The Seven Signs (Pt. 4)

 

After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, in Aramaic called Bethesda, which has five roofed colonnades. In these lay a multitude of invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight 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?” 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.” Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked. (John 5:1-9 ESV).

 

The next miracle of Jesus that John records after His healing of the royal official’s son is the healing of the lame man at Bethesda. Unlike the former healing, the healing of the lame man took place in Jerusalem, where Jesus had gone up to celebrate one of the feasts “of the Jews” (v. 1). This would have been one of the great pilgrimage feasts, such as Passover or Booths/Tabernacles, that required Jews to make the journey to the Holy City, but John does not specify which one it was. Bethesda was the name of a pool, which was one of two pools at Jerusalem’s Sheep Gate. There Jesus met a man who “had been an invalid for thirty-eight years” (vv. 3, 5).

 

It is important to note that Jesus selects the lame man out of a crowd of many people who were unwell. He approaches the man and asks if he wanted to be healed (v. 6). At first read it seems like a ridiculous question. He has been there for nearly four decades hoping to get into the water before the others to receive healing from the waters “when they were stirred” (v. 7). It is also notable that there is almost no indication that the man had faith in Christ when Jesus healed him. Later verses state that he did not know who Jesus was at the time of his healing, and he later reported Jesus’ activities to the authorities who were out to accuse Him of sin (vv. 12–13, 15). Regardless of whether the man had faith or how strong his faith was, Jesus healed him (vv. 8–9a).

 

Our sovereign God does not need our faith in order to intervene in His world supernaturally. However, this does not mean that we are not to intercede on our own behalf or that of others (cf. James 5:13-16). The key is not in what we do, but what He does. He will work His will for our good, even when we least expect or deserve it. We cannot fall into the trap of thinking that God is an uncaring divinity. He loves us and only desires our good in all things.