This is another one of the remarkable
miracle stories and there are just a few of them chosen by
John to give us pictures of two things. They've given us pictures
of how God saves sinners and they've given us pictures in
each of them of how in the salvation of sinners God reveals his character
and his glory. And so here is the Lord Jesus
Christ performing this miracle and I want us to have in mind
the picture of what was going on in that place in beside that
pool at the sheep market in Jerusalem and how it's a remarkable picture
of the fall of man and the sadness of that fall and how salvation
is, as it is in Genesis chapter 3, salvation is God coming to
fallen man and God revealing himself to fallen man. And in
all of these pictures there is, as you might recall from the
story that we looked at last week of that nobleman, the Lord
just said a word to him and instantly that man believed. He believed
and he went away with assurance and peace that his son, who was
at the point of death, was now alive and well. In the previous
story the woman at the well had a word from the Lord Jesus Christ.
He said to her, you believe me and out of your belly shall flow
living waters. And in an instance that woman
went from being concerned about a water pot and concerned about
the religion of the Samaritans to actually going back into that
town and rejoicing. The story of Nicodemus is a similar
story, isn't it? That man was drawn to the Lord
Jesus Christ by the miracles that he did in Jerusalem, but
he was drawn out of the darkness. The darkness is a picture of
the religion of the Jews. He was drawn out of that darkness
into the light of the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ, and
in Nicodemus' case we see him in John 7. standing before that
Sanhedrin of all those people who had in their hearts to slay,
as Graham read to us earlier, the Lord Jesus Christ. And he
stood before them and said, He's righteous and we're acting unrighteously. And at the end of John's Gospel
there is the glorious picture of Nicodemus coming with Joseph
of Arimathea and honouring the body of the Lord Jesus Christ.
The journey to salvation has some remarkably similar elements
in it, but in all of it, the Lord Jesus Christ is revealing
His glory as He comes to His chosen people and creating life
in them. And that's what happens in the
gospel, isn't it? Graham read it to us there a
little while ago, and it's my prayer that it might be the case,
isn't it? For the Father raises the dead, God raises the dead,
the spiritually dead, verse 21 of John chapter 5, and that word
quickeneth is to make them alive. All of a sudden they're alive,
they're alive to who they are, they're alive to the character
of God, they're alive to how God saves sinners. Even so, the
Son, the Son gives life to whom He will. And in all of these
stories we have a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ meeting And this is another one of those
stories. He says to this man, will you
be made whole? Will you be made whole? When
the Lord Jesus comes, he always comes personally and particular. In every one of those cases,
there are words said. The Lord heals and the Lord makes
alive through his word. His word that created this universe
is his word that brings the new creation. I want us to see a
couple of verses in Galatians 6 verse 14. Paul is writing to this church
that is beset by legalists who want for people to add something
of their doings and something of their legal activities, something
to the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, and anything you add
to the work of the Lord Jesus Christ is to deny his work in
total. And I just love it. Galatians
is such a significant book. It's so, so powerful in its declarations
of the gospel, the free and sovereign grace of God. And he says at
the end of the book, in verse 14 of Galatians 6, he says, But
God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord
Jesus Christ. by whom the world is crucified
unto me and I unto the world. Before we go any further, when
Paul's talking about the cross, he's not talking about a piece
of wood or a piece of gold that people have these days. There's
enough of the cross being sold by the Roman Catholic Church
to fund all of its idolatry that you could build Noah's Ark out
of it all if you wanted to. It's not that. It's not that
cross. It's all about the doctrine of
the cross which is what the whole book of Galatians is talking
about. It's all about who was crucified, why he was crucified,
why he was risen, why he was put to death, why he was buried,
why he was raised glorious. It's all about our salvation.
He has just one thing he wants to boast about. One thing that
he has his confidence in is the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ
and in that cross the world is crucified unto me, the world
to me is a crucified thing, the world is dead, the world is hanging
there dead before me, and I to the world. Two crucifixions happened
for Paul in that one crucifixion, so he's not talking about a piece
of wood. Verse 16, and this is what I wanted to say, for in
Christ Jesus Neither circumcision availeth anything. That word
avail means to have power, to have strength, to overcome, to
be strong, to be sound in health. Circumcision doesn't avail anything.
Circumcision provides no power whatsoever. an uncircumcision,
nor uncircumcision. So circumcision speaking of the
works done under the law of Moses, all of the legalism that people
want to think they have. They think that it has a power.
They think that there's power in the things that they do. And
both the circumcised Jews and the uncircumcised Gentiles all
have some sort of righteousness. You can read about it in Romans
too. They do the things that the law says, naturally. We know
that it's wrong to lie. We don't need Moses to tell us. That's all written on the hearts
of all of God's people. They know the Ten Commandments.
They know it's wrong to lie. They know it's wrong to steal.
You don't need to teach people those things. They know them
already. Uncircumcision is all those works that are done without
reference to the law or obedience. But the only thing that matters,
the one thing that has power, and this is what the Lord Jesus
Christ has done to all of these people, and this is what he does
to this man who's withered up and lame and sitting there, and
he's been there for 38 years in that state. but a new creature,
a new creation. Circumcision doesn't avail anything,
has no power. Uncircumcision doesn't avail
anything, has no power. The only thing that has power
is a new creation, a new creation. One that's recently made, one
that's fresh. and the one that dwells in all of the hearts of
God's people. And that's what we're seeing
pictures of, aren't we? Nicodemus is told, you must be born again.
If you are not born again, if you don't have life from heaven,
if you don't have life from God, you can't even see the kingdom
of God. You don't even know what you're missing out on unless
you have new birth. And you can't enter the kingdom of God. You
have to see it. It's this new creation. This new creation,
and as many as walk according to this rule, peace beyond them
and mercy and upon the Israel of God. Why do we spend and have
the focus of what we do in church about the Lord Jesus Christ and
him crucified and his word? There's nothing else that creates
life. There's nothing else. that brings
this new creation. It comes through the Word. Faith
comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. That Word
of God in Romans 10 is the preached Word of God. So we have nothing
else to do. We have no power. That's what I'm trying to say.
We have no power. This powerless man sitting beside
that pool in Jerusalem is a picture of the fact that the religion
of the Jews was a powerless religion. It had no power to bring life
whatsoever. That's why Nicodemus is a picture
of it, isn't he? He's the best that the Jewish
religion had. And he was drawn to the Lord Jesus Christ out
of the darkness into his light. But Nicodemus, like all of us,
has to be brought to this particular place where the Lord comes in
almighty power and he does as he did to Lazarus. He said to
Lazarus, come out. He said, come out. Lazarus, come
out. And what happened to that dead
man? He came out of that tomb, didn't
he? And if the Lord Jesus Christ had said, come out, everyone
that was in a tomb would have come out. That's why he had to
say, Lazarus, come out. This particular one, come out.
It's almighty power. It's the almighty power of his
grace. We read it in John 5, verse 24. It's to raise the very
dead. It's to raise spiritually dead
people to life. So I want us to, as the Lord
allows, I want us to go look at this picture this morning
and then I want us to look at the teaching. But if we don't
see the picture, and if we don't see the picture in the context,
then we won't understand all the teaching that goes with it.
And this is a remarkable miracle, isn't it? This is the miracle.
This is the miracle that caused the Jews to begin their persecution
of the Lord Jesus Christ with one intention. They are always
sought to destroy him. The one who gives life, the one
who brings power, the response of the religious world is kill
him. Let's kill him. Okay, we're going
to sing again and then, Lord willing, we'll be able to. We're
going to sing number 70. It is not that I did choose thee
for Lord, that could not be. This heart would still refuse
thee, hadst thou not chosen me. Thank you. He is coming. I'll see my soul you Let's begin in John chapter 5,
but we also need to be reminded that John tells us exactly why
these things are written in John chapter 20 verse 31. These particular
stories are written that you might believe, that Jesus is the Christ. That's saving faith. It's not
what you believe about yourself, it's believing who to the Lord
Jesus Christ is. Jesus is the Christ, the Son
of God, and that by believing you might have life through his
name. So let's go back in our scriptures
to John chapter 5 and let's try and paint this picture. I want
us to imagine that you were there that day. And you walked into
Jerusalem and you walked past this street market and you saw
this pool of Bethesda. The word Bethesda means house
of mercy. This is a place of mercy. And
the Lord Jesus Christ has gone to this feast. And it's worth
noting that it's called the Feast of the Jews. They used to be
called the Feasts of God in the Old Testament when God instituted
them, they were the Feasts of God. And now that man has taken
over, they are now, in John's Gospel, they're called the Feasts
of the Jews. The Jews Passover used to be
called the God's Passover, but the Jews had so taken it over
and so polluted it by their religious self-righteousness that the Lord
Jesus Christ comes and turns it all upside down. And Jesus
went up to Jerusalem. The Lord Jesus Christ went to
all of the appointed feasts. He could say to these same people
who sought to slay him there, can you accuse me of any sin?
And there wasn't one sin that they could accuse him of under
their law. I'm hoping our friends will allow
us to continue. Okay. And there is at Jerusalem,
by the sheep market, by that sheep gate, a pool which is called
in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches. And I don't
want us to think of some measly little thing here. Herod was
a remarkable builder and the things that he built in and around
Jerusalem and especially around the temple were remarkable buildings
and so this is a building with five porches having five colonnades,
five places that surrounded it so that people could rest from
the heat of the sun beside the pool. In these, in these, these
porches lay a great multitude. Don't forget, get the picture,
there's a great multitude of these people beside this pool,
a great multitude of impotent people. That word impotent means
to be weak, to be feeble. It really means to be without
power, without strength, powerless, needy and poor. So just get the
picture of this great multitude that's beside this pool. The
Lord goes to this sheep market. He's always looking for His sheep,
isn't He? He goes over hills and dales.
He'll always go to where His sheep are. That's why He's there
this day. He's got a sheep there. He'll
go to the very ends of this universe to find his sheep and he'll organise
everything in this universe so that one of his sheep will come
to him as he comes to them. So there's this great multitude.
It's a great picture of fallen man, isn't it? They are blind. They're both physically and spiritually
blind. They are hot, which means that
they are lame, crippled and maimed. And they are withered, which
means they're dry, they're wasted up. You can just imagine someone
whose arm has been rendered paralyzed and all the muscles and everything
are just wasted up to nothing at all. It's a picture of man
in his fallen state before God, isn't he? He has no power. He
is blind. He's blind physically and he's
blind spiritually. He is lame. He cannot walk to
God. He can't take the first step.
He's maimed and he's withered and he's dried up. And what's
he doing? He's waiting. He's waiting. He
has no ability to achieve a cure for his disease. And you can
guarantee that these people that are gathered there and in a sense
left there have tried everything else that was available. They've
come from all over nation Israel, no doubt, and they've come from
all the different tribes, aren't they? There are sons of Levi
there, there are sons of Judah, the tribe of the kings of Israel. They're there. It's a picture,
as I said earlier, it's a picture of the emptiness of that religion.
Those people walked past every day, didn't they, those Jews,
those Jewish religious people, and there's not a thing they
could do for any single one of them. But I want us to remember that
it's the Lord Jesus Christ that came to that place. And it's
the wonder of the glory of the gospel, isn't it? That our God
comes to his sheep where they are. He doesn't tell his sheep
to get up and get themselves ready and come to him. He's the
one that comes to them. Always it's God who institutes
the salvation. Salvation from beginning to end
is all 100% the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And you might have
to spend three days in a whale belly like Jonah to know that,
but that's exactly how it is in all of the scriptures, isn't
it? Salvation is of the Lord. It's of the Lord's coming. It's
of the Lord's seeking. It's of the Lord's finding. It's
not God requiring us to do something to get to Him, but God coming
to us, and that's the glory of this picture. And our God doesn't
change. The Lord Jesus Christ who walked there and went there
to this day to that particular group of people is the same yesterday,
today and forever. He's still doing the same thing.
He's still going through this world and he'll find his sheep
amongst the weak and the powerless and the blind and the lame. and the withered, the dried up.
But they were gathered there. Why are all these people gathered
there? They were gathered there, verse 4, for an angel went down
in a certain season into the pool and troubled the water.
Whosoever then first, after troubling the water, stepped in was made
whole of whatsoever disease he had. And you can well imagine
that those who find the the glory of God revealed in
the wonders of what he does, you can understand why they get
offended by this person. They have cut it out of their
Bibles and they'll tell people that they should be relieved
that it's not actually there. The question is, is it too hard
for God? He who commands the angels, is
it too hard for God to send an angel? It's too hard. Does he need, does God need to
explain everything that he's done? So we're not told how often
this happened. We're not told how often this
happened. The reason this is given to us here is it's the
reason why all these people were gathered. A great multitude were
gathered there. Now they had heard of this in
the past, but it may not have happened for a generation. But
that was the only place you could gather. That was where you had
to be. That's the reason they were there. I love what my friend
Chris Cunningham said, he said, the understanding of Scripture,
which does not require any reasoning nor speculation on your part,
is the right one. We just believe what God says,
don't we? That's why he said it. We know
that there's a multitude. The people who say that, deny
this verse of the Scripture, are quite happy to acknowledge
that there's a multitude there, and they're quite happy to acknowledge
why the multitude is there. They're saying this just didn't
happen anyway. So we have no record of this happening and
the Lord Jesus Christ heals this man without any reference to
the angel troubling the water. It's just something. It was the
reason this great multitude were there. And while they were waiting,
unable to do anything at all themselves, he who commands the
angels came himself. He came. It's a great picture
of him still coming to his people. Verse 5, And a certain man was
there which had an infirmity thirty and eight years. Always in the Scriptures the
Lord deals with certain men, and as the Gospel is proclaimed,
it is certain people that are hearing. God is always speaking
to certain people, whether it's in grace or in judgment, He's
speaking to certain people. Salvation is always an individual,
personal matter. It's something about which you
ought to be intensely, personally interested. And you shouldn't
be interested in following a crowd no matter how how esteemed they
might be in the eyes of men. We have just one issue, haven't
we? We have to deal with God personally ourselves. You have
to meet and deal with the Lord Jesus Christ. And meeting him
here, brothers and sisters, will cause the meeting then to be
a glorious meeting, a glorious meeting. There's a certain man
was there which had an infirmity 38 years old. And the Lord Jesus comes to this
particular man, doesn't he? So why, what was it in this man
that attracted the Lord's attention particularly? It doesn't say
he was crying out to God. What was he doing when the Lord
came to him? He was lying there, that's all
he was doing. He was just lying there, impotent,
powerless. He was lying there and he'd been
in that state for 38 years. And the Lord Jesus Christ comes
to this particular man. His salvation is pictured in
his healing miracles of him just coming to particular people.
And he comes at a particular time. This man had waited 38
years. And the Lord Jesus Christ walked in Acts chapter 4. He
walked past another man. For the three years of his public
ministry, the Lord Jesus Christ walked past a man into that gate,
beautiful, and that man was there begging for arms, and he didn't
heal him. Why? Because he was going to bear a certain man. He always deals
with certain men and his timing is always absolutely perfect
in all of it. So that cripple at the beautiful
gate like this cripple, he suffered during those years,
didn't he? He had to wait all of those years
Did he complain after he was cured of his waiting time? No. Is he rejoicing now? Of course he is. Did God owe
him an explanation? He didn't at all, did he? Our
God is absolutely sovereign and he comes at a perfect time. And if you can turn over to John
chapter 9, there's a story of how these religious people and
we in our blindness would see these people. Verse one of chapter
nine, as Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from
his birth. See, the Lord Jesus came and
he saw this man. He saw this man lying, but in
this blind man, he saw him which is blind from birth. And his
disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin? This is
how the Jews thought about these things. That's how we think about
these things in so many ways, don't we? Who did sin? This man,
or his parents, that he was born blind. Listen to what God says
in response to that attitude, and we've had that attitude ourselves,
brothers and sisters, haven't we? How many times have we seen
people that have been in trouble, and we think, well, we think
of the, as the Pharisee there, but for the grace of God, go,
oh, that's the Pharisee's prayer. What did he say? Jesus answered,
verse 3 of John 9, neither hath this man sinned nor his parents. Why was he in that state? That
the works of God should be made manifest in him. The works of
God in opening the eyes of the blind. So the Lord Jesus Christ,
verse 6, Jesus saw him lie. And knew that he now, in a long
time in that case, he saith unto him, Wilt thou be made whole? Will you be made whole? The Lord Jesus Christ, when he
comes to his Chosen Ones, he always sees us lying, unable
to help ourselves, in need of sovereign mercy. Salvation begins
with him seeing us lying and coming to us and speaking. He
saw him He saw him out of all that crowd. He saw all the others
through the eyes of omnipotence. He sees all of creation and all
of humanity all at one time and he doesn't have to learn a single
thing. He cannot learn a single thing because he knows it all
and creates it all. He finds us. He comes to us and
he comes with a question. Will you Will you be my hall? It is, this word made speaks
of God's creation, isn't it? You think of what had to happen
to this man. 38 years he hadn't moved, hadn't been able to walk,
hadn't been able to get anyone to throw him into the pool. For
all of those years, we're not told how long he sat by that
pool, but some considerable time you can imagine. You can imagine
the number of times when the water was stirred by someone.
Maybe some naughty children throwing some rocks in or maybe some wind
stirring it up. And you can imagine the extraordinary
rush of all those people to get down to the water. And he said
to the Lord Jesus, I've got no one to throw me in. He couldn't
get in. He couldn't crawl in. He needed someone to pick him
up and actually throw him into the water. Well, even the blind
men could get there before him. Even the lame men could hobble
down there before him. Even the ones with a withered
limb could get there. But he had no power. He had no power whatsoever. You think of the creative activity
of the Lord Jesus Christ in speaking these words to this man when
he says, rise, take up your mat and walk. Instantly, billions
of cells came to life. blood vessels, kilometres and
kilometres of blood vessels and nerves became alive. Muscles that were wasted away
became big and active. It's an extraordinary creative
miracle. So is salvation, brothers and sisters. We are new creatures,
new creation in the Lord Jesus Christ. He makes, He makes Will
you be made whole? Not will you join me in making
yourself whole. Not you doing your best. Not
you doing your best and you assisting me. Not me starting something
and you finishing it off. Will you be made whole? Will you be made whole? Our God creates. Who will answer that question
in the affirmative? Who will be made whole? Someone
who has absolutely no wholeness to start with is the question,
isn't it? If you have some little bit of wholeness, if you have
some little bit of righteousness, some means of you getting yourself
right and into the presence of God that you have something to
boast about in His presence, you don't need to be made But if you are, like this man,
powerless, lame, blind, withered, if you're among that group, I
have to be made. God has to do it all for me.
He has to do every little last tiny bit. He's got to come to
me where I am because I can't get to him. He's got to come
and he's got to speak a word to me. He's got to challenge
me about where I'm at in all of my religious self-righteousness
like he did to Nicodemus. But he has to come. It has to
be a new creation. Will you be made whole? The remarkable
thing is that the Lord Jesus Christ asks this man a question,
a really simple question, isn't it? And you would think that
there would be a really simple answer. Look with me in verse
7. The Lord Jesus asks a simple
question, doesn't he? This man is so ignorant of his
state that he can't even answer a simple question properly. He
said, Sir, I have no man when the water is troubled to put
me, to throw me into the pool. And while I'm coming, another
steppeth down before me. What a miserable, sad case this
man presents to us. No one to help him. No one. He's got no one. It's the one thing in all of
this story that can attract the mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ. He says, I have no man. I have
no man. I can't help myself. And no one
else can help me. I can't be made whole in this
pool by anything that I do. And I've had no one to help me
for 38 years. I've had no one to help me. As I said, this man, like Nicodemus,
like the woman at the well, like the nobleman, like all of the
pictures in the scriptures, this man begins with extraordinary
ignorance. Not only is he powerless, but he's ignorant, isn't he?
He's ignorant of who's standing before him. He's ignorant of
how this one can save him, and he doesn't even know the right
answer to a simple question. Such is the state of fallen man,
isn't it? When God comes to Adam, he says,
where are you? Where are you? Where are you
at? See, this man's answer to the
Lord Jesus Christ doesn't even reveal a flicker of faith. There's no life, there's not
even a flicker of faith in this man, is it? Pray to God that
we would learn that faith is the result of the mercy of Christ. Faith is the evidence of Christ
coming to us and revealing himself to us. Faith has an object, and
it's the Lord Jesus Christ. The object must be revealed,
and then the activity of faith comes. See, faith does not attract
the mercy of Christ. Faith is the result of the mercy
of Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ showed
mercy to this man before this man had moved a muscle, before
he'd exercised any faith whatsoever. I have no one, he didn't realize
that Will you be made whole? Will
you be made whole? How are sinners brought into
the presence of a holy God? How did you enter the holy of
holies on the day, that day of the Passover? How did you get
in there? The only possible way you got
in there was the high priest had your name written on his
heart. and the high priest had your name written on his shoulder,
and everything, the government's on his shoulders, and he carries
his people into the holy of holies in the presence of God. And he
carries his people into the holy of holies with his blood-bought
sacrifice. And that's what the sheep were
there for, weren't they? All the sheep were there to represent
that lamb. Behold the lamb of God who takes
away the sins of the world. Will you be made whole? Will
you be made whole God's way? If you're powerless and lame
and blind and withered, you don't have any choice but to be saved
God's way, do you? Turn with me to Romans chapter
five and see how Paul echoes these same sentiments for us. He speaks of the trials that
we are going through in the earlier verses of this chapter, but he
says in verse six, For when we were without strength,
when we were powerless, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous
man will one die, but yet peradventure for a good man some would even
dare to die. But God commended his love toward
us, Sinners, powerless, yet sinners,
Christ died for us. How much more then, being justified
by his blood, shall we be saved from the wrath through him? For
if, when we were enemies, how did Christ find you? When he
comes to find you, what does he find you? Powerless, without
strength. sinners, enemies, we were reconciled
to God by the death of His Son. Much more, being reconciled,
we shall be saved by His life. And not only so, but we also
joy in God, we rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
by whom we have now receive the atonement. You see,
your enemies, sinners, powerless, and they're the people that receive.
They're the recipients, aren't they? Not those that have something
to offer God as a bargaining tool. Will you be made whole
God's way? Will you be made whole by a new
creation? Will you be made whole by the
gospel? The Lord Jesus Christ is the
gospel, by the gospel coming to you in power, coming to where
you are and speaking words of life. Listen to what the Lord
Jesus Christ says to him. He says in verse 8, he said unto
him, to this man who is powerless, this man who is ignorant, this
man who is amongst that multitude, this one particular man amongst
that multitude of the lame and the withered. The ones lying
there hoping for something to happen, he comes to him and he
says, rise. He says, rise, take up thy bed
and walk. Rise, take up thy bed and walk. said the Lord Jesus Christ spoke
a word to this particular man, just like he spoke a word to
that particular woman, just like he spoke a word to that particular
noble man, just like he spoke a word to that particular Pharisee
called Nicodemus. Here we see the free, sovereign,
electing grace of God in the Lord Jesus Christ. Here we see
the effectual, powerful word of God He didn't say help me,
did he? He just says rise, take up thy
bed and walk. Our Lord Jesus Christ is absolutely
sovereign and when he speaks with power, it always happens. He just said, didn't he, to this
universe, exist, and it did. His very first words were, Light
be, and light was. He spoke a universe. We're still
trying to figure out how big the universe is. And when man
goes up there all the time, every time he takes a jolly telescope
to it and he gets them up in space to get a closer look, always
he's trying to find out where it came from. Ridiculous, isn't
it? God told us where it came from.
He just spoke a word and it came into existence. He just spoke
a word. He speaks a word and salvation
comes into existence. He speaks a word personally and
particular to you and life. Life from above. That new creation
springs into existence and that new creation rises up when it
was lying, doing nothing. It takes up its bed. The bed
was just a little pallet thing. We mustn't think of it being
like a big four-poster bed that you've had to be Arnold Schwarzenegger
to lift. He just picked up his little
mat, it might have been, or just some little bed, and he walked. The Lord Jesus Christ never attempts. If someone tells you that there
is a God who wants to do something, then you walk away from them
because they've just blasphemed the God of Scripture. If you
hear of a God who tries and fails, then you have heard of a false
God and another Jesus. This God, our God, speaks and
creation comes into existence. He speaks and creation obeys
him. He can speak to the wind and
the waves and say stop and be still and they're still in an
instant. He can speak to the dead and they'll rise. He's still
speaking to the dead and they'll rise. These are spiritual pictures
of the Lord Jesus Christ coming to us. The Jesus of modern religion
is a figment of man's imagination. The Jesus who loves everyone
but can't get his love to keep him out of hell because of their
wicked disobedience to him is not the God of this scripture.
The Jesus who died for everyone but his blood shed can't save
them is not a God. The God who tries and fails is
like the God that is spoken of in Isaiah, isn't it? They pray
to a God who cannot save. We're talking to a God and we're
proclaiming a God who saves. And listen to what it says in
verse 9. And immediately, immediately he was made whole and took up
his bed and walked. Immediately he was made whole.
The Lord, as we saw later on in John 5.21, He says, As the
Father raises the dead and quickens them, gives them life, even so
the Son gives life to whomever He will. And He gives life by
speaking a word. Immediately it happens. I love what verse 24 says. Truly,
truly, verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my
word. Did this man hear? And his body responded immediately,
and he had nothing to commend himself to God in any way at
all. He who heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent
me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation,
but is passed from death unto life. A new creation looks at
that and says, what a Saviour. That Saviour has come to me.
That Saviour has spoken to me. Immediately, immediately there
was no debating, there was no hesitation whatsoever. So let's
remember. Let's have this picture in our
mind as we go through the rest of this remarkable chapter. He
comes, the Lord Jesus Christ, he comes to their Jewish feast,
he comes at an appointed time, he comes as a sovereign God to
his people, and he comes to this particular multitude out of all
those self-righteous people, all those people at that feast,
he comes to this particular group of people, he comes to them. Oh dear, oh dear, brothers and
sisters, what were you like when he came to you? What were you
like when he had mercy upon you? That's one of the remarkable
things about this story, isn't it? That this man was a recipient
of mercy before he had a clue who had given him mercy. This
man was a recipient of the grace of God before he knew. Is that
true for you, brothers and sisters? He saves by his word when there
is no strength. And he speaks a word, and there's
a creative power happening, just as he did to the nobleman. He
said, your son lives. He didn't have to be there, he didn't have
to see him, all he had to do was speak a word. And what he
did, which was remarkable, not only did he speak a word about
that son, he spoke a word into the heart of that father, and
the father just rested. He went to his bed that night
and didn't even bother to go down and see him. He just believed
a word. Where did that come from? Where did that? That's the new
heart that God gives, isn't it? And we need to listen in as we
read these next few verses and see what the response is of this
religious world. And we've got to remember that
the Lord Jesus Christ had been to the temple in John chapter
two. And he comes to the temple and he comes to his own people
and his own people receive him not. And he went to the temple
on that first day and he says, where did you get your authority
from? He said, this is my house. So this is my Father's house,
this temple, and every little thing in this temple, including
the lambs on the outside, and the blood on the sacrifice, and
the mercy seat, and the light, and the manna, everything, all
the bread, everything in this temple speaks of the Lord Jesus
Christ and Him crucified. This is my temple, this is all
about me, and if you don't understand who I am, you don't have a clue
what's going on with this temple. Nothing has changed, brothers
and sisters. Now then, in his dealings with
the Samaritans, he revealed that he comes to the uncircumcised,
and he's come to the Gentiles, hasn't he? You think of the great
pillars of the Jewish religion in that day. Their temple, their
nationality, their traditions, their circumcision, and there's
Sabbath keeping. And here we are in chapter 5
and in the original text the Lord Jesus Christ comes to the
Jews and again and again. He's a repeat offender when it
comes to the Sabbath. He's always healing on the Sabbath.
He's always healing when the religious Jews are around. He's
always healing others, but listen to what they do. There is this
man, there is this extraordinary miracle that's happened, this
miracle that even Nicodemus had said a year earlier, only God
can perform these miracles. Verse 10, and the Jews therefore
said unto him that was cured, it is the Sabbath day, it is
not lawful for thee to carry thy bed. There were strict Sabbath laws,
and nearly always they were about man's activity in earning something
for his sustenance and for his business. But the question is,
who's the one commanding? Who wrote the law? Whose finger
wrote the law on those tablets of stone on Mount Sinai? He didn't break it. He kept every
jot and tittle of that law, and he kept it absolutely perfectly.
And every one of his children, including this man, has perfectly
kept it in him. See, the Sabbath's a person.
The Sabbath's the Lord Jesus Christ. It's the rest that the
children of God have from their labours in him, because he's
finished the work. That's what the Sabbath's all
about. It's about the glory of the finished work of the Lord
Jesus Christ. He says the works are finished in the foundation
of the world. God didn't have to rest like we do on the Sabbath
day. As wise as it is, God just finished
his work, he stopped his work. It's a picture of the Lord Jesus
Christ, the Sabbath. It's unlawful for you to carry
thy bed. Verse 11, and he answered, he
that made me whole, the same said unto me, take up thy What man is that which said unto
thee, take up thy bed and walk? There's this man that's been
healed. He's been 38 years a cripple and he's standing in front of
these Jewish leaders and they care nothing about his healing
and they care nothing about the mind of healing. All they're
caring about is this man's carrying a bed. God mocks man-made works, self-righteous
religion, and he wants his people over and over again to see the
emptiness of it and the shallowness of it, and the fact that there
is absolutely no love in it whatsoever. There's no love in legalism.
There is no love in legalism for God, and there's no love
in legalism for fellow man, and the Pharisees reveal this again
and again and again. but it's remarkable isn't it
that this man doesn't know who he is he's been the recipient
of the grace and mercy of god before he actually knew who it
was he didn't know verse 13 He that was healed didn't know
who it was, for Jesus had conveyed himself away, a multitude being
in that place. The Lord Jesus Christ was so
ordinary in his external appearance that he could walk through a
crowd of Jews and just disappear from sight. These stupid pictures
that you see these days of the Lord Jesus Christ looking like
a girl, the first pictures they ever made of the Lord Jesus Christ
were they took a young lady They took a young lady and then they
managed to somehow construct the Lord Jesus Christ with long
hair and a pathetic look on his face. We don't see it so much
in our world, but every time you see a picture of the Lord
Jesus Christ you know it's a lie. get rid of them. I got sick to
death of seeing them in India. In India, the Catholics had done
a big work in the southern part of India where we were, and every
time you saw a statue of the Lord Jesus Christ, it was either
a pathetic infant in the arms of Mary, or he was a dead corpse
in the arms of Mary, or he was looking with his long hair and
this lonesome look. this lonesome look. I just got
to detest them so much, and they're all over the place here today. Get rid of them, brothers and
sisters, they're just telling you a lie about the Lord Jesus
Christ. And listen to what happens. So
the Lord Jesus Christ had come and he'd healed him, and then
he found, verse 14, What would Jesus find of him in the temple? Isn't it remarkable? He's on
the outside of the temple at the beginning of this ministry.
The temple is a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ and gathering
with his people. People like this weren't allowed
in the temple. They don't want to have that sort of defilement
coming into their place. That's why that other man in
Acts 4 is standing outside, sitting outside the gate begging. But
he's now in the temple, so he's been taken from a place of misery
to the place where God meets with his people. It's a glorious
picture of salvation in him. We have to be extraordinarily
careful in our judgments. The Lord Jesus Christ is the one that
sees most clearly. It would appear from the text
that sin had something to do with what But he said the same thing to
the woman in John chapter 8, sin no more, sin no more. As we saw in John chapter 9,
people can attribute illness and disease to sin and they can
be very wrong about it. So the Lord Jesus Christ can
say these things and we have to be extraordinarily careful
about our judgments of other people. And the man departed and told
the Jews that it was Jesus which had made him whole. Some commentators
want to criticise this man and think that he's actually going
to the Jews to excuse himself from being stoned to death for
breaking the Sabbath, but I don't think it's got anything to do
with that whatsoever. If the Lord Jesus Christ has met with
you like the woman at the well, like someone about it. No doubt they've
been telling all sorts of people in the temple, but these Jews
speak of the religious leaders. He told the Jews it was Jesus
which made him whole. And therefore, therefore did
the Jews persecute Jesus and sought to slay him. They sought
to destroy him because he had done these things on the Sabbath
day. He'd done these things on the
Sabbath day. The Lord Jesus Christ went to this religious world
and he deliberately provoked them. And he deliberately provoked
them for a purpose, isn't it? He wanted people to have their
eyes fixed on him who's the fulfillment of the law. He wanted people
to take their eyes off the religious, legalistic, wickedness of these
men who cared nothing, nothing about this man. Just like the
blind man, didn't they? In John chapter 9 they kick him
out of the temple, they kick him. And what they were doing
by removing him from Jewish worship, they were effectively condemning
this blind man who could now see and see the Lord Jesus Christ
clearly. They were condemning him to hell.
It's extraordinary, isn't it? The wickedness and the blindness
of man-made works religion. It's a Sabbath. comes and sees you lying, helpless,
lame, withered, blind. Lord Jesus Christ sees you there
and he comes and he speaks the word of grace and the word of
power You'll rest in the Sabbath. You'll
rest in He who is the Sabbath. It was that work for the Lord
Jesus Christ. It's the Lord's delight to heal
His people. It's the Lord's delight to come
to His people. It's the Lord's delight to rejoice
over His people with singing. It's the Lord's delight to take
His people from a place of misery and a place of hopelessness and
helplessness and take them into the fellowship of His temple. May the Lord come to you and
I, and the glorious thing is that even when we don't know
him, he's been gracious to us. Even when we're not aware of
how merciful, he's always merciful to his people. Let's pray. Heavenly
Father, we pray that you might grant us the blessings of your
presence in your coming and your speaking words of power to our
hearts yet again. And for those of us who have
heard you speak and have met with you, there is one desire
in our hearts, Heavenly Father, that you would send your Son
and he'd speak again to us and remind us of the glory of his
finished work and how in the Lord Jesus Christ there is in
him a rest of peace with you forever because of the glory
of the finished work of Him who is our Sabbath. May we go into
this world rejoicing Heavenly Father in who He is and what
He's done. We pray in His name and for His
glory. Amen.