Even Now

John 11:1-23 Where is he? How many times had she asked that question over the past four days. Her only brother had come down with some mysterious virus and nobody could do anything for him. Well, nobody except for their friend Jesus. How many times had he reached out his hand and blind people could see, or lame people could walk? If there was any hope for Lazarus it would only be through his good buddy Jesus. Granted she hadn’t actually asked Jesus to come, she had only sent word that His friend was deathly ill. But if Jesus was the friend that he professed to be, wouldn’t he have come? But she waited and Lazarus got worse, and she waited, and she waited, and Lazarus died, and she waited and Lazarus was buried. Jesus had healed the paralytic and he didn’t even know that guy, he healed the blind man who was just some random face in the crowd, surely he would show up for his friend. And still the thought tormented her, where was he, surely she couldn’t have misjudged Jesus so badly. He had eaten at their table and slept under their roof surely that had meant something to him, or maybe not. And then a murmur began to weave it’s way through the crowd that had gathered to mourn with the two sisters, the master is here, Jesus has arrived. And Martha couldn’t help herself, she was on her feet rushing to meet her friend. The thought that had burned in her heart was already on her lips, John 11:21-22 (NIV) "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” I don’t think it was said with a mean or vindictive spirit, but I don’t think it was simply a statement of fact either. I think she was disappointed and maybe she even felt betrayed and I’m sure the question, even though unasked, could be read in her eyes, “When you heard he was sick, why didn’t you come then?” Max Lucado says that “The grave unearths our view of God” And he’s right. How often have we heard “God, if you existed my child wouldn’t have died, if you’d have answered my prayers my life wouldn’t be empty, if you cared my mother wouldn’t have developed cancer.” How often are we guilty of dealing with God in that very same way, of demanding to know why he doesn’t do it the way we want it done, when we want it done. The experts tell us that it would have been a day and a half walk from where Jesus heard the news to Bethlehem, but Lazarus was in the grave for 4 days. So Jesus really took His time getting there.

And then she said the most incredible thing, something that revealed volumes about her character and her faith, John 11:22 But I know that even now (that’s key, even now) God will give you whatever you ask." Even now, she said. My brother’s been dead for quite a while, but even now. Jesus I may not understand what you’ve done, I may not be able to explain it, I may not like it, but even now I still believe that you are capable of anything. I want to cover 3 areas that I believe God can do EVEN NOW: 1) Even now God can do the impressive. I love the story of Gideon. Maybe you don’t know it, after all it happened four or five thousand years ago. It was during a time that Israel had come under foreign rule, the story is found in the book of Judges. The Midianites had conquered Israel and the people had run for the hills, literally living in caves. Not satisfied with that the Midianites made a nasty habit out of burning any Israelite fields they found and killing their animals. In a situation like this who do you need? You need a hero, right? And where do you find a hero? Well I checked the yellow pages online and they skipped right from herbs to hobbies. But if you’re God you don’t need the yellow pages and so an Angel was sent to a young farmer named Gideon. Well to make a long story short Gideon raised up an army of 32,000 men - not bad. But God said “Hey you guys could defeat the Midianites all by yourself, tell anyone who is afraid to go home” Well, it’s war – there’s death and stuff, if you give people the option, there’s a good chance they’ll go home. So, 22,000 of them left – Gideon lost 2/3 of his army. Imagine how Gideon must have felt. But still 10,000 is better than none. But God said “Hey Gideon: you still have too many, get everyone to drink from the stream and keep only those who drink from their cupped hand” Well 9,700 of them knelt down to drink and Gideon was left with 300 soldiers. To quote God in Judges 7:7 "With the three hundred men here, I will save you and give the Midianites into your hands. Let all the other men go, each to his own place." And He did. Now that’s impressive. But not necessarily impossible - impressive. You see, the three hundred men surround the Midianite camp in the middle of the night each one armed with a trumpet, a clay pot and a torch. On a prearranged signal they blow their trumpets and smash their clay jars, wave their torches and yell “For the Lord and for Gideon.” Well the Midianites were sleeping, so they woke up, panicked, turned on each other, beat each other silly, and retreated. God does some impressive things in our lives, perhaps helping us deal with anger, or helping our relationship with our spouse or our children. People have prayed for work and found the perfect job. That’s

impressive. People have been sick and others have prayed for them and they have gotten better, that’s impressive. God answers prayer in an impressive way, but none of those things were impossible. People have found the perfect job without praying, sick people have gotten better without praying, relationships have been restored without God. But, before we can move farther, we must first see that He does do impressive things in answer to our prayers. There are most likely situations in your life that you need to say, “Even now I believe God can do some impressive things for me.” Maybe you’re at the end of your rope in your marriage or frustrated with your children and you feel like only a miracle could help, he’s still in the miracle business. God still does the impressive. Throughout the Bible we read how God stepped in and helped his people. Abraham, David, Solomon, Joshua, Moses, Daniel - each one could tell an amazing story of the impressive work that God did for them and even today there are people who would confirm that even now, in 2004, God does the impressive. God has done impressive things with this church, four and a half years ago Emmanuel’s House Church consisted of Myself, Malinda, a few helpers, and a hamster named Hammy. Rest in peace, Hammy. Look where we are today, impressive but not impossible. God can and will continue to do the impressive through Emmanuel’s House Church. When? Even Now. 2) But let’s move to the next step of faith: not just the impressive, but Even Now God will do the improbable. Do you remember the story of David and Goliath? It seemed like everyone wanted to whomp on Israel at some point, and this time it was the Philistines. The story is found in the book of 1 Samuel 17. The Israelites are on one hill, the Philistines are on another hill and the Philistines trot out their Champion, Goliath, and he was one big sucker standing over nine feet tall. Throwing down a gauntlet Goliath says, 1 Samuel 17:8-9 “Choose a man and have him come down to me. 9 If he is able to fight and kill me, we will become your subjects; but if I overcome him and kill him, you will become our subjects and serve us." Well, none of the Israelite soldiers were all that excited about the prospect of a one-on-one battle against this guys knee-caps. But along came David, not a soldier but a shepherd, not an adult but a teenager and armed with a slingshot and five smooth stones, he killed the giant and saved the day. What would you say to that? A professional soldier armed with the very best armaments available to him challenged by a mere boy with

little more then a toy. What are the chances of David being the victor. Possible, but not probable. So, God not only does the impressive, he does the improbable. Daniel surviving a night in a den full of lions, Abraham and Sarah having a child in their nineties, Noah building a 450 foot boat miles from the nearest major body of water. Impossible not, improbable yes. And God does the improbable today. People addicted to one thing or another who have tried everything to break that addiction have turned to God and have conquered it. Possible yes, probable no. But even now God does the improbable. Through prayer abusive husbands have become loving mates, nagging wives have become encouragers and impossible teens become our friends. Possible yes, probable no. But even now God does the improbable. Cancer patients have been prayed over and all traces of the disease have disappeared, Possible yes, probable no. But even now God does the improbable. What are the chances of a small Albanian nun winning a Nobel Peace Prize for her work in India, as well as establishing hundreds of hospices around the world. Possible yes, probable no. But even now God does the improbable. What are some of the improbable things that need to be done in your life, things that just aren’t likely to happen? Need a personality transplant – are you a real jerk - He can do that. Need self control, He can do that. Do you have giants in your life that need to be put down, he still defeats Goliath’s. And not only can he do the improbable in your life, he can do the improbable in your church as well. He’s already doing it. I mean, look around the room at each other. When you look around, would you say it is likely that there are a few foreign missionaries, several local missionaries, enough musicians for about 3 praise teams, artists, public speakers – we’ve ministered to people on the streets, at concerts, at bible studies, in homeless shelters, we’ve seen people healed, delivered, set free. We’re not talking about a church of 500 here – we’re talking about God doing the impressive and the improbable with people who are willing to submit to Him. God can help us to minister in improbable ways to our community here in Royal Oak. When? Even now. 3) But since we’ve established that God does the impressive and the improbable, let’s talk about the final aspect: Even Now God does the Impossible. Let’s return to our original story. Jesus’ friend Lazarus becomes ill and his sisters send news to Jesus. As we noted before, in the account we have, they don’t actually ask Jesus to come, but judging by their reaction, they expected him to come. Not only did

they expect him to come, they expected him to come and heal their brother. That much is evident in Martha’s words in John 11:21 (NIV) "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died,” and the words of her sister in John 11:32 (NIV) "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died." Now that’s pretty much laying it on the line. Now you would think that with expectations like that and knowing Jesus the way we know him that he would have rushed to be with the sisters, or maybe knowing that he wouldn’t have made it in time did a God thing and zapped Lazarus back to health long distance. John 11:5-6 (NIV) Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. 6 Yet when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days. Now I don’t know why Jesus waited two days, and I’m not going to pretend I do. What we do know is that when Jesus heard the news his friend was already dead and ready to be buried. And then he came. But Lazarus had already been in the grave for four days. And even though it would appear that Martha had reprimanded Jesus for not being there sooner, that’s not at all what’s going on: she basically tells him “It’s not too late because even now you can perform a miracle.” Could you do that? Standing next to your brother’s filled-in grave could you express that type of faith in God? You see her statement was not only saying that she believed that Jesus could raise her brother, but that she would trust him even if he didn’t. A woman was talking to her friend whose young son had cancer and she made the comment: “Perhaps God will be good and heal your son,” the reply from the mother was, “God is good whether he heals my son or not.” That is what Martha was saying. Even now, I believe that you can do anything. But the story doesn’t end there, because Jesus goes to the tomb, let’s read John’s account. John 11:38-44 (NIV) Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. 39 "Take away the stone," he said. "But, Lord," said Martha, the sister of the dead man, "by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days." 40 Then Jesus said, "Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?" 41 So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, "Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42 I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may

believe that you sent me." 43 When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!" 44 The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them, "Take off the grave clothes and let him go." Now before we write this off to “well He was God, He can do those things,” let me point out to you that Jesus said that we would do even greater things – and He was specifically referring to miracles, if we would simply believe. This guy’s been dead five days, in the grave four days and he’s brought back to life. That is impressive, that is improbable, and that is impossible. Dead people don’t come back to life - that just doesn’t happen. But it did happen, and it can still happen with God. You see it is the reality of what the Angel Gabriel told Mary in Luke 1:37 “For nothing is impossible with God," and Jesus summed it up when he said in Luke 18:27 "What is impossible with men is possible with God." God still does the impossible today. People can change their behavior, but only God can change their hearts. What have you been told is impossible in your life? Can you say with Martha Even now? Say this in your mind with me: I can do ALL things through Christ who strengthens me. But wait a minute – I can fly like Superman if I want to? You’re missing the whole point! What is it in your life that is in the will of God, that you know God would be pleased about for your life, but you have written it off as impossible – because you’ve listened to men, because you’ve listened to demons, because you’ve listened to everything but the voice of God telling you “I will do that if you will only trust me to.” See, it’s about having your will submitted to His. When you love the things God loves and hate the things God hates and you are in constant communication with your Savior whom you have a deeply intimate personal relationship with, then suddenly there are things in life that are cooler than flying like Superman, but no less impossible. Have I ever seen someone put a cape on and fly and do it in the name of Jesus – no, I can honestly say I haven’t. But I have seen a woman with a scar stretching from her neck to about halfway down her arm, and I watched the scar physically disappear before my very eyes as I prayed for her healing both on the inside and outside. I prayed for my friend Dan O’ Donnell to be raised from the dead, and don’t you dare tell me that I didn’t have enough faith – it was his time to die, because we have all been appointed a time to die, and that was his. But as I was praying, I felt convicted by the Holy Spirit that I was praying for the wrong person, and I asked God who I should be praying for, and he told me to pray for the guy in the car who lived through the car

wreck – he told me that even though it was hurting me so much, He would help me grieve the loss later, but right now I need to switch my focus because God is in the business of using bad situations and bringing good out of them. He said to pray for this other guy in the car, an unbeliever, that He could see the truth of what God wants to do with his life. At that very moment, Dena Schultz looks over at me and says “I think we need to switch our focus and start praying for so-andso. The next day we’re watching the news and there’s so-and-so on the news, jumping and rejoicing and showing the “foolishness” of God. News reporter says “why are you happy when your friend is dead?” He says “Jesus saved my life. He saved me in more ways than one, and you’d be happy too if your life was spared so that someone who already knows Jesus could go and be with Him and you could get a second chance at life.” Now, a guy getting saved after a car accident that he should have died in? That’s not impossible, God chose to do the improbable and the impressive instead that night – BUT it all started with me believing that God could do the impossible. I said, “raise my friend from the dead, God, I know you can do it.” He said, “Luke, thanks for submitting your will to my will, but that’s not my will tonight, will you submit to my will and pray for someone else even if it hurts you to do so?” “Luke, thank you for believing me to do the impossible, now let me show you my plans for the night, so that you can be in line with them.” You know what all of this looks like without an intimate relationship with God? It looks like praying a bunch of stuff against His will, getting mad that He doesn’t do what you want, never noticing or caring about what He is doing (never turning on the tv set to see that man proclaim the gospel out of a tragedy), pouting and getting bitter at God because you don’t get your way….that’s what it looks like without an intimate relationship with your Savior. So you’d better have one. Sometimes not having that relationship can look like a false faith, where you are trying to build up faith in a God who can do anything, but you have no relationship for a foundation to stand on, so you start believing Satan’s lies. Like when Satan told Jesus to jump and have the angels catch Him – that would have been miraculous, right? But Jesus was in line with His father and knew it wasn’t His will. Or when the voice of Satan is heard through some people by the cross, saying to Jesus “you saved other people, now come down from that cross and save yourself” – that’d be miraculous, right? But again, Jesus could see past it and stayed in His Father’s will. Sometimes we think we are seeing a miracle of God, but it’s really from the enemy, and the only way to have discernment and know the difference is to have a personal relationship with God. Only God can create. Satan can not create, he can only distort what is already created. There’s a story that illustrates this: Satan argued with Jesus one time about who had

the greater power! Satan said, ’I can do anything you can do only better.’ Jesus replied, ’Ok, prove it, go ahead and try creating a man.’ Satan said, ’No problem,’ as he reached down and picked up a handful of dirt and began to mold and shape it. With that, Jesus slapped his hand and said, ’Get your own dirt!’ If we’re going to go to this next level of faith, this believing God to do the impossible, we have to know when it’s God rather than the enemy and we have to be able to discern God’s will, and the only way to do any of that is to have a very close, personal relationship with Him. That’s where it all begins. It really is about being in the will of God and submitting to the will of God. I wanted to pray for my friend in that car wreck, but that wasn’t the will of God that night, and I was close enough to Him to know that. God shut that door. And when God shuts the door, don’t try to get in through the window. The will of God never will lead you where the grace of God cannot keep you. He will give you everything you need if you will just give up your right to take matters into your own hands and trust Him to do the impossible. During Gladys Aylward’s harrowing journey out of war-torn Yang Chen during the Communist take-over, she faced one morning with no apparent hope of reaching safety. A 13year old girl tried to comfort her by saying, "Don’t forget what you told us about Moses in the wilderness," to which Gladys Aylward replied, "Yes, my dear, but I am not Moses." The young girl replied, "Yes, but God is still God." That’s the faith of a child that we are told to have. And faith that small, even as small as a mustard seed, will move mountains if it be God’s will. God still does the impossible. What would you have God do with Emmanuel’s House Church? Can you see it as God sees it? Can you see it, not as it is, but as God would make it? Close your eyes for a minute and answer this question, if E’s House could be anything and do anything without taking into consideration any human limits. Forget about money, buildings, staff what do you believe God can do with this church? Because even now God can do the impossible. Whatever it is you see in your mind, I want you to ask God to change it to fit in His will for this place, and then I want you to pray it with all of your heart. If your brain just can’t seem to get past human limitations of what is possible and what is not based on OUR strength, then I want you to pray a simple prayer for a while that goes like this: Lord I believe, help my unbelief. Prayer: Jesus, we offer up our bodies to you as a living and holy sacrifice of worship. We bring our entire lives to the altar of sacrifice today. Jesus, there are things in our lives that we have bought into the lie of believing will never change – Lord, we lay those at your feet in worship, and we trust you to do the impossible. Lord, we thought you only did miracles in the olden days. We repent, and lay that down at

your feet in worship. We thought we could invoke your name to do our will instead of humbly submitting to you, we thought we could call on you to do the miraculous when we don’t even know you. We repent, and we want to know you. We want to call you Abba, Daddy. We want to love the things you love, and hate the things you hate. We lay down all the parts of our lives and all the sections of our hearts that we have not given to you wholly and completely, and we give them to you today, and we trust you Lord to do the impossible, and we submit to your will in every way. Thank you for filling us with your Holy Spirit, and may you continue to guide us and continue to guide this church. We love you. Amen.