ARVADA UNITED METHODIST CHURCH

Transcription

1 ARVADA UNITED METHODIST CHURCH April 26, 2015 Unpacking the Gospel of John by Rev. Rusty Butler Scripture John 5:1-18 Have you ever sat in one of the Hot Springs in Colorado? Which one did you sit in? There are Hot Springs all over the State of Colorado. The closest ones are the ones in Idaho Springs. I have not been to those. They say those are clothing optional after dark. If I go there, I m going in the day time. About twenty five years ago in the middle of spring, I went to a Camp Director s meeting at Mt. Princeton Hot Springs. I can still remember it. We stayed in cabins down by Chalk creek that runs through this camp and one night there were about thirty of us we all went out to the creek. It was cold beginning of April about 10,000 feet high This was before it got commercialized you were supposed to sit down by the side of this creek in the mud and the water. Well it was warm but not all that warm.other people must have got the warmer spots But it was part of the stream you reach out from here to there and you could feel the freezing cold mountain stream. People kept hopping up going into the freezing cold water and then back into the warmer water. It was crazy. I m not sure it was very restorative or healing but it was interesting. I had one friend who told me that he and his youth group were doing a hiking retreat.they were hiking along one of the mountain trails and they came across a natural hot spring on the side of the mountain and there was a man who was sitting in the hot spring and he was just sitting there they went to investigate and the man had died of a heart attack. My friend had to help pull him out of the hot spring. I always think about that when I get into one of those hot springs.

2 I have another clergy friend. He lives in Durango. Every year we try to meet to go golfing in Pagosa Springs. They have a large place there where there are about 20 or so Hot Tubs and Pools you can sit in. My friend wants to always go to the Hot Springs every night that we are there or to sit in a Hot Tub morning and night every day. I d rather watch a movie. To each their own. It restores him, I m not sure if he thinks there are healing powers in the waters but all over the globe people flock to places like these to be healed and restored in and through the water it looks like it must have been the same in the time of Jesus. There is a place that was uncovered in the late 1800 s in Jerusalem by St. Anna s church. Here is a picture. It has five porticoes They believe this is the place that the author of the Gospel of John was talking about. Bethesda, Bethzaitha, Bethsaida, Pagosa, Mt. Princeton, Glenwood. Different names but there is a pool. And there people came to be made well. To restore themselves in the water. Today we are going to think about the story of the man who was sick for 38 years but who was made well. Would you pray with me? O God may the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts and the faith we grow here, mend and restore, tired, broken and worn out spirits. Amen. I never know exactly what to do with the healing stories in the Bible. Do you? They are just so far out there, I don t get them. It may be that I don t understand them because I ve seen such good people here at church and in my life who have gotten sick and then no matter what their faith, strong or not so strong never get well again. My grandmother was a saint, I thought. She had four boys my dad and uncles was an elementary school teacher, a farm wife, just a terrific gem of a

3 person. She had diabetes. As she grew older she lost a foot to that disease, then a lower leg. Then the knee. Then the other foot, then the other leg. I watched her go through that. It was disheartening, every visit to go down to Kansas and see what other body part they had had to cut away. My uncle who she lived with had to carry her to the restroom and help her when she needed. It was heart wrenching to me. If there s some magic in the world that exists about healing people I wish that it might work all the time and not just in a spot here or one time over there. So I don t know what to do with these healing stories in the Bible. I do know there is a strong tendency sometimes with these healing stories to romanticize and idealize the person who is cured to think something like oh what great faith they had, I should just have faith in Jesus like that person and then I will be made well. That is the way these stories often get interpreted. But let s look again and listen to what is really going on. The man is sick, been at the pool for 38 years a long time. Jesus comes along and notices this guy. Asks him do you want to be well? If you read the conversation closely, the fellow doesn t say that he wants to be well he just starts to complain. I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; and while I am making my way, someone else steps down ahead of me. Now if you were him, wouldn t you have figured out a way to roll down to the edge and as soon as you see the water stirring roll on in? I don t know if I like this fellow. He seems like a whiner a complainer. Doesn t answer Jesus question about whether or not he wants to get well. But Jesus doesn t even take this into consideration. I like that no whining, says Jesus. Stand up, take your mat and walk. At once the man was made well and he took up his mat and began to walk.

4 When he s asked who healed him, He says, He didn t know. After 38 years Wouldn t you know who healed you? Not only is he a whiner and a complainer, now he s an ungrateful whiner and complainer! That rubs me the wrong way. Doesn t that rub you the wrong way? It doesn t stop there when Jesus see him again over in the Temple later, the guy finally figures out who Jesus is and then goes and rats him out to the Temple Authorities tells them that Jesus did it and on the Sabbath. Jesus broke the Sabbath laws not me! What kind of person is this? Who is he? He had no gratitude, no faith, no humility, no guts. He didn't deserve to be healed. He didn't deserve anything. When you work at a church, there are people who come by and want some help. Valerie and I do what we can and if we can t help we send people to the Interchurch ARMS office located down in Room 209. If they can t help we send people off to the Jeffco Action Center. If they can t help we try to figure out who can help. Many of the people who come have a story. Sometimes those stories will tear your heart out. Sometimes they do not. I remember one person who called consistently needing help. He lived in Boulder and he didn t have a job. He would call every couple of weeks or so asking for assistance with the motel he was living in. He d give the name of the motel and ask for a night or two. Just send the check up to the motel. He had a terrible stutter. You knew right away when you answered the phone..same guy. He was poor poor pitiful me. We helped him once or twice. If you gave him help, he was going to call back. He called Dan Odell who was serving down at Jefferson Ave. He told Dan where he was staying and asked for assistance. Dan has a big heart. He went up to the motel. Went to the room and knocked on his door. Guy opens the door What do you want? No stutter.

5 Found out from the motel manager that she would get check after check from churches all across the front range buying this guy a room. Sometimes I just get so disgusted with some of these people who come asking for help But you know what? He s the guy Jesus healed down by the poolside. Why? What is he doing? Why is he doing that? And I think the answer might be the message of this text. Jesus healed the man who was sick for 38 years ungrateful, whiner, traitorous, not because of who the man was, not because of who the person was, but because of who Jesus was. Now anyway you cut it that's a radical idea, and it's right at the heart of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It's the reason Jesus taught. It's the reason Jesus could teach "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you," not because of who they are, but because of who you are as my disciples. I know there are so many times when I have thought I m not going to help this person or heard people say or seen policies and procedures that make it hard for people to get help. Aurilla is a member of the church, she works in the CASA program, people who are in prison or who have been and she told us one Friday morning in class that right now we have laws and arrest people solely because they are homeless. So we pass laws that make it more and more difficult for those down by the poolside. We put them in jail? It is interesting, isn't it, that the pool in this story from the Gospel of John is right in the shadow of the temple, right in the shadow of the church. How many people do you know, I mean really hurting people you know, who have left the temple, left the church for the pool? In John's story, the temple (institutionalized religion, the church) wanted nothing to do with the undeserving poor. So they went to the pool. So did Jesus. And that's where Jesus healed. Down by the poolside.

6 Let us pray. May our hearts be reminded of what it means to be human.