John 5:6-7 Jesus asked the invalid, “Do you want to get well?” “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.”
Jesus heals a man who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. No one today can imagine the suffering he experienced back then when the options for assistance were very few. If he lived today it would be different, right? Today such a person could reach out to many different agencies in a community for help. He could call the government, too, and find a department that could help. He might even call a church or para-church ministry that could show him love, compassion and care.
The miracle Jesus performs is astounding. In the midst of a crowd of disabled people – the blind, the lame and the paralyzed – Jesus asks him if he wants to get well. What a startling question given the situation of this man and the others around him. They were next to the healing waters of the pool. They wanted to get healed or they wanted to beg for alms.
The man answers and Jesus, without hesitation, commands him to pick up his mat and walk. He does as Jesus says, he is healed. What a wonderful event for this man and for all the others to see. Someone cares, someone can meet their need.
Contrast this miraculous event and Jesus’ question with the words of the Jews who were there and asked the healed man why he was breaking the Sabbath laws by carrying his mat. Jesus is greater than the Old Testament laws, in fact he fulfills them in this event. Their adherence to the law has blind the Jews to the needs of the lame and the poor. Ritual trumps human suffering, in Jesus’ day and today. Despite the concern for following the rules and regulations, Jesus remains Lord of the Sabbath. Jesus can alter the Sabbath, suspend it, or remove as He chooses. He is God. This is His claim.
Jesus is Lord of your Sabbaths, your habits, your aspirations, your abilities, your life. For us at times it is much nicer to amass enough human credits to show Jesus than to allow Jesus to manifest himself in our lives. The Lordship of Jesus Christ in our lives is Christianity. Anything short of that is only religion.
