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25. February 2022
Key verse 8: "Jesus said to him: Get up, take your bed and go!"
"Break" in tennis means winning a set when the opponent serves.
In a figurative sense, we can describe “Break” as undeserved happiness.
It would be nice if we had a break every now and then. I want to tell you today how we can experience this break.
I'll first tell you a real story of how a broken man found great happiness through an undeserved break. His name was Worms Jake, an American.
One day in 1955 he was on the beach in San Francisco. At that time he was at the lowest point of his life in despair. His relationships with those closest to him were broken and he was heavily in debt.
He asked himself: "What am I going to live for?"
It seemed to him at the age of 55 that he had no reason to continue living. While pondering the meaninglessness of life, he tripped over a bottle in the sand.
He picked up the bottle and examined it closely. Then he found a note in the bottle and the note was kept in the bottle with a cork.
Then he pulled the note out of the bottle and read it,
"To avoid confusion, I hereby declare that I will donate half of my entire fortune to whoever finds this note. My lawyer gets the other half. Signature, Daisy Alexander, June 20, 1937.”
(Daisy Singer Alexander was the only child and heiress of Isaac Singer, founder of the lucrative Singer sewing machine company. She died childless in England in 1939, aged 81.)
Worms laughed to himself at first. He said to himself, "You must be joking, how could that label have stayed in the bottle for 18 years?"
He almost wanted to throw away the bottle with the note.
But he decided to take the bottle with the note home with him. At home he put the bottle in a cupboard.
One day he told a friend the bizarre story of this bottle.
The friend stared at Worms with wide eyes and said, "Don't you know who Daisy Alexander (née Singer) is?"
Worms shook his head. He had never heard of Daisy Alexander.
With curiosity and hope for a great stroke of luck, Worms began researching the life of Daisy Alexander. She died in 1939 at the age of 81. She had written her will in her own handwriting and put it in a bottle. Her fortune was to be divided according to her will.
Worms brought the will before the court. He hired an ocean expert to support his legal claim. The ocean expert confirmed through his research that a bottle can first come from the River Thames through the English Channel to the North Sea, then through the Bering Strait to the North Pacific Ocean and then to the coast of California. This would take about 15-20 years. And through this confirmation, Worms Jake was able to receive the inheritance from Daisy Alexander.
The defining moment of the whole story, however, was when Worms Jake recognized the value of the found bottle and declared that the gift of the inheritance was now his.
This story shows us an undeserved grace experienced by Worms Jake. Through this grace he overcame his depression and lived happily.
In the Bible we find a similar story of undeserved grace. Our Bible passage introduces us to a man who was also a desperate man like Worms Jake. He used to lie by the Betesta pond, despairing of his future, since both his legs had been paralyzed for 38 years. He had come there hoping for healing. Many people with various diseases were waiting there for the water to move. For they believed that after the water began to stir, whoever stepped into the water first would be cured of his disease. Because both his legs were paralyzed, he could not get into the water quickly when the water started to move. That's why he was desperate. At this Betesta there were many other fatalistic patients.
The depiction of this picture is a symbol of the helpless situation of people under the power of sin and death. Unfortunately we cannot help ourselves. We are like cancer patients in the hospital who feel very sorry for themselves and other patients but cannot help. This is the situation of mankind without God. We need the saving grace of God.
God is not waiting for us to take the first step to our salvation, but God has already taken the first step to our salvation. That is why we can be saved by the grace of God.
However, we cannot be saved because we were the first to say “yes” to Christ, but because God first said “yes” to us in Jesus Christ.
God first took His step to save us. Therefore John says, "For God so loved the world (men) that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life" (John 3:16).
So our salvation is God's grace, for our salvation was at the cost of Christ's life. This Bible story shows us how Jesus takes the first step in healing the crippled man. Of his own accord, Jesus comes to the paralyzed man. Jesus experiences the situation of man.
Jesus begins the conversation with him and asks him: "Do you want to get well?"
Of course the man came to be healed.
But we should look the reality of life right in the eye. Healing or living a healthy life requires many lifestyle changes.
Jesus knows that it is not easy for us to change our way of life, because staying where we are is much more comfortable than changing the situation.
Even the paralyzed want to be cured of his paralysis. But he does not want to know what is expected of him after the healing.
We are not to close our eyes to the difficulties that the change would bring us. Any positive change always brings us some difficulties.
That's why C.S. Lewis, a famous U.S. writer, that "it is better to choose customary dependence than unusual freedom."
Jesus knows that it is not easy for the paralyzed person to let go of the life that has been dependent on others and to lead an independent, self-reliant life without fear.
Jesus knows that changing our lives challenges us to take on new responsibilities and new opportunities.
Jesus' question "Do you want to get well?" is a question for ourselves.
It is a lifelong question for every human being. We are to ask ourselves whether we really desire to be healthy from sickness and to live a healthy life.
We should answer clearly if we are healed from our illness and accept new challenges after healing.
There is an interesting comics story. A man had been shipwrecked and landed on an island. A passing ship wanted to rescue him. That's why it sent a small lifeboat. When six sailors came ashore from the boat, they handed the abandoned man a stack of newspapers.
Then the confused man asked: "Why this stack of newspapers?"
"Oh," they replied, "These are from the captain. He wants you to look at the headlines about the world and tell us if you really want to be saved or not!”
Let's get back to the Bible text. As we return to independent living, we face several real life challenges. That is why Jesus asks the paralyzed man and also us: “Do you really want to be healed?”
By this Jesus means: "Do you want to take on the responsibility of living independently?"
The paralyzed man does not answer Jesus' question.
Maybe he doesn't want to hear the question. He wants to live off self-pity. He wants to hear compassionate words from others and get their help, but not independence. The man was full of self-pity.
But Jesus shattered his self-pity and said to him, “You are healthy. Get up on your own, take your prayer and go!”
At this moment the man has to make a decision. He should decide whether he should get up and walk on his own or expect help from others with self-pity.
Although Jesus holds out the prospect of healing his paralyzed legs, the man must make the decision of faith himself.
But this decision is not an own effort to save him. This decision is akin to saying "thank you" in the same way that saying "thank you" to accepting a gift.
No one claims accepting a gift as their own achievement. The gift remains as a 100 percent gift.
The salvation is not one's own achievement either, but 100 percent God's grace, although one accepts it through one's own decision of faith.
That is why we should always remain grateful to God for salvation. God's grace to us is based on God's saving love.
Our gratitude for grace restores God to the center of our lives and teaches us that we live by God's grace.
If we look at the healed man at the pool of Bethesda, we can name three periods of his life:
- The years of his paralyzed legs (his past)
- Meeting the wonderful person who healed him and
- His totally changed new situation (his changed present)
God wants us to accept his grace. We want our joy in the Lord to fill our hearts, and let that joy radiate from us so that other people can see it too.
Jesus Christ is our Savior and our only consolation. He should be the center of our life.
God wants us to know His grace better and enjoy it abundantly.
We should remember the words of Jesus in Matthew 5:16: "Let your light shine before men so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven."
Here I do not mean that we should do something special ourselves, but that we allow the Lord to manifest His grace in us and through us.
God is light. He wants to work in us and through us. We can either conceal or reveal God's work in us. But it is God's will that we reveal his work and give him glory.
We are called by God to do this.
Even today Jesus comes to each of us and speaks to us as he did at the pool of Betesta.
He asks each of us, "Do you want to get well?"
If we answer "yes," He says, "Get up and go. My grace is enough for you!”
God meets your sin problems in Jesus and says: “All your burdens are off you forever. Live strong and be a blessing to others!”
Jesus made each of you free through his cross.
You are to accept this freedom by believing in Jesus Christ.
You can just let go of the old burdens of sin. You are free. That's why you can get up and walk free. It is a new world of grace.
If we now hold fast to the grace of God and live vigorously, we will experience the wonderful world of God even better and become a bright light for others.
I was a poor boy of a poor family in South Korea. I should have worked as a woodcutter after graduating from elementary school because my parents' house was very poor. But God chose Mr. So-Hee Yeon as my class teacher for my 6th grade. Through him, God encouraged me to attend middle school. And God helped me further so that I was able to finish university through the scholarship. And God led me to have faith in Jesus Christ during my first college year. And He led me to marry Esther, a missionary in Germany, and to come to Germany as a student missionary. So I was able to start a happy family, have two sons and lead German students to faith in Jesus Christ. It's all 100 percent grace of God. I thank God!
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