A man who had been lame for 38 years was in Bethesda, by a pool that was blessed by an angle each year, and the first one in the pool was miraculously healed. Jesus asked this man “Do you want to be made well?” The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up…” The crippled man assumed Jesus knew how things worked at the Pool of Bethesda, and he explained to Jesus why it wasn’t possible for him to be healed. Quite naturally, the man couldn’t think of any other way for his need to be met. “Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.” It’s easy to imagine that the man’s first reaction was, I can’t do that – why even try? Yet something wonderful prompted the man to say, If this man tells me to do it, I will try. Jesus guided the man towards a response of faith. “And IMMEDIATELY the man was made well, took up his bed, and walked. And that day was the Sabbath.” (John 5:7-9)
Jesus was consistently maintaining that it is lawful to do good on the sabbath JUSTIN. He ignored the mass of scribal regulations, and as a result came into conflict with the authorities. By the way The pool of Bethesda has currently been excavated in the area just north of the temple area, and found to have five porches, just as John said, in spite of doubts of its actual existence.
Amazingly, not everyone was happy about this man’s miraculous healing. The day Jesus healed the man at the poolside happened to be a Sabbath. As the man left Bethesda, the Jewish leaders saw him carrying his mat, and they stopped him: “It is the Sabbath,” they said. “The law forbids you to carry your mat” (John 5:10). The man told them that he was simply obeying orders: “The man who made me well said to me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk’” (John 5:11). The Jews inquired who would so brazenly promote Law-breaking, but “the man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd” (John 5:13).
JESUS JUST MAKES EVERYTHING ALRIGHT…
Your Personal Pastor -Bill Stockham