John 5 - Bethesda (House of Chesed)(Sabbath rules)
[1 After these things there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.] Jesus is returning to [Jerusalem]. It’s been a year since He's been there - remember what went down the last time: Jesus messed w the Temple. Cleaned it out. Messed up the emporium that the Jews had going on there. Jesus made some enemies.
This time, we see more brokenness. Sam was broken - it was her choices. B’s son was broken - but that was due to an illness (i.e. some accident of birth/life). And life is full of both, right? Some brokenness we experience by our own choices. Some comes on us through no fault of our own. [God always sees/cares, and is working something better…]
[2 Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda, having five porticoes.] Five [stoas] - this is a big pool. [A double pool?]. And it was [intermittent]? [3 In these lay a multitude of those who were sick, blind, lame, and withered.] So, a large pool with five stoas FULL of sick people... all waiting for their shot at hitting the healing-jackpot. Only this was no [lottery; 1 in 300mill]. It sort of looks like this was simply, first-come first-healed...
[5 A man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years.] We'll call him, “PG”. 38yrs - a lifetime of some kind of severe debilitating physical condition.
[6 When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had already been a long time in that condition, He says to him, “Do you wish to get well?”] Jesus sees him. But the verbs are past tense. Having seen him (i.e. in the past). Having known he’s been sick - sick many years, and known many years. Jesus has known him. He has seen him. He knows PG wants to be healthy. Question: why the question? Why does He even ask? Because [words create/reinforce reality (The Word SPOKE. Powerful things)] But Jesus sees him. Again, He sees the brokenness. Whatever brokenness we are experiencing. And He has a plan. Do you want [thelÅ] to get well? This Greek word "well" here gives us our word, hygiene. I.e. that which keeps us healthy.
[7 The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, but while I am coming, another steps down before me.”] PG doesn’t answer the question. What PG gives Jesus for an answer is more of an excuse. This is the physical temporal thing that is holding me back in life. Like so many, PG is also too focused on the [physical]. On the water. He thinks he needs this stirred-up water. The water will make him healthy and clean… What’d we learn in Samaria? What’d Jesus tell Sam? This water, this physical water might help you meet a physical need (temporarily), but it will never heal your real brokenness. [Other water/reality…]
[8 Jesus says to him, “Get up, pick up your pallet and walk.”] Jesus TELLS him to do something he perhaps has never done. Be rising up. Sometimes, the breakthrough we need, the healing we need, comes as we do something we have never done. Some of us, Jesus is asking us to do something. Never done it. Not part of our routine. Well how’s that routine working out for you? Rise up.
[9 Immediately the man became well, and picked up his pallet and began to walk.] Right away, PG is healed. Jesus strengthens him to get up, move around, even pick up his mat - maybe for the first time ever! He don’t need no pool. No H2O - Jesus has LIVING WATER. How do you think PG felt about getting up? It’d been years. Was he afraid? Hesitant? Sometimes we’re stuck, in a rut, on that mat, in that place of excuses. Dysfunctional comfort. Rise up. The life you’re living is NOT what I designed you for. Immediately PG becomes well. Maybe something is holding you back, keeping you down - you need to rise up. And you don’t need a pool. Only Jesus. Trust Him.
Why does Jesus tell him to pick up his mat? (Cus it's his only possession? But now he has no need?) Why does He even pick PG in the first place? Clearly, Jesus has another life-lesson in play here - for the Jews AND for His disciples. And somehow He weaves it ALL together - for our good [Rom 8.28].
[Now it was the Sabbath on that day. 10 So the Jews were saying to the man who was cured, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not permissible for you to carry your pallet.”] Cured - our word ‘therapy’… PG had been there at that pool for YEARS, living with his disability, waiting for his therapy, his lucky hygiene. but surely everybody, all these Jews would have known him. And now suddenly, he’s up and about. A bona fide miracle! And - no luck involved - the miracle smashes head-on into spiritual blindness. The Jews are so focused on the physical, the external - for them it’s not just about water. Not about people. They think that to be clean they need to observe the Sabbath, i.e. strictly obey all their Sabbath rules. To them, people are less important than the program, the rules. But that's all wrong: People are more important than the program.
The language literally is, Sabbath was, on that day. Sabbath is the subject in the sentence. I.e. Sabbath rules this day, and so we obey Sabbath rules on this day. Sabbath is one of the Top 10 Commandments [Deut 5] - a prohibition of work (even on penalty of death) - but it finds its genesis in [Gen 2.1-3], where God Himself rested on the 7th day of Creation, after working at creating the universe for the preceding 6 days. The heart of Sabbath is not only needed rest but to help people to focus on the Lord [Is 58; Ps 92] - but in Jesus’ day the legalists have made it NOT about the Lord or people but all about [Shabbat]. About Sabbath rules, things people should not do.
[“It is NOT permissible”], they say. ’Permissible’ literally means, being out, going out. As in being allowed out, i.e. to do something. It is about being free, being authorized, permitted to do something (or not). Jesus uses a related word when He later says, “ALL authority has been given to Me”. I.e. the Jews are saying, you are NOT authorized, allowed out to do this, to carry your mat. [11] PG is like, well, the One Who had the power and authority to heal me DID authorize me to carry my mat…
[14 Afterward Jesus finds him in the temple and said to him, “Behold, you have become well; do not sin anymore, so that nothing worse happens to you.”] What we see is, PG starts out, he is all about what is physically Do-Able (and he is UNable). For the Jews, Shabbat is about what is Permiss-ible. And they are so consumed with what is NOT permissible, that they don’t so much care about the person. They care more about their rules, AND that someone is ignoring their rules. But Sabbath rules do not rule us. Theyu don't have the final authority. With Jesus, the One with the Real Authority, the question becomes, what is Profit-able? What builds up? [1Cor 6.12, 10.23]. What is good, better for people. Look at Him. He goes to this pool, and focuses on this one guy who has been stuck there for his whole life, can’t get out. And after Jesus heals PG, He then goes and tracks him down in the temple. He doesn’t want anything worse to befall PG. [Nothing worse]. You have become physically well - now it’s about your heart. Stop choosing what you want over what God wants.
This is the essence of [Sabbath, Mk 2:27-28 i.e. times and extended times of focusing on the Lord]. It gets at the heart of why our Created made us in the first place - to focus on Him. It's definitely something we try to do when we gather on Sundays [this is also one reason why we encourage folks to go on times of retreat]. And of course none of us will ever do this perfectly - that’s why Jesus died for us. That’s why we all need to receive the forgiveness He offers, that He purchased on for us on the Cross. We tend to fall short when it comes to focusing on our Creator. That is why the Lord gives us Sabbath. And that's why we all need to come take a daily deep dip in Bethesda - which in Hebrew means, the House of Chesed. God's House or swimming pool of everlasting love and grace.
Yes, Jesus is authorized. We’ve seen He has the authority/power to create something out of nothing [water to wine]. His authority extends over all matter (and non-matter]. Jesus also exerts His power from any distance. His authority is not limited by any distance [B’s son]. And here with PG we see that Jesus’ power and authority is directed towards people for their welfare [Jer 29.11]. He cares. He cares about the mat we’re stuck lying on. AND He cares too much to let us stay there. House of Chesed. House of Grace, for our good…
Referenced verses
Gen. 2:1-3 Thus the heavens and the earth were completed, and all their hosts. By the seventh day God completed His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.
Deut. 5:12-15 “Observe the sabbath day to keep it holy, as the LORD your God commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath of the LORD your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter or your male servant or your female servant or your ox or your donkey or any of your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you, so that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out of there by a mighty hand and by an outstretched arm; therefore the LORD your God commanded you to observe the sabbath day.” —> REST and REMEMBRANCE (reflecting on the Lord)
Is. 58:13-14 “If because of the sabbath, you turn your foot from doing your own pleasure on My holy day, and call the sabbath a delight, the holy day of the LORD honorable, and honor it, desisting from your own ways, from seeking your own pleasure and speaking your own word, then you will take delight in the LORD, and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth; and I will feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father, for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”
Ps. 92:0 A Psalm, a Song for the Sabbath day.
1 It is good to give thanks to the LORD
And to sing praises to Your name, O Most High;
2 To declare Your lovingkindness in the morning
And Your faithfulness by night,
3 With the ten-stringed lute and with the harp,
With resounding music upon the lyre.
4 For You, O LORD, have made me glad by what You have done,
I will sing for joy at the works of Your hands.
5 How great are Your works, O LORD! Your thoughts are very deep.
Mark 2:27-28 Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”
“Shabbat is the centerpiece of Jewish life and has been so since the infancy of our nation. According to the Talmud, Shabbat is equal to all the other commandments, and the term shomer shabbat (“Shabbat observer”) is synonymous with “religious Jew” in common parlance. Through increasing your Shabbat observance, you’ll create a space to connect with G‑d, family and friends. Try it, you’ll like it.” -from “What is Shabbat?” by Rabbi Menachem Posner @ chabad.org
1Cor. 6:12 All things are lawful for me, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be mastered by anything.
1Cor. 10:23 All things are lawful, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful, but not all things edify.
Jer. 29:11 ‘For I know the plans that I have for you,’ declares the LORD, ‘plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope.
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