Raised by Love

John 15:13

As we arrive at John 11:38–55, the atmosphere is heavy with expectation because Jesus stands before the tomb of Lazarus, surrounded by grief, confusion, and fear; the stone is sealed, the mourning has begun, and the future seems already decided. Yet Jesus does something radical: He calls life out of death, so this moment is not only about Lazarus; it is an announcement, a prophetic sign pointing forward to Jesus’ own resurrection and to the renewing power of the Holy Spirit that will transform history itself. The Gospel tells us that Jesus is deeply moved, then He approaches the tomb not as a distant miracle-worker but as a friend who has already wept, and when He commands, “Lazarus, come out!”, it is more than a miracle, but it is a declaration that death does not have the final word. In John 15:13, Jesus later says, “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends…” So the resurrection of Lazarus foreshadows that greater love because Jesus is already moving toward His own death so that humanity might experience renewal through the Spirit.
 
Lazarus walks out of the tomb still wrapped in grave clothes, and then Jesus tells the community, “Unbind him and let him go.” This detail matters because resurrection is not only an individual act; it is communal since others must participate in removing what belongs to death. This moment anticipates Easter morning, when Jesus Himself will rise, not merely to return to life as before, but to inaugurate a new creation through the Holy Spirit. In the Wesleyan understanding of holy love, resurrection is not only an event but a process of sanctification in which God calls us out of what suffocates us, fear, sin, injustice, and invites the community to help remove what still binds us.

The raising of Lazarus is therefore both personal and prophetic: it shows us the heart of Christ and prepares us for the cross and the empty tomb. One of the hardest truths of the Gospel is that sometimes things must die for renewal to begin, and Lazarus had to pass through death before new life could be revealed. Jesus Himself would face the cross before resurrection glory; then this pattern is not limited to individuals; it also unfolds within history. Human societies have carried practices that needed to die so that justice could emerge since slavery, once defended by distorted theology and cultural power, had to be confronted, resisted, and ultimately dismantled through the courageous witness of believers and communities shaped by holy love, and today, racism still lingers as a grave cloth that binds humanity.

The Gospel calls us to allow old systems of domination and prejudice to die so that reconciliation and true belonging can be born. This is not a message of despair, but of hope because death, in the Kingdom of God, becomes a doorway to renewal, the stone that seems final becomes the place where God speaks life.
 
As we approach the beginning of Lent, the church enters a season that mirrors this movement from death to renewal. Lent is not simply about giving something up; it is about allowing God to remove what prevents us from living fully in love and, just as Jesus asked that the stone be rolled away, Lent invites us to open the places of our lives we would rather keep closed. During this season, we walk with Christ toward the cross. We confront our own patterns that need to die, habits, fears, resentments, trusting that resurrection will follow. Lent teaches us that transformation often begins with surrender.
 
As we close Black History Month, we remember that the journey toward justice has always carried echoes of resurrection, and communities who endured oppression, segregation, and systemic injustice have witnessed God’s renewing power again. The fight against slavery, the Civil Rights Movement, and ongoing efforts for racial equity reveal how holy love works within history, calling societies out of tombs of injustice.
 
The resurrection of Lazarus reminds us that God does not abandon communities trapped in systems of death. Instead, Christ calls people and nations toward liberation. When the church stands for dignity, justice, and reconciliation, it participates in the resurrection work of God. There is a powerful illustration of this kind of transformation in the film The World We Make and it is the story follows a young interracial couple navigating prejudice and misunderstanding in a small community.

What begins with tension and resistance gradually becomes a journey toward empathy, healing, and renewed relationships. The film shows how love has the power to confront inherited patterns of fear and to reshape the future. Like Lazarus stepping out of the tomb, the characters must face what binds them: assumptions, history, and pain, before they can move into freedom. The story reflects the Gospel truth that transformation is relational, and renewal does not happen in isolation; it happens when people choose courage, compassion, and the willingness to see one another through the lens of God’s love.

After Lazarus is raised, the religious leaders begin to plot against Jesus, and, ironically, the miracle that brings life to Lazarus accelerates the journey toward Jesus’ own death. This is where John 15:13 becomes clear: the raising of Lazarus is a sign that Jesus will lay down His life for His friends. Holy love is costly because it confronts injustice, challenges systems of power, and sometimes provokes resistance. Yet this is precisely how transformation happens since the resurrection of Lazarus announces that the greatest love in the universe is already at work, a love willing to enter death so that others may live.
 
Throughout this series, we have seen how relationships are transformed when God’s love becomes the center, and we have explored friendship, delay, grief, compassion, and now resurrection. Each movement has shown us that transformation is not superficial; it is rooted in the holy love of Christ. As we close Transformed Relations by God, we recognize that resurrection is the culmination of all relational healing. Jesus restores not only Lazarus’ life but also the community around him. Relationships broken by grief are renewed through divine love, and today, as we stand at the edge of Lent, we begin to look forward to a new journey, a new series called “The Biggest Love in the Universe.”

If Lazarus’ resurrection points us toward Jesus’ own rising, then the next chapter invites us to explore the magnitude of God’s love revealed through the cross, the resurrection, and the sending of the Holy Spirit. The biggest love in the universe is not abstract; it is personal, sacrificial, and transformative. It is the love that rolls away stones, calls the dead to life, and sends us into the world as agents of renewal.
 
As Jesus calls Lazarus from the tomb, He also speaks to us. He calls us out of what binds us, individually and collectively. He calls systems of injustice to fall away, He calls communities to become places of healing, and He invites us into a rhythm of dying and rising that reflects the heart of God. So today, hear the voice of Christ: Come out of fear, come out of division, come out of the old patterns that keep love buried, because the greatest love has already been revealed, a love willing to lay down its life for friends, a love stronger than death, a love that is about to lead us into a new journey together.