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Through the Apostle John, in the Gospel of John, Chapter 5, God is adding another brush stroke to the portrait in His Word of the healing ministry of Jesus Christ. Our beloved Savior left the city of Cana where he had spoken a word while being some twenty miles away from a nobleman’s son, and the Spirit of God healed the boy. There was a feast of the Jews, and he then went up to Jerusalem, by the sheep market near a pool. The Hebrew name of this pool is called Bethesda, and it had five porches. A great number of individuals with various illnesses and infirmities would come there and wait for the moving of the water. An angel went down at certain times to trouble the water in the pool, and whoever would step into it first would be healed of whatever plagued them. This happened over two thousand years ago, when medicines were very few, and those who needed medical attention were often ostracized and treated poorly.
It seemed very odd to me that an angelic assignment would allow the healing of only one person, when the pool had fives porches stocked with plenty who needed to be healed. Can you imagine the sight of all those individuals that were sick, diseased, blind, and maimed in some way, waiting on these porches for this one event? They were waiting for that one chance at a miracle, and it must have been a scene of mad scrambling, pushing, and shoving when even the faintest rumble in the water took place. The chance of healing for those that were blind was far less, they couldn’t see the water and had to rely only on hearing the noise of it.
Numbers 23:19 tells us that God is not a man, and He does not lie. He doesn’t have to do takebacks or do-overs. He honors His promises and backs up every word He speaks. In Malachi 3:6, He said, “For I am the LORD, I change not.” The consistency of our Heavenly Father is tremendously comforting and assuring. It also lets us see beyond a shadow of doubt that He will never violate or overstep His Word. He has created the universe to function according to His divine order, and the laws that He has ordained are not flexible to our conditions and circumstances. They do not bend to our whims or needs. Romans 6:16 tells us that we become a slave to whatever we choose to obey. We can be a slave to sin, or we can choose to obey God. So obedience to the faith is the way to please and honor God, and to reap the rewards of His promises.
There is tremendous power in faith. Jesus Christ said in Matthew 19:26 that all things are possible with God. In Mark 9:23 he said, “Anything is possible if a person believes.” And after performing his many miracles, he would often say to people, “your faith has made you whole.” It is one thing to believe that God has the ability to work a miracle, most of us believe that He can do anything; but it is entirely another thing to trust that He is willing to do it for you. This requires an active faith, and many of us have not become fully persuaded that God is not only able to do all things, but He is willing to perform wondrous works for us and through us. It is not enough to believe He can, we must have faith that He will!
In John 5:6, Jesus Christ asked the man that had been ill for thirty-eight years, “Would you like to get well?” The man replied to Jesus and said that he had no one to put him in the pool when the water is troubled, so someone always gets in ahead of him. This was the man’s reasoning. It was as far as he was willing to go in his mind. Faith is activated through the cooperation of our minds and hearts. Jesus bypassed the man’s reasoning, and immediately laid the groundwork for activation. James 2:26 tells us very plainly that faith without works is dead. Faith with works is made alive. So it can be no surprise to us that Jesus provided this sick man with a spiritual vehicle that would transport him from little or no faith to active faith in a matter of seconds. He did this by revealing the action required to back his faith. In verse 8, Jesus told him to, “Stand up, pick up your mat, and walk!”. Verse 9 tells us that he was healed instantly. This man had faith in the words of Jesus, and then acted upon them.
We must understand that faith is more than a law, it is the foundation of our relationship with God in Christ. Faith is a demonstration of our gratitude for who God is and what He has done for us. Faith must be present to witness the power of God. We can see this in Deuteronomy 32 (NKJV) which gives us another record of the Children of Israel again turning their backs on Heavenly Father. In verse 30 He said, “I will hide My face from them, I will see what their end will be, For they are a perverse generation, Children in whom is no faith.” If we lack faith and gratitude, we forfeit the communion and fellowship that is our privilege and obligation as children of the Most High.
Before the sick man was healed by Jesus Christ, he had a glimmer of hope, as evidenced by his positioning. Whatever mechanisms were at work on his behalf, he was in the right place, but a great deal of time lapsed before he received the miracle he sought. This is a bit like where many of us are today. We want the Lord to trouble our waters, to shake up the pieces of our circumstances and conditions so that negativity falls away, and peace and wholeness are left in its place.
God is asking us, “Do you want to get well—do you want to be made whole?” What is your answer? We cannot answer God’s question by giving Him the reason that we believe will explain our conditions. He knows exactly why we’re in the shape we’re in. Like the sick man, we know where to go for the miracle we need, but Jesus Christ has revealed that it will not take place without faith, and faith requires the cooperation of our hearts and minds. We also know from God’s Word that action is an absolute necessity. So our blessed Lord will always trouble our waters for healing and deliverance, but we must be ready to stand up, pick up our mats, and walk!■
Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.
“Lord, Trouble My Water” written by Reverend Fran Mack, edited by Kim Times for Sundie Morning Sistas ©2017. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! SMS is dedicated to inspiring and encouraging Christian Women through the Word of God.
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