John 11:25

25. I am… resurrection… life The due understanding of these two sublime verses requires an analysis of the two principal terms. Resurrection is the reunion of a conscious soul to a body by it vitalized. Thence results actual physical life compositely of soul and body. Yet life, as often used, especially in John’s Gospel, designates something over and above this. Certainly does this higher meaning exist when the life is conditioned, as here, upon faith. It is then a life upon life; THE life supereminently; the glorified, celestial Life, over and above a life consisting in mere conscious existence. When, therefore, Martha names the resurrection, Christ responds, I am not only the resurrection but I am more; I am the life. He is author not only of that mere life resulting from union of soul and body, but of the celestial life by which man is a glorified being. We then paraphrase the words thus: I am not only the physical resurrection, but I am the life celestial; he that believeth in me, though he (like Lazarus) should die, yet the life celestial survives; and he that (unlike Lazarus) is still alive, and is a believer in me, shall never experience any death of that celestial life. To be the resurrection is one thing; to be the life another.