"Lame Excuses" Series

“Lame Excuses”

John 5:1-15

So it is an interesting question to pose to someone when we ask a person who is been critically sick for 38 years... In that entire time he could not walk. Now someone asked him, hey do you want to get well? You can’t walk. No wheelchairs at that time. Jesus approaches this area and it is located by the sheep gate which is where the sheep were led into the temple yard to be sacrificed. All of this is happening by the pool of Bethesda and John tells us that they are in the yard were a multitude of sick people... Blind, lame, paralyzed. And all of them, are waiting for one thing—the movement of the water. Verse seven.

Millions of people every year flock to Hot Springs Arkansas to experience the warm Springs, many thinking there is a healing agent to the water. But God doesn’t need that sort of thing to heal land here in the NT this belief the man held is really based on superstition. We don’t need to wear cross around her neck... We can; we do not need a statue of one of God’s saints on our dashboard, we don’t need oil for healing. It is Jesus who does the healing.

Often Jesus would ask for the individual to express their faith before he healed them. But not every time. In fact in this story I noticed several things that are completely different.

1. The man never ask for Jesus’s help

2. John does not report that the man had faith in any amount

3. The man did not even know who Jesus was

So much for our list of things we need to do to be healed. The man believed that an Angel would calm and stir the pool setting the healing water into motion and then the first one to jump in its healed. It was superstition. Jesus doesn’t work that way. When God heals there is never a clearer picture of his amazing grace in action. Again Jesus is performing a miracle on the Sabbath by ordering the man to pick up his mat and walk. Don’t think for a moment that Jesus didn’t know he was breaking the Sabbath. He did so many miracles on the Sabbath that I do have begun to think that he did it on purpose. Here’s what the Pharisees were taught: whoever on the Sabbath brings anything partakes anything out from one place to another, if he does it willingly he shall be stoned to death. That’s how serious this was. Describes that a list of 39 things you could not do on the Sabbath. So we ask why? Why go ahead and do it? Easy. Jesus was his solution. Not the Pharisees. Not the wall. Not describes. Jesus. There was no hope in the system.

To Jesus heals the man. He gets up and never touches the water. Pages walks away. I’m guessing he actually jumped and Hopped and ran. His legs were now working. If we read this carefully we notice the man had been sick like this for 38 years. It doesn’t say from birth. Jesus says to him, don’t sin or something worse could happen. Doesn’t mean he could be lame again. It refers to what happens to those who live a life filled with sand instead of a life filled with Jesus.

These are several things to think about here.

1. This fellow had used every resource he had to get well. That’s what we do. We depend on our own resources to solve her own problems. Then they don’t work, we whine and complain.

2. Sometimes we do turn to God but usually we have the wrong goal in mind. This guy wanted Jesus to help him get into the pool. Because in my mind, that’s what I need. The pool wasn’t what he needed. He needed Jesus. If I’m down because my bank account is low I want God to give me a better job or help me win the lotto. When I really need to trust it all to him.

If I’m down because of my marriage or I’m in a bad relationship—I want God to change them; it’s like Adam in the garden... Lord is that woman you gave me. She is the problem! When maybe I’m the one that needs to change. Me. Then Jesus asked him the big question. Do you want to get well who wouldn’t? The choice was actually the lame man’s. A beggar in that day could make money by never doing anything. Just sit there all day. Now he might have to actually go to work.

You want to be healed?

• Yes Lord but I can’t. I’ve tried Lord. Everything I know to do. But I can’t get in the water in everyone else beats me to it. The man sounded hopeless. Thousand like he had completely given up on life.

And maybe you have as well.