My story is short, but it’s important. It starts with my doctor entering my room with the expression.
Have you ever seen that expression? The one the doctor wears when he’s about to shatter your life? The expression that makes your blood run cold and your insides knot up before he says a word?
I hate that expression.
The doctor was kind. His tone was quiet… somber. He was a good guy, I had spent a lot of time in his presence over the preceding days. Beneath his professional demeanor was something else. I believed he truly cared about me as a person, not just another patient. That’s the best kind of doctor you can have, I think.
This time though, that caring had a very specific name. It was pity.
There was nothing more to be done. My time on this earth was coming to a close and modern medicine was out of its depth. For all the advances we have made as a species, death remains the certain end.
My sisters were in the room with me. Their incessant bickering stopped as they prepared together to greet what was coming.
Mary, my encourager, comforting and sweet, she smiled bravely at me as the doctor said aloud the words we didn’t want to hear: there was nothing he could do. Whatever was making me sick was merciless. I would be dead within a day, maybe two.
Martha, my anchor, stern and businesslike as always, pursued the doctor into the hallway. I remember smiling as I heard her fierce whispers. Even though I couldn’t make out the words, I’d heard that tone of voice enough growing up that I felt sorry for the doctor.
Mary, sat on the edge of my bed, held my hand in both of hers and tried to hide her tears with her long hair. Moments later, Martha re-entered the room, her “don’t test me” face still firmly in place. She told me she had been texting one of the teacher’s students students and told them of my situation.
“Everything will be fine, Laz,” Martha said. “He’ll come and you will be fine. You know He can. You’re going to be fine.”
I believed her. The teacher was close to our family. We were all friends. We saw the things He could do. We knew the rumors about who He must be. He would come and I would live. It was what He did.
I know it sounds crazy, believe me. My sisters and I have heard of faith healers, and these guys on TV who have performed amazing miracles unexplainable by science, but maybe explainable by a little smoke and mirrors and crowd psychology. None of us are fools. Mary is a little quicker to believe perhaps, but Martha would never put her faith in someone unproven. It simply isn’t her nature.
Here’s the thing. The teacher has proven Himself to be the genuine article. He has healed so many. He’s done so much. I can’t even begin to tell you the stories I’ve heard.
He would come. I would be fine. I smiled as I fell asleep.
Fast forward two days. He hadn’t come. Mary had cried herself out already. She just sat with me, holding my hand while we waited. Martha’s strain was apparent, even though she thought she was hiding it from us. I knew hope was lost when she finally broke down and sobbed. That’s the last thing I remember.
PAUSE
I wish I could tell you what I experienced, that I saw a bright light or that I heard the voice of God or that angels flew me to my rest. I can’t. I simply don’t remember. All I remember is Martha crying. Then I heard a familiar voice say in a loud voice: “Lazarus, come out!”
My eyes opened. Why were they closed? I didn’t remember falling asleep. Where was I? I was cold and even though my eyes were open, it was completely dark. I felt cold steel beneath me and when I lifted my arms they banged into a steel ceiling. Claustrophobia started to set in, but I felt warm air around my feet. Not everything was dark. Looking down I saw a sterile looking room filled with familiar faces, and him! The teacher, Jesus had come! I pushed against the wall behind me to slide off the counter and discovered it wasn’t a counter at all but a sliding shelf. Sitting up and looking around I realized I was in a morgue! Good grief! A morgue!
I wasn’t sick... I was dead!
I looked around, bewildered and saw faces. Faces that spoke volumes, I saw shock, joy, elation. The teacher said something quietly and my sisters Mary and Martha approached me and helped me down off the morgue drawer.
They told me that when he arrived I had been dead for four days and preparations were being made to inter my body at Brookside cemetery.
My story is short, but it’s important. I know Jesus, and I was dead, but now I’m alive.