The text that I am now reading in my devotionals in the New Testament is from John 5, the story about the invalid man who spent many years by the pool but was later on healed by Jesus . Beginning on the first verses the story goes:
"Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for a feast of the Jews. Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by fie 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 knew that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, 'Do you want to get well?'" (John 5:1-6)
I will stop there for now. As I was meditating upon this story, and I've heard this story many times, I got curious what that whole concept of 'healing pool' meant. Some versions of the text said something about an angel would come and stir up the water and the first one to get into the pool would be the one who will be healed.
Making a mental picture of the scene, two things come to my mind: 1. Was this "angel" who stirred the pool for healing one from by God? 2. How pitiful this disabled man's situation is, all those 38 years, waiting beside the pool for healing, and yet still nothing. I could picture the pool as very dirty, from the fact that it is a public pool and is filled with the sick. I could only imagine what this man had to go through everyday for all those years, waiting for a miracle.
When I tried to search for answers to my first question in the hopes that I could glean more from the story than my personal study, I came across an article from desiringGod.com about it.
Pastor John Piper from his sermon in 2009 said, "Jesus knows you perfectly, inside and out, all you have ever felt or thought or done." He adds the scripture verse from Psalm 139:2-4,
"You discern my thoughts from afar... Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, you know it altogether."
I had to pause for a moment to let that sink in.
Just a few verses in could do so much to me in reminding me of who God is. I never thought that even just one of His attribute -- being omniscient, all-knowing brings such great comfort to me. Wow. God knows! He. Knows. The Creator of the whole universe, the most Holy God, the Almighty One. God himself. God. Knows. He knows of every struggle I'm in, be it with sin and temptation, God knows every longing I have, God knows every desire I have, God knows the pain I feel, He knows everything. If I just stop right there and savor that truth, try to wrap my mind around it, to fathom what it all means, and in the end bank on it, and with all my heart believe it, what great Comfort it surely brings to me.
Whenever the feeling of sadness looms over me, one of the things that bring me comfort and relief is when I tell someone about it. Usually a friend, someone I trust deeply to give me scriptural advice and pray for me. I don;t know but there is something distinctly comforting in being able to tell another soul what you are going through even if their understanding is limited, and that they could not fully understand your situation. The fact that someone listens and nods and is there for you makes you feel you're not alone. It lessens the burden you're in.
How much more with God, right? BUT best of all, it doesn't just stop with him knowing everything. He's not only the all-knowing, powerfully omniscient,
"my-thoughts-are-not-your-thoughts-my-ways-are-not-your-ways" God, he's also the God whose
thoughts are higher than your thoughts, whose ways are higher than your ways (Isaiah 55:8-9), and as if that is not enough, he goes on further to say: he CARES for you. Jesus gives us this invitation to
cast all our anxieties on him because he cares for us (1 Peter 5:7). To a weary soul carrying a heavy heart this can only be like an oasis in a vast desert, a cool drink to a travelling pilgrim under sun-parched lands.
Psalm 9:10 says
"Those who know your name will trust in you, for you, LORD, have never forsaken those who seek you." It is vital that a Christian grow in the knowledge of who God is to better respond to him (and to situations) rightly. The more we understand about God, the better equipped we are in dealing with the lies the enemy throws at us. This is best done by regularly being in His Word.
I cannot overemphasize the importance of God's word in a my life. The Psalmist said it is a lamp upon thy feet and a light unto thy path. If God's word is pictured to be a light for the path, and Christians are expected to be the light of the world, then we as people who know God through Christ (and the only way to know God
is through Jesus Christ - John 14), should be more zealous in sharing the light of Christ to those who are lost in the darkness that is in the world.
Going back to that story, we learn that in the last verses, Jesus not only healed that man for him to be relieved of his physical illness, but he commanded him to
"Stop sinning, or something worse may happen to you."
In the end, God is not only after our physical healing as he is to our spiritual healing. HE came to heal the world of the greatest illness we have, which is
sin. Sin has infected everyone of us that apart from Christ, we will limp our way towards hell. There is more healing in Christ’s blood for Sin than what the pools of Bethesda claims to offer. Sadly, this truth is watered down today. The reality that most people, even some preachers, are too afraid to talk about. Sugarcoating the gospel (the good news of Christ's salvation), thereby making little of what Jesus had done on the cross by paying for our sin and reconciling us back to God, they are bringing more souls to destruction with their sweet talk that hell is not real (and that we can be cleansed by other means apart from the blood of Christ, such as purgatory, alms, indulgences, certain rituals, etc) and heaven can be achieved here on earth.
God knows us and cares for us. He is patient with us, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. There is so much problem in this world but it all boils down to the source of it all: Sin. God's word said: No one is righteous, no not one. We cannot save ourselves from our sin. Only Jesus can. And by dying on the cross in our place, our sins are imputed upon him and he nailed it to the Cross once and for all. That those who believe in him will not perish but have everlasting life. He lived a perfect life so his righteousness could be ours before the Holy Father.
Unless God gives us a new heart of flesh to replace our hearts of stone we cannot accept this message. So I'm praying now to everyone who gets to read this, We cannot be after the healing and reject the Healer if we are to be genuine towards him. God cannot be mocked. He gave us his only begotten Son, place your faith in him. He will give you a regenerate heart as He will sustain you to walk in holiness everyday becoming more like him, first, by doing what he commanded the healed man to do in John 5:14.