Here is a reality we all face:

The longer something painful is present in our lives, the less hopeful we become that it will ever be different.

If it was true seven years ago and it was still there last Christmas and the same was true yesterday, then it will probably be there tomorrow and next Christmas and seven years from now.

And it doesn’t really matter what it is. When it’s been present for a long time, the possibility of it being absent doesn’t seem all that likely. Whether it’s depression or back pain or trauma or workaholism. I mean, sure, in all these cases you start off with hope that something could be different. But the longer it all just stays the same, the odds increase that your hope will eventually evaporate.

If it was possible, what current pain would you love to see eliminated from your life?

Something physical? Mental and emotional? Addiction of some type?

As you answer that question and begin to imagine a life without that pain, I need to be upfront with you today. I don’t have guarantees to give. I’m not here to make promises about when you will be healed or where you will be healed or how you will be healed.

But I do want to show you what is still possible for you – yes, even after all these years of living with that thing that you know has greatly restricted your life.

John 5:1-15 Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish festivals. Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. Here a great number of disabled people used to lie – the blind, the lame, the paralyzed. One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?” “Sir,” the invalid replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.”

Then 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. The day on which this took place was a Sabbath, and so the Jewish leaders said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat.” But he replied, “The man who made me well said to me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’” So they asked him, “Who is this fellow who told you to pick it up and walk?” The man who was helped had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there. Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, “See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.” The man went away and told the Jewish leaders that it was Jesus who had made him well.

Don’t you love it when people ask you obvious questions. Questions like: Do you want to feel better? Do you want a raise? Would you like to see the dessert menu?

Jesus asks this man who has been an invalid for 38 years, “Do you want to get well?” I mean, you don’t really have to be God in the flesh to know the answer to this question. But He’s God in the flesh and He’s still asking this question. It’s like the question God poses to Adam in Genesis 3, “Where are you?”

Um, you’re God…besides this woman, I’m the only human you have to keep up with…and you don’t know where I am. God knew exactly where Adam was. But Adam needed to acknowledge to himself where he was and why he was there. Jesus wants this man to tell Jesus what he wants. But the guy doesn’t answer the question.

The man just tells Jesus why he can’t make his way to the only source who can help him. “Do you want to get well?” “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred.”

Don’t shut down your desire simply because you can’t figure out how to make it become a reality yet.

We get so obsessed with the how. And we also seem to get more fixated on our obstacles rather than focusing on our opportunities. Jesus is present but the only response this man can give has to do with his circumstances and his obstacles.

This many believed the myth that many believed about this place. The belief was that there were times when an angel would come and stir the water and the first one in would be healed. And this man tells Jesus that someone always goes down ahead of him. In other words, “I’ve tried…but it’s just no use.”

Let me ask you what will seem like an obvious question:

Do you want to get well?

For some of you, it’s a physical sickness or pain: cancer, fibromyalgia, carpel tunnel, excruciating neck and back pain, arthritis, migraines.

For some of you, it’s mental and/or emotional: depression, anxiety, you’re paralyzed by fear, or there’s just chaos in your mind and you never feel free from it.

For others of you, it’s addiction – that thing that seems to have a “forever” grip on your life. Maybe it’s sexual addiction or food or drink or drugs, prescription or otherwise. Perhaps it’s your workaholism that’s costing you greatly. Maybe it’s your addiction to needing everyone around you to be happy with you. Maybe it’s an addiction to safety or comfort that’s robbing you. When our sickness is an addiction, it means we’re seeking help from the very things that will destroy us.

For others of you, it’s wanting to see your conditions change: you long to move from infertility to fertility, single to married, deep sense of shame to a deep sense of acceptance.

Whatever it is, do you want to get well?

If your issue is trauma from abuse, do you want to get well?

If your marriage is failing, do you want to get well?

If it’s workaholism, do you want to get well?

If it’s self-absorption, do you want to get well?

If it’s a destructive body image you have of yourself, do you want to get well?

If it’s a chronic disease you’ve had for a really long time, do you want to get well?

I know it’s been a long time. I know you’ve tried everything. But do you want to get well? Again, I’m not guaranteeing some instant healing today, but I am seeking to build our imagination about what’s possible when Jesus is involved. Here’s a question we all need to answer honestly:

Where are you looking for your help and your hope?

This man is looking to a kind of magic pool for his healing. And I’m all for anything God uses for our healing. But this man needs more than what this pool can provide.  

Psalm 33:16-22 No king is saved by the size of his army; no warrior escapes by his great strength. A horse is a vain hope for deliverance; despite all its great strength it cannot save. But the eyes of the LORD are on those who fear him, on those whose hope is in his unfailing love, to deliver them from death and keep them alive in famine. We wait in hope for the LORD; he is our help and shield. In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name. May your unfailing love be with us, LORD, even as we put our hope in you.

When you think about a man who has now been an invalid for 38 years, when do you think he gave up on hope? Was it 6 months in? After a decade? At the 25 year mark?

And yet, after 38 years, help comes to find him. Hope seeks him out.

One of the reasons we stop hoping for things to be different is because we’re tired of being disappointed. I get it; it’s a real risk. When our adoption was held up in Indian courts, I told my wife, “Let’s just walk away from the process.” It had been hard. It had been disappointing and I didn’t want to keep exposing myself to the possibility of even more disappointment. Thankfully, Shauna said, “Ben, we can’t walk away now.” And I’m grateful that hope remained.

“Hope needs, besides wishing and imagining, a faith that what we wish and what we imagine is possible.” Lewis Smedes, Keeping Hope Alive

Jesus tells this man, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” And he does. But it’s the Sabbath. And the Jewish tell this man that the law forbids him to carry his mat on the Sabbath. Sometimes our greatest sickness is that we’re enslaved by man-made religion. The guy is walking for the first time in 38 years and all they can tell him is, “Sir – that’s not allowed.”

Do not expect everyone to celebrate your healing.

While I can’t make specific promises to you, I love what a commentator wrote while reflecting on this moment:

What is humanly impossible, God loves to do.

So Jesus heals this man and then He just slips away. In verse 14, Jesus finds this man at the temple.  I love this fact – Jesus has come to find this man twice. The first time he finds him, he’s there to heal him of a disease that has been present for 38 years. The second time he finds him, he tells him something that seems out of place. He says, “See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.” What is Jesus doing? First he’s saying something we all need to hear: See to it that you stay well. We are not responsible for our full healing, but we do have some responsibility.

In what you’re trying to overcome, what is your responsibility?

But he’s also telling the man this – there’s something worse than being an invalid for 38 years. What is Jesus saying? He’s saying that spiritual sickness or what Jesus calls being lost – this is worse than being crippled for 38 years. If there is something worse than being an invalid for 38 years, then there must be something even better than physical healing – being found in Jesus.

This scene causes the religious leaders to come after Jesus. And I want you to see his response to them.

John 5:17 In his defense Jesus said to them, “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I too am working.”

The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit are ALWAYS at work.

They come after Jesus because he’s breaking the Sabbath law. But He does something else that makes them come after Him even more. He said, “My Father is always working.” But by using the phrase “my Father”, he’s now guilty of blasphemy in their eyes.

And this is going to get him to be crucified on a cross. And as he’s dying on a cross, He’s doing even more than healing your physical body. He’s giving his whole life for your whole life. And with arms stretched wide, he’s asking you, “Do you want to get well?” And like the invalid, you’ve been telling him all the ways you’ve tried to get well. I’ve tried working harder, being better, and even trying to become more religious. But it’s not working. And Jesus is saying, “If you want to get well, take me in. Receive me. Put your whole life in my hands.” If you want to experiencing spiritual healing by placing your life, your future, your hope in Jesus, you can do that now.

What lies have you been believing? There’s no one to help you? Your faith and prayers won’t make a difference? Things will never change?

Don’t give up and don’t set down your hope. It may take a long time to see healing or it might happen in a moment. It might even happen in this moment. I want to create space for you and God to ask each other a question.

Pray your desires.