Do You Want To Be Well?
John 5:6
Jesus is making his way through the crowd at the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem. To do so he has to pass by a pool. Today, just like every day, it is surrounded by those who cling to life by a thread of hope. Legend says that this pool sometimes becomes the channel of God’s grace. Legend has it that the first one to enter the water after an angel stirs it up will be cured. So the square is full. There are blind, lame, diseased, dumb, paralytics, amputees. The vestiges of an occupied society. The outcasts, the homeless, the beggars. All there waiting for a chance at new life, to be freed of their special form of imprisonment.
Jesus and his disciples step carefully across the plaza. On every side are living reminders of the ravages of a fallen world. The air reeks of impending death, that particular scent of bodies unable to care for themselves, sitting in the shade or the sun, hoping against hope that today will be the day. The crowd following Jesus picks its way through the lumps of humanity. Suddenly the Master stops. There is no particular reason to stop; in fact, there is every reason to get through this jumble of decrepit human waste as quickly as possible. But there Jesus is, bending down talking to a man. Some of the followers think to themselves, “Not again. Why is it that he seems to always find places and people who are so disgusting? I’m nearly dying from the stench. Why can’t we just get out of here?” Others think, “What’s going on? Did that paralytic say something? I didn’t hear him? What’s happening? Let me push forward. I want to see.”
They were used to His penchant for associating with the dregs of life. This man was just Jesus’ type. He might have been in his forties but he looked as ancient as Methuselah. The sun had faded what was left of the rags he called clothes. He obviously had not eaten well in a long time. His skin had that pale sickly transparency that comes with a prolonged state of being bed-ridden. He smelled of sweat and urine.
He was no better or no worse than many others at the poolside. But for some reason, Jesus is focusing on this individual.
The Master asks only one question. “Do you want to get well?” Those closest to him hear the softly spoken inquiry. “What did he say?” They are incredulous. It seems to be the most pointless question that anyone could possible think to ask of those crowed in the plaza.
The thoughts of the hearers sprint through their minds. “Do you want to get well? What do you mean, do you want to get well? Why in God’s name do you think he’s sitting here, day after day, enduring the push of other stinking bodies, going without food, having no place to care for himself? How could anyone not see that they are all here to get well? How stupid can you be? Why else would he be here?”
The paralytic answers. But he doesn’t actually answer Jesus’ question. The man offers only an explanation for his inability to recover. “Sir, I can’t get to the pool fast enough. I have no one to help me and before I get there, someone else is always first”. This man catches the meaning of Jesus’ question. Jesus does not ask if this crippled man desires to be well. Jesus asks if he is willingly pressing toward being well, if he is presently ready to do whatever it takes to be well. The Greek word is thelo. It is distinguished from another Greek word with similar English translation, boulomai. Where boulomai means to intend, the design, to purpose, thelo is stronger. It means not only to be entirely willing, but also to press on to acting on that willingness. Jesus doesn’t ask this man if he has the passive desire to recover. Jesus asks this man if he is totally and completely ready to do whatever it would take to be restored. And this man replies, “Yes, I am willing. But I need help. This is something that I cannot do alone. And my personal tragedy is that I am alone.”
There is more to Jesus’ question than a qualification of willingness. The Greek makes it clear that Jesus does not ask simply if the man wants to be healed. The question really says, “Are you willing to do whatever it takes to be generated whole?” The word translated “become” means “to begin to be” or “to come into existence”. We would recognize it from its transliteration – genesis. Are you completely willing to begin to be? Are you totally committed to a new existence – a genesis – a beginning that will begin right now? And what is this the new beginning of? Of being whole. The Greek word means “healthy” or “sound”. Although the New Testament does not place the same emphasis on health that the Greek world did, the fact that Jesus brought wholeness to many as a sign of God’s grace and power underlines Jesus’ role as the liberator of a new life that embraces the whole man, body and soul. Jesus asks this man about his motives, his passion and his commitment to restoration. But Jesus may well have intended more than the obvious recovery of this man’s health for the question reaches far below the surface. Just how ready are we to do whatever is required to begin our own rebirth?
The cripple correctly answers Jesus. “I cannot do it on my own?” In that reply he states all the motivation necessary. That reply is the answer of one who is able in his inability. “Yes, Lord, I am willing, so willing that I beg for what ever help I need. I want to live again. I want life. But I, alone, am unable. Help me.”
And that willingness is enough for Jesus to say, “Then trust me. Follow through right now. I am here, now, in this moment, to help. Take the action of your desire and . . .
Rise up and walk.”
The crowd gasps. A man paralyzed for thirty-eight years stands up. In confusion and amazement, people back up, fall over others, sit down in disbelief. Some are frightened. Some offer prayers. A miracle occurs in this most wretched of places. But most miss the real miracle. It is so subtle, so invisible. The real miracle happens before the conversation even begins. Jesus, the man who is God, seeks out the man who is no longer a man, who is broken, alone, hopeless. Jesus bends down to confront, converse and convert. The real miracle is that without asking, without even knowing or imagining, God visits this victim of the world and asks him to be reborn. God initiates. God searches. God authors the contact. It is Jesus’ intention to bring this man to wholeness before the paralytic even knows Jesus is there. The Great Hunter seeking us out.
The miracle is that God cares enough to bend down, seek out the broken and lost, and offer genesis. The rest is just consequences, the result of being drawn into communication with God. God cares nothing about ability. God cares about motivation in the midst of inability.
The scene moves on. The man is so excited that he does not even get Jesus’ name. Only much later does he learn who it is that touched his whole being in that moment. Jesus proceeds through the crowd, His direction set through surrender to the Father’s will. But on this day, in this place, we know this: God visited one of our own – and he was remade.
Do you want to be well?
