Good News [1976], GOOD NEWS BIBLE WITH DEUTEROCANONICALS / APOCRYPHA Today's English Version (AMERICAN BIBLE SOCIETY, New York) [word count] [B15000].
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The Death of Lazarus
1 A man named Lazarus, who
lived in Bethany, became
sick. Bethany was the town where
Mary and her sister Martha lived. note
2 (This Mary was the one who
poured the perfume on the Lord's
feet and wiped them with her hair; it
was her brother Lazarus who was
sick.) note
3 The sisters sent Jesus a message:
“Lord, your dear friend is
sick.”
4 When Jesus heard it, he said,
“The final result of this sickness will
not be the death of Lazarus; this has
happened in order to bring glory to
God, and it will be the means by
which the Son of God will receive
glory.”
5 Jesus loved Martha and her sister
and Lazarus.
6 Yet when he received
the news that Lazarus was
sick, he stayed where he was for two
more days.
7 Then he said to the disciples,
“Let us go back to Judea.”
8 “Teacher,” the disciples answered,
“just a short time ago the
people there wanted to stone you;
and are you planning to go back?”
9 Jesus said, “A day has twelve
hours, doesn't it? So whoever walks
in broad daylight does not stumble,
for he sees the light of this world.
10 But if he walks during the night he
stumbles, because he has no light.”
11 Jesus said this and then added,
“Our friend Lazarus has fallen
asleep, but I will go and wake him
up.”
12 The disciples answered, “If he is
asleep, Lord, he will get well.”
13 Jesus meant that Lazarus had
died, but they thought he meant
natural sleep.
14 So Jesus told them
plainly, “Lazarus is dead,
15 but for
your sake I am glad that I was not
with him, so that you will believe.
Let us go to him.”
16 Thomas (called the Twin) said to
his fellow disciples, “Let us all go
along with the Teacher, so that we
may die with him!”
Jesus the Resurrection and the Life
17 When Jesus arrived, he found
that Lazarus had been buried four
days before.
18 Bethany was less than
two miles from Jerusalem,
19 and
-- --
many Judeans had come to see Martha
and Mary to comfort them about
their brother's death.
20 When Martha heard that Jesus
was coming, she went out to meet
him, but Mary stayed in the house.
21 Martha said to Jesus, “If you had
been here, Lord, my brother would
not have died!
22 But I know that
even now God will give you whatever
you ask him for.”
23 “Your brother will rise to life,”
Jesus told her.
24 “I know,” she replied, “that he
will rise to life on the last day.” note
25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection
and the life. Whoever believes
in me will live, even though he
dies;
26 and whoever lives and believes
in me will never die. Do you
believe this?”
27 “Yes, Lord!” she answered. “I
do believe that you are the Messiah,
the Son of God, who was to come
into the world.”
Jesus Weeps
28 After Martha said this, she went
back and called her sister Mary privately.
“The Teacher is here,” she
told her, “and is asking for you.”
29 When Mary heard this, she got up
and hurried out to meet him.
30 (Jesus had not yet arrived in the
village, but was still in the place
where Martha had met him.)
31 The
people who were in the house with
Mary comforting her followed her
when they saw her get up and hurry
out. They thought that she was
going to the grave to weep there.
32 Mary arrived where Jesus was,
and as soon as she saw him, she fell
at his feet. “Lord,” she said, “if you
had been here, my brother would
not have died!”
33 Jesus saw her weeping, and he
saw how the people with her were
weeping also; his heart was touched,
and he was deeply moved.
34 “Where
have you buried him?” he asked
them.
34 “Come and see, Lord,” they answered.
35 Jesus wept.
36 “See how much he
loved him!” the people said.
37 But some of them said, “He gave
sight to the blind man, didn't he?
Could he not have kept Lazarus
from dying?”
Lazarus Is Brought to Life
38 Deeply moved once more, Jesus
went to the tomb, which was a cave
with a stone placed at the entrance.
39 “Take the stone away!” Jesus ordered.
39 Martha, the dead man's sister, answered,
“There will be a bad smell,
Lord. He has been buried four days!”
40 Jesus said to her, “Didn't I tell
you that you would see God's glory
if you believed?”
41 They took the
stone away. Jesus looked up and
said, “I thank you, Father, that you
listen to me.
42 I know that you always
listen to me, but I say this for
the sake of the people here, so that
they will believe that you sent me.”
43 After he had said this, he called
out in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come
out!”
44 He came out, his hands and
feet wrapped in grave cloths, and
with a cloth around his face. “Untie
him,” Jesus told them, “and let him
go.”
The Plot against Jesus
(Matthew 26.1–5; Mark 14.1–2; Luke 22.1–2)
45 Many of the people who had
come to visit Mary saw what Jesus
did, and they believed in him.
46 But
some of them returned to the Pharisees
and told them what Jesus had
done.
47 So the Pharisees and the
chief priests met with the Council
and said, “What shall we do? Look
at all the miracles this man is performing!
48 If we let him go on in this
way, everyone will believe in him,
and the Roman authorities will take
-- --
action and destroy our Temple and
our nation!”
49 One of them, named Caiaphas,
who was High Priest that year, said,
“What fools you are!
50 Don't you realize
that it is better for you to have
one man die for the people, instead
of having the whole nation destroyed?”
51 Actually, he did not say
this of his own accord; rather, as he
was High Priest that year, he was
prophesying that Jesus was going to
die for the Jewish people,
52 and not
only for them, but also to bring together
into one body all the scattered
people of God.
53 From that day on the Jewish authorities
made plans to kill Jesus.
54 So Jesus did not travel openly in
Judea, but left and went to a place
near the desert, to a town named
Ephraim, where he stayed with the
disciples.
55 The time for the Passover Festival
was near, and many people went
up from the country to Jerusalem to
perform the ritual of purification before
the festival.
56 They were looking
for Jesus, and as they gathered
in the Temple, they asked one another,
“What do you think? Surely
he will not come to the festival, will
he?”
57 The chief priests and the
Pharisees had given orders that if
anyone knew where Jesus was, he
must report it, so that they could arrest
him.
Good News [1976], GOOD NEWS BIBLE WITH DEUTEROCANONICALS / APOCRYPHA Today's English Version (AMERICAN BIBLE SOCIETY, New York) [word count] [B15000].
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