John 11:39

John 11:39. Jesus saith, Take ye away the stone. The sister of him that was dead, Martha, saith unto him, Lord, by this time he stinketh: for he hath been four days here. No expectation of some great blessing which God will give in answer to the prayer of Jesus (John 11:22) is now in Martha's mind. She cannot understand the removal of the stone. To her, as the (elder) sister, the right of expostulation belonged; and it is in the simplest and most direct terms that she urges that the dead may not be exposed to the living. Nothing could more vividly illustrate the power which at this moment death wielded alike over the body of the departed and his sister's spirit. It is probably to bring out this power in the most forcible manner possible that not only is Martha described as ‘the sister of him that was dead,' but that the description precedes her name. How differently does the Evangelist himself feel! It is instructive to observe that in the words ‘him that was dead' he changes the term for death, using not that of John 11:26 , but another which expresses simply coming to the end of life.