Jesus’ Angry Tears - John 11:28-37

It’s rather providential that our text this morning is centered on grief and sadness because our denomination, the Presbyterian Church in America, experienced the death of two highly influential pastors this week: Dr. Harry Reeder and Dr. Tim Keller. They both passed away within twenty-fours hours of one another.

There is real grief, pain, and sorrow that comes as the result of death. We know of course that our heavenly hope has become a heavenly reality and we can rejoice in that, but it’s still tough for those they’ve left behind.

John stresses in this text the close relationship that Jesus had with Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. And so we remember that Jesus wept in part, because he too, experienced the sadness that comes from the loss of a friend.

So we’re continuing to walk through John 11, and everything is building to Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead.

And last week, we looked at Martha and Jesus’ interaction and Jesus famously said in verse 25, “I am the resurrection and the life.” This week, we’re looking at Martha’s sister Mary and her interaction with Jesus.

And everything up and to this point has been quite sad. Martha is distraught, and as we just read, so is Mary. They’re in the middle of grieving the loss of their dear brother.

And it’s in this passage that we learn something incredibly profound. Jesus doesn’t idly stand back and watch you grieve and suffer. Rather, Jesus shares in your grief, pain, sorrow, and it makes him angry. That may sound rather surprising, but don’t worry, I’ll do my best to explain what I mean!

There are three things we see from this passage: First, we discover that Jesus grieves with his followers (vv. 28-30). Second, we learn that we should take our pain and grief to him (vv. 31-32). And we learn lastly, that our grief, pain, and sorrow makes our Lord angry (33-37).

Jesus Grieves with his Followers (vv. 28-30)

Whenever I think about grieving, pain, and loss, this is one of the first passages that comes to mind. And it’s for obvious reasons, it’s the passage where we see the shortest verse in Scripture, “Jesus wept.”

Technically, in the Greek it’s not the shortest verse in the Bible, but it is in the English. That’s your fun fact for the day. But nevertheless, this is certainly one of the first passages that comes to mind when you think about those grieving the loss of someone they loved.

But look at verses 28-30 with me:

“28 When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary, saying in private, “The Teacher is here and is calling for you.” 29 And when she heard it, she rose quickly and went to him. 30 Now Jesus had not yet come into the village, but was still in the place where Martha had met him.”

So, Jesus wants to speak with Mary privately and then she takes off to meet him.

But what I think is important for us to see is that Jesus was moving towards, (albeit, quite slowly!) to a family in deep grief. Our Lord set out to visit a family coping with the loss of their brother.

Isn’t it true that people sometimes avoid those in grief? They avoid them because it’s tough to know what to do or say - so the easiest thing to do is just avoid them altogether. It’s easier to walk a wide circle around them to avoid any possibility of interaction. But that’s certainly not the case for Jesus. Jesus makes his way to be with Mary and Martha.

How comforting is it to know that the Lord doesn’t run away from you when you’re walking through the difficult season in life? Even when it may seem like the Lord has withdrawn his presence from you he hasn’t abandoned you. You may go through seasons of testing, pain, and grief but if you’re truly born again, the Lord has not deserted you.

And I think there’s a takeaway here for how to best comfort those in grief: go out of your way to be with them. Just being there means so much.

I’m sure most of us here have lost a loved one at some point or another. And at funerals lots of people come up and talk to you and at least in my experience, you don’t remember what people said to you. Rather, what sticks out in my mind is who was there. You remember more than anything who was willing to show up for you.

There’s something comforting about someone’s presence. It means a lot when someone is willing to go out of their way to be with you when you’re grieving.

We even see this elsewhere in Scripture. When Job’s friends initially come to visit him after he lost everything, they simply sit down with him. They’re just present and that’s frankly, the best thing that they did! It wasn’t until they started talking that they began to make mistakes and draw incorrect theological conclusions.

We too, should be present and available for those who are grieving. Funerals are where you learn who your friends are. You quickly figure out who the people are that truly care about you.

It’s quite remarkable what Jesus does in this passage. He goes to visit Mary and Martha knowing full well that he would be going into a potentially hostile environment. Remember the Jews had tried to stone him. No doubt, he intended to raise Lazarus from the dead, but we certainly learn some helpful practices for how to appropriately comfort those who are mourning.

Before we ever offer any words of wisdom or advice, we should first offer a shoulder to cry on.

Jesus is there even in the midst of pain, grief, and suffering. He hasn’t abandoned you in the midst of grief and suffering. He’s not walking away from you, rather, he’s walking toward you.

Take your pain and grief to Christ (vv. 31-32)

So Jesus hasn’t abandoned you in your grief, but we see secondly, that we should take our pain and grief to him.

Jewish funerals were chaotic events, because not only were musicians playing, but there were also professional wailers. So there was a funeral form, if you will. And so, you can imagine, the music is rolling, the wailers are wailing, and then Mary runs out.

She’s adding more chaos to an already chaotic funeral experience. And everyone assumes that she is going to Lazarus’ tomb, but of course, she’s going to see Jesus.

She falls at his feet. She prostrated herself before Christ, but more than that, it reveals her emotional state, doesn’t it? She’s bereft and grieving! But notice she says something very similar to what Martha said previously in verse 21. Mary says here, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

Again, it’s an incredible statement of confidence in Jesus Christ. She recognized that he had the power to heal Lazarus had he arrived in time.

But notice something about Mary: She doesn’t find comfort for her soul from those around her. The professional wailers isn’t what brings her soul peace. Nor do the other formalities of the funeral service. She goes to Jesus.

You really see what you rely on for peace and comfort in the midst of grief and pain. It’s easy to turn to sin, vices, people, or whatever to bring you meaningful comfort when you’re suffering.

And for so many of us, isn’t our first reaction to look for a quick fix online, or talk to a friend about what’s going on? Neither of those things are necessarily wrong, but it reveals something about our hearts. It reveals that we believe these other things are going to give us meaningful comfort. That we turn to the internet or friends for comfort before we go to the Lord.

I’ll be honest with you all, I’m not a fan of overused, meaningless, Christian cliches like, “God never gives you more than you can handle.” Or “Look to Christ.” Or “Cast your cares on him.” Statements like that bother me, not because I don’t think they’re true. They bother me because they’re so vague it’s hard to understand exactly what they mean! When we make those comments what exactly are we saying?

So I must confess, this second point has a little bit of cliche flair to it, but I’ll explain to you what I mean when I say, “Take your pain and grief to Christ.”

Just as Mary cast herself at the feet of Christ, so must you and I cast ourselves at the feet of Christ in prayer. We have access to the Lord through prayer. It’s so obvious, and yet, it’s something that we all take for granted isn’t it? We either forget to spend time in prayer, or we don’t truly believe in its power and usefulness.

But where else can we go? There’s a clarity that comes in the midst of grief isn’t there? You see more clearly the things that really matter.

Take your pain, sorrow, and suffering to Christ in prayer. His yoke is easy and his burden is light.

After all, he understands what you're going through not just on a spiritual level but on an emotional level as well. Jesus was a real person. He experienced temptation. Jesus knows what it’s like to suffer. In fact, he knows it on a level that none of us will ever experience.

Not that long ago, there was a viral video that made its rounds online where, the founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerburg told an audience that “he was human.” Past tense. As in, he used to be human. And so, as you can imagine, it fired up all sorts of conspiracy theories. Mark Zuckerberg isn’t human or perhaps he’s so sort of humanoid.

And it certainly doesn’t help that Zuckerburg has a pretty stiff, and awkward presentation. But I think this whole conspiracy theory was put to bed when it was reported that Zuckerberg won a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu tournament. It was a total shock to a lot of people. No one even knew that he trained Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. But I think it confirmed in everyone’s mind that Zuckerburg is in fact, a human.

And I bring up this goofy story, only because I think there’s a temptation to think of Jesus in a similar way. Jesus was a God robot that just did perfectly what he was supposed to do without experiencing on any real level what you and I face each and every day. But nothing could be further from the truth. He experienced what we have experienced.

But in our modern evangelical times, I tend to think we emphasize his divinity to such a degree that we neglect or forget about his humanity. He’s two natures in one flesh. Jesus felt emotions. He felt pain. He wasn’t a divine humanoid sent to earth.

He isn’t a spiritual stoic. Isn’t that precisely what we see in the passage? We’re told that he’s moved in his spirit. On one hand, he’s moved in his spirit by the grief and sadness of Mary and the Jews around her.

It’s a clear picture of Christ’s humanity.

This is the Jesus that we worship. He’s not some distant god that lacks understanding or feeling. He’s experienced it personally. He knows pain, sorrow, and suffering.

And it’s always easier to take our burdens to someone who really understands isn’t it?

Jesus is angry over sin (v. 33-37)

But what I think is most interesting about this passage is that Jesus doesn’t merely share in your grief and sadness, although that’s true. What’s probably the most interesting detail about this whole passage is that grief and sadness makes Jesus angry. He’s angry over it.

Look again at verse 33 with me. “When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled.”

The two little words, “deeply moved” are where I want to direct your attention. Many of your Bibles probably have a footnote next to “moved” in verse 33, because in the Greek, the word for “deeply moved” can also be translated as “indignant.” It’s the Greek word that was used to describe an angry horse snorting its snout.

So you could translate verse 33 as, “he was outraged in spirit and troubled…” That changes the scope of this passage doesn’t it? We tend to think of this passage as one of grief and sadness, but what are we to make of Jesus’ anger? Is he allowed to be angry here? At first glance, it seems like an out of place emotion. Jesus is on his way to a funeral, everyone is supposed to be sad, not angry.

And certainly, Jesus isn’t angry at a particular person. He’s not mad at Mary or Martha. Jesus is outraged and angry over the entire situation, the pain, grief, sorrow, and death which is the result of the sinful, fallen, broken world that we all live in.

We’re all sinners of course. I think every one of us understands that point. I’m sure we all recognize that God hates our sin. But think about this: God not only hates sin, he hates the effects of sin. Because when Adam sinned in the garden, not only was sin passed down by ordinary generation, but sin also made life and the world a difficult place.

Our Lord hates things like cancer, shocking natural disasters, sudden tragedy, heinous evil.

That makes Jesus angry: And so, when we read those two famous words, Jesus wept, his tears weren’t exclusively tears of sadness, they were also tears of anger. A perfect, holy, righteous, anger geared towards the effects of sin.

Let’s be honest for a second: it’s tough to find good news. Politically, culturally, morally, nothing seems to be going well. The Hokies aren’t even good at football anymore. In God’s perfect providence he’s even taken that away from us. But in all seriousness, doesn’t it feel like nothing in our world is going well. The news is almost exclusively bad.

But guess what? It’s not always going to be like this. And this is what’s so amazing about this passage. Jesus isn’t just going to sit on his hands, wallow in his sadness and anger and kick rocks! He’s going to do something, he’s going to raise Lazarus.

The Lord is going to fix it. I don’t want to steal too much thunder from next week’s sermon, but that’s part of what we see in Jesus raising Lazarus - he’s undoing the effects and curse of sin. He raised someone from the dead.

And one day for all of you whose faith is grounded in the sin atoning work of Christ, you too will experience a day where the effects of sin will be no more. You’ll be in a place where pain, grief, sorrow, depression, and suffering are completely unknown.

Have you ever walked out of a hospital and thought to yourself, “I hate cancer!” Or walked out of a funeral and thought, “I hate death!” Don’t the effects of sin that we all experience make you long for something better?

Revelation 21 tells us that, “[The Lord] will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

And we know when Jesus raised Lazarus it should point us to his resurrection, which of course is the first fruit of what is to come! We too will one day rise!

Maybe that’s the silver lining of the negative 24 hour news cycle. It makes us all long for something much better. It makes us look forward to our heavenly home. No pain. No suffering. No death.

I understand why people will refer to funerals as a celebration of life. They want to make a sad situation positive, it’s taking lemons and making lemonade, but no matter what you call a funeral or how you think of it, you cannot escape the reality of death and the sadness that accompanies the loss of a loved one. It always hurts. That’s why funerals regardless of what you call them are always sad.

However, the only thing sadder than a Christian funeral is a non-Christian funeral. It’s so sad when someone’s entire life and hope is grounded in this sin sick world because they believe this is as good as it gets. Isn’t that incredibly depressing, to believe that this world as we know it, is as good as it gets? The non-Christian funeral is devoid of any meaning or hope.

But that’s not true for the Christian is it? In fact, the Apostle Paul instructs us in 1 Thessalonians not to grieve as those without hope. It’s true that Christians have a heavenly hope beyond the grave because of Christ’s death, resurrection, and ascension.

But there’s something tremendously comforting about Jesus weeping in this passage. Yes, of course, Jesus is with you in the valleys of life, and yes, Jesus can sympathize with what you’re going through and we should of course take our pain to him, but there’s something more.

There’s comfort in knowing the Lord Jesus possesses a holy discontentment and anger directed at the brokenness of our world caused by sin. Aren’t we all frustrated over the same thing? Doesn’t cancer, suicide, tragedy, doesn’t that frustrate you?

It should be a source of great encouragement and comfort to know that it angers the Lord too because he has the power to change it! He has the power to raise the dead to life. Only Jesus has the power to restore all things. He is making all things new!

The pain, grief, and suffering you may experience in this life will one day be no more because the Lord isn’t going to put up with it forever. He intends to do something about it.

This is why we take our grief and pain to him. We cannot change the reality of sin and death in this world, but he can!

This is the Christian’s hope. We worship and serve a God who is indignant over sin and death and intends to one day fix it. Amen.