John 5:1-18.
So the Lamb of God walks through the Sheep Gate into the House of Mercy. It's Jerusalem in the Spring and John is about to introduce the third element of salvation- grace. Water to wine was salvation by the word. Healing of the nobleman's son was salvation by faith. This particular miracle will upstage the era of grace. Jesus walks into the scene of a multitude of lame folks floundering around a giant pool of water, waiting on an angel to stir it up and the first one in gets healed. "Last one in's a rotten egg!" In fact, it might have smelled like rotten egg. Maybe it's a geothermic pool that bubbles every now and again, I don't know. But one point is that the lame guy is focused on the pool. Wrong thing to look at. Jesus is going to turn this man's eyes to Himself, the Healer, the Grace-giver. Again Jesus asks the profound, "do you want to be made whole?". This is very similar to Chapter One where he turned to ask His disciples, "what do you want?" We need to get this straight. We need to decide what we want and it needs to be Jesus. Everything else should pale in comparison. So check yourself...how are you doing with that? Sigh... So many distractions and noise make this difficult. We have so much invested in this world, this becomes tough to execute. Maybe we are too full of ourselves to be full of JC. Maybe we just don't know how this could work. Maybe we need a little more faith and a lot less fear. Some folks prove they really don't want to be healed and truly live. They make excuses and pretend they are victims. Victimization can paralyze you if you let it.
So the lame guy (that's you and me, by the way), doesn't answer Jesus' question. Instead, he whines out an excuse, "I've got no one to help me into the water. Someone always beats me to the punch." Jesus doesn't even flinch. Of all the people in this scene, He's chosen this guy to heal. He doesn't address or entertain the excuse, but simply gives the order of truth to heal the man. Picking up his mat and walking away from that place meant no relapses allowed. Don't go back. Don't give up. Get rid of that junk and walk free. It's time to start really living. A lifestyle of sin had put him in that place, now he had received grace-undeserved. Returning to a lifestyle of sin would mean establishing a position of grieving the Holy Spirit in rejection and opposition; therefore, sentencing himself eternally separated from God. Don't go back. Whatever is weighing you down and keeping you from holiness and good relationship with the Lord-drop it right now and don't look back. It's not worth it.
This is not a popular concept in the world today. "Toleration is the new national religion".-Jon Courson. People don't like to face or deal with their sin. If we say sin is wrong, we are narrow-minded, judgmental, intolerant, hypocrites. Yet they will want a doctor to cut out the cancer that is going to kill them otherwise!
This story is a model for ministry. Jesus saw a multitude of need, but only healed one that we know of. We are not to meet every need, but only do what the Father says to do. More on that next week. Otherwise, we will kill ourselves trying to fix everything. God doesn't burden us that way. We need to be close to Him, be listening for His nudge, and respond in obedience. He doesn't intend for us to burn out or go crazy. Pray, "what do you want me to do?".
We don't know why God does certain things in mysterious ways. We can't even fathom salvation. We love because He first loved us. We say "yes" to Him, but it was He that chose us. We seek Him, but He finds us. But don't give up when you don't understand completely. We've got to trust Him, no matter what. Don't let what you don't know shipwreck what you do know. Stand on the truths and promises of God that you do know.
So this was the beginning of a trail of hatred. The religious leaders would start plotting to kill Jesus. He broke the cultural law of the day by healing on the Sabbath. He's going to address their accusations next week. Brace yourself...
