| Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” |
| —John 5:8 |
Have you ever tried to do something, but needed some help in doing it? Maybe you wanted a book or favorite object from a shelf in your room that was higher than you could reach. You stretched and you stretched and you stretched. But, you still could not reach what you wanted to get down. Or, maybe you wanted to put on or take off your boots in the wintertime. You tugged and you tugged, and then you tugged some more. But, you still could not get those boots on or off.
When faced with something you cannot do, I imagine you yell, “Hey, can you help me!” And, someone nearby answers and comes to help you do whatever you wanted to do, but could not do for yourself. But, what if no one comes to your aid?
The Apostle John shares a critically important story, as found in John 5:1-15:
1 Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish festivals. 2 Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. 3 Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed—and they waited for the moving of the waters.
4 From time to time an angel of the Lord would come down and stir up the waters. The first one into the pool after each such disturbance would be cured of whatever disease they had. 5 One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?”
7 “Sir,” the invalid replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.”
8 Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” 9 At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked. The day on which this took place was a Sabbath, 10 and so the Jewish leaders said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat.”
11 But he replied, “The man who made me well said to me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’”
12 So they asked him, “Who is this fellow who told you to pick it up and walk?”
13 The man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there.
14 Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, “See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.” 15 The man went away and told the Jewish leaders that it was Jesus who had made him well.
In this Bible story, a man wanted to be healed from some illness that prevented him from moving easily. He believed that an angel would come and stir up the Pool of Bethesda. If he could somehow get into the pool at the exact moment the angel stirred up the water, he would be healed. He would only be healed if he was the very first person to enter the water.
Jesus asked the man if he wanted to be healed. The man explained that he had no one to help him get into the water. Then Jesus said something to the man that totally surprised the man. Jesus said, “Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.” The Bible tells us that the man was immediately healed.
That day this man learned a very valuable lesson. And, we can learn this lesson, too. The man learned that when he really needed help, all he had to do was ask Jesus. As we get to know more and more about Jesus, we will also learn that whenever we really need help, all we have to do is ask Jesus. His help is the most powerful; the best help we can find.
