Sermon Tone Analysis

Realizing our own limitations is an important process of self-discovering in every persons life.

My youngest son just turned one, and he is still too young to understand his own limitations.

Literally, he is a danger to himself.

So we have to take certain precautions to make sure he avoids seriously injuring himself.

We have to put a gate up to bar him from falling down our staircase.

We have to puree his food, or dissect it into tiny pieces or he’ll choke to death.

You cannot leave him alone in a bath tub with even a few inches of water in it for fear that he will ingest too much water and suffocate.

And he has no idea!

He is clueless of just how fragile he is.

He has not realized at all what his limits are- he has not come to understand his own inability.

And that is a dangers place to be in.

John 5 is all about helping us to understand our own inability.

Jesus masterfully demonstrates for us our spiritual limitations, our moral disability if you will.

At some point in the process of salvation, ever person must come to understand just how spiritual and morally limited he or she really is.

Otherwise, if we live our lives in ignorance of our spiritual and moral limitations we will have no idea just how much danger we are in.

John 4- Jesus is in Samaria, and without any signs or wonders the entire town believes

John 4 (end)- Jesus leaves Samaria in order to go to a people who do not honor Him- He leaves Samaria and returns to Galilee.

There he heals the royal official’s son- and the entire household believe in Jesus Christ.

John 5- Jesus leaves Galilee and returns to Jerusalem for a feast.

And here in Jerusalem Jesus finds no one to honor him whatsoever!

In John 5 Jesus masterfully points out to His Jewish audience their desperate spiritual inability and the danger in continuing to live in such a manner.

Friends, all of us must realize our own desperate spiritual need and the danger of failing to do so.

How can we come to this kind of an understanding?

How can we see our spiritual need the way Jesus sees our spiritual need?

I believe there are several truths that we need to understand here in John 5 if we are going to see our spiritual need the same way that Jesus does.

I. Sometimes, we cannot see our own spiritual needs because of other needs that seem to be more important.

(vv.

1-9a)

This narrative begins with Jesus entering Jerusalem on a feast day (unsure which feast exactly).

And he passes by the sheep market (better gate) where there is a pool called Bethesda, and it has five porches or colonnades (pillars holding up some soft of roof structure).

And in near the pool, under the shelter of the porches lay a great multitude of those who had some kind of physical ailment- they were sick, blind, lame, and/or withered.

Either one or a combination of these things.

Imagine that- a great multitude of desperately sick and needy people (young and old alike I imagine).

And they are all waiting for the moving of the water.

Now there is a textual issue here at the end of v. 3 and into v. 4, and for the moment we are going to skip over it, but we will come back to it this afternoon and have a what I hope is a helpful conversation about it.

V. 4 is an explanation for why there was a great multitude of sick and blind and lame and withered waiting under the roofs of these five colonnades near the pool of Bethesda.

They were all waiting for the water to be troubled in the hope that they might be healed.

It is in this setting that we are introduced to the man that Jesus will interact.

We tend to read over verse like this without pausing to think about what the text just said.

This man has been sick or 38 years.

That is a long time to be dealing with this sickness.

We are not told exact what this sickness is, but from the rest of the narrative we can think of him as at least paralyzed, lame or exceedingly weak, and maybe his sickness included more.

Imagine having to deal with this kind of illness for 38 years!

Jesus sees this man lying there, and He knows that this man had been sick for a long time.

How did Jesus know that?

Jesus didn’t need anyone to tell him what was in the heart of man for he already knew- go back and read John 2 were we are first introduced to this idea.

So Jesus purposefully went up to this man (why didn’t he heal the rest of the multitude?),

and he asks him- “Do you wish to get well?”

What is this man’s response?

It is very interesting.

Jesus asks him do you wish to get better?

And this man starts talking about what I think has been consuming his thoughts as he is laying there waiting for the stirring of the water.

“Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool: but while I am coming, another steps down before me.”

What was the man’s need?

What was clouding out all other needs in his life?

He was so focused on finding someone to carry him down into the water, he didn’t realize who it was talking with him.

Sometimes we can get this way.

We know something is missing in our lives.

It’s like we have a hole in side of us and we try to fill that hole with lots of different things- if I can only get married things will be better, if I can only get a better job or some financial stability, if I can only find some real friends, if I can only get my kids to listen to me, if I can only fix my spouse, if I can only ....

My youngest son is this way when it comes time for food.

When he is hungry, that is all he can think about.

Sometimes, he will crawl into the kitchen when my wife is cooking the meal, he will sit in the middle of the floor, and will just start to scream- and the house could be burning down around him, and it wouldn’t matter- all he can think about is filing his stomach with food.

We can get so focused on our immediate needs that we have no clue that our real need is a spiritual one, and only Jesus can fill that hole inside of us.

Why don’t we see our spiritual need they same way Jesus does?

Because we are distracted in this life by other needs that seem to be more important.

Satan is really really good at that.

What does Jesus do?

It is interesting Jesus does not here call for this man to put his faith in Him.

Earlier at the end of John 4 with the royal official Jesus called for an initial step of faith- go your way your son is healed.

But here Jesus simply states, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.”

And immediately the man was made whole- he picked up his bed and walked.

What the man really needed was Jesus.

And Jesus proves this point beyond any shadow of a doubt.

How can we come to this kind of an understanding?

How can we see our spiritual need the way Jesus sees our spiritual need?

1.

Sometimes, we cannot see our own spiritual needs because of other needs that seem to be more important

II.

Sometimes, we cannot see our own spiritual needs because of man made religious reasons (vv.

9b-13)

What key piece of information do we find out at the end of v. 9? The same day that Jesus healed this sick man was the Sabbath day.

This is important!

Do you think this took Jesus by surprise?

Do you think that Jesus forgot?

Or, did Jesus intentionally heal this specific man (he had a whole multitude to choose from), and did Jesus heal him intentionally on the Sabbath?

Does that strike you as being a little bit odd?

A man who has been sick for 38 year miraculously is healed!

The guy who these Jewish leaders walked past day after day for 38 years, and now he is up walking and carrying his bed.

And what do these Jewish leaders focus on?

Hey, it’s not lawful for you to carry your bed.”

If it was me I might be marveling about something else.

But, that is just me.

The Jewish leaders are upset that this guy is violating the Sabbath.

DA Carson-

The Old Testament had forbidden work on the Sabbath.

But what is ‘work’?

The assumption in the Scripture seems to be that ‘work’ refers to one’s customary employment; but judging by Mishnah (Shabbath 7:2; 10:5), dominant rabbinic opinion had analysed the prohibition into thirty-nine classes of work, including taking or carrying anything from one domain to another (except for cases of compassion, such as carrying a paralytic).

By Old Testament standards, it is not clear the healed man was contravening the law, since he did not normally carry mats around for a living; according to the ‘tradition of the elders’ the man was breaking the law, since he was contravening one of the prohibited thirty-nine categories of work to which the law was understood to refer.

What is this man doing here to Jesus?

Jesus heals this sick man, the Jews find out he did it on the Sabbath and they are furious, and in order to avoid the wrath of the Jewish leaders this guy throws Jesus under the bus! “I am only walking and carrying my bed because the guy that healed me told me to do so.”

“It’s his fault, don’t blame me.”