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This article originally appeared in the August 2006 Gold Canyon Lifestyle

Jesus' Question

Do you want to get well? What a strange question. The Disney Institute warns their new employees that they will be asked this obvious question: “What time does the 3:00 parade start?” I have never worked for Disney nor have I ever gone through their training. But I can go out on a limb and surmise that the 3:00 parade starts at 3:00! Right? It reminds me of the time I asked a clerk what’s on a Turkey Melt. The look on the teenage girl’s face said it all when she replied with kindness and sarcasm: “duh, turkey!?!”

I wonder if the invalid in John 5 felt the same way after being asked the question: “do you want to get well?” Initially, we would all utter a collective: “duh!” Of course he does. What 38-year-old man wouldn’t want to be healed after a lifetime of being unable to care for himself. If you lived in the Roman empire and had any kind of handicap, you were a lifetime beggar. Your career was chosen for you. There were no exceptions. You were reduced to dependence on others and their generosity toward you. If you were lucky, someone would carry you to areas like the marketplace or the local temple where you could probably make enough to survive.

Of course he wants to be well, right? He wouldn’t be at the pool if he didn’t want to be healed. Rumor was an invisible angel would stir the water and the first one in would be healed. So this disabled man is blessed enough to be dropped off at the healing waters but not blessed enough to have someone wait around and get him in first. He wanted healing but just couldn’t get healed, right? Of course.

However, we might have to look deeper simply because of who asked the obvious question. If it was anyone else asking a lifelong beggar at the potential banks of healing waters if in fact he wanted to be healed, we’d say “duh! No kidding!” But because God in the flesh asked the question, we might have to step back to see where He was coming from.

Is it possible that sick people do not want to get well? Is it possible that invalids like their predicament over healing? Is it possible that sick people today really want to stay sick, that sinful people like to remain in their sinfulness? (Note: not all sickness is related to personal sin, however Jesus ties this man’s paralysis to his sin in vs. 14.)

Jesus asks a simple question in verse 6. A simple yes or no would suffice. But the man answers in excuses and explanations. “There is no one to help me and I’m too slow and it’s my parents’ fault and my spouse is to blame and someone else should do it and...” Counselors hear this type of response all the time. The same kind of blame-game is seen in his answer later in verse 11.

Are you struggling with some sin habit that debilitates you spiritually? Are you miserable in your sin? Paralyzed with grief or guilt or discouragement? Healed people have to begin carrying their own mat. Healed people have to own up and face some responsibility. Healed people have to stop making excuses and rationalizing. Healed people want to be healed!

There are hurting people today that are paralyzed in their own sins and they cry out but they really don’t want to be healed. Healing hurts. Healing has its own set of problems and pain. When Jesus approaches this man and asks: Do you want to get well? Do you want to be healed? Do you want me to touch your life? Do you want me to clean you up? Do you want to be transformed? Do you want a new life? Do you want to stop blaming your past and stand in the grace that I offer? Can you pick up your mat from now on? Can you be responsible and disciplined to pray and feed on the Word and walk with your Savior? The obvious answer is yes. Or is it?