Sermon Discussion Questions:
1. Read John 5:1-18. What strikes you as odd? What do you have questions about?
2. Why do you think Jesus was intentionally controversial here? Why couldn't He wait till the Sabbath was over to heal this man? How should we approach controversy?
3. As you read through the story, what do we learn about the man who was healed? Did he have faith in Jesus?
4. Why do the Jews think Jesus' claim in 5:17 is the same as making Himself "equal with God"?
Jean-Jacques Rousseau was one of the most influential thinkers in the Western world. He also was kind of a jerk. Listen to what he thinks of himself:
“The person who can love me as I can love is still to be born…Show me a better man than me, a heart more loving, more tender, more sensitive…Posterity will honor me…because it is my due….I rejoice in myself…if there were a single enlightened government in Europe, it would have erected statues to me.” (Rousseau, cited in Intellectuals by Paul Johnson, p. 10).
“What could your miseries have in common with mine? My situation is unique, unheard of since the beginning of time.”
What an insufferable man. Would you want to be his friend? (Incidentally, he would consider you lucky to have the honor: “I was born to be the best friend who ever existed.”)
We hate arrogant people. People who think they are more important than anyone else, who talk like everyone ought to listen to them. We hate that.
And yet, we don’t hate Jesus. Jesus makes some of the most audacious claims any human being has ever made…and yet, we do not respond to him the way we respond to Rousseau. Both men were very influential, helped shape the modern world, and both made extreme claims about their own self-importance. And yet, one we find repulsive, and the other compelling.
Why?
As we turn to our text today, we will see Jesus make some audacious claims, but we will also see that He has power to back it up:
[Page 890] 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 Aramaic called Bethesda, which has five roofed colonnades. 3 In these lay a multitude of invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. 5 One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?” 7 The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.” 8 Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” 9 And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked. Now that day was the Sabbath. 10 So the Jews said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to take up your bed.” 11 But he answered them, “The man who healed me, that man said to me, ‘Take up your bed, and walk.’” 12 They asked him, “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Take up your bed 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 may happen to you.” 15 The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him. 16 And this was why the Jews were persecuting Jesus, because he was doing these things on the Sabbath. 17 But Jesus answered them, “My Father is working until now, and I am working.”
18 This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.
Jesus is Powerful, Controversial, and Divine
Now, before we go forward I want to draw your attention to two quick factoids about the text that will take a few minutes that might interest you.
First, notice the language in verse 2: “Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, in Aramaic called Bethesda, which has five roofed colonnades.” Not “there was.” Why does that matter? Because in AD 70, the Roman army marched into Jerusalem and destroyed (among other things) this gate. This would be like someone writing ‘In New York City there is a place called the World Trade Center.’ If someone speaks that way, it sounds like they are writing before September 11th, 2001. Which tells us that John’s gospel was likely written before 70 AD. If you are interested in that more, then I’ll send out a longer article this week in the weekly email about it.
Second, you may be reading this section and wondering: where did verse 4 go? Did you notice that in the passage we have verse 3, and then we jump immediately to verse 5? Most translations today have a footnote after verse 3 that tells you: “Some manuscripts insert, wholly or in part, waiting for the moving of the water; for an angel of the Lord went down at certain seasons into the pool, and stirred the water: whoever stepped in first after the stirring of the water was healed of whatever disease he had.”
Our English translations are based on thousands of ancient manuscripts, and we are always wanting to base our translations off of the oldest and best manuscripts. Verse numbers were added to the Bible around 1551, and at that time, the oldest manuscripts we had included this explanation about an angel stirring the water. Later, we found many older manuscripts that did not include that verse. So, what most scholars believe happened was that at some point, an early Christian scribe who was copying this story down wrote a marginal note to explain what the “stirring of the waters” was in vs. 7, and that was mistakenly included in the text by the next scribe.
Both of these little factoids show us the confidence we have in the historical reliability of these texts: the gospel is written within a generation of the events described, and though we stand two-thousand years apart, we have such a wealth of early manuscripts that we are able to parse out what have been mistaken amendments or additions to the text, and the Bible has nothing to hide, so the translators when they encounter an issue like this, they just print the explanation in the pages themselves. This should give us strong confidence that the words of Scripture we are reading are the historically accurate words of those who authored them.
Jesus is Powerful
Jesus again returns to Jerusalem for a feast (the last time He did so, in John 2, it was during Passover and He cleansed the temple), and again we are going to see Jesus’ tension with the religious authorities there flare up. Jesus travels to the pool of Bethesda, a place where the sick and disabled gather. Supposedly an angel would visit the water and “stir” it, and if the sick would wade into the waters at the right time, they would be healed. That’s possible. It is also possible that the pool was fed by an underground source, maybe even a hot spring, and the healing associated with entering the waters was a superstition.
How the pool worked is besides the point for the story. The pool only serves as a foil to Jesus. Jesus approaches a man who has had a disability for 38 years.
When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?” - John 5:6.
We will come back to this, but here we see the first indication of Jesus’ unique power. There are many invalids there, but Jesus zeroes in on this one man and immediately “knew” that he had been there for a long time. Jesus has access to knowledge in a unique, immediate way.
Do you want to be healed? The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.” - John 5:7
Normally, when Jesus heals someone, we are given some indication of their faith (”See, your faith has made you well!”)—they ask Jesus, approach Jesus with confidence that He can do something, like the father we read of last week (John 4:46-54). Here, the man does not approach Jesus. He doesn’t ask Jesus for help. He doesn’t even answer Jesus’ question directly. Jesus asks him if he wants to be healed, and he replies with what Don Carsons thinks is: “the crotchety grumblings of…man who thinks he is answering a stupid question,” (Carson, PNTC).
And yet, Jesus is not limited in either His power or His compassion. He does not wait for this man to find Him, He seeks him out; He does not wait for him to ask, He just heals. Jesus is not a power that you unlock with your faith. If you just have enough faith you can activate God! No, God is a person, not a force. And He is free to dispense with His mercy and grace as He wills. He shows mercy to whom He shows mercy, and He will show compassion on who He shows compassion. So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy (Rom 9:15-16).
Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” 9 And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked. - John 5:8-9
With only His words, Jesus restores to this man what the last 38 years have taken from him: his strength, his dignity, his ability to walk. Jesus is strong, and Jesus is kind.
But Jesus is also controversial.
Jesus Is Controversial
Why does Jesus only heal this one man? There were many people there at the pool. Yet, after Jesus heals this man, He slips away: “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,” (John 5:13).
That seems strange, doesn’t it? Jesus does not set up a healing booth, curing everyone at the pool. Why?
First, it must not always be God’s will to heal. Our church has much we can learn from our Pentecostal and Charismatic brothers in Christ. One thing we can learn is their strong affirmation that God heals. What should you do if you are sick? James tells us: “Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. 15 And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. 16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed,” (James 5:14-16).
One point we want to be cautious about, however, is how that tradition can sometimes speak and act like it is always God’s will to bring healing, and if you are not healed it is a sign that you have not had enough faith. An influential pentecostal church in our city, teaches that “divine healing and deliverance from sickness is provided for in the atonement and is the privilege of all believers.” But, when you read the gospels, you’ll notice that often Jesus will prioritize His teaching ministry over and above His healing and miracles. When Timothy was sick, Paul encouraged him to use the typical medical cures of his day (”use a little wine for the sake of your stomach and your frequent ailments,” 1 Tim 5:23). And when Paul was afflicted by a thorn in the flesh and asked the Lord to remove it, he was told “No” by God—”My grace is sufficient for you, my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor 12:9).
But we are given one small indication in the text as to why this man may have been selected for healing out of all the other sufferers there at the pool.
Afterward Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, “See, you are well! Sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you.” (John 5:14)
Sin no more so that, in order that nothing worse may happen to you. Apparently, this man’s 38 year long illness was a consequence of his sin. You cannot avoid the connection Jesus is making here. Later, when Jesus meets the blind man in chapter nine, His disciples will assume that this man’s blindness was because of sin. But Jesus tells them: No, it wasn’t because this man or his parents sinned; it is so the glory of God might be shown through him (see John 9:1-7). Job’s friends all assumed that the avalanche of suffering he was experiencing was because he sinned, but he hadn’t. Job was blameless.
Not every suffering comes from sin. But, that doesn’t mean that sin cannot create suffering. Repeatedly throughout the Old Testament, individuals suffer seriously because of sin. In the New Testament we see this as well—Paul tells us of the sin in the Corinthian church in abusing the Lord’s Supper (”That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died.” 1 Cor 11:30). Apparently, this man’s illness was the by-product, the consequence of sin in his life. And perhaps this is why Jesus zeroed in on him out of everyone else. Maybe everyone else there was suffering, and their suffering had nothing to do with sin or their own moral responsibility. But this man, Jesus sees, and Jesus knows what’s at the heart of the issue.
This makes Jesus’ initial question to the man make much more sense: Do you want to be healed? Jesus’ isn’t only addressing this man’s physical ailment—his physical ailment is simply an expression of what his deeper issue is; He is here to address his soul, to speak to the root that caused the illness. In Jesus’ question we find Him confronting the nub of the issue: his sin. If you remember, the first recorded words of Jesus in John’s gospel are “What are you seeking?” (John 1:38). There, and here, it is as if Jesus breaks the fourth-wall, looks up at us from the page and asks us: What are you looking for here? Or…Do you want to be healed? You’ve been learning about who I am, what I have come to do, and what your great problem is…so, do you want the help I have to offer?
The terrifying thing about sin is that we can come to love the cage, to no longer desire freedom, because freedom is scary.
“sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you.” If you persist in your sin, then something worse than 38 years of paralysis may come. That illness was just a helpful object lesson. Later in chapter 5, Jesus explains that those who persist in sin will experience “the resurrection of judgment,” (John 5:29). Jesus is warning this man that his life of physical suffering, is nothing compared to the eternity of suffering he will experience in hell if he refuses Jesus’ word. Every joy and good thing, is but an appetizer of the fuller and deeper joy that awaits us in heaven. And every sorrow and pain is but a dim reflection of that outer darkness that awaits those who refuse Jesus’ help.
Warnings are expressions of love. Moms warns their kids not to play in the street. Co-workers warn us about a difficult boss. Friends warn us not to visit the disappointing travel destination. Warnings are an expression of care and love—I don’t want you to experience something bad. Why would we take Jesus’ warnings any different? Why do we hear His warnings and assume: That’s not very loving. His warnings are His love! He doesn’t want you to die! He doesn’t want you to experience what is worse than death!
I think the reason that we blanch at Jesus’ warning is that we do not see the danger He sees. Which is just another way of saying, we do not think He really has the knowledge, perspective, or authority to declare such a warning, to judge in such a way. We like the Jesus of our own creation. We like the Jesus that makes sense to us. The real Jesus doesn’t make sense.
The doesn’t wait for us to find Him, He finds us…and then changes us; He both welcomes and warns; offers forgiveness and summons us to repentance; heals us and rebukes us; showers us with grace and empowers us to follow His law; promises us heaven and warns us of hell.
Modern, made-in-America, talkshow Jesus doesn’t hold such sway, cannot by definition. The Jesus of our cultural imagination can specialize in a bastardization of grace or law…can parody them, but cannot have them to their full authentic strength like the real Jesus.
We can have a Jesus that is affirming and gentle, but can’t forgive us because He doesn’t really have a moral standard that we have transgressed, so we are left with a skin-deep, topical cream while deep down we know our bones to be broken.
Or, we can have a Jesus that is hard and unflinching, who has punishing moral standards, but can’t actually guide us to life because he only cuts but never heals, tears down but never builds, and we are only left with a deep and abiding sense of self-hatred.
The real Jesus is controversial because He can say both to the vapid spirituality of liberalism and the crushing legalism of conservatism—I have something better. You are a sinner in desperate, desperate need…but I can help! I can heal you! You deserve judgment, but I can take it for you!
We don’t like that because we have to admit that Jesus has the right to judge us.
What is the saying? “Only God can judge me.”
Fine, then.
Jesus is Divine
Jesus heals this man on the Sabbath (John 5:9). This is really an outgrowth of the last point—Jesus is controversial. He goes out of his way to do so. Being controversial for controversy’s sake is always a bad idea. That is the path of vanity and popularity through obnoxiousness. Our commitment is to the Truth, and when that path leads into obscurity, we follow it; and when it leads us into tension, we follow it; and when it leads into massive controversy, we take it. Because that’s what Jesus does.
Jesus intentionally heals this man on the Sabbath (He could have waited a day), and then summons him to “take up his mat and walk” (He could have not told him that).
And this was why the Jews were persecuting Jesus, because he was doing these things on the Sabbath. - John 5:16
The Sabbath was the fourth command that God had given to the Israelites in the ten commandments, but Moses taught that the Sabbath was actually the sign of the entire covenant that Moses made with Israel. It was like the engagement ring or the pledge of allegiance, it symbolized all of the other commands (see Ex 31:13; Ez 20:12). And one of the main causes of Israel’s failure in her history was her repeated violation of the Sabbath. God’s people were commanded to cease from their normal labor and spend the day in worship of God. And so, by Jesus’ time, the Jews were extremely sensitive about meticulous obedience to the Sabbath command—while there is no prohibition against healing someone on the Sabbath in the Law, they believe this is a violation. Now, Jesus could have replied that this wasn’t a violation, that this was an act of mercy or great need that would have been allowed (but He doesn’t); He could have replied that the Sabbath was a sign of the wholeness and perfection of the seventh day of Creation, so healing a crippled man perfectly accorded with the Sabbath (but He doesn’t).
Here is Jesus’ defense:
“But Jesus answered them, “My Father is working until now, and I am working.” - John 5:17
Here is what is surprising about that:
- No single Jew would refer to God as “My Father.” God spoke to Israel collectively as His Son, and God spoke of the Davidic king as His Son, but no individual Jew would ever presume to call Yahweh “My Father.” That was too audacious of a thing, nearly blasphemous to presume.
- Jews recognized that while the Sabbath command harkened back to the seventh day of creation when God rested from His labor, this did not mean that every seventh day God stopped working. God sustained the universe and continued to providentially rule the earth—He continued to labor. Jesus’ argument is that He shares such a close identity with His Father, that if the Father is working on the Sabbath, He is working—He is permitted to do what other humans cannot do.
18 This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God. - John 5:18
The Jews recognize that Jesus’ statement (and work on the Sabbath) is an unequivocal statement of equality with God. Jesus is saying that He—unlike any other human being—can do what God does, work on the Sabbath. And they are outraged. This must be either the ravings of a lunatic or…He is telling the truth.
Jesus is who He says He is, or He is monstrous fiend. The Jews cannot accept He is the Son of God, so they are prepared to have Him killed.
But this is instructive to us. Our response to Jesus, if we are interacting with the real Jesus, must be extreme.
You cannot like Jesus.
I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to. (Lewis, Mere Christianity)
