Whether it’s healing, deliverance or salvation, God’s power, to be experienced, always demands our response. That response is called faith. As William Barclay said, “The power of God never dispenses with the effort of man.” In other words, divine power is released to have its full effect in our lives when our will engages God’s work. Now to be clear, our will doesn’t create God’s power, it just opens the spigot for that power to flow. So risk bending your will to God’s work; perhaps today it will create conditions for Divine power to turn your malady into a miracle.
The Journey: John 5:3-8
A great number of disabled people used to lie at the Pool of Bethesda—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed. One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 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?” “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.” Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked.
The pool of Bethesda was where sick people—the infirmed, the blind, the lame, the paralyzed—would wait for the water to stir. There was a belief that when the water was moved, either by a natural phenomenon or by some sort of act of God, the sick and lame could experience curative powers if only they could get into the water.
One paralyzed man had waited thirty-eight years to get into the water at just the right moment, but in all those years, he had never been able to get into the pool at just the right time. Now Jesus knew he had been there a long time holding out for healing, yet in verse 6, he asks, “Do you want to get well?” The guy is paralyzed—for four decades he’s totally dependent on others—and Jesus asks him if he wants to be healed. Really! Doesn’t that seem a bit insensitive of Jesus?
But it’s not at all insensitive. Jesus’ one desire was restoring lost sheep to the Good Shepherd’s care—so insensitivity this can’t be. Obviously, there is more here than meets the eye: this is about how Divine power operates. Whether it’s healing, deliverance or salvation, God’s power, to be experienced, always demands our response. That response is called faith. So any time Jesus acts “harshly”, he’s just doing what’s needed to move a person to respond to God in faith.
In this story, we see that pattern: Jesus sparks the man’s faith by asking if he really wants healing. It could have been that the guy had grown accustomed to his condition, strange as that may sound. Think about it: others took care of him, so a healing would mess with that nice convenience: He would now have to work for a living, he would need to care for himself, and he would now be expected to contribute to society.
But his response was quick and certain. Yeah, he wanted to be healed; he was ready for the change, and all that change would require in his life.
Being ready for change—and willing to cooperate in it—is critical to God’s work in us, since Divine transformation won’t happen without human cooperation. The pre-condition for your miracle is willingness to abandon whatever paralysis has grown up around your need by taking that risky step of faith:
Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked. (John 5: 8-9)
William Barclay said, “The power of God never dispenses with the effort of man.” In asking the lame man to “get up”, Jesus was saying, “grab your will, reject your paralysis and exercise your faith to cooperate with God’s work.” Divine power is released to have its full effect in our lives when our will engages God’s work.
Now to be clear, our will doesn’t create God’s power, it just opens the spigot for that power to flow. “Get up” was what catalyzed the human faith needed to activate Divine power in the lame man. And as he bent his will to accommodate Jesus’ command, power happened—and so did one of the outstanding miracles of the Bible.
So what does that mean for you today? How about this: Risk bending your will to God’s work; perhaps today it will create conditions for Divine power to turn your malady into a miracle.
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