Page 12 12 ENCOUNTER 2 Early A.D. 30 Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus of Bethany, the town of Mary and her sister Martha . . . Therefore the sisters sent to Him, saying, “Lord, behold, he whom You love is sick” . . . Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So, when He heard that he was sick, He stayed two more days in the place where He was . . . “Our friend Lazarus sleeps, but I go that I may wake him up” . . . Then, when Mary came where Jesus was, and saw Him, she fell down at His feet, saying to Him, “Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died” . . . Jesus wept . . . Then Jesus, again groaning in Himself, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay against it. Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of him who was dead, said to Him, “Lord, by this time there is a stench, for he has been dead four days” . . . Now when He had said these things, He cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come forth!” And he who had died came out bound hand and foot with graveclothes, and his face was wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Loose him, and let him go.” (John 11:1-44) This story, which I’ve abbreviated above, takes us further into the meaning of Bethany as it relates to the Lord’s heart for His church. Love and Friendship Note that at the beginning of this narrative, we are told that Jesus loved Martha, Mary, and Lazarus. And that love was felt and understood. Listen to Mary and Martha’s words, “He whom you love is sick.” The Lord’s love for them wasn’t an abstract idea. They knew it, and they were confident in it. Notice also that Jesus called Lazarus His friend. Listen to His words: “Our friend Lazarus sleeps.” In John 15, the Lord said to His disciples, “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.” Love and friendship. These two words sum up the heart of Bethany. Bethany is the
In His excellent piece, “of Marriage after Divorce in Case of Adultery,” John Owen pointed out that to insist that divorce simply secures a legal separation but does not dissolve the marriage relation would bring in a state harmful to men. God has appointed marriage to be a remedy against incontinence (1 Cor. 7:2), but if innocent parties lawfully divorced may not marry again, then they are deprived of this remedy and debarred from this benefit. If the divorced person has not the gift of continency, it is the express will of God that he should marry for his relief; yet on the supposition of the objector he sins if he marries again, yea is guilty of the horrible crime of adultery. Is not this quite sufficient to expose the untenability of such and anomoly?
A.W. Pink