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When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had already been a long time in that condition, He said to him, "Do you wish to get well?" (John 5:6)
There is so much deep and intensely important lessons in this verse that I can see I may be here for some time. These words of Jesus resonate very deeply in my own heart as a means of confronting me just as He did this sick man, making me face my own inner motives, attitudes and paradigms.
Do you wish to get well?
At first this seems like a no-brainer. What a silly question! Why, anyone can see how obvious the answer to this question would be. Or is it so obvious?
Do you really want to be well?
Or are you so used to living in dysfunction that you may find it too uncomfortable to be free of all those familiar ways and co-dependencies and crutches you have used for so long. Are the props and excuses that you have arranged all around you so important to you that you are actually loathe to give some of them up in exchange for a radically different life? This new existence will not only involve a healed body but more importantly a healed soul where you will have to face the requirements of being more responsible for yourself and your actions.
You think this is a no-brainer and that the question itself is something of an insult to your intelligence. But that feeling of insult itself may be a warning signal that far deeper down inside there are false beliefs and assumptions buried under years of sickness that justify your views of reality and the ways things are or should be for you. You have been living most of your life now with this sickness and may not even be able to remember living any other way. You may have spent years living in the midst of a whole clutch of people who likewise live in disabilities, sicknesses, dysfunction and pain who share similar assumptions about how God feels about you.
Do you want to be well?
Ah, now some of the deeper issues are beginning to emerge. What is your gut-level picture of God and how He views your situation? I am not talking about just your theological beliefs and professions about what and who God is, I am talking more importantly about your heart feelings that have a way of subtly insisting they are more true than what anyone else could ever say about God. I am a Stranger who suddenly has shown up in the crush of the crowd around you, who looks no different than any other man walking by except that I am daring to challenge your whole paradigm of reality by asking what at first seems like a blatantly stupid question like this. But this question has a way of exposing many assumptions deep inside that you have never thought were important enough to challenge before because they are shared by so many you have lived around for so long. But I ask again,
Do you want to be well?
The seeming absurdity of this question has the ability to bring all sorts of other questions very quickly to the surface. And the direction that you choose to have these questions to take your mind will reveal your even deeper beliefs about how I feel about you, about principles of life and the way things really are. Are you ready to question your status quo? Are you ready to let go of your daily routine, of your beliefs about magical cures or mystical options in favor of trusting a total Stranger who is standing before you suddenly able to read your heart and your thoughts? What are you going to do with Him? His questions are uncomfortable but somehow compelling and intriguing. Are you ready to be different from everyone around you, to change your beliefs about what you really need and the methods God might use to bless you and empower you?
Do you want to be well?
Are you at the point in your life yet where you are sick and tired of being sick and tired? But the option I am offering you may look and feel so unfamiliar that you will be strongly tempted to doubt its viability. What evidence do you have upon which to make such a radical decision? Why should you take action based on such little proof to go on? All you have known your whole life is being brought up for question now and a whole new way of perceiving reality is being offered you. But this is all so unfamiliar and strange and unlike anything you have ever dared to think about before that it requires some vitally serious choices on your part before you can know what is beyond the next step. It means that you are going to have to trust in My word alone without having the benefit of observing others coming to freedom ahead of you.
Do you want to be healed?
Here we are, Me standing in the midst of a busy crowd of people pushing and shoving and involved in religious activities, hurrying around to fulfill their supposed religious obligations and expectations on this Sabbath day while inattentive to the needs and pain of those around them, preoccupied with religious formalities and schedules. We both live in a society with strong religious restrictions and expectations about proper behavior and severe limitations on what a person can do or say or even how far they can walk. Yet all of these restrictions are designed to reinforce pictures of a God who is severe and exacting and demanding and must be properly appeased in order to remain on His good side.
You are very familiar with all of this, but do you realize the implications that these rules and expectations have on your opinions about God and about life and about who does or does not deserve to be healed? You are also familiar with the superstitious notions that have grown up in your culture about what might bring about your healing. That is why you spend so much of your time here at this particular pool, because it seems to be the only faint hope you have left for healing even though all the odds are stacked against you. Its almost like playing the lottery. But you have determined to hang onto hope anyway even though it is obviously far beyond your reach to meet all the social demands and physical requirements necessary to get even the chance of supposed healing from the stirring of the waters.
But tell me, what are you going to place your faith in now? Do you have so much confidence that these mysterious water movements can really bring healing to your crippled condition that you will remain here for as long as it takes, hoping for a way to get into the water first ahead of all who are obviously more alert and capable than you are? Is this going to be your focus of attention, the god you depend on the rest of your life? Or are you ready to let go of these dubious attempts to cure yourself and place your trust in Someone you have never met before but whose words and demeanor resonate deep within your soul as a Man who just might know what He's talking about?
Do you want to be healed?
I detect inside of your heart a growing unrest with the kind of mutual beliefs about reality that are shared with everyone around you. I sense that you have started questioning the truth of what everyone else accepts as common knowledge, conventional wisdom, the way things must be as accepted by all the other sick and hurting people that fill this place. Something inside of you has been stirring your spirit with questions and has been challenging even your own beliefs about what God is really like. Yet you have also been confronted with the obvious reality of your own condition and the severe limitations of your ability to function in health and wholeness. These limitations have corroborated the expectations of society about your emotional and spiritual limitations as well and you have been grappling inwardly for some time now about the real truth of what God must be like.
Has God forgotten you or just been ignoring you? If He really cares about people why does He leave you hurting and impotent for so long? Based on what you have heard in the traditions and teachings of the religious leaders it may seem that God certainly must not care very much about people like you. In fact, it is commonly accepted that when you are stuck with problems and your life is filled with trials and/or sicknesses that God is upset with you and is punishing you for something that He expects you to correct before He will bless you again.
But is this really true, or is it all nothing but a big sham, religious manipulation to control people? Are you even allowed to think such radical thoughts or do you feel God might notice what is going on inside of your heart and see you as an insurrectionist? If God were to show up in person right now and confront you about what you have been allowing to float around in your thinking, would He be mad at you and demand that you re-conform you thoughts to the assumptions and assertions of the religious mainstream? Or might He be surprisingly different that anything you had ever encountered before?
Do you want to be healed?
You sense a feeling of urgency growing inside of you as you realize that this Stranger with His most unusual question may likely not stay very long. He expects an answer soon. He may be swept away by the crush of the crowd at any moment never to be seen again. You sense that you may be facing a moment of opportunity like you have never had or may never see again if you don't respond quickly. What are you going to say? Are you going to give a litany of excuses why you are not well yet? Do you tell Him all about your logistical problems with your perceived options? Does that really impress Him at all or even address the question He has asked you? Or do you feel the increasing pressure as His question forces you to face what is much deeper in your heart, the real struggles that you have not shared with anyone else, your frustration with God and with life for the way you feel you have been mistreated?
All of these thoughts and emotions are flowing through my own heart this morning in a surprising and challenging way for me personally. I hear God saying these things to my own mind even as I write them out one after the other. As I said at the beginning, there is a rich mine of healing here in this passage and I intend to not only flush out as much as I can find but far more importantly I want to encounter this radical Jesus speaking His offers of life and healing to me and to respond in ways that allow Him to do whatever He wants to do in me just as He did so long ago at that pool of Bethesda.
Father, I want to say that yes, I do want to be healed. But I also sense that You are pushing me to look deeper and deeper inside to expose weaknesses in my assertion rooted in hidden lies about You that You want to expose, challenge and replace with diamonds of glory about Your true character. Do whatever it takes to cleanse me of all my false feelings and beliefs about You and fill me with the glory of Your truth and Your presence today so that others will be drawn to want healing from You too.
