Tuesday, Aug. 23

Tuesday

Jesus healed lots of people that had been sick for a long time. He healed a woman who had an issue of blood for twelve years (Mark 5:25). He healed a young man who had been going into demon-inspired fits from the time he was a small boy (Mark 9:21). He healed a man blind from birth (John 9:1).  To have simply walked up and healed this man, who had been suffering for thirty-eight years, would have presented no problem to our Lord.  And what's more, Jesus could have even healed the man from a distance. Jesus would not have even had to have the man in His presence. He could have simply commanded it, and it would have been done - just as He had done on another occasion for the servant of a centurion (Matthew 8:5-13).

But there was something unique about this man's situation. There was something particular that was going on in his heart. Look at what Jesus does in this particular case. He walked up and asks the man a surprising question: "Do you want to be made well?" (John5:6).

At first glance, that would seem like the most ridiculous question anyone could have asked!  Obviously, the whole reason the poor man had been at the pool for those thirty-eight years was so that he could go into the water and, perhaps, receive a miraculous healing!  But to appreciate this, you need to understand what Jesus was intending in His question. The Lord wasn't simply asking the man if he was interested in being healed. Nor was He asking if He may have permission to heal him.  He was probing the man's heart and making him search within himself.  He was making the man come to terms with whether or not he really, truly had the will to be healed.  He was basically asking him, "Do you genuinely have the will to be well?  After thirty-eight years of being an invalid, do you really want to stop being one, and to be made well?"

You see; not everyone who wants to be relieved of their misery necessarily wants to be relieved of all the other things that their misery might bring them.  I have been involved in pastoral work long enough now to know that this is very often the case.  Someone can suffer from something so long that, when faced with having that suffering alleviated, they are scared to death that they won't know what they'll do without it.  Sometimes, people can almost build a whole identity around their suffering.  Their suffering is how other people have come to relate to them.  Frankly, it's very often the thing that lets them off the hook in other areas of life. 

I believe we can see this in the man's answer to Jesus. When Jesus asked him if he wanted to get well, why didn't the man simply say, 'Yes'?  He didn't say anything even close to "Yes"!  Instead, he gave a strange explanation about his circumstances, it almost sounds like an excuse for his condition.  It's hard not to detect just a hint of personal pride in the man's complaint over the injustice of it all; and perhaps even the expectation of the sympathy it would evoke from others.  I can't really cast too much blame on him for this, though; because I believe I've done the same sort of thing at certain times. I'm afraid I'm as human as he was.

This reminds me of something from C.S. Lewis' classic book, The Great Divorce. It's a dream-like story of a group of people who were offered a trip to heaven.  In one part of the story, a man from earth stands face-to-face with an angel. On this man's shoulder is a horrible, disgusting lizard-like creature that keeps whispering things to him. In Professor Lewis' parable, the lizard is representative of "lust"; and it keeps chattering into the man's ear, while the man snarls at it and tells it to be quiet.

The angel asks the man, "Would you like me to make him quiet?"; and the man says, "Of course I would." "Then I will kill him," the angel says. But as the angel moves his hands toward the lizard's neck, the man backs off in horror. He didn't want anything as drastic as that! The angel tried to explain that it was the only way to deal with it; and so, he kept asking the man, "May I kill it?" The man offered all kinds of alternatives. "Let's do it later." "Don't bother! Look! It's gone to sleep." "I don't think killing it is necessary; I think a gradual process would be better." "I'd let you kill it; but I'm not really feeling very well today." "I'd really like to get a second opinion." Clearly, there was a sense in which the man loved having this lizard that he hated. But still the angel kept patiently asking for permission: "May I kill it?"

Finally, the man bursts out, "How can I tell you to kill it? You'd kill me if you did." The angel convinced the man that killing the lizard wouldn't kill the man; and so, with great fear and trembling, the man finally gave the angel permission.

The angel strangled the lizard and threw it off the man and onto the ground. And then, a wonderful thing happened. Freed from the thing that held him in misery, the man was transformed into a being almost as glorious as the angel himself. And what's more, the lizard itself didn't die; but was instead transformed into a glorious, white, shining stallion for the man to ride upon. And away he and the stallion rode in thankfulness and joy.

I believe that Jesus wants to set us free from all of the miseries and disabilities that bind us.  He is even able to turn the hopelessness of our misery into something glorious and good if we will let Him. But He first challenges us to truly want to be made whole and well by Him. He first makes us probe our hearts; and asks us, "Do you want to be made well?"


Jeff Frazier