25 May Sermon – Sunday, May 25, 2025
Just so you know, today’s gospel reading was the optional one, a rare alternative for any lectionary day. The other selection was about Jesus promising to send the Holy Spirit upon his absence in the flesh. I chose this story so we can wrestle with how God views human suffering.
The backdrop for today is a religious festival of the Jews held in Jerusalem. In order to participate, one must either reside in the capital city or travel to get there. Arrangements must be made in advance. Think about what it takes to visit a loved one in a Harrisburg or West Shore hospital or rehab, to go see relatives who live an hour or more away.
In order to travel you must have the means to do so which means owning a vehicle or having access to one. You yourself must be mobile. You’ve got to be able to get in and out of places, to navigate through doorways and go some distance in order to get from where you are to where you want to be. None who lie in the porticos near the Sheepgate and pool can do any of those things.
For years, they have watched traffic go by on either two feet or four legs. They’ve seen objects loaded upon things with wheels being pushed or pulled on roads that surround the temple. They’ve watched animals carried by hand, in cages and over people’s shoulders. But they themselves have remained stationary for years with very limited capacity for being mobile. Either they are unable to see, to walk or move at all.
Have you ever had a taste of what it’s like to watch the world go by? Perhaps when you were ill or injured as a kid something caused you to sit out during PE class. You found yourself on the bleachers watching classmates run around, laugh and have fun. Perhaps the teacher gave you busy work to do. How unfair it seemed to be punished for a thing you couldn’t help. Why should you have to suffer?
Perhaps your family didn’t have the means to take vacations growing up, but you had to listen to other kids describe what they did last summer because that was a school assignment for every person in the class. I personally struggle with hearing hospital staff talk about their latest purchases, entertainment experiences and elaborate plans for exotic destinations. It’s easy to become envious, jealous or feel trapped by making comparisons.
But making comparisons is how human beings assess their lives, right? So in today’s gospel reading, there’s stark contrast between a multitude of those who are able and a multitude of those who are disabled. The former are upright, the latter, lying down within five covered walkways. They are likely propped up as best they could manage against a limited number of available vertical columns.
Do you feel anything toward them one way or the other? If so, what do you feel? Perhaps you feel sorry for them, but wish they’d go elsewhere. After all, they are in your way. You can’t get through the porticos into the temple without passing them and all their belongings. You wonder if there isn’t a more suitable place for them to have their needs met or another roof they might possibly live under.
One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years, the equivalent of a lifetime back in ancient times. I don’t understand God’s timing. The fact that this man is healed seems to suggest that people who suffer the longest or have the greatest number of setbacks will one day be moved to the front of the line. Does that qualify as justice or delayed justice?
Certainly a case is made for prior injustice or at least unfairness. When the healing waters have stirred, this man has been denied access. He cannot manage to get there in time. He misses out while others find success. He doesn’t have the opportunity for treatment or care that others receive. He even witnesses their healing while being denied of his own time and time again.
When Jesus asks, “Do you want to be healed,” it seems to imply that the man himself may be responsible for his long term condition. “If you wanted to be healed, it seems as though you could have been. Why haven’t you? What is it you’re doing or not doing? What else is wrong with you? Don’t you want to be healed?”
But no, when Jesus asks, “Do you want to be healed,” Jesus isn’t accusing the man of not trying or praying hard enough, he’s asking for a direct honest answer in order to help the man get what he wants or needs. This is a very important aspect of helping anyone. We must ask them directly what they want or need and not make assumptions. We don’t know what it’s like to be them. Even if we were once in a similar circumstance, we are different people.
The man describes his dilemma, the obstacle he can’t overcome regardless of the effort he seems to put in or the number of multiple opportunities that arise repeatedly, regardless of the promise they hold. This man’s story parallels many tales of addiction and rehab.
“Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.” This man has finally realized that on his own, he will never succeed. His struggle has lasted thirty-eight years. He has resigned himself to the fact that there will always be another person able to help themselves who for whatever reason will never choose to help him.
In other words, it wouldn’t have taken Jesus himself to help the man find a cure. It only would have taken one other person willing to help, one willing to carry him and step down into the pool when the water was stirred up. This suggests that people wouldn’t have to suffer a lifetime had someone been willing to step up before stepping in the direction they were headed to accomplish something for themselves.
Oh, Lordy, Lordy. What began as a sermon about theodicy, explaining where God is active amidst suffering (or God’s apparent absence thereof), has become instead a hard look in the mirror. How are we failing to recognize the suffering in our midst or our part in it?
Another point to consider in this scene is how those suffering do not hide or distance themselves from public view. They are not made to hide or distance themselves from the business of worshipping God or of practicing one’s religion. These invalids are literally the homeless who have encamped themselves in plain view, upfront along the edges of all the foot traffic, vehicles, bicycles, and passersby along a stretch of walkway.
No one who is able is absolved from responsibility. No one who is in better shape and able to help themselves is excused from helping someone less fortunate. And when people fail, Jesus doesn’t waste a minute or make that suffering person wait one moment longer.
He instantly makes it possible for the suffering person to reach their ultimate goal. He doesn’t just make it possible for them to get to the pool next time on time once the waters are stirred. He doesn’t hesitate. Nothing is more important. He delivers the person from suffering immediately and his instructions to them include telling them to pack up and move on. Get your things and go. There’s no reason for you to remain in the place where you were stuck, where hope didn’t die, but may have diminished over time.
Verses that follow the ones in the same chapter from which we read reveal that the man didn’t even know who Jesus was. When asked by the Jews, “Who healed you?” The man didn’t know. Only when Jesus saw the man in the temple on the Sabbath, introduced himself and said, “Sin no more,” that nothing worse may happen to you, did it become clear that Jesus was his healer.
The ESV Study Bible notes that in this particular case, the man’s suffering may have been due to sin, but Jesus saying that doesn’t suggest all suffering is due to personal sin. “Sin no more,” seems like good advice for anyone about to make a fresh start, doesn’t it?
So today’s gospel wasn’t only about Jesus showing compassion to a person who had suffered a lifetime and experienced unfair disadvantages on top of being disabled. It was about God expecting others to act in kind, to respond within reason, as we are able in the midst of our comings and goings, in the midst of us trying to worship God and practice our religion.
It’s about not ignoring those who suffer and engaging them directly, at least long enough to find out their most pressing need. And we have to give the guy credit for being lucid, for not being bitter or making multiple excuses, for understanding his situation and for articulating his main problem succinctly. He had been trying, just not succeeding. Let us pray.
Dear Lord, you see right through us and know everything about us. As we look to you to solve the world’s problems, give us opportunities to assist and make solutions possible. You have clearly defined ability as the capability to do for others that which we also need for ourselves. Help us rise to those occasions, to show compassion and to facilitate healing. In your holy name we pray, Amen.