Easter 6: Do You Want to be Made Well?

John 5:1-9
 
Soon another Feast came around and Jesus was back in Jerusalem.  Near the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem there was a pool, in Hebrew called Bethsaida, 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.

“DO YOU WANT TO BE MADE WELL?”

This is a story about healing – physical healing.  A man had suffered – he was blind, crippled, paralyzed – the story doesn’t specify exactly what his ailment was, but he had suffered with it for thirty-eight years!  For thirty-eight years he sat there by the pool, knowing that others were being healed, but unable to reach that healing for himself, until one day Jesus came by and saw him.

Try to imagine what must have gone through his mind when Jesus stopped to speak to him.  Whether blind or lame or whatever, he could never manage to make it into the pool at the magical moment of healing because there was never anyone who seemed to care to help him and he couldn’t make it on his own.  And now, “Do you want to be healed?” Jesus asks.  We might think: “What kind of question is that?”  He’s been waiting for thirty-eight years – of course he wants to be healed!

But does he?  He has lived this way for – at least – the better part of his life.  Do you suppose he even remembers what any other way of being might be like?  Obviously, he has accommodated himself to his ailment by this time.  He has managed to survive with it for a lot of years.  It may not be much of a life by our standards, but it is a life and it’s what he’s used to.  It’s what he knows.  When you come down to it, it’s a pretty good question after all:  Do you really want to be healed?

Are you familiar with the old saying: Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t know?  I recently read a more modern version of this same expression.  This one is by Bill McKibben, who is an environmentalist leader and 21st century philosopher.  He puts it this way: "There is a tendency at every important but difficult crossroad to pretend that it's not really there."

Have you ever stood at a cross-roads point in your life where something nudged at you that this was the time to take a new road?  Maybe it was subtle – almost subliminal – or maybe you were faced by a clear, obvious choice between a disliked, but familiar, known path, and another new path – totally unknown and thereby frightening, even while it might hold wonderful possibilities for you?

I suspect we have all been there at one time or another. And we all make different choices as to which path we decide to follow.  Sometimes we might be willing to try any new turn in the road, convinced that the road behind us is just too miserable to tolerate anymore. Sometimes the road ahead may be too shrouded in mystery – it might lead somewhere better, it might lead somewhere worse – and we find ourselves immobilized with fear, and so we settle for the devil we know.  We stand at the crossway and pretend it isn’t really there.

We stay with the job we hate and tell ourselves it’s at least secure – it’s a paycheck.  We stay in bad relationships because we are too afraid to start from scratch again with someone new.  Or, conversely, we keep jumping from relationship to relationship because we are too afraid to ever fully give ourselves to any one relationship.  We put off going to the doctor because we’re afraid of what she might find.

We dream big dreams about our lives and our talents, but we let our fears speak too loudly and we never do take a chance and act on those dreams.  Sometimes we know full well that the choices we have fallen into are sucking us dry, consuming our souls, but we’re still afraid to turn onto a new way.  We stick our heads deep down in the sand.

So, it’s not such a silly question after all: Do you really want to get well?  Are you willing to step out and take a chance on a whole new life?  Jesus could have healed the man in the story at any time, but he wanted the man to make his own decision.  This man has been defined by his affliction for years. No one expects anything of him because, well hey, he’s just that blind guy, or that cripple over there.  Healing will bring a whole new world of expectations to him.  So Jesus asks him – Is this what you really want?  Are you prepared to leave your limitations behind you and are you ready to step into something basically unknown to you?

I suspect that for the sick man – and for every one of us – it comes down to a question of whether or not we trust the one asking the question.  Healing, we have learned, does not always take the form that we want it to take.  When God offers healing or puts a new possibility in front of us, do we trust God enough to step out in faith?  Do we really believe that Jesus is there to catch us if we stumble?

Back when I used to do Youth Ministry, the kids would ask: But how do I know if this is the right thing?  And I still believe in the answer I gave them way back then: Pray about it.  Give the question your best thought, looking at pros and cons.  Seriously ask God to guide you.  Listen the best you can for God’s answer. Then make a choice and go with it – knowing, that even if, somehow, you still haven’t chosen the best path, God will not abandon you there – God will still make it work for the best for you – if you ask God to be in this with you.
We face difficult crossroads all the time in our personal lives.  This church may be facing a difficult crossroad.  But God has not and will not abandon us.  God is with us every step.  Do you really want to be made well?  Yes, Lord.  Yes, Lord.  We do.  Make us whole, in your love and mercy.  Amen.