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Joe G. Wilson

Lazarus Risen

John 11:43-44
Joe G. Wilson September, 22 2013 Video & Audio
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Joe G. Wilson
Joe G. Wilson September, 22 2013

Sermon Transcript

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This afternoon this message goes
out to Roger Vanegas. He's from Central America. It
also goes out to all of our friends there in Central America who
are believing in our Lord Jesus Christ. They are reading the
messages that's preached from this pulpit. They take the messages
in English and they are translating them into Spanish. And then they
read them. I just wanted you to know that.
So you have friends in Central America. Our message this afternoon
is about Lazarus. And in John 11, verse 45, the
Scripture says, And when he thus had spoken, he cried with a loud
voice, Lazarus, come forth. And he that was dead came forth,
bound hand and foot with graveclothes, and his face was bound with a
napkin. Jesus saith unto them, Loose
him, and let him go." This afternoon our message is entitled, Lazarus
Risen, a picture of God's irresistible grace. The soul that hears the
voice of the Son of God, though he never heard it before, knows
the sound of the shepherd's voice. When the Savior speaks to a sinner
dead and trespasses in his sins, he speaks with a loud voice. Our Lord went to the tomb of
Lazarus And the scripture says he spoke with a loud voice, Lazarus,
come forth. A sinner is dead and trespasses
in his sins and he's dead. Unless the sinner hears a voice,
a voice from Almighty God, a voice from the very mouth of our Lord
Jesus Christ, he will remain dead. in his sins. But when our
Lord went to this tomb and he spoke those words, Lazarus, come
forth, Lazarus came alive. This afternoon, each of you that's
hearing my voice, if you know the Lord Jesus Christ, you have
heard the voice of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is a voice that is
unlike any other voice you've ever heard. Because in coming
to know God, you've never heard a voice before. You wouldn't
know what a voice is. But when God speaks our name,
we hear that voice. Because like turning a switch
that turns on the lights in this room, When you flip that switch,
the lights come on because energy is applied to the lights. A lost
sinner needs supernatural power. He needs power not from a preacher,
not from even the preaching of the gospel of Christ. He needs
the power of Almighty God, the Holy Spirit to come and to quicken
us and make us alive. Oh, how we love to preach the
Word of God, how we love to hear preachers stand and declare the
Word of God with such boldness, with no fear within their heart,
but they proclaim it with all that God has for them to declare
it with. Some preachers have a Ph.D. Some of them have a D.D. Some of them have a T.H.D. Some
of them are taught of Christ Himself. The power of the preacher's
voice is given by God. But the effectiveness of the
Word of God is that which opens men's hearts. And that's what
happened to Lazarus when our Lord spoke a loud voice. He spoke a powerful voice, a
voice that had more power than any other sound in the entire
world. Lazarus had known our Lord. Other people had heard our Lord's
words, but when our Lord spoke Lazarus' name, it was a powerful
voice. The day that our Lord spoke your
name, it was a powerful voice. It was no ordinary voice. It
was a voice of great power. Revelation 1, verse 18 says that
our Lord has the keys of hell and death. Our Lord, our Lord
Jesus Christ holds the hearts and the souls and the salvation
of every one of His people in His hand. And it is depending
upon our Lord speaking your name, my name, and bringing us to life. A thousand men could have come
before that tomb and said, Lazarus, Lazarus. You take a hundred voices,
singing a sacred song sounds mighty good. You could have taken
a thousand preachers, sang the name Lazarus, come forth. Lazarus
would have been dead and continued in his death. But when the Lord
spoke that word, the first time Lazarus came forth, the power
of Almighty God came forth and quickened him and brought him
back to life. That's the power that we need
this morning. That's the power that America
needs this morning. This is the power that every
child of God needs to hear the voice of Almighty God with a
loud and powerful voice. Even if our Lord spoke a small
voice, a quiet tone, from his voice, the reaction would have
been the same. It was not the volume that brought
Lazarus from the tomb. It was who spoke the word. Preachers are preachers. They
are given, sent out by God. But like Paul, Paul's message
was a message, a special message. Paul was endowed with the message
that other preachers of his time did not have. The Apostle Paul
had power to go and to preach and declare and to do a ministry
that other ministers of that day could not preach, could not
perform because He had the power behind Him, the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, sacred preachers, preachers
of the Gospel of Christ, they stand and preach the Word of
God as God has given them the power and the ability A thousand
preachers once again standing at the tomb of Lazarus, good
and bad preachers, educated and uneducated preachers, could not
have performed what our Lord said in His voice. Whether it's loud or whether
it's a small voice, the reaction is the same if it comes from
our Lord Jesus Christ. And then I would like to say
this evening, that the voice of our Lord is a personal voice
that comes to each of us. This voice is like that voice
that said unto Zacchaeus, Zacchaeus, make haste, come down, for today
I must abide in thy house. Our Lord did not say at that
particular time, why don't you come down? Our Lord said, Zacchaeus,
Make haste, come down. Our Lord Jesus Christ, as He
calls us unto the grace of God, calls us by our name. Some of us are known by our name
Bill. Some of us are known by our name
Gerald. Some of us are named of other
common names, Mark, Luke, Paul. It doesn't make any difference
what our name is in this life. What makes the difference is
the intention of Almighty God toward you. It was Zacchaeus
that our Lord came to dwell in his house. And he said, Zacchaeus,
make haste, come down for today. I must dwell in thy house." It
should be the hope of every person that our Lord Jesus Christ would
come and call your name and say those very words, make haste
for today I dwell in your house. That house is not casa. It's
not that word that means dwelling. It's not that word that means
home. But in this case, this word house
means in the dwelling where you are. It's not my house, the house
with the air conditioning bills, but it's the house where God
will come and fellowship with me and dwell with me and feed
me and fellowship with the grace of God throughout the day and
throughout the night. Zacchaeus, make haste, for today
I must dwell in your house. May God dwell within our house
today. May God come and not only dwell,
but to stay forever within us and speak words of great comfort. This afternoon, there is a responsibility
of every church to preach the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is the responsibility of every
gospel preacher to preach the gospel to all men as God gives
him the opportunity. It is the responsibility of all
who hear the gospel of Jesus Christ to repent and to believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ. We are commanded that all men,
everywhere, repent. But there is something that I
know that the Scriptures say. I know that there are some things
that the Scripture teaches about responsibility. Though I am responsible,
I know that all are responsible before God to believe that which
is plainly revealed in the Word. And I know that all who believe
on Christ shall be saved. Acts 16 and 31. He that believeth
on the Son of God hath everlasting life. And I know that no man
by nature can or will come to Christ. Fallen man has neither
the desire nor the ability to come to Christ. John 5 in verse
40 says, And he will not come unto me that ye might have life. We're not forbidding people to
come. We have pews to spare. It's that they will not come.
And coming to God, the arms of our Lord Jesus Christ beckons
His people, but they will not come until that voice of our
Lord Jesus Christ speaks to them. I know it is not in the realm
of man's power. It is not within the scope of
man's heart to desire to come to Christ. Unless God does for
a sinner what he cannot do for himself, he will perish. None can believe except God himself
creates faith in them and calls them to trust in our Lord Jesus
Christ. And there's one other thing that
I know that the Scripture teaches. And we know that saving faith
is a gift of God. Ephesians 2 and verse 8. This, this afternoon, is the
doctrine of our Lord Jesus Christ. No one can come. Anyone may come. Someone shall come. The scripture teaches us one
more thing. People shall be willing in the
day of his power, thy power. And all who do come to him shall
be saved forever. Blessed is the man whom thou
choosest and causeth to approach unto thee. I'm not in a tomb
this afternoon. I'm not cold and lifeless in
a tomb this afternoon, and neither are you. But if we are outside
of Christ, we are like that person who lays in a tomb, lifeless,
cold, stiff, because there is no life, physical life in him. Every man is likened unto that
person who is dead in this life physically. We are dead in our
self toward God. We have no life in us toward
God and we need the work of the Holy Spirit to change that. There are many pictures of effectual
calling and irresistible grace in the Scripture. One of the
most instructive pictures I find here in John chapter 11. where
Lazarus was dead. He was dead. No life in that
man. And the Lord knew that he had
no life. But for the glory of Almighty
God, the Lord Jesus Christ brought him to life. There are five things
now this afternoon I want you to take home about Lazarus. I want you to see, first of all,
this afternoon, Lazarus' condition. Lazarus' condition is plainly
declared in John 11, 14. Lazarus is dead. Our Lord said
he was dead. Our Lord waited until Lazarus
died that the glory of God may be manifested. He was dead. There was no life. There is nothing
left in him. that is the state of all human
beings by nature, spiritual dead, dead in trespasses and sins,
and incapable of either knowing or changing their condition before
God. The Scripture says in Romans
5.12, Wherefore, as by one man's sin entered into the world, and
death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for all have sinned. What do we know about death?
cannot move toward God. The dead have neither the will
nor the ability to come to Christ. The dead do not desire God's
salvation. The dead cannot see. The dead
cannot understand. The dead must be raised from
death to life by the power of God and the resurrection of the
new birth. Verily, verily, I say unto you,
the hour is come, and now is, when the dead shall hear the
voice of God, and they shall hear and shall live." The hope
of every man is that God would speak your name, that God would
raise us from death to life and bring us into a relationship
in communion with our Lord Jesus Christ. The second thing I want
us to think about, about Lazarus is his calling. His calling. In Luke chapter 11 verse 43,
you will see Lazarus and his calling. His calling was from
none other than our Lord Jesus Christ. And so it is with you
this afternoon and all those who are listening to me. Our
calling has to be that of Christ Himself, not a church, not a
form of religion, not a ritual that we would go through, religious
ritual, but our calling comes effectually from none other than
the Lord Jesus Christ in the very hand of Almighty God. Lazarus experienced something
that so many know nothing about. Lazarus had already experienced
a general call. He knew the Lord before he died. He knew of Him. He had heard
the message before. But Lazarus didn't just need
a general call. As we in this life A congregation
just doesn't need just to hear a gospel message and an invitation
given and a persuasive minister to plead with you to come and
give your heart to God. That's what we call a general
call. It goes out publicly to everyone. But all the general
calls are ineffective of bringing us into the presence of Almighty
God, bringing us to an understanding, bringing us into a vital union
with our Lord Jesus Christ. As Lazarus, so are we this afternoon. We need a particular call. A general call goes so far. It's a good-sounding message,
but a general call has never saved one soul. not one soul. Until the Spirit of God calls
you, an effectual call, an effectual calling of our Lord Jesus Christ,
speaking your name, making you alive in God, in Christ Jesus,
we are still in our sins. How many churches do we have
in this city of Houston, Texas this morning. How many gospel
messages went out this morning? How many general calls were made? How many persuasive arguments
were made this morning to persuade someone to give up his sin and
come to God? I hope a lot. I hope a lot. But I do know this, that any
and every persuasive message and call, general call to a public
to come to God is ineffective. It will never bring man to salvation. Only the work of Almighty God,
the work of Christ on the cross, and the effectual call of Christ
Himself will bring us into salvation. Regeneration doesn't come about
through a general call. Regeneration comes about through
an effectual call of God Himself. God has not depended upon preachers
to save people. He has brought preachers into
the world to feed the sheep of His congregations, but He has
never intended for a preacher to save one soul, one soul. Some years ago, we were in good
friends with a lot of different preachers, Southern Baptists
particularly, where they have to turn in a report on a weekly
basis of how many people were converted, how many people were
baptized, how many people did this and how many people did
that. Well, all in good, I suppose. But it is a far cry from the
work of Almighty God of bringing men into salvation, calling them
and bringing them to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. The third thing I want you to
see about Lazarus is his conversion. And he that was dead came forth,
bound hand and foot with grave clothes, and his face was bound
with a knacket. And Jesus said unto them, Loose
him, and let him go. When Lazarus heard the voice
of God, he came alive and he began to scramble, I suppose,
getting up from where he was laying. And he came out and he
had a napkin over his face. He was bound in grave clothes. In the nightly tradition of that
time, they would wrap a shroud around you. It was not just a
spread over you. They bound you in a cloth. So
Lazarus wasn't really going too far. He might have been able
to hobble, but not too far, because he was bound. Today, in our conversion,
we are regenerated. But now, in this process of God's
work, we are converted to our Lord Jesus Christ. We're brought
to the knowledge of God. And through the studying of the
Scripture and hearing Gospel preachers deliver the Word of
God, Lazarus started his conversion. He became alive and then he came
forth from the tomb bound. The preaching of the gospel,
folks, is taking off the grave clothes. It's taking off the
misunderstandings about what truth is and bringing our minds
and hearts in relationship to God and what God actually teaches
us. Now that's the third thing. The
fourth thing is about Lazarus that I want you to remember is
his communion. After regeneration, his calling,
we find something else takes place in our lives and in the
life of Lazarus. We have communion. Then six days
after the Passover came to Bethlehem where Lazarus was which had been
dead, whom he raised from the dead. They that made a supper,
Martha, served, and Lazarus was one of them at the table with
him. After so many days our Lord came
back to Bethany and he went to Lazarus' house and the scripture
is telling us that Lazarus was there and they made a supper
and the Lord came And there's two things that I want you to
think about. It was Lazarus' house, it was
Lazarus' table, but now something is completely different in the
life of this man. Lazarus truly was the owner and
had the table, but now the Lord is the master of the house. And
this is what happens in the life of those that God brings into
a relationship to Himself. not only start believing, but
we start communing with our Lord Jesus Christ. They sat at the
table and the Lord is the head of that table. He is the master
of not only of the casa, but as the master of the house that
Lazarus lived within. He was now the controller. He was the master of the heart
of Lazarus. So now the Lord is the special
guest into the house of Lazarus. The fifth thing and the last
now that I want you to see about Lazarus, and that is his conflict. This is a part of the message
that I want you to get. Once Lazarus was called, once
Lazarus was converted, once Lazarus was brought back into the community,
once he was loved around his family again, his life was changed. His life was changed in the point
that now he began to suffer the persecution that will come in
knowing and believing and trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ. It
was said in the scripture that they sought to kill him because
he had been blessed of our Lord, but the Lord did not bless anyone
else. People believed upon the Lord
Jesus Christ because of what happened to Lazarus. Someone
told me this week in this message with a positive note. in it with
a positive note. I said, okay, I will. The positive
note is found in John 16, 33, where our Lord says, I have overcome
the world. Though this life may be a life
of conflict in knowing our Lord Jesus Christ, yet the message
today is this, that our Lord has overcome the world. And in another part of the scripture,
in the Apostle Paul in Galatians, Paul talks about that everything
that has been done has been done by our Lord Jesus Christ. It is not for me to put together
a life for myself. It is that our Lord has put one
together for me. I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live, but I live
by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself
for me. This idea of the Christian life,
I think, sometimes gets turned upside down. We don't come to
the Lord Jesus Christ to have a happy and fulfilled life. We
come to the Lord Jesus Christ to serve Him and to give Him
praise and honor in this life, knowing that conflict will probably
come to this casa, to this life. Life in Christ means conflict. But always remember, This one
thing, if you receive nothing else from this message this afternoon
is that my life is not mine anymore. It is Christ and Christ alone. It's not what happens in this
life to me. It's the life that God has prepared
for me in glory. That is what brings us to this
realization of being a Christian, that God has died for me, He
has saved me, He has redeemed me, and He has prepared for me
a place in heaven. May God bless you this afternoon. May God bless this message to
your hearts.

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