Do You Want to be Made Well?
John 5:1-15
Let me start with questions today.
That thing that’s gnawing at you – even this morning – that thing in the shadows, that deep seated, lingering issue in your life…
The question that Jesus has for you today is, Do You Really Want To Be Made Well?
Or has that thing, that issue, that deep-seated lingering issue, become such a part of your life that you’ve just learned to “live with it”? Has it become so much a part of your life that you say, “Well, it’s who I am.”
If Jesus were to offer today to make you well, to heal you in that area of your life would you be ready to respond in complete faith and in complete obedience? If he were to speak to your heart and heal you today, would you truly want it and would you truly be ready?
In the Gospel of John, a lot of ministry has occurred before we get to Chapter 5. John has not written so much chronologically, Luke is much more. John is written as it says at the end of the book for one reason – that you would know that Jesus is the Son of God and that you may believe.
As we begin John Chapter 5 today, Jesus is headed back to Jerusalem (he is going up to Jerusalem). And we find out as we continue to read that Jesus is headed there with a very clear purpose. Jesus was going to prove that he is God in the Flesh, Co-Existent God in nature, in power and in authority. The text we’re looking at today is actually the kick-off of that purpose.
And so we start in John 5:1.
John 5:1 (NLT)
1 Afterward Jesus returned to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish holy days.
Jesus is going up to Jerusalem for one of the three Jewish holy days all Jewish males are required to attend. Which holy day is not important to John’s context right now, but we know Jesus is going to begin what is ultimately the final show-down with the Pharisees.
In the northeast corner of the wall surrounding the Old City of Jerusalem was the Sheep Gate (same area as Lion’s Gate today.) This is where the animals for sacrifice were brought in to be prepared to go to the temple. And near this gate was a natural spring pool called the Pool of Bethesda (or Bethsaida) and there were five great porches built around this pool with large steps going down into the water.
The masses of broken and needy people would gather at this pool because of its “healing legend.” The Pool of Bethesda still exists today. It’s one of our favorite stops when we go to Jerusalem and it’s always very powerful.
Last night I asked our oldest daughter Danielle, if I could share a bit of her testimony about the Lord spoke to her vividly and personally here at the Pool of Bethesda in 2014 when we were there.
If you don’t know, our daughter Danielle, eight years ago, had a life and death situation occur. She had a very large tumor in her spinal canal. And she went in for a very intense, life and death surgery. The head of neurosurgery at Scripps did the surgery for this very rare tumor. They took out the backside of five vertebrae and took out a major tumor. In the process of that she lost seventy percent of her blood in this thirteen hour surgery where the surgeons never moved. Two surgeons never moved for thirteen hours. And in the end when they came out they said to Josh, her husband, “Don’t expect her to walk. We had to take some nerves and we had to get the tumor. We could not leave it. And so you need to prepare yourself that she may not walk.”
And so then they took her up to her room and they made her keep her head down because of the loss of spinal fluid, and so for three days she couldn’t pick her head up and for those three days the world was praying for her; many of you, all through that surgery.
And so after the three days they came in. During the three days they would come in and poke her feet and say, “Do you feel that?” and she would say “no.” And they would say “Wiggle your toes, are you wiggling them?” And she would say “yes” and she wasn’t. They would say, “Lift up your leg, are you lifting it?” And she would say, “Yeah, I am” and she was not moving. And so the intensity is growing and growing and growing.
And after three days they finally sit her up on the bed, maybe it was the fourth day. They put her feet on the ground. And everyone in the room isn’t breathing; I mean we were all just crying out to God. And she doesn’t know because no one has said this to her. And so they put her feet on the floor and they say, “Okay, now try to stand up.”
And she doesn’t know, and she stands up. It’s hard, and it’s painful, but she stands. And then after awhile they say, “Okay, take a step.” And so everyone is holding their breath and she puts one foot out. And pretty soon by maybe four or five days she has moved to the door and the first time she moves out of the door into the nurses’ station the whole floor erupts in praise when they see her, because they had all been working with her and they all knew that this was the moment that they would know.
When she ended up walking around the whole nurses’ station, the nurses were following her, like a parade. It took a little while, but it was a real miracle.
And so when we were at the Pool of Bethesda in 2014, Dani wrote in her journal what she has allowed me to read to you. So let me read her journal from that trip.
It says, “Jesus met me supernaturally where he healed the paralyzed man at the Pool of Bethesda. He showed me the parallel to my own life. He spoke to me, ‘Get up and walk.’ God healed me and he healed me for a purpose. And he made me new. He washed away the pain and the sorrow and renewed me at Bethesda.”
This is just an awesome spiritual moment and when this occurred Dani couldn’t even stand up, the hand of the Lord was so strong on her. That is not an advertisement for you to come to Israel, but it is what we experienced there. Dani experienced the Lord speaking to her saying “You are the person that I came to Bethesda to heal.” For Dani, it’s not just physical but spiritual and everything that goes with that struggle.
For you and I, it may be something else. It may be personal. Maybe much more likely a lifestyle, an emotional, relational, spiritual issue. That issue is on the table today for you. Please keep it in mind as we continue in John 5:2.
John 5:2–3 (NLT)
2 Inside the city, near the Sheep Gate, was the pool of Bethesda, with five covered porches.
3 Crowds of sick people—blind, lame, or paralyzed—lay on the porches.
Now, in some of your Bibles the explanation of the legend is in verse 3 and verse 4. But the NLT and the ESV put this explanation in a footnote.
The NLT footnote says: [the crowds of sick people were] waiting for a certain movement of the water, for an angel of the Lord came from time to time and stirred up the water. And the first person to step in after the water was stirred was healed of whatever disease he had.
We don’t know if this ever really happened or if it was just a legend because Bethesda was a natural spring. Periodically the water would bubble up from underground which would have looked like the legend describes.
Either way, there was a great multitude of suffering, hurting and pitiful people here watching and waiting for their lives to be somehow magically made better by the “stirring of the water” (the legend) their hopes reduced to whatever their chance was to knock someone else over to get to the water first.
It was a microcosm of a broken and hopeless world and into this very depressing scene steps the Lord Jesus. And he apparently comes alone, possibly so he can move easily through the crowd of hurting people. And as he surveys this depressing scene of needy people he sees YOU! He picks YOU out of the crowd and he makes his way through the masses to YOU!
By the way, you are being represented today by a middle-aged, invalid man – stuck in his illness.
John 5:5 (NLT)
5 One of the men lying there had been sick for thirty-eight years.
The ESV says this man is an invalid, meaning in some way paralyzed by his illness.
The amplified Bible says,
John 5:5 (AMP)
5 There was a certain man there who had suffered with a deep-seated and lingering disorder for thirty-eight years.
Do you see why this man may represent you today? Many of us have struggled with a deep-seated and lingering disorder for a very long time.
I don’t know how long this man had been at the legend pool, but we know that he had carried this deep seated and lingering disorder for thirty-eight years. And after thirty-eight years, our deep seated and lingering disorders tend to kind of become WHO we are. After an extended time, our struggles and our difficulties can end up defining who we are.
And this man, paralyzed by his deep seated and lingering disorder ad all but given up on any real hope. He lay at the “healing pool” because that is what he did, that is who he had become. And Jesus came looking for YOU! – I mean, HIM.
Jesus came into the mass of human suffering and he came looking for YOU. And the question Jesus asks this helpless and hopeless man is the same question he wants to ask you today.
John 5:6(a) (NLT)
6 When Jesus saw him and knew he had been ill for a long time . .
One of the definitions for the root word translated “SAW” is: to perceive or discern, to turn the mind, or attention to a thing.
Jesus steps into the MASS of humanity and he “perceives” he “discerns” – YOU and he turns his full attention to YOU. And then Jesus asks YOU the same question he asks this man.
Again, John 5:6.
John 5:6 (NLT)
6 When Jesus saw him and knew he had been ill for a long time, he asked him, “Would you like to get well?”
[ESV: Do you want to be healed?]
[NKJV: Do you want to be made well?]
The Greek word for “well” means To be Healthy - in body or mind.
It seems like a strange question, doesn’t it? Can you see this guy saying to Jesus, Uhhh, isn’t that a little obvious?
You know, if you see a man stopped on the side of the road with his head under the hood of his car, you really shouldn’t ask him if he’s having car trouble. You should be able to figure that one out.
And I’ve never walked into a hospital room and asked a person if they want to get well because it seems to be a pretty good assumption. But Jesus doesn’t work on assumptions. He is looking at the deepest places of our hearts.
And here in verse 6, Jesus asks YOU the most important question, “DO YOU WANT TO GET WELL? . . . AND DO YOU WANT TO GET WELL, TODAY?”
This question and our honest response to it may be behind more of our “paralysis in life” than we might be willing to admit. Remember this invalid man who represents you and me… after so long, he’s actually grown accustomed to his deep-seated and lingering disorder (amp). I doubt he even tries to be first to the water any more.
So, Jesus sees, he perceives, he discerns us and he turns his full attention to us. And then he asks us, Do you want to be made well? And if in the deepest place in our heart he sees that we are actually saying, “Uh, no, not really” then he will leave us in the same condition he found us. He will not force his healing on us.
Is it possible to say on the outside that we want to be made well but on the inside for us to be (in some way) kind of nursing and protecting that lingering disorder that is paralyzing us? Do you think Jesus is asking this man for a casual, superficial response? NO!
Jesus is looking for a brutally honest response from the deepest part of this man’s heart and that is a place that only Jesus can SEE into.
Sometimes our surface response to this question uncovers our true response. What if this man would have responded with anger and defensiveness? “What are You talking about? I’m here, aren’t I? I’m doing what I can! What do you want from me?”
Then Jesus would say, "I want truth from the deepest place of your heart. I want truth at that level."
“Do you REALLY want to be Made WELL?”
Or are you (for some reason) protecting your “lingering disorder” or the sin that is paralyzing your life? The first step to Jesus making you well is an honest answer at the deepest level of our hearts to the question from Jesus, “Do you REALLY want to be made WELL?”
The second step is an honest recognition of our own inability to make ourselves well.
John 5:7 (NLT)
7 “I can’t, sir,” (I can’t do it, I can’t make myself well) the sick man said, “for I have no one to put me into the pool when the water bubbles up. Someone else always gets there ahead of me.”
Now, Jesus doesn’t respond to this statement, but he sees the truth in this man’s heart. And I believe he sees two key ingredients in this man for our healing and our new life in Christ. He sees surrender and he sees brokenness. This man truly did want to be healed and he truly recognized his inability to make himself well.
It may have taken him thirty-eight years, but he finally accepted the fact that he could never make himself well on his own.
Maybe you’ve reached step one, where you’ve truly and honestly said, “I really do want to be made well.”
But then you’ve made the monstrous mistake of saying, “I’m going to really start working on it.” “I’m going to try really hard.”
Sometimes we really do want to be made well, but we want to do it our way. The problem is, this is not Burger King and the King of Kings is NOT that awkward little Burger King who lets you have it “your way.”
The reason you can’t have it your way is because your way doesn’t work and that is what this invalid man finally realized and Jesus saw his heart. This man realized the utter hopelessness of his condition. He was truly ready to be made well and he realized he could never do it on his own.
STEP 1 – Honestly want to be made well;
STEP 2 – Honestly believe you cannot do it your way
STEP 3 – Exercise Total FAITH and Total OBEDIENCE
As far as the Bible is concerned there is no other way to victory. In verses 8 and 9 Jesus gives this man opportunity to exercise step three – faith and obedience.
John 5:8 (NLT)
8 Jesus told him, “Stand up, pick up your mat, and walk!”
It is a simple command from Jesus but it takes a full measure of two things from the man. It takes full faith and it takes full obedience. This man really did want to be made well and he really knew he could not do it his own way. And there was something different about this Teacher who had just SEEN him (personally) in the crowd.
So he puts his full faith in Jesus (though he didn’t yet know his name) and he put his full obedience in the command.
And (listen please), the instant this man fully believed, Jesus gave him the power to fully believe. And the instant he fully obeyed, Jesus gave him the power to fully obey. And as he began to stand by faith, suddenly he had the power to stand. And after thirty-eight years, in an instant, this man was made whole and he found himself standing on his feet.
John 5:9(a) (NLT)
9 Instantly, the man was healed! He rolled up his sleeping mat and began walking! . . .
After thirty-eight years of pitiful “wishful thinking” at the “legend pool” this man jumped up, grabbed his cot and went walking, and leaping and praising God, just as Jesus told him to.
Unfortunately, while he was walking, and leaping and praising God – with his cot, he ran into the religious leaders – just as Jesus knew he would.
John 5:9(b)-13 (NLT)
9 . . . But this miracle happened on the Sabbath,
10 so the Jewish leaders objected. They said to the man who was cured, “You can’t work on the Sabbath! The law doesn’t allow you to carry that sleeping mat!” (never mind he had been healed)
11 But he replied, “The man who healed me told me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’ ”
12 “Who said such a thing as that?” they demanded. (still no response to the healing)
13 The man didn’t know, for Jesus had disappeared into the crowd.
Immediately this man’s healing was ignored and it was challenged and he was given reason to fall away and be discouraged. Suddenly he had to hold on to his faith and continue his obedience in the face of difficulty and persecution.
Remember at the beginning I said Jesus had a purpose for going to Jerusalem? Well, this is it.
Jesus healed this man in order to use him. He was healed to be an instrument of God. And what this man and this healing begins here with the Pharisees – ends with Jesus on the cross.
And you heard in Danielle’s testimony from the Lord speaking to her on this same exact spot. Dani said, “He healed me for a purpose, and made me new.”
Not just made well – made well for the glory of God.
And then we finish with a bit of a scary note.
John 5:14 (NLT)
14 But afterward Jesus found him in the Temple and told him, “Now you are well; so stop sinning, or something even worse may happen to you.”
I don’t know if this man’s infirmity had something to do with his sin but I do know a warning when I hear one and this is a warning.
Jesus tracks this man down in the temple and Jesus says to him, “Now you are WELL - You’ve been delivered. You’ve been healed. Do not go back to the sin from which you were saved,”
There are numerous warnings in the New Testament about not returning to our sin once we’ve been healed. If you want to check a scary one, check 2 Peter 2:20-22.
It seems clear to me that Jesus is saying here the faith and obedience that made you well you must continue to walk in or you will easily fall back into whatever paralysis Jesus healed you from.
The Pool of Bethesda represents our feeble and hopeless attempt at making ourselves well.
We say, “I’m going to get there, I’m going to fix this and then everything’s going to be OK.”
NO IT’S NOT! You’re going to remain spiritually paralyzed until the day you:
1). Stop protecting your sin, and truly want to get well
2). Recognize that you can’t make yourself well
3). Exercise Total FAITH and Total OBEDIENCE
Which must be done with a continual commitment to moment-by-moment be walking in the Spirit and moment-by-moment be crucifying the flesh – then you will find yourself well and you will go walking and leaping and praising God!
That thing that’s gnawing at you – even this morning – that thing in the shadows, that deep seated, lingering issue in your life…
The question that Jesus has for you today is, Do You Really Want To Be Made Well?
Or has that thing, that issue, that deep-seated lingering issue, become such a part of your life that you’ve just learned to “live with it”? Has it become so much a part of your life that you say, “Well, it’s who I am.”
If Jesus were to offer today to make you well, to heal you in that area of your life would you be ready to respond in complete faith and in complete obedience? If he were to speak to your heart and heal you today, would you truly want it and would you truly be ready?
In the Gospel of John, a lot of ministry has occurred before we get to Chapter 5. John has not written so much chronologically, Luke is much more. John is written as it says at the end of the book for one reason – that you would know that Jesus is the Son of God and that you may believe.
As we begin John Chapter 5 today, Jesus is headed back to Jerusalem (he is going up to Jerusalem). And we find out as we continue to read that Jesus is headed there with a very clear purpose. Jesus was going to prove that he is God in the Flesh, Co-Existent God in nature, in power and in authority. The text we’re looking at today is actually the kick-off of that purpose.
And so we start in John 5:1.
John 5:1 (NLT)
1 Afterward Jesus returned to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish holy days.
Jesus is going up to Jerusalem for one of the three Jewish holy days all Jewish males are required to attend. Which holy day is not important to John’s context right now, but we know Jesus is going to begin what is ultimately the final show-down with the Pharisees.
In the northeast corner of the wall surrounding the Old City of Jerusalem was the Sheep Gate (same area as Lion’s Gate today.) This is where the animals for sacrifice were brought in to be prepared to go to the temple. And near this gate was a natural spring pool called the Pool of Bethesda (or Bethsaida) and there were five great porches built around this pool with large steps going down into the water.
The masses of broken and needy people would gather at this pool because of its “healing legend.” The Pool of Bethesda still exists today. It’s one of our favorite stops when we go to Jerusalem and it’s always very powerful.
Last night I asked our oldest daughter Danielle, if I could share a bit of her testimony about the Lord spoke to her vividly and personally here at the Pool of Bethesda in 2014 when we were there.
If you don’t know, our daughter Danielle, eight years ago, had a life and death situation occur. She had a very large tumor in her spinal canal. And she went in for a very intense, life and death surgery. The head of neurosurgery at Scripps did the surgery for this very rare tumor. They took out the backside of five vertebrae and took out a major tumor. In the process of that she lost seventy percent of her blood in this thirteen hour surgery where the surgeons never moved. Two surgeons never moved for thirteen hours. And in the end when they came out they said to Josh, her husband, “Don’t expect her to walk. We had to take some nerves and we had to get the tumor. We could not leave it. And so you need to prepare yourself that she may not walk.”
And so then they took her up to her room and they made her keep her head down because of the loss of spinal fluid, and so for three days she couldn’t pick her head up and for those three days the world was praying for her; many of you, all through that surgery.
And so after the three days they came in. During the three days they would come in and poke her feet and say, “Do you feel that?” and she would say “no.” And they would say “Wiggle your toes, are you wiggling them?” And she would say “yes” and she wasn’t. They would say, “Lift up your leg, are you lifting it?” And she would say, “Yeah, I am” and she was not moving. And so the intensity is growing and growing and growing.
And after three days they finally sit her up on the bed, maybe it was the fourth day. They put her feet on the ground. And everyone in the room isn’t breathing; I mean we were all just crying out to God. And she doesn’t know because no one has said this to her. And so they put her feet on the floor and they say, “Okay, now try to stand up.”
And she doesn’t know, and she stands up. It’s hard, and it’s painful, but she stands. And then after awhile they say, “Okay, take a step.” And so everyone is holding their breath and she puts one foot out. And pretty soon by maybe four or five days she has moved to the door and the first time she moves out of the door into the nurses’ station the whole floor erupts in praise when they see her, because they had all been working with her and they all knew that this was the moment that they would know.
When she ended up walking around the whole nurses’ station, the nurses were following her, like a parade. It took a little while, but it was a real miracle.
And so when we were at the Pool of Bethesda in 2014, Dani wrote in her journal what she has allowed me to read to you. So let me read her journal from that trip.
It says, “Jesus met me supernaturally where he healed the paralyzed man at the Pool of Bethesda. He showed me the parallel to my own life. He spoke to me, ‘Get up and walk.’ God healed me and he healed me for a purpose. And he made me new. He washed away the pain and the sorrow and renewed me at Bethesda.”
This is just an awesome spiritual moment and when this occurred Dani couldn’t even stand up, the hand of the Lord was so strong on her. That is not an advertisement for you to come to Israel, but it is what we experienced there. Dani experienced the Lord speaking to her saying “You are the person that I came to Bethesda to heal.” For Dani, it’s not just physical but spiritual and everything that goes with that struggle.
For you and I, it may be something else. It may be personal. Maybe much more likely a lifestyle, an emotional, relational, spiritual issue. That issue is on the table today for you. Please keep it in mind as we continue in John 5:2.
John 5:2–3 (NLT)
2 Inside the city, near the Sheep Gate, was the pool of Bethesda, with five covered porches.
3 Crowds of sick people—blind, lame, or paralyzed—lay on the porches.
Now, in some of your Bibles the explanation of the legend is in verse 3 and verse 4. But the NLT and the ESV put this explanation in a footnote.
The NLT footnote says: [the crowds of sick people were] waiting for a certain movement of the water, for an angel of the Lord came from time to time and stirred up the water. And the first person to step in after the water was stirred was healed of whatever disease he had.
We don’t know if this ever really happened or if it was just a legend because Bethesda was a natural spring. Periodically the water would bubble up from underground which would have looked like the legend describes.
Either way, there was a great multitude of suffering, hurting and pitiful people here watching and waiting for their lives to be somehow magically made better by the “stirring of the water” (the legend) their hopes reduced to whatever their chance was to knock someone else over to get to the water first.
It was a microcosm of a broken and hopeless world and into this very depressing scene steps the Lord Jesus. And he apparently comes alone, possibly so he can move easily through the crowd of hurting people. And as he surveys this depressing scene of needy people he sees YOU! He picks YOU out of the crowd and he makes his way through the masses to YOU!
By the way, you are being represented today by a middle-aged, invalid man – stuck in his illness.
John 5:5 (NLT)
5 One of the men lying there had been sick for thirty-eight years.
The ESV says this man is an invalid, meaning in some way paralyzed by his illness.
The amplified Bible says,
John 5:5 (AMP)
5 There was a certain man there who had suffered with a deep-seated and lingering disorder for thirty-eight years.
Do you see why this man may represent you today? Many of us have struggled with a deep-seated and lingering disorder for a very long time.
I don’t know how long this man had been at the legend pool, but we know that he had carried this deep seated and lingering disorder for thirty-eight years. And after thirty-eight years, our deep seated and lingering disorders tend to kind of become WHO we are. After an extended time, our struggles and our difficulties can end up defining who we are.
And this man, paralyzed by his deep seated and lingering disorder ad all but given up on any real hope. He lay at the “healing pool” because that is what he did, that is who he had become. And Jesus came looking for YOU! – I mean, HIM.
Jesus came into the mass of human suffering and he came looking for YOU. And the question Jesus asks this helpless and hopeless man is the same question he wants to ask you today.
John 5:6(a) (NLT)
6 When Jesus saw him and knew he had been ill for a long time . .
One of the definitions for the root word translated “SAW” is: to perceive or discern, to turn the mind, or attention to a thing.
Jesus steps into the MASS of humanity and he “perceives” he “discerns” – YOU and he turns his full attention to YOU. And then Jesus asks YOU the same question he asks this man.
Again, John 5:6.
John 5:6 (NLT)
6 When Jesus saw him and knew he had been ill for a long time, he asked him, “Would you like to get well?”
[ESV: Do you want to be healed?]
[NKJV: Do you want to be made well?]
The Greek word for “well” means To be Healthy - in body or mind.
It seems like a strange question, doesn’t it? Can you see this guy saying to Jesus, Uhhh, isn’t that a little obvious?
You know, if you see a man stopped on the side of the road with his head under the hood of his car, you really shouldn’t ask him if he’s having car trouble. You should be able to figure that one out.
And I’ve never walked into a hospital room and asked a person if they want to get well because it seems to be a pretty good assumption. But Jesus doesn’t work on assumptions. He is looking at the deepest places of our hearts.
And here in verse 6, Jesus asks YOU the most important question, “DO YOU WANT TO GET WELL? . . . AND DO YOU WANT TO GET WELL, TODAY?”
This question and our honest response to it may be behind more of our “paralysis in life” than we might be willing to admit. Remember this invalid man who represents you and me… after so long, he’s actually grown accustomed to his deep-seated and lingering disorder (amp). I doubt he even tries to be first to the water any more.
So, Jesus sees, he perceives, he discerns us and he turns his full attention to us. And then he asks us, Do you want to be made well? And if in the deepest place in our heart he sees that we are actually saying, “Uh, no, not really” then he will leave us in the same condition he found us. He will not force his healing on us.
Is it possible to say on the outside that we want to be made well but on the inside for us to be (in some way) kind of nursing and protecting that lingering disorder that is paralyzing us? Do you think Jesus is asking this man for a casual, superficial response? NO!
Jesus is looking for a brutally honest response from the deepest part of this man’s heart and that is a place that only Jesus can SEE into.
Sometimes our surface response to this question uncovers our true response. What if this man would have responded with anger and defensiveness? “What are You talking about? I’m here, aren’t I? I’m doing what I can! What do you want from me?”
Then Jesus would say, "I want truth from the deepest place of your heart. I want truth at that level."
“Do you REALLY want to be Made WELL?”
Or are you (for some reason) protecting your “lingering disorder” or the sin that is paralyzing your life? The first step to Jesus making you well is an honest answer at the deepest level of our hearts to the question from Jesus, “Do you REALLY want to be made WELL?”
The second step is an honest recognition of our own inability to make ourselves well.
John 5:7 (NLT)
7 “I can’t, sir,” (I can’t do it, I can’t make myself well) the sick man said, “for I have no one to put me into the pool when the water bubbles up. Someone else always gets there ahead of me.”
Now, Jesus doesn’t respond to this statement, but he sees the truth in this man’s heart. And I believe he sees two key ingredients in this man for our healing and our new life in Christ. He sees surrender and he sees brokenness. This man truly did want to be healed and he truly recognized his inability to make himself well.
It may have taken him thirty-eight years, but he finally accepted the fact that he could never make himself well on his own.
Maybe you’ve reached step one, where you’ve truly and honestly said, “I really do want to be made well.”
But then you’ve made the monstrous mistake of saying, “I’m going to really start working on it.” “I’m going to try really hard.”
Sometimes we really do want to be made well, but we want to do it our way. The problem is, this is not Burger King and the King of Kings is NOT that awkward little Burger King who lets you have it “your way.”
The reason you can’t have it your way is because your way doesn’t work and that is what this invalid man finally realized and Jesus saw his heart. This man realized the utter hopelessness of his condition. He was truly ready to be made well and he realized he could never do it on his own.
STEP 1 – Honestly want to be made well;
STEP 2 – Honestly believe you cannot do it your way
STEP 3 – Exercise Total FAITH and Total OBEDIENCE
As far as the Bible is concerned there is no other way to victory. In verses 8 and 9 Jesus gives this man opportunity to exercise step three – faith and obedience.
John 5:8 (NLT)
8 Jesus told him, “Stand up, pick up your mat, and walk!”
It is a simple command from Jesus but it takes a full measure of two things from the man. It takes full faith and it takes full obedience. This man really did want to be made well and he really knew he could not do it his own way. And there was something different about this Teacher who had just SEEN him (personally) in the crowd.
So he puts his full faith in Jesus (though he didn’t yet know his name) and he put his full obedience in the command.
And (listen please), the instant this man fully believed, Jesus gave him the power to fully believe. And the instant he fully obeyed, Jesus gave him the power to fully obey. And as he began to stand by faith, suddenly he had the power to stand. And after thirty-eight years, in an instant, this man was made whole and he found himself standing on his feet.
John 5:9(a) (NLT)
9 Instantly, the man was healed! He rolled up his sleeping mat and began walking! . . .
After thirty-eight years of pitiful “wishful thinking” at the “legend pool” this man jumped up, grabbed his cot and went walking, and leaping and praising God, just as Jesus told him to.
Unfortunately, while he was walking, and leaping and praising God – with his cot, he ran into the religious leaders – just as Jesus knew he would.
John 5:9(b)-13 (NLT)
9 . . . But this miracle happened on the Sabbath,
10 so the Jewish leaders objected. They said to the man who was cured, “You can’t work on the Sabbath! The law doesn’t allow you to carry that sleeping mat!” (never mind he had been healed)
11 But he replied, “The man who healed me told me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’ ”
12 “Who said such a thing as that?” they demanded. (still no response to the healing)
13 The man didn’t know, for Jesus had disappeared into the crowd.
Immediately this man’s healing was ignored and it was challenged and he was given reason to fall away and be discouraged. Suddenly he had to hold on to his faith and continue his obedience in the face of difficulty and persecution.
Remember at the beginning I said Jesus had a purpose for going to Jerusalem? Well, this is it.
Jesus healed this man in order to use him. He was healed to be an instrument of God. And what this man and this healing begins here with the Pharisees – ends with Jesus on the cross.
And you heard in Danielle’s testimony from the Lord speaking to her on this same exact spot. Dani said, “He healed me for a purpose, and made me new.”
Not just made well – made well for the glory of God.
And then we finish with a bit of a scary note.
John 5:14 (NLT)
14 But afterward Jesus found him in the Temple and told him, “Now you are well; so stop sinning, or something even worse may happen to you.”
I don’t know if this man’s infirmity had something to do with his sin but I do know a warning when I hear one and this is a warning.
Jesus tracks this man down in the temple and Jesus says to him, “Now you are WELL - You’ve been delivered. You’ve been healed. Do not go back to the sin from which you were saved,”
There are numerous warnings in the New Testament about not returning to our sin once we’ve been healed. If you want to check a scary one, check 2 Peter 2:20-22.
It seems clear to me that Jesus is saying here the faith and obedience that made you well you must continue to walk in or you will easily fall back into whatever paralysis Jesus healed you from.
The Pool of Bethesda represents our feeble and hopeless attempt at making ourselves well.
We say, “I’m going to get there, I’m going to fix this and then everything’s going to be OK.”
NO IT’S NOT! You’re going to remain spiritually paralyzed until the day you:
1). Stop protecting your sin, and truly want to get well
2). Recognize that you can’t make yourself well
3). Exercise Total FAITH and Total OBEDIENCE
Which must be done with a continual commitment to moment-by-moment be walking in the Spirit and moment-by-moment be crucifying the flesh – then you will find yourself well and you will go walking and leaping and praising God!