Get Up

Scripture

John 5:1–18 The Message

Soon another Feast came around and Jesus was back in Jerusalem. Near the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem there was a pool, in Hebrew called Bethesda, with five alcoves. Hundreds of sick people—blind, crippled, paralyzed—were in these alcoves. One man had been an invalid there for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him stretched out by the pool and knew how long he had been there, he said, “Do you want to get well?” The sick man said, “Sir, when the water is stirred, I don’t have anybody to put me in the pool. By the time I get there, somebody else is already in.” Jesus said, “Get up, take your bedroll, start walking.” The man was healed on the spot. He picked up his bedroll and walked off. That day happened to be the Sabbath. The Jews stopped the healed man and said, “It’s the Sabbath. You can’t carry your bedroll around. It’s against the rules.” But he told them, “The man who made me well told me to. He said, ‘Take your bedroll and start walking.’ ” They asked, “Who gave you the order to take it up and start walking?” But the healed man didn’t know, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd. A little later Jesus found him in the Temple and said, “You look wonderful! You’re well! Don’t return to a sinning life or something worse might happen.” The man went back and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well. That is why the Jews were out to get Jesus—because he did this kind of thing on the Sabbath. But Jesus defended himself. “My Father is working straight through, even on the Sabbath. So am I.” That really set them off. The Jews were now not only out to expose him; they were out to kill him. Not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was calling God his own Father, putting himself on a level with God.

Introduction

I am always fascinated by folks trying to figure out the end of the world or when Jesus will return. Even Jesus said he did not know the time only the Father did. People say that Jesus is delayed or he is late. Nothing could be further from the truth. Jesus is right on time. God’s time not our. I know that God has his own time for doing things. Just like it took us two years to sell this building, God was not late or early but right on time. Paul says in “For why we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.” Not too soon not too late, the right time.

I said all of that to get to this: this sermon is at the right time. We are about to under go a lot of change in 2019. Not only will we have new landlords, but we will be buying new property, building a new building at that new location, becoming a new church with a merger or no merger that will call for a new name, new logo, new life.

The religious leaders whom John calls “the Jews” (remember we talked at the beginning of this series that John is not an anti-semite because he and his community is Jewish. He uses the term to identify those that are persecuting his community. It is used more to identify a way of thinking than a group of people. It is a way of thinking that rejects Jesus and his message. John still considers himself and his community Jewish, but Jews that believe Jesus is the messiah.

Background

I don’t want to spend a lot of time telling you something I already told you, but I think we need a quick reminder of John and his community’s situation. The gospel was written after the destruction of the temple and the dispersion of a large number of the Jewish population in Palestine to other areas of the mediterranean world. In this sign we have the first episode of the of the persecuting synagogue’s rejection of Jesus. it all involves healing on the sabbath. So with that in mind, let’s get to it.

Exegesis

Contextually there is nothing to catch up on here. This takes place after last week’s sign of healing the royal officials son. However, jesus has gone from Galilee to Jerusalem again for a “festival.” No idea what festival scholars argue over which one and some of the arguments get really far out. I believe the reason John is not specific about which festival is because it is not important except that it brought Jesus to Jerusalem and to the pools at Bethesda. There’s a lot of disagreement even on the name of the area, but once again I don’t think that’s important. However, we do know now where these pools were located. Let’s take a look at this video and some pictures.

Video and Pictures

These are some pictures from our trip in 2015. When I was there in 2007 Bishop Watson led a healing service where when pastor’s MS went into remission!

So Jesus goes there we are not told why, this was a place of superstition and somewhat pagan. It was long associated with the greek god and semitic gods of healing. If you noticed verse 4 is missing this is because scribes inserted it to explain why the water was stirred up, It was a widely help belief in Jesus time that spirit beings were in or near waters especially water that moved. In fact there was a superstition if somone fell into a river and was being swept away you did nothing to help them because the belief was that a spirit being had a hold of them and there was nothing you could do.

When the water was stirred by the spirit the belief was that healing was available. Hence the lame mans frustration. You will read in some commentaries that he was paralyzed. No where does it say he was, but he was certainly and invalid who had trouble moving about. He couldn't get to the water fat enough when it was stirred or bubbled.

Jesus comes by and notices him. We are not going to speculate on any of this, there are a lot of unanswered questions here, but we are not going to get bogged down in ambiguity or partial detail. Jesus comes and notices the man and perceives he has been there a long time. 38 years the man says. This is longer than most poor people lived in Jesus day.

Jesus asks him if he wants to be well! As if he would say no. But you know there are people who actually like to be sick they enjoy the attention or use it to help in their begging, especially in Jesus day. If you look closely the man doesn’t say yes or no, he just complains that he has no one to help him get to the water. Jesus simply responds, get up, pick up and walk up. And immediately the man is healed!

The Talmud lists some 39 regulations about the sabbath all punishable by death. One of them is that you can’t carry anything to your home. Needless to say this man attracted attention of the religious authorities and they wanted to know who had healed him and commanded him to carry his pallet thus breaking the law. He has no idea because jesus had slipped away.

Later on Jesus and the man run onto each other at the temple and Jesus seeks to heal him as well as cure him as he warns him not to return to sinning. Jesus surely didn't think sin had cause his problem however his sickness could have been the result of sinful choices. However, I think what jesus is doing is spreading the news of the coming Kingdom and making sure this man was prepared for it. Now the man goes back and tells the Jews who it was that healed him. I don’t think he was ratting on Jesus, but was just trying to protect himself from the Jews.

I don;t think he was rattin on Jesus,

Now John indicate here that Jesus was known for breaking the sabbath laws. The authorities do not celebrate the fact that this man had been healed from an infirmity he has had for 38 years, nope, they are more interested in someone who has violated their religious traditions.

John 5:15–16 The Message

The man went back and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well. That is why the Jews were out to get Jesus—because he did this kind of thing on the Sabbath.

Jesus defends himself saying that God never stops working even on the sabbath. This, actually was a rabbinic tradition. The Rabbis knew that if God stops working that the universe would come apart. The sabbath meant that he stopped creating. The religious authorities know that, what they are really mad about is that he makes himself equal to God, this is blasphemy. they are now out to kill him.

Ok so this is a sign that points to something. First it points to jesus as the Son of God, second it show Jesus once again as the life giver, and finally it point to Jesus passion for the first time in the gospel.

Application

Great story isn’t it? But what does it say to us today? What is it calling us to? Well there is a lot here, but I want to zero in on what I said at the beginning, we are in for a lot of change.

We do not like change very much. In fact many time we will just continue with destructive thoughts or behavior in the name of religion. We have that going on this morning with Westboro Baptist Church picketing churches over on Enota because they don’t think like they do. They are the Jews Joh writes about.

But here is the deal, we all have a little bit of those authorities in us. I am dealing right now with 2 churches that would rather die than receive the new life being offered to them in merger. it is alike a cancer patient who is offered a complete cure and says no thanks I’ll just die. This is pure idolatry. it is worship of the status quo.

The authorities were having their faith challenged by Jesus. They didn’t like that. He interpreted the sabbath much differently than they did. I like how one commentator puts this:

"Jesus’ inquisitors represent the “religious establishment” for whom the vigorous preservation of religious tradition counts more highly than the spontaneity and openness of faith. These people know their Scriptures and use them to defend all of the wrong things.”

The authorities were so scared of the change of the threat that Jesus represented to their status quo the want to kill him. This is exactly why Jesus asked the man if he wanted to be made well. many of us do not want the new life Jesus offers us and that means frankly our faith is dying or dead. i ran across this warning the famous theologian Karl Barth gave to the german and Swiss churches after WW 1:

He thinks about people who live in a wilderness alongside a canal. The canal was there to bring them water and life, and it was with great effort and cost that the project was built for their place in time. Great sacrifices were made, and many died as the canal was cut through mountain and desert. But the great irony is that the canal has become dry, and while its walls still convey evidence of the coursing of water, there is nothing there that can give life to anyone. Nevertheless, the people continue to service it, to defend it, to name their children after its architects and engineers; but it is only a historic thing. A canal meant to convey something—water and life—now has become static, an end instead of a means. Something for the museum. People tell stories about it instead of drink from it. The older ones treasure the stories most; the younger ones have to be initiated deliberately; but each generation seems to lose a fraction of the true vision of the canal as time goes on. And no one has a memory of what water in the canal really looks like. The possibility always exists that my life, my church, my tradition, my denomination, even my Bible will become relics of religious curiosity instead of living instruments of God. Men and women will be ordained, earn Ph.D.s, and launch magazines, publishing houses, colleges, and seminaries with solid evangelical commitments, and it will all be for nothing. Empty canals. There are specialists who can cite Scripture and verse, who can measure orthodoxy with exacting precision, who can identify the religious speck in someone’s eye from a great distance, but in whom love for God does not exist (5:42). On a national level I have seen evangelicals unsheathe their religious swords over arcane doctrinal matters (“But this is a slippery slope!” “But this is where liberalism begins!” “This is an agenda that must be exorcised!”). On a local level I have seen older church members viciously lash out because “the contemporary service” isn’t to their liking or they perceive that their power and influence are diminishing. All of it, suggests, is empty religion, religion that seeks its own glory. In the end, it is religion that would condemn and crucify Jesus as a religious duty.

Jesus says to us get up, pick up, and walk up. It is new life, it is a new thing. We can choose to stay by the pool never venturing close enough to make any difference, a dead canal. Or we can say yes to where he is leading us and growing us. I want to get up, pick up, and walk up some of the churches around us might want to become relics and die a slow agonizing death. This change will do us good!

Say it with me:

Get UP!

Pick Up!

Walk Up!