What Sort of Love?

The sisters sent word to Him, saying, "Lord, behold, he whom You love is sick."

Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. (John 11:3, 5)

I began wondering a few days ago why John placed this last verse into this story. It seems like stating the obvious – of course Jesus loved these friends of his. Why did John have to tell us that Jesus loved them? So I decided to look into the Greek and see if there were any clues. Sure enough, I discovered that these two verses were actually saying quite different things which is exactly why John took the effort to write it this way.

The word translated 'love' in the quote from the sisters is phileo. This is the kind of love that we are most familiar with, a sibling kind of love or brotherly love. This is the affectionate love that is most common between friends but comes far short of the superior kind love that God has for us. But phileo love is certainly an important kind of love that God designed for us to enjoy with each other.

The second reference to love, the love that John says here that Jesus had for His three special friends is far beyond the kind of love that they said they believed He had for Lazarus. This love is the agapao love, the selfless, deep, self-sacrificing kind of love that originates with God. I believe that John here intentionally wanted to make the strong point that the assumptions that Mary and Martha had about Jesus' feelings toward them fell far short of the reality of how Jesus truly felt about them.

It is also very important for John to mention this fact because of how this story progresses. Those reading this story would begin to have the same kind of serious questions about how much Jesus really loved these friends as they did based on the strange way in which He chose to respond to their request. If He were to be judged by His immediate reactions to their request to come and heal their brother, it could be very easy to assume that maybe He didn't really care nearly as much as even a good friend would be expected to care. In fact the very next verse launches into the story from the basis of this declaration of Jesus' love by saying, So when He heard that he was sick, He then stayed two days longer in the place where He was.

If Jesus had only had the kind of love, the brotherly love of an average or even special friendship that these sisters assumed He had for them, it would be expected – and they did expect so – that Jesus would immediately respond to their request and come to their aid to heal their brother as soon as possible. When He did finally arrive later in the story they both in their own unique ways expressed their confusion and disappointment that He had not acted very responsibly in their opinion like one who really cared about them as they thought He should.

Those familiar with this story know the tension that builds as these sisters struggle with how to relate to their intense disappointment with Jesus. It appeared to them that He had given occasion to His enemies to gloat over this apparent defeat, for everyone seemed quite certain that once a person had been dead past three days that there was absolutely no chance of them being brought back to life again. Given this apparent failure on the part of Jesus to look out for some of His closest friends, the Jewish leaders and other skeptics had begun to circulate like vultures insinuating doubts about the validity of Jesus' love and His claims of Messiahship that challenged entrenched beliefs of their culture. Pretending to come to comfort the sisters, some were actually coming to reinforce the apparent defeat of Jesus' power and love in their lives. In this context it was a very strong temptation to slip into hopelessness and despair.

So right at the outset of this story John establishes explicitly that Jesus' love for them was far deeper than they or anyone else had assumed. In the face of circumstances that seemed to reinforce their doubts about His care for them, in the face of His choices to seemingly ignore their pleas for help, He was actually cooperating with heaven to orchestrate the crowning miracle of His whole ministry for their behalf. In doing so He was putting their assumptions and their faith under great strain, but was also offering them an opportunity to experience far greater glory and joy than if He had responded in the kind of love they believed He had for them.

The application for this seems clear, yet it is also very easy to miss under the stress in similar circumstances. When God does not answer our prayers in the time we expect and seems to be ignoring us, it is vital that we cling to the truth that His love is far superior to the kind of love we expect from Him, that it is His heart we must trust rather than His sometimes strange responses to our petitions.

If we keep judging God by how effectively He answers our prayers the way we want them answered, we will live in confusion, sorrow and frustration and our doubts will have plenty to feed on and will readily multiply. We must be extremely careful about basing our opinions about God's love for us on what happens to us (just ask Job). To do this is to play into the accuser's trap and we can easily become offended with God. Jesus is seeking to cultivate and encourage a faith in us that is not based on answered prayers customized and expedited for our benefit and comfort. Rather, Jesus desires that we come to trust His heart and believe in our own heart that His love for us runs infinitely deeper and stronger than anything we have ever before experienced or known.

Yes, that is easy enough to say, but I am painfully aware that I too struggle many times to believe in the goodness of God and trust His heart when things get tough. Yet this is the stuff that living faith is made of and I want to have much more of it. Of course, asking for increased faith is also asking to be taken through experiences potentially like that of Mary and Martha that can be very trying and painful. But that is exactly why these stories were written, to encourage me to base me faith on the end of the story, to remember the far greater joy that Jesus wanted to share with them that was exponentially more thrilling than anything they had ever hoped for themselves.

Father, help me to more firmly believe in Your heart of love for me personally. Increase my faith that trusts You whether things are going good or whether everything seems to be collapsing and I can't feel You close to me. You know I always want to feel Your comforting presence and enjoy Your peace and joy of having You close. But I know You want me to have a much deeper, more mature faith than just a phileo relationship with You. Fill me with confidence in Your agapao love for me so You can work miracles in my life that will result in far greater glory for You than anything I have imagined.