John 5:1-9
"Near the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem there was a pool, in Hebrew called Bethesda, with five alcoves. Hundreds of blind, crippled, paralyzed--were in these alcoves. One man had been an invalid there for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him stretched out by the pool and knew how long he had been there, he said, 'Do you want to get well?'"
The sick man said, 'Sir, when the water is stirred, I don't have anybody to put me in the pool. By the time I get there, somebody else is already in.'
Jesus said, 'Get up, take your bedroll, start walking.' The man was healed on the spot. He picked up his bed roll and walked off."
The first time I read this story, I was really confused. It doesn't make much sense if you don't understand the importance of the pool in Bible times.
The pool in Bethesda was important because every so often (no one knew when) the pool would stir itself and the first sick person (invalid) to get in the water would be healed. Because no one knew when the pool would stir, there were hundreds of sick people surrounding it waiting for the opportunity to hop in. The problem was, only the first person who got in would be healed. Can you imagine waiting there like this man did for thirty-eight years?!? I haven't even been alive for that long! I can't imagine the disappoinment of using all your energy to get yourself into the pool and having someone else beating you too it. And what if the person who got healed was one of the people who had been laying next to you for thirty-eight years? I know I would be pretty mad if one of my friends got there first!
The sick man in this story is a lot like us. He had an illness that affected his life. Just like we are affected by sin. He also made excuses when he was confronted by Jesus! When Jesus asked him if he wanted to be healed, instead of saying 'YES!' he made excuses of why he hadn't gotten into the pool first. God isn't looking for excuses from us. The sick man also walked away from all the other sick people. Look at the last sentence in the passage..it says, 'He picked up his bedroll and walked off.' He had spent every minute of every day with these people for the last thirty-eight years and once he was healed he didn't even help the others get into the pool or better yet tell them about Jesus and how he healed him! It's sad how I'm quick to judge this man when we do this all the time too! Christ has healed all of us of our disease and yet we don't go out and tell everyone about it!
How can we respond to this story? We need to admit our illness. 1 John 1:8-9 says 'If we claim that we're free of sin, we're only fooling ourselvs. A claim like that is errant nonsense. On the other hand, if we admit our sins--make a clean breast of them--he won't let us down; he'll be true to himself. He'll forgive our sins and purge us of all wrong doing.'
We also need to respond to the question, 'Do you want to get well?' We need to stop making up excuses for God. Our God is a god of second chances..he wants to heal us of our illness. John 1:11-12 states 'Jesus came to the world that was his own. But his own people did not accept him. But some people did accept him. The believed in him. To them he gave the right to become children of God.'
Lastly, we can not walk away from those who need Jesus. Romans 3:23-24, 'All people have sinned and are not good enough for God's glory..they are made right with God by being made free from sin through Jesus Christ.' We have been healed but there are still thousands of people laying by the 'pool'. Don't just get up and walk away. God has saved us so that we can help save other people.
