That's Not Fair - Why is This Happening to Me?
Faith / Real Life / John 11
That’s Not Fair
Why Is This Happening to Me?
I’ve spent a lot of time waiting for God to move things that, looking back, He may have been waiting for me to move.
There have been seasons when I’ve felt stuck between two choices: walk forward in faith or remain somewhere that had become comfortable.
I prayed. I thought. I waited. And sometimes I convinced myself that waiting was the spiritual thing to do.
God, if You want me to move, make it obvious. God, open the door. God, show me what happens next.
I was waiting for the stone to roll away. But eventually I began wondering:
What if He was asking me to move it?
That realization scared me. Because if I’m honest, part of me wasn’t just afraid of what was behind the stone. I was afraid of what Jesus might do if it actually moved.
John 11 begins with love and delay
In John 11, Lazarus is sick, and his sisters send word to Jesus:
“Lord, the one You love is sick.”
Not the guy who deserves Your help. Not the guy who has done everything right. Just: the one You love.
That detail matters. Lazarus is loved, and Lazarus is sick, at the same time. Hard things are not proof that God stopped loving you.
Then Jesus does something surprising. He waits two more days. He knows the situation. He knows the urgency. He knows the fear. And still, He does not panic.
Jesus doesn’t panic just because I do.
I do. I can manufacture urgency in a hurry. I want the answer now. The decision now. The outcome now. Jesus does not seem rushed by the things that rush me.
By the time He arrives, Lazarus has been dead four days. Martha tells Him, “If You had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died.” That sentence is packed with the questions so many of us bring to God: Where were You? Why didn’t You move? Why am I still stuck?
Movement One
Faith Waits
Sometimes there is genuinely nothing I can do to force what I want to happen. A diagnosis. A door that hasn’t opened. A prayer I still don’t understand. A loss I would never have chosen. In those moments, faith is not pretending everything feels fine. Faith is trusting that Jesus’ delay is not the same thing as His absence.
Mary comes out next. She’s crying. Everyone around her is crying. Jesus sees them, and then John gives us one of the shortest and most powerful verses in Scripture:
Jesus wept.
He already knows what He is about to do. He knows Lazarus is about to walk out of that tomb. And still, He cries.
That matters to me. Hope doesn’t require pretending it doesn’t hurt. Jesus doesn’t stand far away from grief and lecture people about faith. He enters it.
There have been times in my life when what helped the most was not a perfect explanation, but somebody coming close enough that I didn’t feel alone. A text. A call. A visit. Sometimes just a hug.
Jesus does that. He steps into the pain before He changes the situation.
What was happening to us wasn’t the only thing happening through us
I watched my mom go through a difficult diagnosis that was taking away functional abilities. There were things happening to her that she could not control. Things that had to be frightening.
And yet one of the things I remember most is how she continued prioritizing love! Love for me, for Kari, for our kids, and for my sister.
She could not control everything happening to her. But she could still influence what happened through her.
What was happening to her was painful. But it wasn’t the only thing happening through her.
I want to be careful here. I’m not saying the diagnosis was good. I’m not saying God caused pain so I could learn a lesson. I’m saying brokenness does not somehow cancel God’s ability to work.
That’s why Romans 8 matters so much to me. God working within suffering does not mean suffering itself is good. It means pain does not get the final word.
Then Jesus changes the whole story
Jesus reaches Lazarus’ tomb. There’s a stone covering the entrance. And He says:
“Take away the stone.”
Jesus is about to raise a man who has been dead for four days. Could Jesus move a rock? Of course He could. The stone is not the hard part of this miracle.
Yet He tells the people standing there to move it.
Martha resists, and honestly, I understand her. What’s behind that stone is dead, decaying, and smells. The stone is covering something no one particularly wants exposed.
Movement Two
Faith Moves
Sometimes faith waits. But other times Jesus has already made the next step clear. The issue is no longer uncertainty. The issue is hesitation. There are moments when we call it “waiting on God,” when really we are afraid of what obedience might change.
And that’s where this story got personal for me.
There have been moments in my own life when I knew deep down what the next faithful step was. The real problem was not a lack of direction. The real problem was that the miracle scared me.
Change scares me. The unknown scares me. Letting Jesus transform my world scares me. Because if He really brings resurrection into the dead places of my life, I may not get to stay the same.
And sometimes stuck is strangely comfortable. At least I know how to live there.
What’s behind your stone?
Maybe your stone is a conversation you know you need to have. Maybe it’s an apology. Maybe it’s asking for help. Maybe it’s admitting you aren’t okay. Maybe it’s surrendering something you know is pulling you away from God.
Or maybe your stone is more fundamental than any of those things.
Maybe you’ve spent years around Christianity without ever actually giving your life to Jesus. You know about Him. You may even believe a lot of true things about Him. But there is still a stone between you and Him.
And here is the amazing news: Jesus already knows what is behind it.
He knew what was behind Lazarus’ stone, and He still said, “Move it.”
Move the stone
Do the next thing Jesus has already made clear. Tell the truth. Ask for help. Surrender. Come out of hiding. Say yes.
Trust Jesus with the tomb
You are not responsible for raising the dead. You cannot save yourself, clean yourself up enough, or manufacture resurrection life.
This distinction matters. The people move the stone. Jesus raises Lazarus. Those are not equal contributions.
It’s our responsibility to move the stone. It’s Jesus’ responsibility to raise the dead.
That is also the difference between Christianity and self-improvement. Christianity is not me fixing myself. Christianity is Jesus doing for me what I cannot do for myself.
Jesus doesn’t just improve dead things, He brings them to life
We are all part of a broken world, and we have all participated in its brokenness. The Bible calls that sin. Sin is not just a few bad habits we need to clean up. It separates us from the God who made us for relationship with Him.
We cannot overcome that separation on our own. We cannot overcome death on our own.
But Jesus refused to accept death as the end of Lazarus’ story. He stood outside a tomb and said, “Lazarus, come out!” And a dead man walked out.
That is why John 11 is more than a story about a miracle in one family. It points to the heart of the gospel. Jesus Himself went to a cross, died, and rose again. The tomb could not hold Him either.
Miracles follow Jesus into places everyone else has declared hopeless.
Saying yes to Jesus means I don’t have to keep hiding the dead things in the tombs of my heart. I don’t have to keep wearing my grave clothes—those labels, those sins, those old identities, those old failures—as if they are all I will ever be.
Jesus offers forgiveness. Freedom. New life. Relationship with God. Not because I earned it, but because He did what I never could.
And maybe this is your stone
If you have read this far and realized, I’ve never actually given my life to Jesus, I don’t want to write around you. I want to talk directly to you.
Maybe you have been hiding things from God. Maybe you’ve been hiding yourself from God. Maybe you thought you needed to fix everything behind the stone before you could let Him see it.
You don’t.
Jesus already knows. And He is not asking you to resurrect yourself. He is inviting you to trust Him.
If you want to say yes to Jesus
There are no magical words you have to say perfectly. Salvation is not unlocked by a flawless script. But if these words express what is happening in your heart, pray them honestly:
God, I need You.
I have been hiding things from You, and God, I have been hiding me from You.
I turn away from the world. I open myself up to You.
I invite You to transform my life, and I want to follow You out of death and into a life of freedom, here, and with You forever.
Amen.
If you just prayed that sincerely, tell somebody. Don’t let this become a private moment you bury again tomorrow. Find a pastor. Tell a Christian friend. Talk to someone who genuinely follows Jesus. Find a church that will help you grow.
And talk to them about baptism.
Jesus saves you. Baptism does not save you. Baptism is your public declaration that you belong to Him—that the old life is being left behind and you are following Jesus into the new one.
Maybe that’s your next stone.
Sometimes faith waits. Sometimes faith moves. Move the stone. Trust Jesus with what only He can do.