NOTE: Back in December, you may recall i posted a series of short stories for the Advent season. i am acutely aware that with so much of our attention turned toward COVID-19, it could be easy for the hope and assurance of the Easter message to get lost in the noise. So i have decided to take a different track with my weekly blog posts for the weeks surrounding Easter. 

Starting last week and for the three following weeks, i am posting four short stories surrounding the ministry, crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. Though i will endeavor to keep each story factual as to the details conveyed through the Gospels – by their nature these stories will be fictional first person accounts involving both historical and fictional characters, as well as fictional details that have been incorporated into each narrative. My prayer is that, through the telling, we are reminded of the hope and assurance we have in Jesus. To that end, let’s look at the account through the eyes of these four people:

Lazarus's Story (March 25)

Miriam’s Story (This week - April 1)

Simon the Cyrene’s Story (April 8)

Simon Peter’s Story (April 15)

All four of these Easter stories will be included in the book The One Who Stood Before Us

Watch for its release FEBRUARY 2021

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My name is Miriam, but most of you know me as Mary. I am certain that you are also well acquainted with my brother Lazarus and my sister Martha. Surely you have heard the story of how Jesus of Nazareth healed my brother of his leprosy. It was a miracle of God! And our lives have not been the same since.

Before my brother contracted leprosy, ours was a life of privilege and ease. Our father’s industriousness had made our family quite prosperous. We wanted for nothing and we enjoyed the best of everything. We were one of the leading families in our town and enjoyed the privileges of that station.

But I don’t want you to think that we took our good fortune and privilege for granted. We did not. We knew our prosperity was a gift from God. We knew that He had blessed us abundantly. We tithed as the Law required, but we also gave generously over and above that which was required. We gave to help the poor and needy within our community. Our father had taught us to be faithful stewards of all that God had entrusted to us.

Our father had also taught us to be kind to our neighbor – whoever they might be. We were raised to lend a hand when needed, and to treat everyone equally regardless of their station. We strived to live at peace with everyone and to honor God in all that we did. As a result we were well-liked within our community – I dare say even that we were well-loved.

So when Lazarus came down with leprosy we were taken aback. We had always thought that leprosy was God’s punishment for unconfessed sin. But as best as Martha and I knew our brother, we could not imagine that to be the case. Even our priest and good friend Phinehas had agreed that God was surely not punishing Lazarus. It prompted me to continually ask God why He had permitted it. Surely it must be a mistake! Our brother did not deserve to suffer in that way!

After Lazarus went away, Martha and I noticed that many of our friends and neighbors became distant from us. Many who regularly had dined in our home barely now spoke a word to us. The many invitations that had always come our way had now become very rare. In many respects it was as if Martha and I had leprosy as well. I can honestly say that the affront did not weigh very heavily on us because our concern was for our brother. But we were still cognizant of the slight.

We had begun to hear stories about Jesus and the miracles of healing He was performing. Word was spreading about Him throughout the land. But we had never considered that He might come near enough to a leper to heal them. Our laws forbid us from coming in contact with someone who has leprosy. So we were certain no man of God would do so – even this Jesus. 

You cannot begin to imagine how our hearts soared when Amari, the overseer of our vineyard, came to us with the message that Lazarus had been healed by Jesus. It was all we could do to stay away from him for the eight additional days required by our laws. But Phinehas assured us that he had examined Lazarus’s body and he had been made clean. Those days passed slowly until we were finally able to reunite with our brother on the eighth day. He who had almost been dead was now restored to us. Our celebration continued for weeks!

We invited our friends and neighbors to join with us to celebrate. Some of them responded cautiously, questioning whether he had truly been healed. Others were hiding their embarrassment for the way they had treated us while Lazarus was suffering from his leprosy. But over time, all of our neighbors witnessed our brother’s healing and joined in the celebration with us. We made the decision to set aside our feelings regarding their affront and welcomed them back into our lives.

So you can imagine what the response was like that first day when Jesus arrived in Bethany! The news reached Lazarus that Jesus and His followers were on the outskirts of town making their arrival. Without a moment of hesitation, Lazarus ran to meet Him – and Martha and I quickly followed. Lazarus never stopped running until he had run straight into the arms of Jesus.

The two men embraced. Tears were streaming down Lazarus’s cheeks and Jesus was smiling broadly. I don’t know how long the two men stood there with their arms wrapped around one another. All I know is that’s how they were standing when Martha and I arrived. I immediately fell at the feet of Jesus and began to kiss the hem of His garment. Martha bowed her head and began to give Him thanks.

After a while He reached down and helped me to my feet, and turned Martha’s and my faces toward His. As I arose I will never forget the look in His eyes and the smile on His face. As I looked into His eyes, they were simultaneously kind and tender, but they were also strong and assuring. I was no longer conscious of anything or anyone else around me. It was as if He and I were the only two standing there. I felt a calm and a peace that I came to realize I would feel every time I was in His presence.

Lazarus interrupted the silence and introduced Martha and I to Jesus. He needed no introduction to us! Quickly, Lazarus added, “Jesus, You and Your followers must come to our home to dine!” I noticed Martha giving the crowd a quick look as she realized she now needed to make preparation for fifty guests joining us for dinner. But she never blinked. Martha would make it happen. If anyone could, she could!

We began the short journey to our home – Lazarus, Martha, me… and Jesus, together with all of His followers. I will confess I wasn’t much help to my sister that night. All I wanted to do was sit at the feet of Jesus – focused on His every word with rapt attention.

Later that night I had an opportunity to ask Jesus why my brother had contracted leprosy. “Surely, it wasn’t God punishing him for his sin, was it? I asked. “No,” Jesus replied. “It had nothing to do with his sin. It was so that the works of God could be displayed through him.”

God had chosen Lazarus to display His glory through him! I had never thought that could be the reason. That meant that Jesus had not come upon Lazarus by chance. He had sought out Lazarus. Jesus had known of his condition long before He had even seen Him!

While Lazarus had his leprosy, I had blamed God for all that had happened. But the reality was that God had entrusted him with a gift – the gift of being used by God to bring glory to His Name. It caused me to look at those events very differently!

From then on, whenever Jesus was near Bethany, he would lodge and dine with us. We knew Jesus to be the Messiah – our Messiah – but in some ways, He also became like a brother to us. He had become a part of our family – and we had become a part of His.

Our lives were again filled with laughter and hope. Our relationship with Jesus gave us a sense of security that we had never felt before we met Him. It was as if nothing terrible could ever happen to us again – because we were friends of Jesus. He had said that those whom He has made clean would never again be unclean. So it must follow that those who He healed could never again become sick. Or at least, that’s what we thought.

Until the day Lazarus fell ill. Early that morning he collapsed in the vineyard. Amari and a few of the workers carried him to our home. Martha placed her hand on his forehead and declared, “He is burning with fever. Send for the priest and the midwife to come treat him.” Martha and I helped the men lay him in his bed while two of the men ran to get Phinehas.

Soon after they arrived, the midwife applied a poultice to our brother’s body that she thought would help relieve his fever. Lazarus had not been conscious since his collapse, so he could not tell us anything. Phinehas was perplexed. He did not know what was wrong with Lazarus, but he told us he feared that Lazarus would not survive.

Martha and I looked at each other and together said, “Then we must send for Jesus. He will heal him! He will make our brother well. He has done it before and He will do it again! Our brother will not die!” With that, Amari sent off one of his swiftest men to carry the message to Jesus.

During His last visit, Jesus had told us that he would be staying in Bethabara for the winter season. It would require a day’s journey for a swift messenger to reach Him. Then it would take Jesus another day to travel here. So Lazarus needed to survive through the night and all through the next day so Jesus could arrive and make him well. Martha and I began to pray asking God to keep our brother alive.

We never lost hope. We knew the Father would hear our prayers. He had heard us before! And we knew Jesus would come. He had come to Lazarus before! We knew He would do it again. We were friends of Jesus. Surely our brother couldn’t die. That’s what we believed… right up to the moment Lazarus took his last breath. 

He never made it through the afternoon, let alone to the next day. The messenger would not have even yet arrived in Bethabara to tell Jesus. We were too late! I was devastated. I could not function in the midst of the grief that overwhelmed me. I was so certain that my brother would not die. Surely Jesus wouldn’t permit it. Jesus must have known Lazarus was sick. After all, He knew Lazarus had leprosy before He ever saw him. And we knew of reports where Jesus had healed people who were not in His physical presence, merely by speaking the words. Surely He could have healed Lazarus – the one He loved – from a day’s journey away. I began to sink into a deep hole of hopelessness and grief.

Martha, true to her nature, took charge. She immediately began giving instructions to everyone in the room to prepare our brother’s body for burial. His body would need to be prepared to lay in the tomb before sunset. Preparations would need to be done quickly. Each person was given a task – except me. I was paralyzed by my grief and could not move or speak.

Somehow, a few hours later, I found the strength to walk beside Martha in the funeral processional to the tomb. All I remember is the wailing and crying of the large number of people that surrounded us. I had been incapable of crying. I was so consumed by my grief that I could not feel anything else. Until… I heard the loud thud of the stone when it was moved into place to cover the opening of the tomb. That sound unleashed a flood of tears – a flood that would not stop!

That night and the next day passed slowly – slower than any day I have ever known. How could I face Jesus when He arrived that night? How could I ever trust Him again? Until now, I had always looked forward to Jesus’s arrival – but that was no longer the case.

I could see that Martha was directing the great crowd of friends who had come to comfort us to prepare for Jesus to arrive. She kept a watchful eye for Him. But He didn’t come! Our messenger returned with the report that he had given the message to Jesus. That morning when he had departed to return to us, there had been no sign that Jesus and His disciples were making preparations to travel here. The messenger had no message for us, other than the statement that Jesus had made in his presence to His disciples: “Lazarus’ sickness will not end in death. It has happened for the glory of God so that the Son of God will receive glory from this.”(1)

But Lazarus’s sickness had ended in death! Even Jesus hadn’t been able to prevent it! I sank deeper into my pit of sorrow and hopelessness. And as each day passed, I sank even deeper.

It was now late afternoon on the fourth day since Lazarus’s body had been in the tomb. We were in the house surrounded by the many friends and neighbors that continued to try to console us. Martha was dealing with her grief by keeping everything – and everyone – organized. 

I no longer was expecting Jesus to arrive. I couldn’t understand why He hadn’t come. But it was too late now for Him to do anything. So I was somewhat surprised when Amari came to Martha and I to tell us that Jesus had arrived. He was waiting at the outskirts of town. Momentarily I thought of that first day Jesus had come to Bethany. I thought of my excitement to see Him. I thought of how we had run to see Him. I thought of the joy. I thought of the way He had smiled at me and looked into my eyes. But today was a very different day. And truth be told, I didn’t want to see Jesus.

Martha told me that she would go out to speak with Him. She was gone for a while before she returned to me and said, “The Teacher is here and wants to see you.”(2) As much as I didn’t want to go, I knew I must. So I went outside the village to the place where Martha had met Him. When I arrived and saw Jesus, my heart compelled me to fall at His feet and say, “Lord, if only You had been here, my brother would not have died.”(3) As the last word crossed my lips, I began to weep uncontrollably.

I felt the presence of a crowd gathering around us. Apparently those who had been in the house with me had followed me to this place. I heard them also begin to wail. Then I heard Jesus interrupt them by asking, “Where have you put him?”(4) 

Someone in the crowd responded, “Lord, come and see.”(5) At that moment, Jesus began to weep, and He reached down and helped me to my feet so we could walk together to the tomb. At the time I thought Jesus’s tears were tears of grief over Lazarus’s death. I would soon realize that He had an altogether different reason for weeping.

When we arrived at the tomb, He instructed someone in the crowd, “Roll the stone aside.”(6) By then, Martha had also joined us at the tomb, so she spoke up, protesting, “Lord, he has been dead for four days. The smell will be terrible.”(7) To which Jesus replied, “Didn’t I tell you that you would see God’s glory if you believe?”(8) 

At that moment I remembered what Jesus had said to me that first day when I had asked him why Lazarus had contracted leprosy. He had said, “So that the works of God could be displayed through him.” Suddenly I realized how small my faith had become and how easily I had turned my back on Jesus. I realized that Jesus had not been weeping over Lazarus’s death; He was weeping over my disbelief!

Tears continued to flow from my eyes but they were no longer tears of grief over my brother, they had become tears of grief over my sin against my Master!

In that moment, I heard Jesus say in a loud voice, “Father, thank You for hearing Me. I know that You always hear Me, but I said it out loud for the sake of all these people standing here, so that they will believe You sent Me.”(9)

Then He shouted, “Lazarus, come out!”(10)

The crowd around us became silent. They were amazed that Jesus would say such a thing. But I now knew that my brother was going to walk out of that tomb. Lazarus’s illness was not unto death. It was so the works of God could be displayed through him! I immediately knew my brother was alive!

All eyes were on the entrance of the tomb. It seemed like time stood still, but suddenly my brother came hopping out of the entrance of that tomb. His hands and feet were bound in graveclothes, so that he was unable to walk. All he could do was hop. His face was wrapped in a headcloth, so Jesus told those that were closest to him, “Unwrap him and let him go!”(11)

Amari stepped forward and began to unwrap the grave clothes from Lazarus. Soon others joined him. In a matter of minutes, they had unwrapped his arms and his legs, and removed the head covering. There standing in front of everyone of us was my brother! 

Martha ran toward him. I hesitated for a moment because I didn’t know which to do –  whether to fall at the feet of my Lord or run to the side of my brother. I finally chose the latter. 

The crowd momentarily stood there in silence, but soon shouts of “Hosanna!” began to erupt. Then one by one, everyone in the crowd began to kneel at the feet of Jesus. Every person there knew they were standing on holy ground. 

Martha and I helped Lazarus, as the three of us walked together to Jesus and knelt at His feet. I was back in that place of calm and peace that is His presence. I knew that wherever He is, is holy ground. I knew that from then on I would always choose to remain at His feet. I would always choose to worship and adore Him. Because the One who stood before me is worthy!

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(1) John 11:4 (NLT)

(2) John 11:28 (NLT)

(3) John 11:32 (NLT)

(4) John 11:34 (NLT)

(5) John 11:34 (NLT)

(6) John 11:39 (NLT)

(7) John 11:39 (NLT)

(8) John 11:40 (NLT)

(9) John 11:41-42 (NLT)

(10) John 11:43 (NLT)

(11) John 11:44 (NLT)

 Copyright © 2020 Kenneth A. Winter All rights reserved.

First published on kenwinter.org 01-Apr-20