City Life Starter

Written by Scott Fiddler

The Word

1 After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 2 Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, in Hebrew called Beth-zatha, which has five porticoes. 3 In these lay a multitude of invalids, blind, lame, paralyzed. 5 One man was there, who had been ill for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him and knew that he had been lying there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?” 7 The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is troubled, and while I am going another steps down before me.” 8 Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your pallet, and walk.” 9 And at once the man was healed, and he took up his pallet and walked. Now that day was the sabbath. 10 So the Jews said to the man who was cured, “It is the sabbath, it is not lawful for you to carry your pallet.” 11 But he answered them, “The man who healed me said to me, ‘Take up your pallet, and walk.’ ” 12 They asked him, “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Take up your pallet, and walk’?” 13 Now the man who had been healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn, as there was a crowd in the place. 14 Afterward, Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, “See, you are well! Sin no more, that nothing worse befall you.” 15 The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him.

John 5:1-15

Commentary

Between the spring of 2015 and the fall of 2019 I was sick. I had Gastropathy, which is a medical term for  “We don’t know what’s wrong with your stomach.” It started with a dinner at The Olive Garden, and for the next 4 1/2 years my stomach never felt the same. I was subjected to an endoscopy, colonoscopy, a stomach emptying test, an ultrasound, and every other diagnostic tool the doctors could think of, to no avail. When my gastroenterologist suggested acupuncture, I knew he had run out of ideas.

Until you have experienced a serious chronic health problem, it can be hard to appreciate how life-altering it can be. I felt nauseous 24/7 for 4 1/2 years. Nausea became my new normal. In fact, I forgot what it felt like not to be nauseous. Somehow, I adapted. Though, I continued to work and live, and wonder, “Will I have to live with feeling this way for the rest of my life?”

The man at the Bethesda Pool had been sick for thirty-eight years. We don’t know what his diagnoses was—maybe it was muscular dystrophy or Parkinsons disease—but he apparently couldn’t walk. To put it in a modern perspective, it would be like not having walked since 1986. He had probably forgotten what it felt like to walk or even stand on his own.

Then came Jesus’ question, “Do you wish to get well?” The question appears insulting without the context. But John explains what prompted the question:  “When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew he had already been a long time in that condition . . .” Jesus asked the question because He knew the man had been in that condition for so long. The question appears to have been intended to awaken hope in the man, to shake him out of a contentment with a dysfunctional normal to which he had adapted.

Application

Hope can be painful. What is certain is not hoped for; it is expected. The only certainty of hope is the possibility of disappointment. It is not surprising then that other religions and philosophies have attempted to eliminate the possibility of disappointment by discouraging hope. Stoicism, Buddhism, and Taoism are examples. Not so with Christianity. The Apostle Paul even referred to the Lord as “the God of Hope” (Romans 15:13). 

Hope matters because hope is a condition precedent to faith (See Hebrews 11:1). And faith is the key that unlocks the door to the miracles Jesus wants to do in our lives (Matthew 17:20).

What dysfunction or abnormal condition have you adapted to because you thought it could never change? Jesus may be asking, “Do you want to get well?”

Prayer

Lord, please awaken my heart to hope in those areas where You want to perform a miracle. In Jesus’ name I pray, amen.