John 11:7–16
Read the passage.
After waiting an extra two days, Jesus announces to His disciples that it is time to go back to Judea. This alarms them because they had left Judea in the first place because of the attempts on Jesus’s life. Jesus responds with a rhetorical question and an illustration about walking in the day versus walking in the night. Timekeeping in the Roman Empire used 12 hours for the daytime and 4 “watches” for the night, so the hours were different lengths based on the time of year and distance from the equator. So, Jesus refers to the “natural day” or the time between sunrise and sunset.
I have to admit that I don’t understand what the rest of the saying is really about. On the surface, it’s obviously true that walking in daylight makes it less likely to trip over things versus walking at night. However that’s clearly not the point because Jesus connects the reason for stumbling is that the light is not in he who walks. Usually we’d say someone is in the light, not the light being in the person. In other places in the Scriptures, stumbling is a metaphor for moral failings, and light means the righteousness of God.
After consulting a bunch of commentaries, it’s making more sense. Jesus is implying that He has more hours of daylight left in His work, and the hour of His death (that is, the night) hasn’t arrived yet. John hasn’t recorded Jesus predicting His death, but we know that He did from the other Gospel writers. Whether the disciples remembered He did this is up for debate, because they seem to have forgotten a lot.
Jesus then explains that He wants to go to Judea to visit Lazarus. Because He uses a metaphor for death, the disciples are still confused and try to persuade Jesus that such a trip isn’t necessary. So Jesus has to tell them plainly what has happened to Lazarus, and part of the reason for the delay in making the journey. If Jesus had been there to heal Lazarus before he died, at least some of the disciples wouldn’t believe…something. My guess is it is specifically “Doubting” Thomas, because he is called by name here, and John records the famous scene after Jesus is resurrected where Thomas is invited to touch the wounds from the nails and spear on Jesus’s body in John 20. It could be that if Thomas didn’t see Lazarus get raised from the dead and also see Jesus raised as well, he would not have repented of his sins and believed Jesus was his God. If that is truly the case, then Thomas’s fatalistic expectation of death in Judea at Jesus’s side is kind of spooky.
Plan our steps and give us the light of Your glory that we may see and do all You have called us to do.