John 5:1 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.
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. The man was an interesting case of hope combined with hopelessness. He had hope, or would never have come to the Pool of Bethesda. Yet once there, he had little hope to be the favored one to win the healing that day. “The invalid man does what we nearly all do. He limits God’s help to his own ideas and does not dare promise himself more that he conceives in his mind.” Jesus told the man to do what he could not do. Jesus challenged the man to believe Him for the impossible. 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. Do you notice that the invalid did not ask any question of Jesus? He did not say, “how am I supposed to get up and walk?” He just did what Jesus told him to do, he got up and walked. He believed in Jesus who spoke the words to him. Jesus did not touch him. It was by His word the man was healed.
There is no limit to the power of Jesus Christ. In all things, He is mightier than whatever it is we are facing. In all things Jesus is supreme. At His word all creation took place. At His word nations were defeated, lions tamed, seas calmed, the sick healed, and the dead brought back to life. It is faith in Him that we will find peace for today and hope for tomorrow.
