Sermon Tone Analysis

Do You Want to Get Well? \\ \\

John 5:1-9

September 14, 2008

 

The June 2 reading from Experiencing God Day-by-Day has this to say:

*The Terror of the Lord*

Knowing, then, the fear of the Lord, we persuade people.

We are completely open before God, and I hope we are completely open to your consciences as well.

— 2 Corinthians 5:11

The fear of God is the greatest deterrent for sin.

Those who perceive God as a benevolent and gentle grandfather will treat their sin superficially.

They will worship halfheartedly.

They will live life on their own terms rather than God's.

But a reverent fear of holy God will dramatically affect the way a person lives.

Even though Paul was an apostle of Jesus Christ, he feared God and knew that one day he would stand in judgment to give an account for everything he had done.

Our world does not applaud fearfulness.

We teach our children to love God, but not to fear Him.

We want to present a loving and nonthreatening image of God to nonbelievers in the hope that Christianity will be more appealing to them.

One of the great condemnations of our day may be that we have lost the fear of God.

We promote Him as a “best friend” who saves us and “lives in our hearts,” but we do not fear Him.

It is true that we are God's adopted children and that we are fellow heirs, even friends, with Jesus, but we are not His equals.

He has forgiven us, but we are still His creatures.

He is God, and we are not!

If you find that you have become complacent with God's commands and have become comfortable in your sin, you are completely isolated from God's holiness.

Take time to meditate upon the awesome holiness of God and allow the Holy Spirit to instill into your life a proper reverence for almighty God.

A deep sense of awe is essential to knowing God.

I, we, all have our challenges to face.

As children we were either too short, too tall, too fat, or too skinny.

Someone else was always smarter, or faster, or more popular.

As adults we are either too young or too old, too inexperienced or too overqualified, too busy or too alone.

Sometimes it's more serious.

We carry the baggage of being abused in some unfair way, we worry about how to pay the bills, we grieve over a loss of someone close, we agonize over a rebellious child or an unsaved parent who is facing a Christless eternity, or we face an uncertain future of chronic physical problems ourselves.

We all experience disappointments and failures which are often beyond our own control.

We get frustrated, impatient, and angry at the way life has treated us.

We may then become resentful and bitter.

Then there are some of us who appear to have it all together while on the inside we wonder why life seems so empty and meaningless.

Maybe we can't exactly put our finger on it, we just know that something is missing.

But this is usually a temporary state, what with so many distractions around.

As Neil Postman says, thanks to our culture, "We can easily amuse ourselves to death."

Then for many of us, I suspect, we're so accustomed to our predictable, safe lives that we become unaware there's more to which God is calling us.

We get so accustomed to our comfortable familiar lifestyle that we fail to realize the difference between living and simply existing.

We fail to recognize the abiding sickness which resides within our own souls.

A sickness that Henry Blackaby, in the devotional I just read, calls complacency sin.

My message this morning is entitled, “Do You Want to Get Well?” and it comes from our key Scripture passage this morning.

Would you turn in your Bible to John chapter 5 and we’ll read verses 1 through 9.

While you’re looking it up, I am going to read the General Confession found in our hymnal.

Listen to it.

“*THE GENERAL CONFESSION*

*Almighty and most merciful Father, we have erred, \\ and strayed from Thy ways like lost sheep.

\\ We have offended against Thy holy laws.*

*We have left undone those things **which we ought to*

*have done, and **we have done these things **which we*

*ought not to **have done;/ /**and there is no health in us.*

*O LORD, have mercy upon **us/, /**miserable offenders.*

*Spare us, O **LORD, as we confess **our faults.*

*Restore us.

We are penitent*

*We want to live according to Thy promises declared through thy Word, Christ Jesus our LORD.*

*Grant o merciful Father, for Jesus’ sake, that we may hereafter live godly, righteous, and sober lives – to the glory of Thy holy name.

Amen”*

We will come back to this confessional later.

Right now, let’s read John 5:1-9 After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep /Gate/ a pool, which is called in Hebrew, Bethesda, having five porches.

In these lay a great multitude of sick people, blind, lame, paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the water.

For an angel went down at a certain time into the pool and stirred up the water; then whoever stepped in first, after the stirring of the water, was made well of whatever disease he had.

Now a certain man was there who had an infirmity thirty-eight years.

When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he already had been /in that condition/ a long time, He said to him, "Do you want to be made well?"

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."

Jesus said to him, "Rise, take up your bed and walk."

And immediately the man was made well, took up his bed, and walked.

And that day was the Sabbath.

Whatever pain we carry, it seems rather insignificant compared to the man in this morning's story.

He had been an invalid for 38 years.

We don't know the cause of his suffering.

We just know that for a very long time he had been unable to do the things most of us take for granted.

But, apparently he still had a sliver of hope.

This man took his place with many others who shared a similar plight.

They gathered at the pool of Bethesda in Jerusalem where some said that every now and again an angel would disturb the waters, and the first one in would be healed.

But that's a mighty tall order if you can't get up

 

Then, one day, someone better than an angel comes along.

His name is Jesus -- the friend of sinners, the compassionate man, the divine healer.

Surely Jesus will tell them to forget about their superstitions.

But something strange happens next.

The compassionate Jesus takes a look at the man lying on the ground and asks a very insensitive question: 'Do you want to be made well?" Talk about "politically incorrect"!

What was he thinking?

This poor sick man could have rightfully come back with some sarcastic response like, "Sir, I really enjoy being here completely unable to move!"

 

Yet there was something about the way Jesus looked at him, something about the way he asked the question, that made it not so foolish a question after all.

The answer was not as obvious as it must have seemed.

Jesus wanted to know.

Did the man really want to be made well or not?

He had waited in this condition for 38 years and it might have been that all hope had died.

The man might have been content to remain an invalid.

After all, if he was cured he would have to bear all the responsibilities of making a living for himself.

There are people who find a sense of security in sickness, and for them, suffering isn't that unpleasant because someone else does the work for them.

"Do you want to be made well?"

Maybe it wasn't such a dumb question after all.

The man failed to give a direct answer.

Why not a simple "yes"?

38 years is a long time to be able to settle into a kind of comfort and safety even in misery.

Being well holds more responsibilities.

Being well holds more accountability.