In John 5, there is a man who has been suffering a severe disability for 38 years. He has been lying beside the pool but is unable to get into pool when the angel stirs up the waters. This man had been unable to get his breakthrough and experience the healing power of God. Then everything changes because he encounters Jesus.
Do you want to get well?
It seems like Jesus was asking the man an obvious question. Jesus is asking us that question. It should be easy to answer. But deep down, people do not always answer ‘yes’. Many people do not want to get well.
If you want to get well…you must be willing to give up your sickness. There are all kinds of sickness, but the spiritual sickness is what’s holding you back from running after God and being whole.
‘I have no one to help me…’ (John 5:7). It’s not my fault. People make excuses. Sympathy from others, getting to put the blame on others, and playing a victim are all reasons why people want to stay spiritually sick.
Jesus said to the man, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk” (John 5:8). The man obeyed Jesus and was healed. He wanted to be well.
Jesus has already spoken. God has already sent His Living Word and healed us. So again, do you want to get well?
“Until you want to get well, you’re never going to fulfill your destiny.”
You have to be willing to let go of your past, your brokenness, bitterness, anger, unforgiveness, and any other spiritual baggage you have been carrying, and say:
‘I don’t want to be sick anymore. I don’t want to miss God’s calling on my life! I want to get well!’
1 Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish festivals.2 Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades.
3 Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed.
[4 waiting for the moving of the water; for an angel of the Lord went down at certain seasons into the pool, and stirred the water: whoever stepped in first after the stirring of the water was healed of whatever disease he had.]
5 One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years.
6 When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?”
7 “Sir,” the invalid replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.”
8 Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.”
9 At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked.
The day on which this took place was a Sabbath,
10 and so the Jewish leaders said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat.”
11 But he replied, “The man who made me well said to me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’ ”
12 So they asked him, “Who is this fellow who told you to pick it up and walk?”
13 The man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there.
14 Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, “See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.”
15 The man went away and told the Jewish leaders that it was Jesus who had made him well.
Questions:
Are you spiritually sick? (Take an honest inventory of yourself. Today is the day to confront the truth.)
Am I doing all that I can do and being all that I can be for God, my church, and His Kingdom?
What did Jesus say to the crippled man at the pool? (That’s what Jesus is saying to you!)
02:54Some churches and some people don’t want to get well. They know if they get well there’ll be expectations on getting well. As long as you’re sick, there’s no expectations on you.
03:56The salvation of God is operating around us. Do you want to get well?
04:25If you say you can’t forgive, you don’t want to get well. People enjoy unforgiveness and bitterness.
06:13A lot of people don’t want to get well. There’s a spiritual sickness about them.
07:00Until you want to get well, you’re never going to fulfill your destiny.
07:04There’s a big problem. People enjoy being victims. They enjoy blaming other people.
