Are we ready?
Let us pray, shall we?
Father, once again we come unto Thee, unto
Thee, O Lord, the original God.
Remember the Lord Jesus said to his disciples,
I will not pray for you, I say
unto you, I will not pray for you,
for the Father himself loveth you.
How blessed that is, how wonderful.
We bow before the wonder and the majesty
of this great salvation.
We bend unto Thee, Lord, as the wind
bendeth a tree.
We know Thee, Father, in Thy love, in
Thy grace.
Not all that Jesus knew of you, Father,
but some, perhaps much.
We cannot measure, Father.
We are in the measureless realms.
We are people with the new creation.
Father, Father, thank you for not just sparing
your son, but giving him.
Hallelujah.
We praise Thee and exalt Thee in our
exaltation.
In Thy exaltation, O God, we do not
forget that we are creatures of dust.
We bless Thee, Father, less carried away as
in some sort of swing party.
We forget.
Amen.
Well, I needn't say where we're to go
this morning.
In John chapter 5, one of the most
important chapters in the whole of the Bible.
Yet, unless you've been cheating and looking ahead,
if I asked you what was the main
content of John chapter 5, what would you
say?
Pardon?
That's not the main content.
That's incidental to the truth.
What would you say is the main content?
I can't hear you, my dear.
You're on track.
So we're going to have a look at
it.
And see the marvellous truth.
And yet, you know, people are often caught
scratching their head, if that's the term to
use in this company.
I said, what's it about?
John 3, oh, John 3, 16, must be
born again.
John 4, oh, well, of course.
John 6, oh, feeding the 5,000.
John 7, Jesus in the temple, said, if
any man thirsts, come and let him drink.
And so we go through, but oddly enough,
John 5 is often missed over.
So, it's like all the most important things,
they are missed over.
But it's so vital, teaching about Jesus in
chapter 5.
If you know the background of it all,
there was a feast.
I said, before I believed it, John is
grouped around feasts.
This one is the feast of, would you
know what it was?
Well, perhaps it'll come out as we go
along.
Chapter 5, then.
There was a feast of the Jews, and
Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
Now, there is a Jerusalem by the sheep
market, a pool, which is called in the
Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches.
In these lay a great multitude of impotent
folk, blind, half-withered, waiting for the moving
of the water.
For an angel went down at a certain
season into the pool and troubled the water.
Whosoever then first, after the troubling of the
water, stepped in, was made whole of whatsoever
disease he had.
Before we go any further, do you accept
that as a superstition, or do you accept
it as fact?
It makes you think, doesn't it?
It's good not to venture opinions at times.
For an opinion is an opinion, and no
one knows the truth.
At least see this.
John didn't say it was a superstition.
Just remember that.
He didn't say it was a superstition.
They believed it, of course, so many things,
but it wasn't true, of course.
So they were waiting for nothing.
That's the conclusion to draw.
But let's go on to it.
It's strange that the Lord should choose this
incident and the things that were held in
people's minds, hearts, about it.
Let's go on now.
He goes up to Jerusalem.
A certain man was there which had an
infirmity thirty and eight years when Jesus saw
him lie and knew that he had been
now a long time in that case.
He saith unto him, Wilt thou be made
whole?
The impotent man answered him, I have no
man when the water is troubled to put
me into the pool, but while I am
coming, Jesus another steppeth down before me.
Jesus said unto him, Rise, take up thy
bed and walk.
And immediately the man was made whole and
took up his bed and walked.
And on the same day was the Sabbath.
Now that is the incident that the writer
John, under the power of the Spirit, takes
as the beginning of a great revelation of
truth.
There are two impotent men potentially in this
chapter.
Notice this word impotent.
It is a big thing for us to
get into our hearts.
A multitude of impotent people were there.
Verse three.
A multitude of impotent people.
Two reasons for impotence we shall look at
in a moment.
A multitude of impotent people.
Physical impotence.
Powerlessness.
That's the back.
And the secret of power is revealed in
this chapter.
You don't think, I hope, that power is
solely in Acts chapter two, or a revelation
of it.
You shall receive power.
Chapters one and two actually, where Jesus speaks
about it.
But here is the tremendous thing to get
into your heart.
And in my heart, for I too, would
join in the impotent folk, unless the condition
for potency in the spirit is real in
my life, then I am completely impotent.
A man of words, a man of ideas,
a man who talks scripture or something like
that.
But you and I must see how deliberately
the whole thing is placed by God.
Now whatever their sicknesses were, I don't know.
Major on the word impotence, will you?
It does say that the disease is in
it too.
Verse four.
Whatsoever disease, whatsoever disease, the disease being not
the cause of the impotence, but the impotence
being the cause of the disease.
I will discuss that with you.
Jesus, you must remember, is God's normal man.
That's right.
He brought him into this world to be
that.
You can say full of love, full of
grace, full of mercy, full of forgiveness.
Say full of power.
For you do know, don't you?
Despite the fact you had hurled at you
from pulpit and pamphlet perhaps, how powerless you
are.
You are actually a bundle of power where
you are sitting.
I hope your brain has some power in
it.
And so on.
You must understand we are all power creations
by God.
When he made a man, he breathed in
the Holy Ghost and lo and behold, the
powerless clay became a man, full of power.
Perhaps you've been trained to think that you
have no power.
And you are waiting for an endowment of
power.
Lots of people are being taught about endowment
of power with the emphasis on the baptism
of the Spirit.
And so they should.
This is a tremendous thing for us to
see.
That God has made creatures of power.
It's the prostitution of the power that's gone
wrong.
It's the misuse of the power that has
gone wrong.
Let us be gathered together now in the
blessed spirit of the Lord and learn what
it's all about.
This man we're talking about here, he had
been 38 years in this condition.
Utterly dependent for what he wanted.
On other people.
He had to hope, any more than a
snowflake has hope of existing when the temperature
would be a lovely 90 degrees.
That's my normal temperature, I like that.
You people think it's hot.
It's just about getting tolerable.
As far as I'm concerned.
But until we have been taught of God,
and we're taught in this chapter, it's the
teaching of Christ that's so important here, not
the miracle.
If he had wanted to perform miracles, why
didn't he heal every person there?
If it was a display of power, in
the sense that we think of power, I
hope if you have got a balloon on
your shoulders that's thinking in those terms, I
hope to prick it well and truly this
morning, that we should see what this thing
is all about, beloved.
All about.
I said that we have faced the condition,
impotent folk.
Verse 7, The word of the man, Sir,
I have no man, when the water is
troubled, to put me into the pool, while
I am coming, another steppeth down before me.
There was a man named Saul of Tarsus.
He heard a voice, he saw a light,
saw no man.
That's the wonder of it.
This is the background.
I hear David crying out in one of
his psalms, No man cared for my soul.
I hope we've got beyond the childish acceptance
of the baptism in the spirit that imparts
some kind of power or potency for us.
It's true, it's in the acts of the
apostles, but what I want to see this
morning is not something extraneous, that is something
I acquire to.
It is not in me and not of
me.
And I'm talking about power on a different
level, as you will have gathered, not just
for the performance of miracles, but for power
to be a son of God.
That's the most wonderful power you will ever
receive in until eternity, upon eternity, or whatever
it will be.
I've run their course.
In this fifth chapter then, Jesus said, rise,
take up thy bed and walk.
Now, that's the first introduction.
Our first introduction in scripture to man is
a garden, and a man made of dust,
and God breathing into him.
Here, it's rather different.
Here it is.
The man was made whole, immediately.
That's how God made Adam.
He wasn't made sinless yet, but he was
made whole, physically.
It was the Sabbath day.
Ten, the Jews therefore said unto him that
was cured, note that, whenever God heals you,
he cures you.
It doesn't deal with a temporary situation.
You'll measure God's ways.
Let me tell you, I'll give you an
instance.
When I was in Bradford many years ago
now, I did one of those foolish things
that men and women do, slip the disc.
It happened to be the disc that squeezed
my sciatic nerve, and I was in tremendous
pain with it.
I went to bed, we prayed about it,
obviously.
I had to lie on a board, and
I don't know what.
And all the big miracle workers all around,
they heard poor old Wally North, and they
came to visit him, and they stood round
his bed, and they prayed.
These were the top men in our district.
Nothing to do with my own particular church,
may I say.
If you know who were in Bradford at
that time, then you might know.
They prayed for me, and things seemed to
get worse.
One night I was groaning in pain, there
really was, my wife always said I was
a baby, but all women know that men
are babies.
So I was groaning, and she was sleeping
in our room, of course I was in
a little ante room to let her get
some sleep.
And I read a psalm.
Do you know I can't remember the psalm
now?
Me, of such a memory as I had
in those days, I can't even remember the
psalm.
It was a little older than I am,
it was ninety-something.
But I called her.
God spoke to me, clearly.
So I called her and she came in,
and I said, dear, go downstairs, get a
bottle of oil, and anoint me, will you?
And all she said, and she named, she
said, all these brethren have been here praying
for you, the men.
Well she went down, she said, all I've
got is some salad oil, I said, that'll
do.
So she went down and got some salad
oil, she poured more on me than she
should have done, but everything was right in
ten minutes.
I never, I was cured, that's what I'm
trying to talk about, never had any back
trouble since.
Never, not a spot.
Hallelujah.
And you say, well that was a woman.
Yeah, it was a woman's ministry.
That opened the door into women's ministry for
me.
Not as a woman, of course.
I just want you to see, beloved, the
difference between being healed and being cured.
So, get this right.
He that was cured, they said to him,
it's the Sabbath day, not lawful for you
to carry a bed.
He answered them, and I like this, he
that made me whole, the same said unto
me, take up thy bed and walk.
The inference being that if you'd made me
whole, I'd do what you told me to
do too.
They gave him Sabbath day jargon, they gave
him traditional teachings, they gave him religious lectures,
I guess, but nobody cured him.
That's the point.
Let us see it, beloved.
Virtually, I don't know what was wrong with
him.
He was a dead man, really, wasn't he?
A nuisance to everybody and to himself.
No, if he'd had a wife, she wouldn't
have called him a nuisance.
Bless her.
But here's the thing to see.
They asked him, what man is that?
Which told thee to take up thy bed
and walk?
And he that was healed wished not who
it was, he hadn't got a clue.
For Jesus had conveyed himself away, a multitude
being in that place.
After Jesus goes and finds him, findeth him
in the temple, and says unto him, Behold,
thou art made whole.
Sin no more.
Not even once more.
I'd like you to notice that, beloved, because
people say they cannot live without sin.
But Jesus commanded him to.
Was he suggesting to him a lie?
Just, when you hear the debates, arguments, and
read books about this subject, go back to
the Bible.
If Jesus suggested to the man that he
could live without sinning, then he was a
liar, unless the man could live without sinning.
I hope you accept that.
And not the arguments and your experience, or
your trying, or things like that.
You'd better read it and underline it in
your Bible, if you believe in underlining Bible.
Go and sin no more.
Not even once.
You say, oh well, the blood keeps cleansing
me, if I, if I, if I, if
I.
You listen to Jesus.
Now you would expect the Lord Jesus to
talk like this.
You can say, may I put it this
way, the debatable verses in John chapter 8,
so they say, this is a man's quote,
in other words, they leave out the really
sort of greatest scholars, if they be, the
whole of John chapter 8, that's the woman
taking adultery, the whole of that first part,
leave it out, say, buh buh buh buh
buh buh.
It's an incident, or they did do in
the days when I used to read these
things, find out.
Unfortunately, it was a man that ought to
have known better that did it.
But, this is, if that is so, that
that section in John 8 shouldn't be there,
you're left with this one statement in the
New Testament.
Go and sin no more.
It's a wonderful thing, isn't it?
He sought Him.
He said in verse 14, Thou art made
whole.
Sin no more, lest a worse thing come
unto thee.
I wonder if the Lord had made him
whole in spirit and soul as well as
body.
I don't know.
That I'll ask.
I've got a lot of questions to ask
when I get to heaven.
The man departed and told the Jews that
it was Jesus which had made him whole.
He didn't say, Now, I'm Jesus talking to
you.
Don't you sin any more.
Of course, you wouldn't have expected him to
say anything less than that, would you?
He didn't say, Now, go and try not
to sin.
He didn't say try not to sin.
He said, Go and do it.
And though he hadn't announced his name to
the man, the man knew immediately.
There's only one man on the earth that
talked about not sinning on him any more.
He knew who that would be.
Now, you see then the importance of this
section.
Chapter 5.
Jesus had done these things on the Sabbath
day.
Jesus told the man not to sin.
And to the Pharisees and everybody else, the
man did sin.
Immediately.
For he carried his bed on the Sabbath
day which broke the law.
Which shows you there's a vast difference to
the laws that men build, religious people who
build laws up on things that say is
from Moses that was never in Moses.
Never did Moses say anything about carrying your
bed on the Sabbath day.
It's an inference from the things that they
were told not to do on the Sabbath.
It's a big thing, beloved, to understand.
I'm so glad that really Jesus tore everything
but the heart out of everything Moses said.
Read chapter 5, 6 and 7 of Matthew.
He left the heart of it the truth,
the central truth but oh how he applied
it differently.
You shall not commit adultery.
See what the Lord says about that.
He left the heart of it, the central
thing when he said now I say unto
you if you do it with your eyes
and your mind your thoughts, you've done it.
Moses never said anything about that.
But then Moses was only a mere man.
Wonderful man.
In fact in this chapter the Lord said
before I hope we're going to get through
it today.
The Lord said do you know who's accusing
you to the Father?
Moses in whom you trust.
What?
Do you think he is literally doing that?
And do you wonder I'm going to stray
now into Luke Do you wonder oh synoptic
Gospels that in the that's gone the word
in the things that happened on the mount
Moses came to talk with Jesus along with
Elijah transfiguration was my word this shows you
how old I'm getting to talk with Elijah
about Jesus' exodus there was no exodus from
sin in the Mosaic teaching it was from
a land with wonderful terrible mockeries of God
on exhibition that's all so he never talked
about his exodus that he led I'm going
to talk with you about your exodus Lord
I'm putting words into his mouth that you're
going to accomplish at Jerusalem Moses knew how
far far short of that it all was
because you will know that in the exodus
the initial phases of the exodus came the
redemption the blood on the houses and so
on well now would you be surprised then
to find that the Lord Jesus is taking
them back in this chapter or way back
if you like or if you like to
think of the other way on into wonderful
truth now let's investigate it and how it
happened ah verse 16 the Jews therefore persecuted
Jesus and sought to slay him because he
had done these things on the Sabbath day
because he'd removed their superstitious superfluous things and
they hated him you take away a man's
deep believing and especially if it's superstitious believing
and it's been in the race and in
your family and you've been bred in it
you take that away from a person and
you become his enemy straight away because people's
believing people's lives are built up upon false
beliefs take that away and they haven't a
life anymore at least not a religious one
here then is the whole truth and Jesus
took it away deliberately smashed it with that
wonderful miracle and ah he explains as we
go on what it's all about here it
is he said to them my father work
his a tool and I work to him
it was simple that if you like was
the law he was brought up on it
was in him though it was never explained
to him as the law his nature was
his law put that down your nature is
your law your
nature is your law you think that law
is something you acquiesce to and do have
been taught to do it or should I
force to do it if you go over
90 on the motorway for instance you should
pay a fine so on do you believe
that your nature is your law I can
reduce it the nature of a lion is
to do the things of a lion and
mate with a lioness and it runs through
all their family that's their laws it's no
good you lecturing them it's no good you
doing this that or the other they behave
according to their nature and so do you
son, daughter you do whether you say you
have a new nature or not all human
life exchanges between was built upon human law
you can make some laws and say well
they make it in the parliament or some
dictator makes a law and so on and
so on and so on and if you
don't like that you rebel against it in
your mind but can do nothing about it
but spend your life in change in a
prison that they build if you rebel now
that runs right through scripture old Karl Marx
wasn't so far out I'm not a communist
when he said that man is a religious
animal wasn't so far out I don't
say you accept his godless dictums and so
on that's right when I go to Romans
2 boy oh boy I shan't get anywhere
today I go to Romans that's the kind
of mind I got God inspires me on
the spot you go into Romans 2 and
you find in Romans 2 you find that
Paul says the heathen do the things by
nature that are in the law the thing
to bear in mind is this and that
is what you do you do the things
by nature by law to have been born
makes you a subject under the law not
man made law Paul deals with that later
on in the epistle in other words you
are I find you to be if I
know you well enough what you are and
you say what you say by nature you
act as you do by nature and nothing
can stop it now that's a tremendous thing
we say we are a heterogeneous lot maybe
people try to find differences and there are
differences as we become more trained and more
this and more that but basically you will
be what you are that's why God says
I am that I am as he would
say I shall forever continue to be what
and who I am I'm not talking over
your heads are you perhaps you think you're
getting a real lecture this morning without notes
but this is the thing to get into
your heart can a leopard change its spots
or the Ethiopian his skin now please get
biblical truth down into the roots of your
thinking unless you can never be other than
a cheat you can never be other than
a liar you listen to Paul God said
I am that I am Paul says I
am what I am he's only changed the
T to a W God says I am
that I am Paul says I am what
I am bless him he goes on to
say by the grace of God now already
this morning you've had enough to do some
real thinking about life as it is and
I hope I haven't gone too far for
you in these realms which will give you
seed thought but we're going on from there
it is the Jews sought the more to
kill him verse 18 because he not only
had broken the Sabbath according to them but
said also that God was his father there
you are he was doing it by nature
he'd got the nature of God that man
that's what he was claiming to have and
he knew the more you dig into the
Greek of the verse you will find it
to be true using the exact words that
made them say what they said how wonderful
it is then he said that God was
his father Amen making himself equal with God
then answered Jesus and said unto him verily
verily I say unto you the son can
do nothing of himself alright let's stop there
have you ever come to the place where
you say you're a son of God and
can do nothing of yourself then you've got
to listen to what he said to that
man sin no more how wonderful
I can only do he says I'm putting
my words to it what I see the
father himself doing that's all I can do
now you think of the multitude of miracles
he did of the multitude of words that
he spoke he was shown what to do
I'd like you to take into your hearts
beloved and God wants you to that once
you're born again you're filled with power and
can do nothing with all that power here
you cannot do anything of yourself I would
like to think you're all here as students
this morning perhaps I'll exclude one two three
four more elderly people but the real students
let's put it that way you can't do
anything of yourself not if you're going to
be a child of God you won't retain
your sonship or daughterhood how do you think
if you will do things of yourself you
can't retain it he says I love
this I'm such a powerless man the potential
is a wonderful thing the potential that you
and I have once we're born of God
been really regenerated from his heart from the
blood of the human Christ it wasn't merely
human of course we've been brought into a
new realm I hope you feel as I
hope it's not just a theory you hold
as taught by GWM or whatever what you
preach has got to come from yourself mind
us I will say from God it came
from the new nature I realised I'd got
from God nobody should be preaching unless they've
got God's nature in them what treacherous sins
are they building on trying to do in
somebody else's life you and I have to
understand beloved these things and I know not
one of you, even the oldest one of
you are as old as I am so
I've lived a long time learned that some
of the thoughts I thought say when I
was 20 aren't right because if I say
God is God that's right you may say
that when you're only 5 but it's learning
what it's all about this is the chapter
that's teaching it's not a theological discourse it
is a statement by Jesus Christ of eternal
truth of which he was a manifestation on
this earth born as he was of Mary
only on the human side how wonderful it
is beloved he says this the father loveth
the son showeth him all things that himself
doeth and listen to his confidence he will
show him greater works than these that you
may all marvel later on in John we
shan't get there anywhere near it this morning
he said I have done one work and
you all marvel it shows you the importance
of this this is the work he's talking
about why should a man possess of such
power God on the earth go to a
place that fool up the people that are
upside down inside out nearly everything impotent all
got diseases and healed one and what you
may call without any compassion on anybody else
no pity on anyone else with all that
power he healed that one man and left
the rest walked away from them Lord I
need you to put me in the pool
I need this I need that learn your
Christ will you learn the kind of man
he is was I mean still is I
suppose the nature of humanity somewhere up there
I'm not going to dissertate upon that tell
you what I think because it doesn't much
matter you might say to me if you
meet me up there well it wasn't like
you said well that's alright I won't stop
on truth of making a book there is
no end God wants us to see this
thing so he did what he did and
only had power to do what he did
because he kept his eyes on his father
that's the sign of a born again man
he didn't keep his eyes on the sick
and the impotent and the millions of people
he could have helped on the earth he
kept his eyes on his father perhaps you
ought to put after that statement a parenthesis
in which you put the words do I
with a question mark do I this is
the secret he is showing us the secret
of life his own wonderful life but people
wanted and haven't a clue usually how they
can say yes you get born again become
a member of the church get baptised in
water baptised in the spirit all these things
you wouldn't need to read a lot of
doctrine if you read the bible I mustn't
let any of the other lecturers know that
I say that there it is that's right
I say it from every pulpit I stood
in I've written a lot of books myself
it sounds so contradictory doesn't it but there
it is here it is beloved isn't this
great do you know who healed that one
there it was the father what I saw
the father do I only do the things
I see my father do and that's why
John wrote this gospel to let you know
about father this is the gospel the only
one that talks about being born again they
say keep your eye on Jesus Jesus said
keep your eye on my father keep your
eye on my father see he's upset in
all accepted evangelical teaching which is true but
you're only keeping your eye on Jesus because
he kept his eye on the father and
he said you can have my life if
you really want it I'm amazed at the
ignorance there is in the world you can
all tell me you don't know much well
that's fine I don't I'm only a little
man God wants us to go through these
things he said let's read the rest no
I'd better let you have a break for
five minutes we'll be right back