Recommended Citation:
Lawal, J. O. (2025, April 2). Love is not always in a hurry. Youth for Jesus, 7(46).
“Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. Yet when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days.” (John 11:5-6NIV)
When you love someone, how do you treat anything that concerns them? You treat it with all the seriousness it requires. But that does not seem to be what we see in our opening text. As we see in it, Jesus loved Lazarus, Martha and their sister, Mary. Yet when he heard that Lazarus was sick, He stayed where He was two more days.
Now that did not look like an expression of love, or did it? No, it did not. If He had loved Lazarus indeed, then, He would have been in a hurry to get to him before he died. But He did not do that. Instead, He waited until the man had been in the tomb four days before He went to raise him up from the dead. And that made everything look like He deliberately used Lazarus’ misery to promote His own glory.
But was it really like that? No, it was not like that. As the account shows us, even though Jesus waited two more days where He was when He heard that Lazarus was sick, the man was already lying in the tomb four days by the time He got to his town. That would mean that it took the messenger that had brought Him the news at least one day to get Him, just as it took Him at least one day to get to Lazarus’ place. Judging by that, Lazarus had already died by the time the man that brought Jesus news of his illness got to Him.
More so, Jesus Himself later plainly told His disciples that Lazarus was dead, that is, before they all left for his place (John 11:14). How did He know that? It was by divine revelation. So, Jesus did not wait two more days where He was because He wanted Lazarus to die before He would go and see him. Rather, He waited that way because He knew that the man was already dead and there was no need to be in a rush to go and raise him up.
But then, He could still have left immediately to raise Lazarus from the dead. And if He had done that, Lazarus’ sisters and their people would not have had to mourn him as much as they did. But He did not do that. Instead, He waited two more days before going to see him. Why?
Well, in answering that, first, Jesus was not in a hurry to go and raise Lazarus from the dead because He knew that the power of God could not be hindered by time or decay. So, regardless of when He got to where Lazarus was, the power of God would still work in bringing the man back to life.
Second, if Jesus had immediately gone to raise Lazarus up from the dead, his family and others with them may not have appreciated the awesomeness of God’s power as they did when He raised him up when his body was already decaying and smelling. In fact, some people may even have said that the reason it was easy for Him to bring him back to life was that Lazarus merely fainted or went into a coma for a while. And that way, they would have dismissed any involvement of the mighty power of God in what happened to him.
But Jesus would not make it easy for anyone to dismiss the awesomeness of God’s power as nothing. So, even though He loved Lazarus and his sisters very much, He handled the bringing back of the man from death to life in such a way that everyone who got to know about it would appreciate it and glorify God for it. And that is showing us that true love is not always in a hurry to help or solve problems. Rather, it is always thoughtful enough to handle whatever it does to help others in such a way that it will be adequately and appropriately appreciated.
Unfortunately, many of us know nothing about this quality of love. Therefore, we are often in a hurry to express our love to people anyhow, instead of acting in thoughtfulness in expressing it. But there are times that love needs to let people appreciate the enormousness of their problems in order for them to also appreciate the solution that it offers them. Otherwise, they may just treat an invaluable gift of love as something ordinary or common. And where that is the case, love may be wounded, paralysed or killed. That explains why some people now find it hard to act in love towards anyone. Their love was wounded, paralysed or killed by some who should have appreciated it.
Well, if you don’t want that to happen to your love for anybody, don’t always make something difficult look easy, just because you can do it. And don’t always make something expensive look cheap, just because you can afford it. Then learn to let people see the need for them to be helped before stepping in to help. Otherwise, you may just make your love or acts of love look like nothing to individuals who have difficulties recognising genuine love.
Cheers!
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