacob come let us walk in the light of the Lord darkness represents chaos it represents lostness it's where the evil sleeps around and slinks around and danger stalks God and Genesis separated light from dark and he does it for his people in Romans 13 11 through 14 let me read that very quickly Romans 13 11 through 14 besides you know the time that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep for salvation is near to us now then when we first believe the night is far gone the day is at hand so then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light let us walk properly as in the daytime not in orgies and drunkenness not in sexual immorality and sensuality not in quarreling and in jealousy in Psalm 43 verse 3 send out your light and your truth let them lead me let them bring me to your holy hill and to your dwelling this is how we understand it wasn't just in the disciples time that Jesus was the light he is the light for us as well our eyes what's darkened and in corruption and in sin we now have been made to see the light and all the way through the scriptures to revelation that illustration stands up all the way through revelation 21 I saw no temple in the city for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the lamb and the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it for the glory of God gives it light and its lamp is the lamb by its light until will the nations walk and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it the true light walk with them just as John said in chapter 1 the true light which enlightens everyone was coming into the world his light is his presence with his people his light is his presence with the church and revelation in the first chapters we read of the lampstand that is set among the churches and when they are found to be unfaithful Jesus says to them if you do not straighten out these issues I will remove my lampstand I will take the light away and you will once again be in darkness the tabernacle had the lampstand that was set up showing forth the light of God to his people and Jesus himself said I am the light of the world let me ask you this do you walk in the light of the presence of Christ do you walk in the light of his presence and in his counsel and in his way the first Peter 2 have you been called out of the darkness and into his marvelous light have you heated the call of Christ to come out of the world with all of its ways and all of its thinking as it dwells in the chaos of sin and darkness and have you been called out into the light of Christ in 1 John 1 if we walk in the light as he is in the light we have fellowship with one another and the blood of Jesus his son cleanses us from all sin 2 Corinthians 4 if you have a pen or pencil I hope that you will jot this down and turn to this and read it for yourself and the hours of the Lord's day and 2 Corinthians 4 verses 4 through 6 in their case the God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ who is the image of God for what we proclaim is not ourselves but Jesus Christ as Lord with ourselves as your servants for Jesus sake for God who said let light shine out of darkness has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ how can you know if you were in the light of Christ he uses these great illustrations of the day and of night and Jesus is coming in and saying that he is the light of the world and only as we stay in the light of Christ is their safety and is their security against the consequences of our fallen nature and of sin which is to dwell eternally in darkness how can you know if you were in the light of Christ Proverbs 4 the path of righteousness is like the light of the dawn which shines brighter and brighter until full day the way of the wicked is like deep darkness they do not know over what they stumble do you walk as Christ did just as the disciples did when they followed him does your life follow his mission have you taken the precepts and the teachings of the scripture to be your personal constitution for life and for living is the law holy to you or is it or is it an encumbrance do you redeem the time given to you and do you serve the master or do you serve the world and task masters of this dark and present reality have you confessed that you are a sinner in need of his grace and in need of his salvation or do you walk as the world does do you speak as the world does do you love as the world does do you find your passions to be in line with the passions of those who dwell in darkness the world sought to crush our Lord Jesus Christ they sought to literally stone the Lord Jesus Christ do we not also see that the world is just as antagonistic to the true church of Jesus Christ and they would seek to crush her as well but as long as we walk and work while there is light we will not stumble and we will not fall have you been called from darkness to light have you confessed your sin to come before the Lord Jesus Christ and to dwell in his light not only for today but forever for there will be no more chaos and danger represented by darkness in the day which is to come only the light of his presence as we dwell there together