Monday after the Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity Sunday
Posted on September 19, 2022 by under
Scripture: St. John 5:1-15 (NKJV)
5:1 After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 2 Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew, Bethesda, having five porches. 3 In these lay a great multitude of sick people, blind, lame, paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the water. 4 For an angel went down at a certain time into the pool and stirred up the water; then whoever stepped in first, after the stirring of the water, was made well of whatever disease he had. 5 Now a certain man was there who had an infirmity thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he already had been in that condition a long time, He said to him, “Do you want to be made well?”
7 The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; but while I am coming, another steps down before me.”
8 Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.” 9 And immediately the man was made well, took up his bed, and walked.
And that day was the Sabbath. 10 The Jews therefore said to him who was cured, “It is the Sabbath; it is not lawful for you to carry your bed.”
11 He answered them, “He who made me well said to me, ‘Take up your bed and walk.’”
12 Then they asked him, “Who is the Man who said to you, ‘Take up your bed and walk’?” 13 But the one who was healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn, a multitude being in that place. 14 Afterward Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, “See, you have been made well. Sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you.”
15 The man departed and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.
Devotion
Thirty-eight years ago, from the date of this devotion, Ronald Reagan was just finishing his first term as President of the United States. While some of us can remember that well, some may not yet have been born. That is how long the man in today’s reading had been sick, and hoped and prayed for a miraculous healing. All he lacked, he thought, was someone to put him into the water when the angel came. His response indicates that he had seen others healed by this miraculous pool-stirring, but could not benefit himself because he had no one to put him in the water. So close, for so long, and yet so far.
Little did he suspect that the very Lord of Life Himself was going to heal him that day! So it is that we often pray for the things that we think we need, but the Lord knows better than we do what is good for us. He gives us things that are even better for us than what we asked for! Let this man’s example teach us to not grow weary of asking for God’s blessings, and to faithfully carry our burdens in this life, whatever they may be, in the meantime.
Prayer: Keep, we beseech Thee, O Lord, Thy Church with Thy perpetual mercy; and, because the frailty of man without Thee cannot but fall, keep us ever by Thy help from all things hurtful, and lead us to all things profitable to our salvation; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever One God, world without end. Amen.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
