UNUSUAL LESSONS FROM THE POOL

John 5:1-16

In John's Gospel there are seven miracles, seven men and seven messages. This is one of the seven selected miracles of Jesus occurring in the Gospel of John. The setting is the pool of Bethesda (meaning "House of Mercy"), the ancient hospital at Jerusalem. It had a healing pool and five colonnades in which the sick lay.

One day Jesus visited that place. A multitude was there waiting for the waters to be disturbed. The first one into the pool after the troubling of the waters was made well no matter what the affliction was.

The multitude there that day were in three respects different, and in two respects alike. They were different in that some were blind, some halt, and some withered; all were alike in that they were impotent and all were waiting, hoping that one day their lives might be different.

That multitude is a picture of so many today in a spiritual sense. We may liken our gathering today to the pool of Bethesda. The things noted about them then could also be true of us today.

They were all different in that some were blind. They were physically blind, but many of us today are spiritually blind. We just cannot see spiritual issues or spiritual truth. All this talk about a new life, a changed life, a converted life, a growing life in Christ...this just does not make sense to some people. They are blind to spiritual realities. But Jesus came to take away blindness...Matthew 11:5.

For some of us, our eyes may have been opened...but we cannot see as clearly as the Lord would have us see. We are like the man in Mark 8:22-26 who confessed, "I see men as trees walking." Could he see or couldn’t he see? The answer is "Yes" to both. He could see in that he was no longer blind; but he could not see clearly. Many Christians are like that man...we have had our eyes opened in salvation, but something has happened which has clouded our vision. We do not see the issues of life clearly.

They were all different in that some were lame. There were those who were physically lame; they were just limping along through life. They did not have the strength to get to the pool quickly enough.

And how many of us today find ourselves in that condition spiritually? There are those who just limp through life...stumbling along, never knowing anything that is different for them. There are those who are making such slow progress.

They were all different in that some were withered. There were those who were physically paralyzed; shriveled. Some of us might be that way spiritually. We have just never grown up. Immaturity characterizes these. A newborn infant is a beautiful sight, but a twenty year body with an infant's mind is a tragedy. Some characteristics of spiritual immaturity may be noted in 1 Corinthians 3:4.

How many believers today are out of Egypt but have not yet arrived in Canaan? How many of us are in a spiritual wilderness? Our faith, testimony, growth, potential... withered! How many of us have lost the use of what we once had?

But there were two respects in which they all were alike. They were all alike in that they were all powerless. That is, all present on that occasion were without power. They had lived like that for years and years, but had no power. The same afflictions, the same problems continued to conquer them. They couldn't do anything to help themselves.

Are we like them? Some of us have been saved for years but we continue to be dominated by bad tempers, profane thoughts, carnal dispositions...we have had no victory. We have carried these things with us throughout our lives. But we have no power!

And they were all alike in that all were hoping. All of them around the pool of Bethesda were waiting and hoping, waiting and hoping that they might be the first in the pool after it was troubled the next time! They were waiting and hoping that some day for them would be different. That's who they were, and that's who many of us are.

Is this the way God intended us to be? Does He have a different plan for us? The story of this miracle tells us He does. Here is what God can do in the lives of those who will believe, respond, obey and walk with Him.

Jesus came along among the multitude. The story centers on one man...and the three things Jesus said to him. Jesus asked one question and spoke two commands. Are we listening? Really listening?

I. A LIFE LOADED DOWN...John 5:6-7. "Wilt thou be made whole?"

In the midst of that multitude, Jesus came. There was a man there...a cripple. What was there in this one man that drew Jesus to him? There were many there, but Jesus singled out just one. "Jesus saw him...knew." Jesus saw! Jesus knew! Jesus cared! Jesus saw differently from anyone else; He always does.

Jesus knew what could be done in that person's life. Did Jesus see the potential of faith in that man's life? Apparently so, for why else would he be chosen from among the many who were afflicted that day? God looked at him as he really was. And God sees us in the same way...He sees us as we really are. Do we see ourselves that way? We need to come in out of the dark into the light. The blood of Christ cleanses in the light, not in the dark...1 John 1:7. He knows how crippled we really are spiritually.

People are important to God. Reaching people is His business. Not everyone is going to respond to the Lord. This is represented by the many who were in the hospital on that fateful day. Many were there...but one was singled out by the Lord to be the recipient of His power and grace.

Jesus would open the life of that man to himself. And so Jesus asked the question, "Do you want to be made whole?" There were obstacles to that man's deliverance that had to be overcome. What did Jesus mean by that question? Was it not this: "Do you want your life to be different? Do you believe life can be different? Are you satisfied with your present life? Some things will change if you are made whole. Do you really want to change?" And the same question comes to us today. The Lord will not work in that man's life until he is ready to respond. Jesus would remove the load from that man's life and make him whole again!

The answer of that man is very revealing. Let us explore some of the obstacles in the life of that crippled man...

1. “I’ve been this way too long!”

He had been a cripple for 38 years. My, that's a long time; that's a life time. It surely was a long duration. His condition had begun five years before Jesus was born!

"What's the use of talking that way to me? Life will never be any different for me. I've been like this for the past 38 years." Is that what we hear him thinking?

2. “There is nothing I can do about it!”

Note the implication of Jesus' question. We will expand it. Jesus said, "I didn't say 'can you'; I asked 'will you'?" How far did that man want Jesus to go? Had the cripple just about given up?

Implicit in Jesus’ question is the awareness that the man’s life would be changed. Things would be different for him. Perhaps he did not want his life to be totally changed. He had been used to begging as a means of livelihood...and that would no longer be an option for him. Some people just do not want to be moved out of their comfort zone.

The man's response indicated that he did not think it would do any good. He had tried to get to the pool before, but he was always second. Actually, the pool only helped the strongest - those who could get there first after the troubling of the water. The weakest among them were not helped but grew weaker.

There had been so many failures, so many defeated hopes, so many unachieved expectations. He had apparently given up long ago any desire that life would be different for him. The question of Jesus at first simply drew from the crippled man a defense as to why such a question was not appropriate for him. He had his shield of defense ready when the question came to him.

3. “No one cares about me!”

He had no person to help. No one there seemed to care about him. "No man cared for my soul" Psalm 142:4. In effect, he lamented that no one was interested in him. How sad!

Was there no member of his family who could be with him? Was there no friend upon whom he could depend? It is sad not to have someone close to help in time of need.

Perhaps he was blaming others; perhaps he was blaming himself. But he was wrong! He had Jesus. And Jesus cared; He would help. There was something about Jesus that arrested the crippled man.

Jesus must build faith into the life of that man. That man must be willing for Jesus to work in his life. He did not know at that time Who Jesus was.

II. A LIFE LIFTED UP...John 5:8-9. "Rise, take up thy bed, and walk!"

Jesus' question was to awaken interest; Jesus' command was to activate faith. The command comes in a most startling way: "Rise!" The man could have said, "But I've been on my back for 38 years. I can't...!" Jesus didn't say, "Can you?" but "Rise!"

Let us remember that the characteristics of a miracle are (a) a miracle must be immediate, (b) a miracle must be complete, and (c) a miracle must be lasting. What Jesus would do in his life, changing and transforming him, would be nothing short of a miracle. Has Jesus so touched our lives...not in a physical sense but in a spiritual sense?

1. The miracle(s)...were there not two of them?

True, the man had no power in himself. That condition had crippled him and had claimed him these many years. Some of us have been crippled and chained by thoughts, attitudes and actions WE have been powerless to defeat.

Do we hear the man say, "I can't!" But Jesus can! Jesus can break the bonds that cripple. Do we hear the man say, "I don't know?" His past seemed against it, but life really could be different for him. Do we hear the man say, "I won't!" God forbid, for he is not beyond the point of no return.

The impossible can become possible...not through man's strength but through Christ's power. No matter what the apparently impossible situations are which we have faced or are facing, the truth is that Christ is able to transform or change us in the midst of them. It is not that the situation itself will change (as with the crippled man), but certainly we will experience a change which will make the situation seem different to us.

Do we hear the man say, "I will!" As he looked into the face of Jesus, there must have been something that arrested him. "You mean, after all these years of living my life on this level, life can be different? You mean this cripple can be made well; this chain can be broken; this slave can be set free?"

Hope and faith welled up within his soul. He swung his legs over the edge of that pallet, and stood. Oh, God, he stood! For the first time in 38 years! I wonder what the crowd thought as they looked on? He had taken Jesus Christ at His word. What our Lord commands, He gives the power to perform. Nothing is too hard for God!

There were actually two miracles that took place that day. The obvious miracle is that the man was made well. That which had held him in bondage for 38 years was removed so that he arose. But the second miracle was that he could walk without learning how to do so!

When I was very young, I was struck with scarlet fever. In those days a three week quarantine was imposed for scarlet fever. When the health official came to quarantine our house, a guest was with us...and had to remain for the twenty-one day period. I was confined to bed...and at the end of that long period of time, I almost had to learn to walk all over again.

But that man walked right away! What a testimony to the power of God!

2. The mat (NIV)...why was Jesus concerned that he take up his bed?

Jesus told him to take up his bed and walk. The miracle occurred as the man obeyed. Faith and obedience go hand in hand together.

In obedience to Jesus, he took his bed with him under his arm. An obvious reason was that he was to make no provision for a relapse, no mental reservation that he would need that bed for that purpose again. He wasn't intending to return to Bethesda.

He walked out of that pool (he also lost his place in line...he wouldn't need that anymore!) into a new life. Some believers fail and suffer defeat because they like to leave a convenient path along which they can retreat later on if their present course doesn't work out. He was to leave the old life, the old habits, the old level of living behind.

But there was another reason for Jesus’ instruction: Jesus would deliberately provoke a Sabbath controversy with the religious authorities for He had healed the man on the Sabbath. A man carrying his bed on the Sabbath could be spotted far away. And surely enough he was!

3. The message...what was the right use of the Sabbath?

Jesus' antagonists criticized the man for carrying his bed on the Sabbath. If you had been bedridden for 38 years and suddenly you were healed, where would you go? What would you do? This man went to the Temple of God. He wanted to worship where he had been excluded these many years...v 14.

"The Sabbath was a central issue in the conflicts between Jesus and His opponents (cf. Mark 2:23; 3:4). The Mosaic Law required that work cease on the seventh day. Additional laws were added by later Jewish religious authorities, which became very complicated and burdensome. These human traditions often obscured the divine intention in God's Law. 'The Sabbath was made for man' (Mark 2:27) so that he could have rest and a time for worship and joy. The Jews' rigid tradition (not the Old Testament) taught that if anyone carried anything from a public place to a private place on the Sabbath intentionally, he deserved death by stoning. In this case the man who was healed was in danger of losing his life...The healed man realized this difficulty and tried to evade any responsibility by saying he was just following orders." Blum, BKC, II, p 289

III. A LIFE LED ON...John 5:14. "Sin no more lest a worse thing come unto thee."

Jesus later found the man who had been healed in the temple. The implication is that Jesus had gone looking for the man. "The ex-paralytic seemed to have no gratitude to Jesus: his conduct put him in a bad light. Jesus' warning...was that his tragic life of 38 years as an invalid was no comparison to the doom of hell." Blum, BKC, II, p 290.

There are at least two instances in the Gospels where those who were blessed by Jesus as recipients of a miracle behaved rather badly. One is found in Luke 17:11-19 where only one out of ten returned to express gratitude to Jesus for healing them of their leprosy. The other is in this episode before us. We must never allow those who behave badly after they have been blessed by Jesus keep us from focusing our attention on the Savior Himself.

He was to walk. But that was routine, somewhat monotonous, possibly boring. But he was to be walking a path characterized by Jesus' third statement.

1. Life's new discipline..."sin no more."

He would walk into a life that will bring to him a greater degree of godliness...Proverbs 3:5-6. Everyday living is involved. The former cripple is accountable NOW for the new life Jesus Christ gave him.

Frequently we pray, "Lord, change my husband, my wife, my children..." so that life can be easier and more comfortable. That is not the way to pray. We should thank God for building character in us through the problems that come to us.

Note the warning: "sin no more!" Was his affliction 38 years before due to some sin in his life? He was not to presume upon the grace of God and return to a life of sin. Here was opportunity, responsibility and accountability.

2. Life's new direction...

The man was to be a walking miracle; a living demonstration of the power of God at work in a person's life. Everywhere he would go he would be a walking object lesson of what Jesus Christ can do in the life of a person. Unfortunately, his behavior pattern began otherwise. What kind of testimony are we bearing?

God does have a plan for our lives. How far do we really want Jesus Christ to go in us and through us? Let us respond to His plan for our lives and, by so doing, bring glory to Him!

Does your life need to be changed? Does mine? Christ will do it...if we will respond by faith and allow Him to so work in our lives.