Wow! no need to bite my head off! I just asked a simple question. Three observations this AM, from three thoughts in the Chapter.
1. When Jesus spoke to the crippled man, he thought he was being accused and judged. He immediately began to defend himself. I think he might have felt as if Jesus was saying “you’ve been here 38 years and couldn’t find the time to get into the water? Do you even want to be well?” Defense of our condition seems to be the first reaction when someone calls attention to it. If I say to one of my kids “your room is messy” the first thing they say is “my brother did it” or “it’s not that bad”….something along those lines.
1. When Jesus spoke to the crippled man, he thought he was being accused and judged. He immediately began to defend himself. I think he might have felt as if Jesus was saying “you’ve been here 38 years and couldn’t find the time to get into the water? Do you even want to be well?” Defense of our condition seems to be the first reaction when someone calls attention to it. If I say to one of my kids “your room is messy” the first thing they say is “my brother did it” or “it’s not that bad”….something along those lines.
I wonder if the same is true when the Holy Spirit speaks to us about our spiritual condition. God isn’t trying to accuse or judge us, He’s asking if we want to be better. There’s no need to defend against someone trying to help, simply agree that “yes, I would like to be better” and allow the Holy Spirit to begin His work in you.
I wanted to make note of a few other things here that I won’t take time to discuss right now: a. the man didn’t even know who had healed him…so much for needing faith to be healed. b. Jesus told the man to “stop sinning”, what I think He meant by that was “stop sinning”. c. the man who was healed was immediately accused by the religious leaders. As soon as he found out who healed him, he went back to them and told them Jesus’ name. I think I would have been on my way and ignored the leaders. I’m not sure why he would run back and tattle to his accusers about the one guy who had taken an interest in him.
2. Reading verses 16-30 I recognized some parallels between what the Father tells the Son, and what the Son later tells the disciples. There seems to be some overlap here. Both say we will do “greater things” and both have shared “all they have been given”. Neither can do anything by themselves, only what they see the other doing. All of this underscores my belief that we are created “in God’s image”, meaning we are created to behave in the same way Jesus behaved, utilizing the same life-giving power that Jesus used. From Father, to Son to you and I there seems to be a “generational” dispensation of power and responsibility.
3. The testimony of Christ is of greater value than that of John the Baptist. John spoke of preparing your heart to hear the message, Christ speaks the words of life that allow us to enter eternal life. Weightier indeed! In today’s blog I haven’t written anything about the most important part of this passage: Jesus is the one and only Son of God, and is the only pathway to eternal life. the Son comes from the Father and brings with Him the instructions on how to be forgiven of our sins and enter into heaven. This is the “work” that God sent Jesus to do. I suspected Jesus was primarily here to die for our sins, but had he done that and nothing else, our faith wouldn’t have lasted past the first century. It would have died with those who experienced it, because they wouldn’t know enough to pass it on. further, they wouldn’t have known about the Holy Spirit, without whom there really can be no progress in spiritual matters.
I would park on this passage and write for a lot longer, but I am actually jotting down these thoughts on a Sunday morning, since I was behind all week on my devotions. Thankfully, I am caught up now and can begin fresh on Monday. In any case, I need to get busy making breakfast for some kids pretty quick…
Continuing to serve,
PR