When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus wept. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man also have kept this man from dying?”Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay against it. Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days.” Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?” So they took away the stone. And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this on account of the people standing around, that they may believe that you sent me.” When he had said these things, he cried out with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out.” The man who had died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.” (John 11:33-44)
Jesus is deeply moved (v33&38), greatly troubled (v33) and weeps (v35). The original words used here create an image of Jesus being stirred up by anger and sorrow. This must be more than just empathy with the sufferers as he knows he is about to raise Lazarus back to life.
“Jesus was moved with profound sorrow at the death of his friend and at the grief that his other friends had suffered. In addition, this sorrow was intermixed with anger at the evil of death, the final enemy” ESV study bible
Jesus rages at death and reverses it!
In the account of Jesus raising a little girl from the dead in the Jesus Storybook Bible, it says “Jesus reached down into death” and lifted the little girl up. Here, he speaks and reverses death. Death has been defeated. Death is the one thing that we can’t beat. He has beaten it
Our hope isn’t to prolong life before death, putting off death as long as possible. Lazarus eventually died again - this miracle was a sign not the end result. Our hope is that he went into death and rose back up again in victory and the same thing awaits us. Death has lost it’s sting - Jesus is the resurrection and the life.