Do you want to get well?
Jesus asked the invalid who had been by the poolside of Bethesda for 38 years. Through these years, the man had sat there praying, hoping, waiting for the waters to be stirred that he may get in first and receive his healing. But year in, year out, he had watched others get the healing because they had someone to put them in the pool. Imagine how it must have been like for him, having no one to lower him in the pool, and yet sit by that well probably hoping that the next time an angel stirred the water, everyone else would be distracted, and he would manage to out run them. His eye must have lingered endlessly on the pool, in the heat of the day and in the chill of night, rarely straying, constantly fighting slumber, because he longed to be well, he deeply desired to walk, otherwise, he would have long given up and gone home.
And one day, Jesus strode (intentionally) by the pool of Bethesda where this man had determined to lie in wait of his hope for 38 good years. When Jesus asked him if he wanted to be well, he started by saying how he did not have someone to put him in the pool when the waters were stirred once a year. Jesus was not interested in all the detail…Being God, he knew this man, he knew his circumstances, and he knew the desire of his heart. And he had come to fulfil his hope. And he did.
‘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.’
Many of us have been desiring to get our healing, we have waited in hope praying the same prayer in a long stretch of time, and like the man by the pool, we have ‘no one to put us in the pool when the waters are stirred once a year.’
And perhaps our prayer is, ‘if only I have someone to put me in the pool,’ ‘if only the waters can be stirred when no one else is alert,‘ but with Jesus, we don’t have to wait for the waters to be stirred, we don’t have to have someone to put us in the pool, with Jesus, all we have to do is be willing to be well. Jesus knows our circumstances, he has counted our tears, he has seen us in the shadows of our discouragement; so He is not asking for details, he is asking, “Do you want to get well?”
