Chapter by chapter

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.”

John 5:5-7

This question that Jesus asks to the man is a closed question, which means it’s a simple ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ answer. The question is about being healed - having his problems removed, being renewed, having vitality. These things are all things that we want in our lives - not just ‘good’ people, but everyone. The whole world wants these things - a better life, a sense of ‘newness’ and good health. 

But what’s interesting is this - the man doesn’t answer the question. It might just be me, but nowhere does the man say if he does or does not want to be healed.

He missed the point.

Instead what the man did was give an answer to the question which he thought he heard, which seems much more like ‘Have you managed to get into the pool?’. The man focused on a method rather than the problem. He was more focused on how he thought he could get healed, which was getting into the pool, rather than opening up his eyes to other possible methods and inevitably the solution.

We can often do the same. For example, Jesus could be asking ‘do you want to see more of me?’ - and we can respond with ‘But I can’t read my Bible like I want to’, or ‘I don’t enjoy the worship’ or even still ‘God I want a new job/new house/girlfriend/to win the lottery’.

Sometimes we focus on what we think will get the outcome we want - we focus on the method - and miss other opportunities or ways to get the outcome that God desires for us. We worry about Bible reading plans, evangelism programmes, life problems whilst forgetting that we should be having a conversational relationship with Jesus.

We just need to answer the question. Jesus will do the rest.

Only for the King

Jx