How Your Doubt can be Redeemed this Easter Season.
In a story kicking off Jesus' road to Calvary, we see how one woman's doubt is transformed into a faith that shocks the world.
This month, we will walk the road to Calvary together with three devotions. Each will bring us closer to Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection. With each step, we’ll find triumph, but we’ll also experience pain and disappointment. This is the story of the Gospels — we don’t experience God’s glory without walking through hurt.
I wonder if you could share how your doubt has been redeemed. I’d love for your story to encourage someone else. Just click the button below to share your story of redemption.
Feel the Tension
If you are reading the story of Jesus this month, I encourage you to pay attention to the tension. I want you to feel how the world around him darkens as Jesus approaches the week of his death.
My favorite movie as a kid was Star Wars.1 If you are a Star Wars fan, you’ll remember the scene when Luke, Leia, Han, and Chewie attempt to escape the Storm Troopers through a vent in the wall of the Death Star. Unfortunately, the vent led to a room-sized trash compactor.
Inside the room, the trash compactor activates, slowly squeezing the heroes and the trash in a massive vise. This slow squeeze is how I feel reading through Jesus’ last few weeks on earth. His enemies (and the enemy of his soul) close in, but Jesus refuses to defend himself or flee. As Isaiah described it, Jesus walks like a lamb to the slaughter.2
This week, we go the place the vise began to constrict.
It’s maybe the most amazing of all of Jesus’ miracles — the resurrection of Lazarus. But my focus for this story isn’t Lazarus, his death, or his resurrection (though the squeeze on Jesus’ life began here).
Mary, Sister of Martha and Lazarus
I want us to turn our gaze to Mary, one of Lazarus’s two sisters.
Luke records these sisters disagreeing about what was required of a follower of Jesus. Martha believed it was to serve, but Mary wanted to sit, listen, and soak in Jesus's presence. Jesus made it clear that Mary chose the better of the two.
Life is found in the presence of Jesus.3
It is important to remember this as we progress through the story. This is where Mary came from. She deeply loved Jesus and wanted to sit at his feet to learn from him. She innately understood that Jesus was important and came to change her world…possibly THE world. Mary wasn’t just in the periphery; she was a disciple of Jesus.
We don’t hear from Mary again until her brother falls ill. When Lazarus becomes sick, Mary and Martha begin to worry, so they call for Jesus. They’ve watched and heard about the unbelievable miracles he’s performed around the region, so surely he would come to heal their brother, too, right?
Again, to put this in perspective, Jesus knew Lazarus, Martha, and Mary. They weren’t just another face in the crowd but had spent deep, quality time together. Their call for help wasn’t like a random call from the street. Jesus heard those every day. These close friends of Jesus sent an urgent message for his help.
Tension (Under Pressure)
In Jesus’ story, the pressure hasn’t really begun. It’s after the resurrection of Lazarus when the vise starts to squeeze. But in Mary’s story, this is when she begins to feel the squeeze of doubt.
Mary and Martha had called. Jesus didn’t come.
I wonder if in Mary’s mind she had the thought of the centurion soldier who called on Jesus to help his servant. Jesus was ready to visit his house, but the soldier knew he didn’t need Jesus in person. He just needed Jesus’ word for his servant to be healed.4
Couldn’t Jesus take a moment to speak a word from a distance?
Lazarus didn’t get better but worse. When we run into Mary again in this story, we see that doubt about who Jesus was crept into Mary’s heart and mind.
Where was Jesus? Who is Jesus?
I Got Issues with Jesus
I’m sure you have had moments like this in your lives. You’ve prayed for healing, finances, a relationship, or relief from oppression, but the answer doesn’t come on time. Kanye West famously had a conversion moment several years ago, but it only lasted a few months. When asked about distancing from his faith, Kanye responded:
“You know, I have my issues with Jesus. There’s a lot of things I went through and I’ve prayed about, and Jesus didn’t show up.”
-Kanye West
In Star Wars, Luke calls on his droid friends to help him. He asks them to find the controls to turn off the trash compactor. As R2D2 frantically works to stop the walls, C3P0 continues communicating with Luke. He can’t see Luke and his companions—he can only hear them on the radio. At one point, he thinks it’s too late. They are crying out in pain—their last sounds before death.
As I read Kanye’s words, a knife rips through my heart. I feel the walls of doubt closing in on Kanye from each side. His words are like a cry of pain. The tension of doubt may be squeezing your faith, too. This is where we find Mary when Jesus finally shows up to check on Lazarus.
Too late is when redemption begins.
Dead and buried for four days, it’s too late to help now (right?). Mary stays in the house. She wasn’t ready to see Jesus. Not yet.
Mary is in anguish. Her brother is dead, and her Savior is a fraud. The walls have completely closed around her.
Again, a knife tears into my heart. I know this feeling of disappointment. Life was not supposed to go this way, and Jesus was supposed to show up. He was supposed to heal, help, and hear. But sometimes what we think we hear, see, and feel isn’t what we really are hearing, seeing, or feeling.
In Star Wars, C3PO misreads those cries of pain. Luke, Leia, and Han are shouting with joy. The walls have stopped. R2D2 comes through, saving them from death.
I don’t mean to discount your pain, but I wonder if today might be the start of your redemption.
The Posture of Redemption
Mary is about to encounter Jesus in a way she never expects, but I want you to see two things that lead to the redemption of Mary’s faith.
1. Jesus’ posture towards Mary.
When Jesus first arrived in town, he quietly announced his arrival, and Martha, the good, older sister, went to meet Jesus.5 Jesus called, but he didn’t command Mary or Martha to come.
After his conversation with Martha, which was impressive on its own, Jesus again calls Mary to himself.6 Again, he gives Mary space. He allows her to meet him on her terms without crowding the place she is comfortable. If you are in pain, angry, and disappointed in God, Jesus gives you space.
He is calling, but Jesus is giving you space to respond.7
Just as importantly, Jesus didn’t give up on Mary. Her anger with Jesus wasn’t a reason for Jesus to cancel her from his life. You haven’t done anything to cause Jesus to cancel you either.
2. Mary’s posture towards Jesus.
Mary wasn’t initially ready to meet Jesus. This seems scandalous for those of us who grew up in a more conservative church world. We don’t ignore God. There is punishment to come for sure.
But Jesus gave Mary space because he valued her feelings. Her emotions were as real to Jesus as they were to Mary. While angry with Jesus, Mary maintained a soft heart toward him. So, when Jesus called a second time, she went to him.
A soft heart doesn’t relegate you to control and composure. When Mary went to Jesus, she was raw and honest. She fell at his feet, weeping, broken before the person she believed controlled the heavens and earth. Jesus went to Bethany already planning to raise Lazarus, but Mary’s heart moved him.
The shortest verse in all of Scripture is in John 11: ”Jesus wept.” Jesus weeps in response to Mary’s anguish. Her heart was soft but genuine. Jesus, where were you? I needed you! Consider how the one who valued Jesus’ presence moved his heart like no one else.
Jesus is calling you and wants you to be honest with him.
The Beginning of the End
Jesus did raise Lazarus from the dead. This set in motion the religious leaders’ plan to kill Jesus, who believed Jesus would bring down the Roman government on their heads. Caiphas, the high priest, famously said, “You know nothing at all! You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.”8
From that moment on, Jesus walks his road to death.
Mary’s story isn’t over, though.
Doubt doesn’t define you.
In the next chapter of John, Mary anoints Jesus' feet and wipes them with her hair in thanksgiving. Jesus describes this as anointing him for his burial, but it doesn’t end there for Mary.
Multiple Marys went to the tomb to anoint Jesus’ dead body, only to find it empty. Christian tradition holds that this Mary was one of those women. If so, Mary was among the first evangelists sent to the disciples to announce Jesus' resurrection.
Mary’s faith was rewarded. The doubt Mary experienced just weeks before Jesus’ death didn’t define her; instead, it propelled her to an essential role in the Gospel story. Your doubt doesn’t need to define you, either.
Jesus is calling. He’s giving you space until you’re ready, but don’t wait. Run to him and give him your heart, honest and raw. Your reward will be a stronger, more resilient faith.
For all the nerds out there, this means Episode IV: A New Hope…ie, the original Stars Wars movie with Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Obie Wan Kenobie, and Han Solo.
Isaiah 53:7: He was oppressed and treated harshly, yet he never said a word. He was led like a lamb to the slaughter. And as a sheep is silent before the shearers, he did not open his mouth.
What a lesson for those of us who find meaning in the doing of life. We are quick to serve and help, but if we aren’t careful, we can make this equal to simply sitting at Jesus’ feet. Life is found in the presence of Jesus.
You can read this in Matthew 8:5-13.
Although we do not directly know who was the oldest, based on her actions, I assume Martha was the oldest.
25 Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life.[e] Anyone who believes in me will live, even after dying. 26 Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die. Do you believe this, Martha?”
27 “Yes, Lord,” she told him. “I have always believed you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one who has come into the world from God.” -John 11:25-27
Yes, Jesus is calling. Your reading this devotion today is a call from Jesus.
John 11:49-50