The Tortoise Will Never Win The Race – The Man Who Was Too Slow John 5:1-16 Series

THE TORTOISE WILL NEVER WIN THE RACE – THE MAN WHO WAS TOO SLOW

CHARACTERS OF JOHN’S GOSPEL – John 5:1-16

John 5:1 After these things there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. John 5:2 Now there is in Jerusalem by the sheep gate a pool which is called in Hebrew Bethesda, having five porticoes.

John 5:3 In these lay a multitude of those who were sick, blind, lame, and withered, [waiting for the moving of the waters, John 5:4 for an angel of the Lord went down at certain seasons into the pool, and stirred up the water. Then after the stirring up of the water, whoever first stepped in was made well from whatever disease with which he was afflicted.]

John 5:5 A certain man was there who had been thirty-eight years in his sickness. John 5:6 When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had already been in that condition a long time, He said to him, “Do you wish to get well?” John 5:7 The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, but while I am coming, another steps down before me.”

John 5:8 Jesus said to him, “Arise, take up your pallet and walk,” John 5:9 Immediately the man became well and took up his pallet and began to walk. Now it was the Sabbath on that day.

John 5:10 Therefore the Jews were saying to him who was cured, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not permissible for you to carry your pallet,” John 5:11 but he answered them, “He who made me well was the one who said to me, ‘Take up your pallet and walk.’” John 5:12 They asked him, “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Take up your pallet, and walk’?” John 5:13 but he who was healed did not know who it was for Jesus had slipped away while there was a crowd in that place.

John 5:14 Afterward Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, “Behold, you have become well. Do not sin anymore so that nothing worse may befall you.” John 5:15 The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well, John 5:16 and for this reason the Jews were persecuting Jesus because He was doing these things on the Sabbath.

INTRODUCTION

Now we will deal with a problem. As most of you will probably notice, there is a comment in your bibles concerning verses 3 and 4. The last half of verse 3 and all of 4 is not found in the oldest manuscripts. For that reason the passage may be in brackets or in italics, or even omitted. Nearly all the scholars, except the diehard KJV Only people, say this section is an interpolation, in other words, it was inserted into the text to try to give some clarification to the story.

When you read the first four verses which we will do now, again . . . . You gain from that, this is like a competition, where the fittest of the worst, gets healed, and the worst of the worst will always miss out. If this is actually what happened, can you imagine the chaos as maimed and semi-immobile, blind, and withered people jostled to get to the pool first. It would well fit Darwin’s evolution philosophy, “the survival of the fittest”, a disgraceful godless teaching. Verse 3 says there was a multitude of people at that pool all lying around, presumably, desperate people like those today with cancer who try all sorts of means and suggestions and alleged remedies hoping something might work. At that pool, if one got healed, then many missed out. It is a bit like the law of the jungle.

Of all the accounts in the gospels of healing, this is the strangest. It is said that an angel stirred up the waters of the pool of Bethsaida, and whoever was the quickest got healed. What do we make of this? In what light does it put God? Do you think a compassionate God would program things this way? It sits awkwardly with me that this is the way God would heal people. I would like to reject the whole idea. You can understand some scribe wanting to clarify this account, for all we really know of the procedure is found in John 5 v 7 The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, but while I am coming, another steps down before me.” Now we can ask ourselves, “Was the belief that the waters were stirred up by an angel, a continuing story myth among those diseased and crippled people, or was it, in fact, truth?” The man Jesus was speaking to certainly believed it.