Interrupted by Jesus - John 11

This is our Sunday teaching by our wonderful intern, Nimesh Roshan! Recorded live at our Sunday Service in Harris Academy Purley, Croydon on Sunday 9th August, 2026. 

The Indestructible Life

There are few things more brutally real than death. It is personal, painful and unavoidable. In John 11, Mary and Martha are living right in the middle of that reality: their brother Lazarus has died, and Jesus has arrived too late.

Both sisters say almost exactly the same thing to him: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” But Jesus responds to each of them differently.

To Martha, Jesus speaks with extraordinary authority: “I am the resurrection and the life.” He redirects her grief towards hope. To Mary, Jesus responds with tears. He enters her grief and weeps alongside her.

That tells us something beautiful about Jesus. He is not distant from our suffering. He knows when we need truth spoken over us and when we simply need someone to weep with us. He meets grief with both authority and compassion.

And perhaps most strikingly, Jesus himself is angry in the face of death. John tells us that he was “deeply moved” — language carrying a sense of indignation and agitation. Death is not simply something Jesus calmly accepts. He confronts it because he loves us.

Then comes the moment nobody expects.

“Lazarus, come out!”

A dead man walks out of his tomb.

Yet even then the story is not quite finished. Lazarus is alive, but he is still wrapped in grave clothes. Jesus tells those around him: “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”

That is a powerful picture of the Christian life. Jesus does not merely promise resurrection someday in the future. His resurrection life begins in us now. He makes us alive — and then invites us to leave behind everything that still belongs to death: shame, fear, bitterness, pride and the old identities that keep us bound.

The invitation is not simply to believe that Jesus can give us life after death. It is to follow the One who is the resurrection and the life.

Jesus entered death, defeated it from the inside, and now shares his indestructible life with anyone who trusts him.

So where are the grave clothes still clinging to you?

Listen to Jesus. Receive prayer. Let him call you out into freedom.

Come out. Take off the grave clothes. Live.