The Resurrection & the Life: Knowing Christ – The “I AM” Sayings of Jesus with R.C. Sproul

Devotional

Day 1: When God’s Timing Feels Like Absence

Jesus loved Lazarus deeply yet delayed coming. His deliberate waiting shattered expectations, letting death’s finality set in so resurrection’s power could rewrite the story. Trust is refined when God’s ways clash with our urgency. The sisters’ cry—“if you had been here”—echoes our confusion when heaven’s clock ticks differently than ours. But divine delays are not divine neglect. [01:37]

“Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So, when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.”
(John 11:5-6, ESV)

Reflection: Where have you equated God’s timing with His absence? How might His delay be preparing a deeper revelation of His character?

Day 2: “If You Had Been Here”: Lament as Faith’s Raw Edge

Martha’s grief carried both accusation and fragile hope. Her raw honesty—“if you had been here”—didn’t disqualify her faith but framed it. Jesus didn’t rebuke her pain; He redirected her vision. True belief isn’t polished certainty but the courage to bring shattered expectations to the One who holds resurrection. [07:21]

“Martha said to Jesus, ‘Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you.’”
(John 11:21-22, ESV)

Reflection: What unmet longing do you need to voice to Jesus today? How might His response surprise your understanding of His care?

Day 3: Four Days Dead: When Hope Seems Irreversible

Lazarus’ decay wasn’t just biological but theological—a point of no return. Jewish tradition saw the fourth day as the soul’s final departure. Jesus let death win visibly so His victory would leave no doubt. He specializes in hopeless cases, rewriting endings when every human clock has stopped. [05:28]

“Jesus said, ‘Take away the stone.’ Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, ‘Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days.’”
(John 11:39, ESV)

Reflection: What situation feels “four days dead” in your life? How might Jesus be inviting you to confront decay with His creative command?

Day 4: “I Am the Resurrection”: Present Tense Eternity

Jesus didn’t say, “I bring resurrection” but “I am the resurrection.” Eternal life isn’t a future event but a present Person. The Zoe-life He gives cannot be extinguished by death. To know Him is to possess unkillable life—a reality that transforms how we grieve, risk, and face mortality. [09:45]

“Jesus said to her, ‘I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die.’”
(John 11:25-26, ESV)

Reflection: How does knowing eternal life begins now change your perspective on today’s struggles? Where do you need to lean into His “never die” promise?

Day 5: Unbinding Stones: From Resurrection to Liberation

Lazarus walked out alive but still bound. Jesus’ power raised him; the community’s hands loosed him. Resurrection always invites participation—rolling away stones of doubt, ungrappling grave-clothes of old identities. New life demands both divine intervention and human obedience to dismantle what entombs. [21:08]

“He cried out with a loud voice, ‘Lazarus, come out.’ The man who had died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, ‘Unbind him, and let him go.’”
(John 11:43-44, ESV)

Reflection: What “grave clothes” still bind you or others? How is Jesus calling you to partner in His liberating work today?

Sermon Summary

John places Jesus at Bethany after Lazarus has been dead four days, when every human expectation of help has already collapsed. Jesus receives the sisters’ plea, “Behold, the one you love is sick,” yet He remains where He is two more days. Christ’s delay does not deny His love for Martha, Mary, and Lazarus. Christ’s delay serves the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through what appears to be an irreversible loss.

Martha meets Jesus with both faith and rebuke: “Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died.” Martha believes that God hears Christ, and she believes in a future resurrection on the last day. Jesus redirects Martha from a doctrine located only in the future to the Person standing before her: “I am the resurrection and the life.” Christ does not merely possess resurrection power, nor does He merely promise resurrection at the end of history. Christ Himself is the resurrection, and Christ Himself is the life.

The question raised by Job, “If a man die, shall he live again?” stands behind every human encounter with death. Human philosophy, nature, and speculation can raise the question, but they cannot settle it. Christ’s historical resurrection supplies the Christian hope, because His resurrection is not an isolated event but the firstfruits of the resurrection His people will share. Christ turns death from Satan’s apparent victory into a transition from life in this world to life in the presence of God.

Christ’s words distinguish physical death from the destruction of eternal life. “He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live,” because the Zoe life Christ gives begins when faith is born in the heart. Thanatos cannot kill that life. Physical death may bring the body to the grave, but it cannot terminate the believer’s personal existence or sever the believer from Christ.

John then brings Christ to Lazarus’s tomb, where Jesus weeps and groans before the reality of death. Christ does not treat grief as unreal, yet He confronts death with the authoritative word of God. “Lazarus, come forth” carries the same divine power by which God created the universe. Lazarus comes out alive, still bound in grave clothes, and Christ commands, “Loose him and let him go.”

Revelation identifies the risen Christ as the One who lives, was dead, and is alive forevermore. Christ holds the keys of hell and death. Christianity without resurrection becomes empty moralism, but Christ the resurrection and the life remains the only sufficient answer wherever life and death are found.

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Key Takeaways

1. Christ’s delay is never loveless [01:37] Christ loved Lazarus, Martha, and Mary, yet He did not arrive according to their timetable. Divine love is not measured by immediate relief from pain. God may permit the situation to reach the point where human strength, strategy, and expectation are exhausted, so that His glory is seen plainly. [01:37]
2. Resurrection is a Person [09:15] Martha looked toward a future event, but Christ stood before her as the reality of that hope. Christian confidence does not finally rest on an abstract belief that things will work out. Christian confidence rests on the living Christ, who possesses life in Himself and gives it to whom He wills. [09:15]
3. Eternal life outlives physical death [16:38] The life Christ gives begins now, at the birth of faith, not merely after the grave. Physical death can touch the body, but it cannot destroy the life that is united to Christ. The believer’s final future is therefore not extinction, but fuller consciousness in the presence of Christ. [16:38]
4. Christ speaks life into death [21:58] Lazarus could not cooperate with Christ’s command, prepare himself for it, or contribute anything to his own restoration. Christ’s word creates what it commands. The same Lord who called a corpse from the tomb remains sovereign over every power that appears final and unanswerable.

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Youtube Chapters

[00:00] - Welcome
[00:15] - Jesus Goes to Bethany
[01:06] - A Sickness for God’s Glory
[01:37] - The Mystery of Christ’s Delay
[03:04] - Lazarus Is Dead
[04:33] - Four Days in the Tomb
[07:06] - Martha’s Grief and Rebuke
[08:35] - The Resurrection at the Last Day
[09:15] - I Am the Resurrection and the Life
[11:16] - The Human Question About Death
[14:40] - Christ’s Resurrection and Christian Hope
[16:38] - Eternal Life Cannot Be Killed
[20:12] - Jesus Weeps at Lazarus’s Tomb
[21:58] - Lazarus, Come Forth
[23:23] - Christ Holds the Keys of Death

Bible Study Guide

Bible Reading

John 11:25-26
Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” [09:15]

John 11:43-44
When he had said these things, he cried out with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out.” The man who had died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.” [21:58]

Revelation 1:17-18
When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, “Fear not, I am the first and the last, and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades.” [23:41]

Observation questions

What details show that Jesus loved Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, even though He stayed where He was for two more days after hearing Lazarus was sick? [01:33]
What does Martha say she believes about Lazarus’s future, and how does Jesus shift her attention from a future event to Himself? [08:42]
In John 11:25-26, what two kinds of death or life seem to be in view when Jesus says believers may die and yet “shall never die”? [16:41]
What actions and words of Jesus are recorded at Lazarus’s tomb before and after Lazarus comes out? [20:29]

Interpretation questions

How does Jesus’s delay in coming to Bethany help explain how God’s love and God’s glory can both be present in a painful situation? [01:37]
Why is it important that Jesus says, “I am the resurrection and the life,” rather than only promising to raise Lazarus at the last day? [09:24]
What does Lazarus’s inability to do anything for himself in the tomb reveal about the power of Christ’s command to give life? [22:01]
Revelation says that the risen Jesus holds “the keys of Death and Hades.” What does that image communicate to believers facing death, grief, or fear? [24:00]

Application questions

Is there an area of life where Christ’s timing feels delayed or confusing? How might the truth that Christ’s delay is never loveless shape the way that situation is brought to Him in prayer? [01:37]
Martha honestly told Jesus, “If You had been here, my brother would not have died.” What disappointments, losses, or unanswered prayers are difficult to express honestly before Christ? What would it look like to bring both faith and grief to Him?
Jesus asks Martha, “Do you believe this?” When fear of death, illness, or uncertainty rises, what does it look like in practical terms to trust Jesus Himself as the resurrection and the life? [19:34]
Eternal life begins when faith is born in the heart, and physical death cannot destroy the life Christ gives. How could this hope change the way a believer speaks with someone who is grieving or facing serious illness? [17:35]
Jesus wept at Lazarus’s tomb even though He was about to raise Lazarus. How does Christ’s grief encourage a person who may feel pressure to hide sorrow or “move on” too quickly? [20:18]
Lazarus came out of the tomb still wrapped in grave clothes, and Jesus said, “Unbind him, and let him go.” Are there old patterns, fears, sins, or wounds that still feel like grave clothes? What help from Christ and His people might be needed to walk in freedom? [22:53]
Christ is alive forevermore and holds the keys of death. How can this truth give courage to live faithfully now, especially in a place where following Christ may involve loss, rejection, or suffering? [24:07]

Sermon Clips

The one who is the resurrection and the life has the key to unlock the grave. To unlock the power of death so that we have nothing to fear from death because for the Christian it is a magnificent entrance to the supreme setting of human life. That's at the heart of the Christian faith. Without that Christianity is simply empty moralism that is irrelevant to modern man. But as long as there's life and as long as there is death, there's no one more relevant than Christ who is the resurrection and the life. [00:24:07]

And so the idea here is that the Zoe this eternal life that he comes to give to his people begins in the soul the moment faith is born in the heart. And that Zoe life cannot be killed by thanatos. Physical death cannot destroy the life that Christ puts into the believer. So, even if you go through physical death you don't die. [00:17:31]

If a man die shall he live again? That question has been in the minds of every human being since death was first experienced on this planet. In every culture, in every tribe, in every civilization, we see people speculating about the question of death and the afterlife. The obvious question is, when I die, is that the end? Is the whole of my existence summed up between the two points of birth and death, such as are marked on people's graves? Or is there something else? Is there something more? [00:11:29]

What's all behind this this concept of resurrection is Christ's promise of the continuity of personal existence. The day that my body dies is not the day that I die. That is the day I become more conscious of reality than I've ever been up until the point of my death. In a very real sense, the ultimate life for which God has made us as living beings doesn't begin until we cross the veil. [00:18:04]

The greatest hope that we have in the world for life after death is found in the historical resurrection of Christ, which the New Testament sets before us not as an isolated incidence or incident, but as an event that is the first of a multitude of events similar to it that will at some point follow. [00:14:31]

"I am the resurrection and the life and he who believes in me though he may die he shall live." And then he goes on to say in the next breath, "And whoever lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?" [00:16:41]

And so Jesus is is so connected with the power over death and the power of eternal life, the power of resurrection, that he is saying here to Martha, "Not only do I have the power to raise people from the dead and not only do I have the power to raise myself from the dead but I am the resurrection." [00:10:55]

And all of that comes down not to an argument but to a person. Where Jesus says, "You're thinking about future resurrection? Listen, Martha. I am the resurrection and the life." [00:15:57]

"Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last. I am he who lives and was dead. And behold, I am alive forevermore. And I have the keys of hell and of death." [00:23:41]

And they were convinced that death was not the final dimension. That now death instead of being a bitter, uh, victory for Satan over us that death had been defeated and now for the Christian death was simply a transition from life here to life in an even better environment and better situation. [00:15:30]

Or is there something else? Is there something more? Life is so precious to humans that there beats within every human heart a hope that somehow there will be victory over the grave. [00:12:17]

And as soon as Jesus cries in that loud voice and gives the imperative of God himself to the dead Lazarus, that heart began to beat and began to pump blood through his vessels. Brain waves began, the rotting tissue became healed, strength entered back into him, and Lazarus, who had died, came out bound hand and foot with grave clothes, his face wrapped in a cloth, but he was alive. [00:22:23]

Jesus does not say, "I will be the one who will raise him in the last day." What he does say is, "I am the resurrection and the life." Now, this is an astonishing claim and declaration by Jesus. [00:09:34]

And now as he's comforting Martha, he's telling her, "Look, Martha, we're not just talking future resurrection here. You're talking to the one who is the resurrection and the life." And he says, "Do you believe this?" [00:19:31]

And what he is saying there, idiomatically, is that God is so loving, so closely connected with love that it could be said that he is the very reality of which we're speaking. [00:10:38]

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Why did Jesus delay despite loving Lazarus?

What does resurrection reveal about Christian hope?

How does Christ transform the meaning of physical death?