Good morning.
On the theme, God can solve every problem.
It's absolutely true.
And that shouldn't surprise us because He runs
the universe.
Things on earth are no problem for Him.
But there are laws according to which God
operates.
And we can miss what God has for
us if we don't understand those laws.
Jesus said, you shall know the truth and
the truth shall set you free.
So I presume from that statement that if
you don't know the truth, you'll remain in
bondage.
Or if you know only partial truth, you'll
remain in partial bondage.
You'll be partially free.
God's promises can be experienced only as we
believe them.
And God can solve our problems if we
understand His laws.
That's why it's so important to proclaim God's
word.
That's why it's so important to study God's
word, to understand God's ways.
Many people, all of us who are here,
and most of us anyway, we could say,
how did you know Jesus is your savior?
It's because you heard the truth and you
responded in faith.
Now if you had not heard the truth,
like many people in the world today, or
like many who have heard the truth, you
did not respond in faith, you would not
be saved.
It's because you understood the truth and you
understood God's law that you were saved.
It's the same with the solution to many
of our problems.
So I've been looking at the miracles in
the gospel of John.
John's gospel has got eight miracles mentioned in
them.
Now John saw many, many miracles, but he
speaks of only eight of them that he
picked out of all the hundreds of miracles
he saw Jesus performing in his life.
And he called these miracles signs.
I want to show you that first of
all in John 2 verse 11.
This beginning of signs.
The word miracle is never found in John's
gospel.
He calls them signs, inspired by the Holy
Spirit, indicating that every miracle had a spiritual
meaning that he wanted us to understand.
And he picked out eight, or the Holy
Spirit picked out eight, because there are some
special truths in these eight miracles that they
were specially called signs.
And that's why it's good for us to
study them carefully, because there are truths here
that have practical application to our daily life.
So we look first of all at the
first miracle of Jesus of turning the water
into wine in John chapter 2.
And then in the second session we look
at the second miracle mentioned in John's gospel,
the second sign in John 4 verse 46.
Onwards over the royal official's son being healed.
One of the number of examples in scripture
where one person's faith benefited another.
As far as we know that son didn't
have faith, but the father had faith and
the son got blessed.
There are examples like that in scripture and
that have happened subsequently in these 20 centuries.
We want to look at the third sign
and that's in John's gospel chapter 5.
John's gospel chapter 5.
And here it is the story of the
lame man being healed at the pool of
Bethesda.
And we need to see what the spiritual
application of this is for our life.
Here is the story, let me first explain
it in a nutshell.
A man who had been lame for 38
years.
He wasn't born lame, he became lame.
And we are told in verse 14 that
he became lame due to sin.
So sometime in his life, maybe he was
20 years old or he lived in sin
for sometime.
And finally as a result of that he
got punished by God, he became lame.
Sin often leads to some type of sickness.
Not every sickness is due to sin, but
sin does very often lead to sickness as
well.
We learn that from this parable.
And then for 38 years he had been
at this pool and lying there hopeless.
He had life, but he couldn't walk and
therefore he was of no use to society.
And that's the picture of people, spiritually speaking,
who are born again.
Yes, they are born again, they have got
life, they are not dead, they are not
like people in the grave.
Death is also, death is a picture of
an unsaved person.
But here is a person who has got
life, but he is not able to walk.
Now the New Testament speaks a lot about
walking.
If you take a concordance and look up
the word walk, you will find some interesting
references, particularly in the epistles.
It says we got to walk in the
spirit.
It says in 1 John 2.6 we
got to walk as Jesus walked.
And other verses like that, walk in the
light, as God is in the light.
So walking speaks of a life of fellowship
with God, of victory over sin, overcoming sinful
habits and not constantly falling.
Falling, falling, you know a little baby can't
walk.
It tries to walk and it falls down.
That's how we are in the beginning.
When we are born again, we are like
little babies, we don't know how to walk.
The day you are converted, you don't get
victory over sin.
You got life, you come out of the
womb, you are born again, Christ has come
into your heart, your sins are forgiven, your
past is dealt with, you are on your
way to heaven, but you still get defeated
by the same sins you were defeated by
before.
And that is our experience, the experience of
every believer in the beginning of their life,
exactly like a baby unable to walk.
But we know that we'd be seriously concerned
if that baby is two years old and
still can't walk.
And we need to be seriously concerned if
we've been believers for two years and we're
still constantly defeated.
I don't mean an occasional fall, that can
happen to any of us.
I can trip going down these steps and
fall.
So can you today.
But that's not because we haven't learned to
walk, that's accidental.
And there's a difference between those accidental falls
that can happen to the most mature saint
in the world and the fall of a
baby who hasn't learned to walk yet.
So, when we talk about victory over sin
or walking in the light or walking as
Jesus walked, we're not talking about that type
of perfection that we'll have only in heaven
where we'll never fall at all.
That's impossible on this earth.
As long as we live on this earth,
we will fall anytime.
That's why there's provision through the blood of
Jesus for cleansing us from sin.
But, it is God's will that we live
in victory.
That we walk in the Holy Spirit and
not be lame.
Because this lame man, he needed help from
others for himself.
Leave alone helping other people.
And a lot of Christians are like that.
They're born again, not only they're not a
blessing to other people, but they constantly need
so much counseling and help themselves.
Now, if you find yourself in a situation
where you're always needing someone to come and
comfort you and encourage you and pat you
on the back and you come to church
worship services just to hear something that will
encourage you and you're not able to help
anybody else, this probably refers to you.
Now, let's read what it says here.
John chapter 5, verse 1 and 2.
First of all, it says here that in
verse 2, there was a pool in Jerusalem.
Jerusalem is a place where the center of
God's worship on the face of the earth
in those days.
It was the only place where there was
a temple.
And that was a place where, in the
Old Testament, God dwelt when he was happy
with his people.
In Jerusalem, by the sheep gate, a pool,
which is called in Hebrew Bethesda, having five
porticoes, and in these lay a multitude of
those who were sick, blind, lame, and withered.
Now, as I've traveled around many churches, I
see that is a picture of many churches.
We can say exactly like it says in
verse 3, in those churches sit every Sunday
morning a multitude of people who are spiritually
sick, blind, lame, and withered.
And it is for such people who are
not healthy, who are not whole, who are
not strong, who are not able to use
their strength to help other people, to bless
other people, who need someone to carry them
around because they are blind, who need someone
to lift them from place to place because
they are lame, who constantly need a pep
talk to keep them going till next week.
It's not God's will that we should be
like that forever.
And yet there is a multitude of such
people all over the world among born again
Christians.
Because they are not filled with the Holy
Spirit.
In another translation it says a multitude of
impotent people, that means people who don't have
power.
Jesus said when the Holy Spirit comes upon
you, you will receive power.
And here were a multitude of people without
power.
They had life, but they had no power.
God has made provision for us, not only
through the blood of Jesus Christ to cleanse
our sin and give us life, but also
he has given us this wonderful gift of
the Holy Spirit to fill us, to give
us power.
I want to encourage you to believe that.
And when you hear that message, don't immediately
get turned off from that, because you have
seen the fanaticism of some people who claim
to be filled with the Spirit.
Or the love of money that you have
seen in some pastors who talk about being
filled with the Spirit.
Now I am not talking about that type
of counterfeit.
I am talking about the real thing.
And whenever you see a counterfeit, remember there
is something real.
Nobody makes counterfeit brown paper.
They make counterfeit dollars and counterfeit gold and
counterfeit diamonds.
So if you see a counterfeit somewhere, you
can be pretty sure that the real thing
must be valuable.
If you see counterfeit gifts of the Spirit,
oh, be absolutely sure there is a genuine
thing somewhere and it is pretty valuable.
You don't get turned off from something because
you have seen the counterfeit.
And if I were the devil, I would
make plenty of counterfeits of the thing that
was valuable.
I would make counterfeit born again people, counterfeit
spirit filled people, counterfeit everything.
Because that is the way to turn believers
away from the real thing.
And get them taken up with unimportant issues.
The most important thing for any believer, if
you are born again, the very next thing
that you need is to be filled with
the Holy Spirit in a genuine way.
Perhaps not in this counterfeit way, definitely not
in that way, but in the same way
the apostles were filled on the day of
Pentecost.
That is the thing that delivers us from
blindness, sickness, lameness and being withered spiritually.
The things that are mentioned here.
Now it says here that Jesus went up
to Jerusalem at the time of a feast.
And when the Jews had a feast, they
had a great time of celebration.
And it is very interesting to see when
all this celebration was going on in Jerusalem,
that Jesus, he went among these poor sick
people in Bethesda, because he wanted to look
for some opportunity to help one of those
poor people.
That is a wonderful example for us to
follow.
Christianity is not all just celebration and feast.
That is part of it, certainly, we are
not against it.
But in the midst of it all, to
look for opportunities in some Bethesda somewhere, where
there are people who are in need, who
need your help.
There is a lovely verse in the book
of Nehemiah, chapter 8 and verse 10.
Part of it we all know and we
sing it in our songs.
The joy of the Lord is your strength.
But there is another part of that verse,
which is not so well known among Christians.
It says, eat the fat and drink, and
then when you have done that, send portions
to those for whom nothing has been prepared,
for those who don't have what you have.
That is true Christianity.
Joy of the Lord is your strength, eat
the fat, drink, and then think of those
who don't have what you have.
Very few people think of that after they
have eaten and drunk.
But Jesus' mind was always like that.
You go to Jerusalem and see all these
people celebrating the feast and you think, perhaps
there are some people who couldn't come here.
Perhaps there are people who couldn't come here
because they were lame or blind.
Let me look for them.
His heart was always like that.
He enjoyed the celebrations, I am sure, but
then he also thought of that.
And that is how a true Christian lives
in the world.
And so he went to Bethesda.
We read in Psalm 41, it is a
very lovely passage, which says, I want to
read this to you, How blessed is the
man, think of this, How blessed is the
man who considers the poor.
The Lord will deliver him in a day
of trouble.
You know, all these blessings listed in Psalm
41 are for people who think about those
who are poorer than them and who have
a thought and a consideration for them.
Who don't selfishly think only about all the
wonderful things God has given me.
The Lord will deliver him in a time
of trouble.
The Lord will protect him.
The Lord will keep him alive.
He will be called blessed on the earth.
The Lord will not give him over to
the desire of his enemies.
The Lord will sustain him when he is
sick.
And when he is ill, the Lord will
restore him to health.
What a lot of things the Lord does
for those who just consider the poor.
That is here on earth.
And then in the final day when we
stand before him, the Lord will say, come
you blessed of the Father, inherit the kingdom
because when I was sick, you visited me.
You didn't heal me, you didn't have the
power for that, but you visited me.
When I was hungry, you fed me.
When I was thirsty, you gave me something
to drink.
When I was in prison, you couldn't come
and set me free, but you came and
encouraged me there.
And the righteous will say, Lord, when was
that?
We never saw you sick or hungry.
He says, when you did it to the
least of these, my brothers, you did it
to me.
There is something we can learn from that
example of Jesus, who when everybody was celebrating,
thought about the poor, helpless people who could
not join in those celebrations.
And that is a way of thinking that
we need to develop and live in all
the time.
That is the way of living a happy
and a useful Christian life on earth.
So that is one thing we can learn
from there.
And we read here that when in this
pool of Bethesda, all these people were waiting,
verse 3, the last part of verse 3,
for the moving of the waters, for an
angel went down at certain seasons into the
pool and stirred up the water.
And whoever then first, after the stirring up
of the water, stepped in was made well
from whatever disease in which he was afflicted.
Everybody did not get healed.
It was the first person who managed to
jump in who got healed.
And this is one of those small mercies
that God provided for a rebellious nation.
The Jews were a rebellious people.
We read much about that in the history
of Israel in the Old Testament.
But even when they were rebellious, God showed
some mercies to them.
And one of these mercies was this angel
going down and stirring this pool.
And one person, whoever jumped in first, would
be healed.
Not everyone, but the first person.
I think this reminds me of hospitals and
doctors in a world full of sin, full
of rebellious people who have no interest in
God.
The world is full of such people.
God has still provided medicines and hospitals and
doctors, small mercies for those who are sick
because He is compassionate.
And it says here in verse 5, a
certain man was there who had been 38
years in his sickness.
Now, I want to do a little Bible
study here.
It's good to know the Scriptures, you know.
I'll tell you something, the reason for that.
The reason I, in my preaching, the reason
why I stick to Scripture so much is
because, like Paul said, I don't want your
faith to rest in the wisdom of men,
but in the power of God, in the
Word of God.
Faith doesn't come by listening to stories.
Faith comes by the Word of God, it
says.
Faith comes by hearing, Romans 10, 17, and
hearing by the Word of God.
Stories will only excite you, stimulate you, make
you laugh.
But God's Word will produce faith.
And that is what we need more than
anything else in our life on this earth.
And if we don't get into the Scriptures,
if you neglect the Scriptures, you'll never get
faith.
If you're not serious about reading the Bible,
I'd say forget about having faith, forget about
experiencing 99% of what God has for
you.
That's the truth.
I'm sorry to see so many people around
the world, everywhere I go, it's the same
in India, where people are not serious about
studying the Scriptures.
And what a lot they're missing.
What a lot they're missing.
They'll discover it when they stand before the
Lord.
Maybe they'll get into heaven, because their sins
are forgiven.
But they'll have such a lot of regret
when they see the Lord and get into
heaven, and discover how useless their earthly life
was, how much they complained and grumbled and
lived in bad moods and anger, and so
many things they could have overcome, if they'd
only read God's Word and had faith.
My dear brothers and sisters, you don't need
stories to tickle your ears.
You need to know God's Word.
And the more you get to know God's
Word, the stronger you'll be.
There's a lovely verse in 1 John 2
which says, the Word of God remains in
you, and you have overcome Satan, the evil
one.
The reason many Christians cannot overcome the evil
one in their daily life is because the
Word of God is not dwelling in them.
How do you expect a person to be
strong who doesn't eat food?
God's Word is meant to be food for
our spirit.
So here's a little Bible study.
38 years.
Many of you are serious about Bible study.
I want to encourage you to spend a
little money and buy a book called A
Concordance.
A Concordance is something that tells you all
the places in the Bible where the same
word occurs.
It's one of the first things I bought
when I had little money, more than 40
years ago.
And I still have that book.
It's been a tremendous blessing to me in
my study of the Scriptures through all these
40 years.
38 years is mentioned only in two places
in the Bible.
You can find that in a Concordance.
But you won't find the spiritual meaning of
that in the Concordance.
For that you've got to meditate and ask
the Holy Spirit to teach you something from
that.
38 years.
This man was lying there for 38 years.
And the other place where it's mentioned is,
you don't have to turn to it, if
you want to you can, Deuteronomy chapter 2
and verse 14 where it says that the
children of Israel, you know the story, they
were brought out of Egypt and they crossed
the Red Sea.
There's a picture of people who are born
again by the blood of the Lamb.
Through the Red Sea is a picture of
water baptism.
A cloud coming down upon them is a
picture of the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
They had this threefold experience that all the
early Christians had.
Redeemed by the blood of the Lamb, baptized
in water, baptized in the Holy Spirit.
But was that the end of their Christianity?
Was that the end of their journey?
That was only the beginning.
And then they walked around through the desert
for two years.
That was God's plan.
And at the end of two years they
came to a place called Kadesh Barnea.
It was on the border of this promised
land.
Now God had promised them, I'll take you
out of Egypt and into the promised land
of Canaan.
But with 600,000 of them they never
got into the promised land.
Because when they came to this Kadesh Barnea,
they said, these giants are too big, we're
scared.
They didn't have faith in God.
And they turned back and God said to
them, Okay, you're going to spend the next
38 years in the wilderness.
Till you all die.
It's exactly the same picture of people who
don't go into a life of victory.
But who live, what I would say, a
life under the law.
Romans 6.14 is a wonderful verse which
says, Sin cannot be master over you if
you are under grace.
And if I were to paraphrase it, it
says, If you are under law, sin will
be master over you.
There are only two options we have.
To live under law or under grace.
And basically, let me explain that to you
in very simple words.
To live under the law means you're struggling
forever and ever and ever and ever to
try and please God.
It's a frustrating life.
It's pictured in the Old Testament like 38
years of wandering in the wilderness.
40 years altogether, including the two years they
took to get there.
So this 38 years, mentioned there and mentioned
here, speaks of a life of struggling under
the law and never succeeding.
I can imagine, picture this man now, this
lame man.
You never know when this angel is going
to come.
At least if you knew the date, you
could stand near the pool.
But you don't know the date.
You don't know when he's going to turn
up.
Here's this man, hoping, waiting, waiting, waiting.
And suddenly the angel comes towards the pool
and he crawls.
And by the time he's crawled, somebody else
has jumped in.
He's missed it.
And then he tries next year, and next
year, and next year.
He says, I'll make it next year.
10 years go by.
20 years.
And he doesn't make it.
Just like a lot of Christians.
And after some time, he just gives up
and moves far away from the pool and
says, no use.
38 years.
Defeated, defeated, defeated.
Is there someone like that here?
Defeated.
You've given up all hope of a life
of victory.
You've heard about victorious life.
You've heard of a deeper life.
You've read books about it.
You've heard of some people who've come into
a life and you've tried and never succeeded.
You're just like this man who tried and
tried and finally just sort of gave up
all hope.
And you're still struggling.
Life under the law, when there is a
better life possible.
And Jesus came all the way to the
pool of Bethesda.
And as you read here, he healed one
man.
How many people were there?
Verse 3, a great multitude.
I believe a multitude must mean at least
five or six hundred.
More than there are here this morning.
A multitude of sick people.
And Jesus comes in and heals one person.
Who said that Jesus healed every sick person
he met?
He didn't do it here.
He didn't even heal one percent of them.
One out of all those six hundred people
lying there.
But he knew whom to heal.
He knew who was desperate.
He knew who was needy.
And I want to tell you this morning.
There can be a multitude of people sitting
here.
And the Lord may have come this morning
just for you.
Because he knows how desperate you are.
How much you've failed.
How much you've tried and tried and tried
and tried.
And are on the verge of giving up.
Perhaps giving up your faith.
I want to tell you God loves you
this morning.
Jesus loves you.
He's got hope for you.
Even if nobody else has.
He has hope for you.
He has come to bless us.
Like he came to bless this man over
here.
But he asked him a question.
Now I want to say one more thing.
As I told you earlier in verse 14.
You read it says.
Jesus told him later on after he was
healed.
Don't sin again.
Lest something worse come upon you.
So this fellow's lameness came because of some
sin.
So in a sense he was reaping what
he had sown.
Maybe in his youthful days, in his teenage
years.
He had done all types of things.
And finally got this sickness that made him
lame.
And he was reaping for 38 years.
You know the devil doesn't tell us when
we begin to sin.
How many years we're going to reap.
He never tells anybody that.
He didn't tell Eve.
You know if you eat this tree.
I'll give you a picture of what the
next 6,000 years of human history is
going to be like.
Or even the next 50 years.
She would not have gone anywhere near that
tree.
And if God were to show you the
future.
We'd avoid a lot of sins that we
are indulging in.
So carelessly today.
This man was reaping.
We see around us people reaping because of
their sin.
But even though he was reaping.
Jesus came to him.
He came to him.
I praise God that I don't have to
reap.
Because Jesus reaped it all for me.
On the cross.
And that's the good news of the gospel.
A man reaps what he sows.
True.
But if I come to the Lord and
say Lord.
I acknowledge my sin.
And I don't blame anybody else.
I blame myself.
He has taken my reaping for me.
He's taken it for you.
You don't have to reap.
That punishment that sin deserves.
And Jesus came to tell this man.
That he could be healed.
But he had to ask him a question.
Verse 6.
When Jesus saw him laying there.
And knew that he'd been there.
Already a long time in that condition.
He said to him.
Do you want to get well?
Now that seems such a ridiculous question.
To go to a hospital and ask a
sick person.
Do you want to get well?
Do you want to get healthy?
Do you want to be healthy?
Do you want to walk?
One would think of course I want to
get well.
But it's not always true.
You know.
I've seen a lot of people in India.
Who are beggars.
Who got leprosy.
And their noses and fingers are all eaten
up.
And they go down the streets.
Of our city.
Come to our gates.
And wander around begging.
And if you were to ask them.
Do you want to be healed?
The answer is no.
Because they won't be able to beg anymore.
Their earning money through begging.
Is dependent on their physical disfigurement.
It's a terrible thing that they do.
They even catch little children in India.
Kidnap them and disfigure them.
Cut out their tongue.
Cut out their hands.
In order to make them beggars.
To beg for money.
And a lot of this.
That goes on.
And they make them.
And these people.
Who kidnap these children.
And put them there.
As beggars.
Usually get the money.
Just for getting drunk.
Terrible things that go on.
Where the gospel is not preached.
So it was a very valid question.
Do you want to get well?
Do you want to finish lying here?
Do you want to finish with your begging?
And do you want to earn your own
living?
Do you want to get well?
Of course this man wanted to get well.
But that's a question the Lord asks us
too.
Do you really want to have victory over
sin?
Do you want to be free from sin?
We may say yes, I want to be
free from sin.
Do you know what it means to be
free from sin?
It means forgiving that person who hurt you
so badly.
Do you want to do that?
Do you want to forgive that person totally
completely from your heart?
Who hurt you so badly?
Do you want to be free from the
love of money?
Do you know that the love of money
is a sin?
The Bible says the love of, not money.
Money is not evil.
But the Bible says the love of money
is the root of all evil.
All sorts of evil.
A lot of people don't want to be
free from that.
They don't want to be free from the
love of money.
They want to spend all their life pursuing
money.
They don't want to forgive certain people.
They say, anybody but that person.
Well, they don't want to get well.
So what can the Lord do for them?
It's a question the Lord asks you.
Do you really want to be healthy?
Do you want to walk like Jesus walked?
Healthy?
Spiritually?
So that's a question that we need to
answer.
Do you want to get victory over sin?
Do you want to walk in the Spirit?
Do you want to spend your time reading
the scriptures more than you watch television?
It's a pretty searching question.
How many people would say, yes Lord, I
do want to know your scriptures.
You know, it's one of the great tragedies
of our time is a whole lot of
young people who don't know the scriptures but
know the names of the movie stars and
the baseball players and whatever other games they
play here.
I know in India there are a lot
of Christian young people who know more about
the scores and records that people have beaten
in various games who don't know the scriptures.
And the Lord asks, do you really want
to get healthy?
To be healthy is to be like Jesus.
To have an interest in the things Jesus
was interested in.
Do you want that type of life?
I'll tell you honestly, a lot of Christians
don't.
Because a lot of things they are interested
in will have to go away.
But for those who are sick and tired
and say, Lord, all this is empty.
What am I going to get out of
all this in eternity?
I want to ask you, my dear brothers
and sisters, the things you spend your time
with today, what benefit is it going to
bring you 2,000 years from now?
2,000 years from now, even if you
go to heaven and you sit there and
you think back over your life, what benefit
is going to accrue to you 2,000
years from now, the way you spend your
time today?
It's a very good question to ask yourself.
Get to know the Scriptures.
Come to the Lord and say, Lord, I
want to live a healthy life on this
earth.
I want to walk.
I don't want to be like those lame,
impotent, blind, withered people lying there in Bethesda,
useless to other people.
And the sick man replied, he says, Sir,
I have no men, verse 7, to put
me into the pool when the water is
stirred up.
See, his dependence was on man.
Everybody around there, all those 600 people, were
selfish.
Everybody thought about himself.
I've got to get into the pool.
You wouldn't find one man there who's trying
to help somebody else get into the pool.
No.
They're all there for themselves.
I jump in first, get healed, and walk
out.
And that's the picture of the human race.
Selfish, self-centered, everybody thinking about themselves.
So no wonder this man said, Lord, I've
sat here for 38 years.
Not one man has ever come to help
me.
You're the first person who ever even came
and inquired about my condition.
And then, Jesus said to him, Arise.
Take up your pallet and walk.
When Jesus speaks a word, there's always power
in it.
Thousands of years ago, he said, Let there
be light.
And there was light.
He said, Let there be a firmament.
The heavens separated from the earth.
Let trees come out of the earth.
The trees came out of the earth.
There's a tremendous power in the Word of
God.
That's why if you believe this is the
Word of God, there's a tremendous power in
it.
It can bring life.
And when Jesus spoke the word, saying, Take
up your pallet and walk, immediately the man
became well and took up his pallet and
began to walk.
The Bible calls the Word of God the
Word of His Grace.
In Acts 20 verse 32.
The Word of His Grace.
The meaning of that is that in every
word, in every command of Scripture, in the
New Testament, there's a grace that is supplied
to keep that promise.
God doesn't tell us to do something without
giving us the grace to do it.
Don't ever think that He'll ask you to
do something.
He spoke about forgiving others.
God will not ask you to forgive somebody
else without giving you the grace to do
so.
If you send your little boy to the
store to buy something, you'll always give him
the money to buy it.
You won't send him without the money.
And God doesn't tell us to do something
without giving us the power to do it.
When Jesus spoke to this man, Get up,
take up your bed and walk.
He gave him the power.
Otherwise, how in the world could he do
it?
How in the world can we obey the
command of Scripture?
Rejoice always.
How in the world can I do it?
Rejoice 24-7.
That's what it says in Philippians 4-4.
You think that's possible?
You believe that behind that word is a
grace that can help you to be free
from bad moods, free from murmuring, complaining, grumbling.
Imagine what will happen in your home if
you began to live like that.
There's grace behind every command.
Believe that.
If you don't believe that, you go back
under the law.
Oh, I've got to do this.
And I try and I try and I
try and I spend 40 years wandering in
the wilderness and never get anywhere.
We've got to believe that when God told
those Israelites, go into the land of Canaan
and occupy it.
He was going to give them power to
kill those giants.
And Joshua and Caleb discovered that later on.
That's what this man discovered.
That there was power given there in his
legs all of a sudden.
It says here in verse 9 when he
began to walk like this.
Verse 9, the last part.
Now it was the Sabbath on that day.
See, Jesus had a wonderful way of healing
people on the Sabbath day.
Because he knew that would really irritate the
Pharisees.
I almost feel that he sometimes used to
look at people and say, wait till the
Sabbath day, I'll heal you then.
It's true, it's a tremendous ministry of irritating,
legalistic, religious people, working them up to help
them to see this is not what God
wants.
This is not religion.
All these silly rules and regulations.
It's a life of love and joy and
victory and peace and fellowship with others and
being good to others and blessing others.
Not all these silly little rules and regulations.
And when the Jews saw him, verse 10.
Now listen to this.
This is the most amazing.
Here we see the utter selfishness and self
-centeredness of religious people.
Of religious people whose religion consists of rules
and regulations and not the love of God.
Now when they saw this man, they probably
had gone by that pool many times and
seen this man lying there for 38 years.
Probably everybody around knew about this man.
And when the Jews saw this man who
was cured, what should they have said?
Praise the Lord!
How in the world did you get healed?
This is wonderful brother.
Tell me how it happened.
They didn't say that.
They looked at the calendar and said, Hey,
this is Saturday.
You shouldn't be carrying your bed on a
Sabbath day.
Even a worldly unconverted person would have rejoiced
with this man.
But not religious people.
I tell you, religious people are some of
the hardest people to get along with.
They grow old with their religious rules and
regulations and become sour and hard to get
along with and difficult people when they get
old.
Don't ever be like such people.
And if you don't want to be like
such people, start when you're young to follow
the religion of Jesus Christ of love and
goodness and joy and peace and faithfulness and
humility and self-control.
And when you see a sinner converted like
this man walking, don't look at what dress
he's wearing.
Is that the right type of dress for
a Christian to wear?
That'll come.
Wait.
Today that's what a lot of Pharisees do.
They're not so excited that the person's converted.
I mean, hold up.
Heaven is rejoicing that a sinner has repented.
Jesus said the angels rejoice when a sinner
repents.
But not these Pharisees.
Hey, there's a little rule we are not
following.
We've got some rules in our church, you
know.
You're not following that rule.
How do I know all this?
I was like that myself.
That's how I know.
I was a legalist to the core.
I'm sorry to say that.
But the Lord took me that way to
show me the corruption of this legalistic religion
and I thank God he's delivered me.
Hopefully.
I was going to say hopefully 100%.
But I sometimes see streaks of legalism still
in me here and there in some situation,
but by God's grace, I don't judge now.
I say, Lord, please deliver me from that
too.
You know, legalism is like a big fat
onion.
It's got layer after layer after layer after
layer.
It takes a long time to get rid
of it.
We throw the whole onion away and seek
to follow Jesus.
He healed people on the Sabbath day and
he told people, listen, you hypocrite, if your
donkey is thirsty on the Sabbath day, what
do you do?
Let it die of thirst?
No!
You take that donkey to the watering trough
and give it water.
Isn't that work?
Yeah.
He says, so also I do good on
the Sabbath day.
And this man said, well, he says, I
don't know about all that, but the person
who told me verse 11 made me well
said, take up your pallet and walk.
And so I walk.
And those of you, I want to give
you a word.
When some legalist comes to you and says,
why are you doing this?
You say the one who gave me eternal
life told me I'm free.
He told me and I don't care what
you think about me.
I have a relationship with someone else up
in heaven.
He told me I'm free.
Now I'm not I'm not trying to give
you an excuse you ladies to dress in
an immodest way or something like that, because
there you'd be tempting other people and causing
other people to sin.
You know, you can take a word like
this and say, yeah, the Lord told me
to dress as I like.
No, he didn't.
He told you to dress modestly and decently.
So that you don't cause other people to
sin.
So, you know, the devil is great at
quoting scripture.
He quoted scripture to Jesus too, don't forget.
So he can try and use a word
and make liberty an occasion for the flesh,
like the Bible says.
So we've got to be careful there.
But then that's a good word for us
to say, this is the word that the
Lord has spoken to me and I'm not
going to be bound by all these silly
rules and regulations.
I want life.
Life is the important thing.
But he didn't know who had healed him.
Later on, because Jesus had slipped away.
That's another wonderful thing.
I was saying that in the first meeting,
how Jesus would heal people and then slip
away.
He didn't want people to know.
It's so different from the way healing meetings
are conducted today.
He didn't get the fellow out and get
the crowd and say, hey, give your testimony
so that everybody knows I am the great
healer.
He never did that.
He was so happy that the man was
healed.
He said, I'm so happy that you healed.
Don't tell anybody.
Just praise the Lord and go home.
He slipped away, it says in verse 13.
You see that again and again and again.
The scriptures, it's a characteristic of Christ and
a characteristic of every Christ-like person.
He does good and slips away.
A good example for all of us to
follow.
So we don't get any credit for ourselves.
Much more for us to follow.
He was the son of God.
We're human beings.
He had a right to get glory, but
not us.
And it's a shame when Christians do things
and seek to draw attention to themselves.
We need to learn to slip away.
Verse 14.
Jesus found him in the temple.
Isn't that wonderful?
That the man, after he was healed, he
didn't go to a restaurant.
He went to a place of worship.
Praise God for that.
He said, the first thing I need to
do is to go to the temple and
praise the Lord for what he's done.
Because that's the place where Jesus will find
you.
If he had gone to the restaurant, Jesus
wouldn't have found him.
He went to the temple, and Jesus is
usually there, by the way.
In the church, in the place of worship.
Today we don't have a physical temple or
church, but in the place it can be
in our home.
And we always get more when we go
back to thank God.
And that's what this man found.
You know, you can get a healing, get
a blessing from God, and that's it.
But you go back to thank God, and
you'll discover you get something more.
Which you wouldn't have got if you hadn't
gone back to thank God.
What did this person get?
He got a revelation on who Jesus was.
He said, Jesus found him there.
And then he discovered it was Jesus.
It's like the ten lepers.
All ten got healed, we read in Luke
17.
One man came back and said, thank you
Lord.
And he got salvation as well.
What did the other nine get?
Physical healing.
What did the tenth fellow get?
Physical healing plus salvation.
All because he came back.
The Lord said, your faith has saved you.
That's wonderful.
Many of us have missed something more.
Because we got a blessing, and we never
came down to worship God and say, thank
you Lord.
And in the temple, we read here that
Jesus told him, don't sin again, verse 14,
lest something worse befall you.
The church is a place of correction, rebuke,
warning.
Don't sin anymore.
Does Jesus say words like that?
Read it.
Verse 14.
Do not sin anymore.
You know what he told the woman caught
in adultery?
Exactly the same words.
Woman, I don't condemn you, but don't sin
anymore.
It's a word that Christians today need to
hear.
I don't condemn you.
Praise the Lord for that.
Don't sin anymore.
Take sin seriously.
I believe that's very important.
And the reason?
Because if you sin again, something worse can
befall you.
Did Jesus threaten people with something worse?
Did he warn them?
He certainly did.
That something worse was hell.
And Jesus warned him, if you can go
back to your sin again, something worse will
happen.
You got lame, the next thing won't be
lameness.
It will be eternal fire.
So we see that sickness is sometimes meant
to save us from hell.
I had an aunt of mine who was
totally unsaved.
She got cancer.
And that made her turn to the Lord.
She died, but she went to heaven.
Would never have gone there if she hadn't
got that cancer.
So God turns Where did the cancer come
from?
The devil, of course.
But God used the evil for good.
God's always in the business of turning evil
to good.
So, sickness, we see here, can turn a
man away from sin.
And we read here that for this reason,
verse 16, the Jews were persecuting Jesus because
he was doing these things on the Sabbath.
You know, you can get so blind to
the good that people are doing that you
can find some small little thing in them
to criticize.
They did that even with Jesus.
And religious people are like that.
I don't mean spiritual people.
I'm talking about religious as opposed to spiritual.
Jesus was spiritual.
The Pharisees were religious.
Religion is full of rules and regulations.
Such people are very picky about little, little
things.
They try to pick out and are completely
blind to all the good that this man
is doing.
That's how they were with Jesus.
I want to say one last thing.
Jesus said in verse 17.
I want to paraphrase these words.
My father's working until now and I myself
working.
Because he was doing these things on the
Sabbath, verse 16, they criticized him.
And Jesus said, My father does not have
a Sabbath.
He works seven days a week.
You know, the only Sabbath that God had
was the one described in Genesis 2 at
the end of creation.
God rested on the seventh day.
And then what happened in the next chapter?
Man sinned.
And once man sinned, God began to work
again and he never stopped working.
He never had a Sabbath.
And Jesus said, Since my father doesn't have
a Sabbath, I don't have a Sabbath too.
We need physical rest and Jesus sometimes would
go for physical rest, but there was a
sense in which he was always working, even
when he was resting, he was praying.
God has never stopped working because man's in
sin.
Because there are poor people, withered people, lame
people, sick, spiritually all over the world.
And if you're in fellowship with God, you
need to have a concern for a world
that is lost in sin.
Because our Heavenly Father is concerned.
Let's bow before God in prayer.
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The Lord bless you richly.