To Die Twice for the Gospel

March 22, 2026, Saint Barnabas Lutheran Church, Howard Beach, Queens, N.Y. 

In 1968 I completed my four years as an enlisted assistant to Air Force chaplains and headed off to college.

Those four years in the Air Force went by so quickly and were such a tiny   segment of my life that it seems remarkable the impact of those years remains so strong sixty years on. I was 18 when I enlisted, which means I spent the entirety of those years before my frontal cortex was completely developed.

Even so, the Air Force was an invaluable introduction to ecumenical and interfaith customs and traditions. I typed sermons for Baptist, Methodist, and Catholic chaplains. I typed, prepared, and duplicated worship bulletins. I prepared the chapel altar for Catholic Mass, Protestant worship, and Jewish shabbat.

I also observed the gulf between evangelical and mainline Protestants. One active couple in the chapel was a master sergeant from a Lutheran background and his wife Muriel, a recovering alcoholic and passion born-again Christian.

Muriel was on Sarge’s back night and day to get “saved,” to find Jesus as his personal Lord and Savior. Sarge figured Jesus had saved him two-thousand years ago through his death and resurrection. 

Enduring Muriel’s evangelical coercion day after day, Sarge finally capitulated and said the magic words. Muriel rejoiced mightily and sent a hand-written message to everyone she knew: “Sarge has been saved!”

By this time I was in college preparing to be a journalist. One night I received a late-night telephone call in the dorm. It was Muriel.

“Sarge is gone,” she said, her voice shaking. “Heart attack.”

Not quite awake, I said, “Oh, Muriel, I’m so sorry.”

“He’s gone,” she said. After a few seconds of awkward silence, she added, “Of course he wouldn’t come back now even if he could.”

Those words echoed in my head as I returned to my room and went back to bed.

“He wouldn’t come back now even if he could.”

I kept repeating the words in my head.

“He wouldn’t come back now even if he could.”

Well, why would he? Why would anyone, safely past the dreaded veil from life to death, want to go through it all over again?

Did Lazarus of Bethany want to come back to the travails of life? Or was he perfectly happy where he was, free of pain, free of worry, free of the agonizing illness that killed him?

When Lazarus walked out of the tomb, was he aware of the stench of the burial cloths still clinging on him? Was he elated to see his sisters rejoicing? Was he surprised to see Jesus standing in front of him? Was he pondering what might happen next?

Lazarus returned to his sisters’ house in Bethany. Did he pick up his life as he had left it. What would be the new normal of life now? News of his resuscitation spread rapidly and he was a celebrity, sought by crowds who wanted to see him, touch him, perhaps ask him what it was like on the other side? (Many scholars use the word resuscitation to describe what happened to Lazarus because he would die again. Jesus was resurrected and will live forever.)

Did Lazarus know a contract had been put out on his life? 

“When the great crowd … learned that Lazarus was there, they came not only because of Jesus but also to see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. So the chief priests planned to put Lazarus to death as well, since it was on account of him that many of the Jews were deserting and were believing in Jesus.”

Thus Lazarus returned from his untroubled repose to extraordinary stress in his resumed life.

Some writers try to interpret what Lazarus was going through by portraying him as desperately unhappy. Nikos Kazansakis, in The Last Temptation of Christ, depicts a ghoulish Lazarus still decaying, much like the dead in Beetlejuice who exhibit the causes of their deaths, whether by ax, disease, or decapitation, as they sit in an eternal waiting room.

We can’t be sure if Lazarus is happy or not because he disappears from the Gospel at this point. He was present when Mary poured expensive perfume on Jesus’ feet and wiped them with her hair. Knowing the miracle Jesus had recently performed, we understand why Lazarus’ sister was so overcome with gratitude that she would go to such extravagant lengths. 

The Bible does not provide any more information about Lazarus. Any further details are based on church history and may or may not be reliable. According to one tradition, after Jesus ascended to heaven, Lazarus and his sisters moved to Cyprus, where Lazarus became the bishop of Kition and died naturally in 63 CE. Another theory suggests they went to Gaul to spread the gospel, with Lazarus eventually becoming the bishop of Marseilles and being executed under Emperor Domitian. Ultimately, what happened to Lazarus remains uncertain. However, it is clear that he died again physically and will one day be resurrected to join all God’s saints in eternal life.

Jennifer Garcia Bashaw, Associate Professor of New Testament and Christian Ministry,Campbell University, Buies Creek, North Carolina, notes that the story of Lazarus of Bethany is a pivotal moment, a high point for how Jesus reveals who he is.

“Throughout the Gospel, Jesus makes several "I am" statements about his divine identity, using metaphors that link him to God's work and affirm his unity with the Father. In his conversation with Martha, before bringing Lazarus back to life, Jesus announces that he is the resurrection and the life, which is the fifth of these metaphorical "I am" declarations:

* I am the bread of life (6:35, 48, 51)

* I am the light of the world (8:12; 9:5)

* I am the door of the sheep (10:7, 9)

* I am the good shepherd (10:11, 14)

* I am the resurrection and the life (11:25)

* I am the way, the truth, and the life (14:6)

* I am the true vine (15:1)

Beyond the emotional and identity-related peaks, John 11 also features a peak of confession or belief. After Jesus tells Martha that Lazarus will rise again and identifies himself as the resurrection and the life, he adds, “Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

Martha’s answer becomes a central declaration in John’s story:

“Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.”

While Peter gives the Christological confession in the Synoptic Gospels, in John's account it is Martha who offers the climactic confession—with the language of belief unique to John. Martha’s role as a model of belief highlights the significance of women disciples in early Christian communities.

John emphasizes this theme again in 20:31: “Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.”

The resuscitation of Lazarus is the climax of the Gospel of John. It’s at this point that Jesus clearly affirms that he is the Messiah, the resurrection and the life.

Lazarus, whether he did so voluntarily or not, emerges from the tomb as a powerful testimony of God’s power and Jesus’ mission.

“Jesus said to Martha, ‘Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?’ So they rolled away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, ‘Father, I thank you for having heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.’” (JN 11:41-42.

And when Jesus’ said, “Lazarus, come out,” this quiet, loving, reanimated man of Bethany became the authoritative, commanding, mighty exemplar of the power of the Triune God.

And Lazarus lives in our hearts as the only person in history who gave his life twice for the Gospel of love.