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15. The sick Man at Bethesda.

When Jesus was once again at a festival in Jerusalem, one Sabbath day he visited, among other places, the halls of the healing bath at Bethesda. Many sick people of all kinds, the blind, the lame, the emaciated, sat and lay there waiting for the water to move. For this bath was not always equally powerful and healing, but only at certain times did an angel move the water.

As soon as the water was moved and flowed, the sick immediately went in, or whoever could not walk had a son or a brother or a friend who helped him to get well, for whoever came in at the right time was healed. Only one poor, sick man had no one. He had been lying in this place for thirty-eight years, no doubt living on alms. But no one helped him to the most precious thing a person can have and desire, health. There were always others around, and the baths only had five compartments or halls. Poor people in misfortune have few friends on earth, but one in heaven. God knows everyone's time. Jesus asked the sick man, ‘Do you want to get well?’ The sick man did not think that his hour of joy was so near. He thought that this friendly stranger, whom he did not know, only wanted to talk to him, as affable people tend to do. ‘Lord,’ he said, ’when the water moves, I have no one to help me in, and by the time I get there, someone else will have climbed in before me.’ Then Jesus said to him with kindness and compassion: ‘Get up! Take your bed with you and go!’ Without the water and without the angel, all pain suddenly disappeared from the limbs of the long-tested man. The refreshing feeling of well-being and strength permeated his whole being again. He got up, healthy and strong, took his bed and went away.

Well-meaning people still rejoice at the unexpected salvation that befell this poor man and love Jesus for it. They say that it is a beautiful, God-pleasing celebration of a holy day to visit unfortunate people and bring them comfort and help. But when the convalescent walked through the crowd with his bed, the Jews said to him: ‘Don't you know that today is the Sabbath? It is not proper for you to carry your bed on the Sabbath.’ For it was forbidden by a law of Moses to carry a burden on such a day. But here is more than Moses! The healed man answered them: ‘He who made me well said to me, ’Take up your bed and walk! He also thought that such a man could speak one more word, but he could not tell them who it was. But afterwards Jesus found him again in the temple and said to him, as if he had forgotten something beforehand, or because he did not want to tell him in front of the people: ‘Behold,’ he said, ‘you have now recovered, sin no more, lest something worse befall you.’ For the recovered man had contracted his long and painful illness through sin. Sin brings nothing good. When the Jews learnt that it was Jesus, they persecuted him and wanted to kill him because he had done this on a Sabbath day. The pious Son of Man lived among such a perverse generation. Jesus then said to them: ‘My Father is always working, even on the Sabbath day, and so am I. What the Father does, I do. What the Father does, the Son also does.’

The Jews now sought even more to kill him because he called God his Father and made himself like him. But Jesus went on to justify himself, ‘that the Father loves the Son and has given him everything, so that all may honour the Son as they honour the Father who sent him. Do not marvel at this,’ he said, ’for the hour is coming in which all who are in the tombs will hear his voice, and those who have done good will come forth to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgement. Verily I say unto you, He that heareth my words, and believeth on him that sent me, shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.’ At this the Jews left him, although he still reproached them with strong words for their unrighteousness. For his hour had not yet come.