Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me

Good morning.  Martha now goes back to the house to get Mary. Secretly she tells her, the Teacher is here and is calling for you. Now the Bible does not say that Jesus was calling for Mary - perhaps she said that because Mary did not go with her when she went to greet Jesus. When Mary heard that, she got up quickly and was coming to Jesus. Those who were with Mary thought that she was going to the tomb to weep there, and so they followed her. When she got to Jesus, she said the exact same thing that her sister had said: Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died. This seems to confirm the idea that they had said this to each other over and over again during the four days since Lazarus had died. As I said before, she did not add the second part that Martha did – even now I know that whatever You ask of God, God will give You. When Jesus saw her weeping, He was deeply moved in spirit and was troubled. Where have you laid him? This is what anyone would say in the same situation. Now everyone would be expecting Him to go there to mourn the loss of Lazarus. As you know, the following is the shortest verse in the Bible - Jesus wept. My Bible says that the Greek for this word is not the one for loud grief, but one that denotes quiet weeping – shed tears. The people that were with Mary wondered, could not this man, who opened the eyes of the blind man, have kept this man also from dying? Of course, as soon as Jesus heard that Lazarus was sick, He could’ve spoken the word, and Lazarus would’ve been healed. He had specifically told His disciples that it was so that the Son of God may be glorified by it. We will see how all this plays out next time. Father thank You that when all seems hopeless and bleak, we can be certain that resurrection is just around the corner. It’s like the story of someone digging for gold and stopping just short of the mother lode. We need to be patient and trust in You.