Do You Want To Be Well?

The Pool of Bethesda, the setting of this passage, is within the environs of Jerusalem. The Pool periodically ripples, and someone sick would jump into it for healing. As a result, hundreds of sick people would come from the countryside to the Pool. The withered and the lame could only make it to the waters by crawling over others weaker than themselves.

It is a horrible sight, except for one thing, Jesus is here.

When Jesus surveys the miserable heaps of humanity around the Pool, His gaze rests on one of the worst cases, a man who has been in the confines of his bed for thirty eight years, and He heals him. We can picture the man standing up to his feet and feeling his muscles become firm and his legs enlarge.

The account of this man's healing is one that helps us learn about ourselves and our Savior.

This is one of the encounters that is meant to make us focus on our brokenness so we can appreciate the healing Christ brings to our lives. As we get to know ourselves, we find more and more that we need His healing. We need healing from bitterness, unresolved conflicts, and things that lie hidden within us. Such issues can hinder us from experiencing God's power and the Do you wish to get well? grace that sets us free.

Do you wish to get well?