Do You Want To Get Well? Series

Do you want to get well?

John has Jesus teach in the context of Jewish festivals

This story is all about the revelation of God in Jesus on the Sabbath Read John 5:1-15

John 5:1-15 Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for a feast of the Jews. 2 Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. 3 Here a great number of disabled people used to lie--the blind, the lame, the paralyzed. 5 One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, "Do you want to get well?"

7 "Sir," the invalid replied, "I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me."

8 Then Jesus said to him, "Get up! Pick up your mat and walk." 9 At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked.

The day on which this took place was a Sabbath, 10 and so the Jews said to the man who had been healed, "It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat."

11 But he replied, "The man who made me well said to me, `Pick up your mat and walk.' "

12 So they asked him, "Who is this fellow who told you to pick it up and walk?"

13 The man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there.

14 Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, "See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you." 15 The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.

Background on pool called Bethesda

Colonnades or porticoes to shade the crippled

Perhaps built by wealthy grateful healed persons

Legend is born by explanations to experiences - ripple in water, subterranean spring or - angel (no vs. 4)

Why not stand in the pool 24/7 - because it didn't work

Did Jesus believe in curative powers of the shrine -

Did the religious people?

Healing shrine at Lourdes - exit littered with crutches and casts - be more convincing if littered with prosthetics

What disables a person -

Do you want to get well?

What disables a person? Broken body? Defeated mind?

Career invalid needs to ask himself:

Do I want to get better?

Jesus always asks great questions -

Do you want to get well?

I don't ask - Is your car broken - do you want your marriage to work, do you want to pass Math?

1st response - blame - I have no one to help me

Don't throw pity parties

2nd thing - Banking on legend - miracle cures

The man didn't need the pool, he needed Jesus

Jesus' stern response "get up!"

Remember last week - Go Home!

Jesus doesn't mince words

38 years with little or no hope replaced by a strict command Get up - quit begging

The man is instantly healed - but this isn't a story about healing, there were dozens there not healed

Jesus is more concerned with crippled ideas of Sabbath

Fixing Religion - Messing with Tradition

The Sabbath every 7 days - defined your lifestyle. What did God intend for the Sabbath?

What kinds of things were illegal to do on the Sabbath? look in a mirror - Sabbaths journey 3000 feet from your house - cord or wire connecting house and barn - burden work size dried fig - no shower for fear of cleaning the floor - pick up a child - but not if the child held a stone

An orthodox Jewish web site lists 39 categories of work

Burning - light a fire - stove - starting an engine - turning on an electric light

Writing or tearing - can tear a package to get food - but avoid tearing through letters on the package

Cooking - but you can warm food if you don't light a fire or turn on electricity

Sewing tearing, tying or untying a permanent knot - so ties and shoes are AOK

Plowing - planting - spitting may part the soil and considered plowing

Reaping, harvesting, threshing, and winnowing

Selecting - may not pick out bad fruit from good, but may eat only the good fruit leaving the bad

Shearing - cutting hair, fingernails, combing pulls out hair

From their website - The Sabbath is more than a mere set of rules. It is another way of life completely, totally divorced from weekday life. When put in handbook form, a different life style may seem very difficult and complex. When lived, however, it is really very easy.