The Gospel of John | Healing on The Sabbath – John 5:1-18
Jesus authentically comes to rescue people from their man-made prisons for His glory.
38 years. It had been 38 years that a man remained unable to walk and move. And so, this man sat at the edge of the pool of Bethesda, waiting for a miracle.
Having just come from speaking to the Samaritan woman, Jesus found himself Jerusalem at the pool of Bethesda. The rumor around the town said that every now and then an angel would come to stir up the pool and that the first to enter the pool would receive healing (this is seen in the omitted verse 4 in ESV, NIV, and CSB translations as likely a scribal note in the column instead of originally included. This flagrant mysticism based in magic or superstition drew the attention of many who sought healing. Yet, only one healing would be given per stirring and no one knew when the “angel” would descend. For those who could not walk on their own, they would be dependent on the mercy of others to receive their healing.
Jesus approach the man who sat near the pool but still as lame as the day he was born. This man’s life would change forever as he would receive the unmerited favor of grace and healing he longed for. Yet, the Pharisees, having been keeping an eye on the teaching and ministry of Jesus Christ, sought to make a mockery and challenge the authority of Jesus at every turn. Today would be no exception as it was the Sabbath and those looking to display their faith and righteousness would be limited in the work they could and could not do. Carrying things constituted work and even the functions of the faith, such as healings would be hindered by the Pharisaical law.
Previously, we had seen the Pharisees challenging the teachings of Jesus and attempting to determine the depth of His teaching. Now, starting in chapter 5, we see the open opposition to the message of Jesus Christ. The man would experience healing from a condition that ravaged him all his life. Yet, rather than seeing the joy in this that a man had been healed, the Pharisees could only see the threat to their system and power. In looking to shield people from the false religions of the day, they had missed the incarnate God made flesh standing in front of them, choosing to cling to their religiosity rather than see lives healed and transformed.
Do You Want To Be Healed?
Jesus approaches the man laid near the pool with a simple question; “Do you want to be healed?” The man replied with the reason he had not been healed. Yet, Jesus’ answer lacks the fanfare and effort that the man sought through his own striving. Jesus told him to get up, take his mat, and walk. Immediately, the man became healed through the hearing of the word of Jesus Christ and arose, took his mat, and walked away. Before he had a chance to even get Jesus’ name, the man had gone in joyful expression of being able to walk after 38 years. In fact, Jesus would later find the man in the temple and exhort him dearly to keep from sin so that nothing worse would happen to him. The message of Jesus Christ throughout the whole of the Gospels rang true with this man; “repent and believe the good news.” Healing would come to this man by the power and grace of Jesus Christ to save people from their sins rather than leave them to die in them.
Jesus’ interaction with this man is tonally difficult to determine. Some of viewed the statements of Jesus as a rebuke for the man’s lack of faith in saying no one could bring him to the water. Others have viewed the interaction as Jesus’ response to sinfulness that the man had been born lame, citing the brokenness of the world through sin as the rational of punishment. Yet, both of these understandings would miss the goal of Jesus’ coming. According to this author, when Jesus asked “Do you want to be healed?” it spoke to the part of the man that had given up hope. There he sat, likely not moving or going home, but waiting to coax someone to bring him to the water at just the right time. 38 years of non-healing had likely chipped away at his spirit being so close to what he thought was the answer and being completely unable to achieve it. Every day he saw the pool reminded him of his inability to move. And so he sat there. For 38 years. Now, the healing that he had been completely unable to achieve on his own had come and bent down next to him. The author and perfecter of life came with healing and grace amidst a crowd of people who likely passed by this man daily without saying a word. Jesus sat next to this man and asked if he wanted to be healed. With the words of Jesus Christ, the glimmer of hope began to return.
Jesus chose this man by sheer grace and divine understanding. The man could not do anything to earn his healing or deserve the grace he received. Everything centered around Jesus Christ. Furthermore, the man’s idea of what woud heal him, the superstitious lowering into the pool, would not be the means of healing for this man. Works would not heal this man, only the power and grace of Jesus Christ to pronounce life to the dead can provide healing from sickness and death. The same question posed to the man at the pool is posed to us as well, “do you want to be healed?” For however much hope we have lost, we can find healing, not just of our physical bodies, but of our souls that will live into eternity. Jesus Christ is our salvation, not any striving or effort on our part but by the grace of God. We need only to listen to the word of God, knowing in faith that, when healing is proclaimed, we can stand in the promise of Jesus Christ that speaks life into existence.
- How does the story of the man at the pool demonstrate the grace of God?
Pharisees Enforcement of Legalism
When the Pharisees saw the man, likely they would have known this person to have been the man who laid by the pool all day looking for healing. Now he walked by them, bedroll in hand, rather than needing someone to carry him. Immediately the Pharisees became shocked and appalled, not at the healing that had occurred but by the man’s flagrant disregard for the Sabbath. God had intended the Sabbath to be a day of rest for mankind, symbolic of the seventh day of creation in which God rested. Yet, over time, the Pharisees had continually heaped laws and regulations on the people beyond the Law given by God in order to demonstrate the righteousness of man. Carrying a bedroll would be considered work on the Sabbath and strictly forbidden by any good practicing Israelite. They had deemed this work rather than a function of living. Talking to the man, he told them of the healing he received by the man who spoke to him. The man’s testimony was not eloquent or complex but rather that someone, Jesus, told him to get up, take his mat, and walk. Outraged, the Pharisees sought the identity of this man who healed on the Sabbath, something also strictly forbidden, for the sake of maintaining the Sabbath. When they learned Jesus’ identity, this fueled their outrage against Him as one who defied the rule and reign of the Pharisees.
Consider for a moment the heart a person must have in order to see a man healed of a lifetime of debilitating disease and feel contempt for the rules being broken. Rather than see the glory of a life transformed and healed, the Pharisees could not stand the threat to their system of power that oppressed others. The rules they added only highlighted their own puffed up sense of self-righteousness. Even then, the Pharisees could only pretend to be righteous as they could not maintain the requirements of the law either. They had become so hardened to the suffering of the world that the healing this man received and the purpose of the sabbath had become profoundly lost within their religious system. The coming of the Messiah would be to save people from their sins, heal and restore them all for the glory of God. The hearts of the Pharisees had been hardened by their own power hungry status so much so that they would miss the Messiah standing before them and could not see the joy in celebrating the healing of man who had been born lame.
The issue never was about the man who had been healed and when they had been healed. Instead, the Pharisees demonstrated their hardness towards their lack of power in the religious system. They understood they could not protest to a man being healed and chose the excuse of the Sabbath. They lost sight of the purpose of the law which sought to magnify our great need of a Savior and protect the lives of the people of God. By adding to the requirements of the law, the Pharisees stated they knew better than the divine author of the law and served as gatekeepers to what constituted true religion and salvation without any power or authority to do so. John 5:18 sums up the main issue; Jesus claimed to be God while circumventing the powers in place. The Pharisees could either submit to God or reject His presence.
- What did the Pharisees actions reveal about their intentions and ideas for how people should worship?
Discussion Questions
- The temptation for many people would be to turn the miracles of Jesus Christ into magical, superstitious events. What does the manner in which Jesus healed the man tell you?
- What does Jesus offer the man beyond the physical healing? How is Jesus different from the people around the man? Where you do see faith, hope, and love present in this story?
- Where do you need hope in your current life? What might Jesus be doing to provide you with hope?
- Do you struggle with needing to strive according to your own efforts?
- How has God challenged your preconceived notions of what it means to follow Him in the past? How is God currently challenging these ideas?
- Where do you need to submit to the will of the God in your life? How does God offer healing to the blind spots and and the areas we need to submit to Him?
