And having said this, he cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth.
At the tomb of a man four days dead, Jesus does not touch, gesture, or plead. He calls one name, and a dead man walks out.
Everything at the tomb worked against that command. One writer lists the obstacles:
He commanded again, crying with a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out." The one who was dead came out. He was bound hand and foot with grave clothes, his face wrapped in a cloth. Everything there stood in the way of obeying the command — his limbs tied, his face wrapped up. But the word of command was a word of power. Life returned to the body. Strength and vigour returned to the limbs. But had he really died? Had life really left his body? He had been dead and buried for four days. So the miracle could not be denied. If Lazarus came out of the tomb, it was the Lazarus who had died. His resurrection was beyond dispute.
The same writer notes what is missing here:
There was no personal contact with the Lord, as there had been with the daughter of Jairus. He only spoke, and it was done. He, who called all creation into existence, called Lazarus out from the dead by His word.
Jesus had just spoken to the Father. So did Lazarus rise in answer to that prayer?
With a loud voice He calls, "Lazarus, come out!" So Lazarus did not rise in answer to prayer. He rose at the Lord's own authoritative, divine word. Lazarus came out, even though he was bound hand and foot with grave clothes. His face was covered too. He could not see where he was going. But the power was in the voice that called him — the power of resurrection life.
He did not say only, "Come out." He said, "Lazarus, come out." One writer points out what that name did:
At last He cried with a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out." Others have pointed this out: if our Lord had not said "Lazarus," all the dead would have risen. The name marked out the one who was to be subject to His divine life-giving power.
The same choosing will mark His return:
Others besides Lazarus were dead and lying in their tombs at Bethany. But the Lord only spoke to the one whom He knew and loved. He made a selection among those who were in the grave. And when the Lord comes down from heaven with a shout, only those who know that voice will respond.
Christ did not need the stone moved, the shout, or the bandages. He used them to teach us:
He could have set Lazarus free as easily as He could have made the stone disappear. He could have willed it all without crying with a loud voice. But He wants us to trust the power of His word. So He would have us notice the corruption that comes before He gives life, and the bondage that may follow it now. Liberty is needed as well as life; but it is unnatural that someone who has been made to live should stay bound.
Christ had already claimed to be the resurrection. What happens at this grave reaches far past it:
"I am the resurrection," He had said. He proved it here. What happened to Lazarus is a pledge of that power which will call every sleeping saint from the tomb. It is a pledge, too, of that power which will call all the ungodly dead to appear at the great white throne. Nothing could stop Lazarus obeying the voice of Christ. Nothing will be able to hold the bodies of the ungodly dead in the grave. God's people can find encouragement from this account. When He calls His own from the tomb, every one of them will come out.
Read as a picture, the call and the untying trace what happens to a sinner who hears Christ's word:
A second word He spoke: "Loose him and let him go." Lazarus is a type of a sinner who hears His Word. We are dead in trespasses and sins. Spiritually, man is in the grave, in death and in darkness. He is in corruption. The Lord of Life gives life. And besides this He gives, along with that life, liberty. He sets us free from the bondage of the law and of sin. In the next chapter we read of Lazarus again. He is in fellowship with the Lord who raised him from the dead. Whoever hears and believes receives three blessed things: life, liberty and fellowship.
- Voice. No touch, no hand on the body — the One who called creation into being called Lazarus out by word alone.
- Name. The voice was aimed. Among all the dead at Bethany, "Lazarus" marked out one man to hear it.
- Display. Christ needed no stone moved, no loud cry, no bandages. He used them to teach us to trust the power of His word.
- Pledge. What happened to one man is a sample of what will happen to every sleeping believer, and to the ungodly dead as well.
- Sequence. First life, then liberty, then fellowship — the next chapter shows Lazarus with the Lord who raised him.
And the dead came forth, bound feet and hands with graveclothes, and his face was bound round with a handkerchief. Jesus says to them, Loose him and let him go.
The dead man walks out of the tomb still tied up in his burial cloths. Then the Lord speaks a second time — not to raise him, but to set him free. Two words of Christ, and two different gifts: life, and then liberty. (The writers quote the older wording "Loose him, and let him go." The ESV reads "Unbind him, and let him go.")
Lazarus obeyed a command that no dead man could obey. Linen strips tied his hands and feet, and a cloth covered his face.
With a loud voice He calls, "Lazarus, come out!" So Lazarus was not raised in answer to prayer, but by the Lord's own commanding, divine word. Though his hands and feet were tied with grave clothes, Lazarus came out. His face was covered too (v. 44). He could not see where he was going, but the power was in the voice that called him — the power of resurrection life. The miracle is complete and perfect.
The Lord who could call a man back from death could have removed the wrappings just as easily. One writer explains why He did not.
What was the difficulty of the stone to Him? For Himself He needed to remove nothing. It was for their sakes. Look at man in the disgusting state of death before he was raised! And what did the binding of the grave clothes, or of the cloth over his face, matter to Him now? … He could have freed Lazarus as easily as He could have made the stone vanish. He could have willed it all without crying with a loud voice. But He wants us to trust the power of His word, and so He would have us notice the decay that comes before He gives life, and the bondage that can follow it now. We need liberty as well as life. It is unnatural that anyone made to live should stay bound any longer.
Between the two words of Jesus there is a living man who can do nothing at all. That gap is the point.
There is not only life, but liberty. When Lazarus heard the voice of the Son of God, he came out. Yet his hands and feet were tied with grave clothes, and he could not see, or walk, or move at all. But when the second word reached him, "Loose him and let him go," he gets liberty.
Christ raises the dead; the untying He leaves to the people standing there. One writer reads the wrappings as marks of a religious system that stamps men with death, and hears the command as still in force.
"Loose him and let him go," is now the word that sets him free. The Lord wills that those who have received life from Him should enjoy it in all its blessed freedom, free from the grave clothes of Judaism, which were meant to stamp men with death, and not with life. "Loose him and let him go," is the Lord's word now to the evangelist and to the teacher. … the Son of God is glorified in freedom, not in bondage.
Set this tomb beside the empty tomb of Jesus. The burial cloths tell two opposite stories.
When Lazarus came out of his tomb at the command of the Lord, his hands and feet were tied with grave clothes. They were evidence that he would have to return to that grave again, and he needed friendly hands to loose him and let him go. But the sacred body of Jesus did not need such friendly service. It did not rise from the dead wrapped in the clothes of death. He left them behind Him, undisturbed by His rising.
Because Lazarus walked out in flesh and blood, writers hold that this scene is not chiefly a picture of the believer's future body.
Strictly speaking, it was not a pledge to the saints that they would rise in glorious bodies, for Lazarus came out bound hand and foot with grave clothes, to walk again in flesh and blood. It was instead a pledge to Israel of the life-giving power of the Son of God on their behalf. It showed them that the promised resurrection, or revival, of the nation rested on Him, and that He would bring it about at the right time.
- Voice. Tied hand and foot, with a cloth over his face, Lazarus still came out. The power was not in his legs but in the voice that called him.
- Life. Only the Son of God gives it. He gave it here by His own commanding word, not in answer to prayer.
- Liberty. A living man can still be tied up. The second word, not the first, let him see, walk and move.
- Hands. Christ raised him; others untied him. That command still reaches the evangelist and the teacher, because the Son of God is glorified in freedom, not in bondage.
- Limit. Lazarus kept his grave clothes, proof he would need that grave again. Christ left His behind. One man was restored to life; the other rose as Victor.