This sermon is from the series on the Life of Christ on the theme THAT WE MAY KNOW HIM and was preached at Cornerstone Baptist Church in Cherry Log, Georgia on March 8, 2015 by Pastor Paul Mims. You can hear this sermon at www.csbccl.org BELIEFS THAT CAN BETRAY YOU John 5:1-18 It is possible that everything you believe about God is not true. It is even possible that everything you believe about the Bible is not true. It is not that the Bible is not true for it is, but beliefs that we develop about it can be untrue. The interpretations that we give to it are often what others have told us and are simply their opinion. All of us have a set of beliefs that we have developed over our lifetimes. It is likely that some of these beliefs are doing us harm and we need to get free from them. Today were going to look at a man and his beliefs that caused him to have a miserable life. We are also going to look at a group of religious people who had beliefs that put them in terrible bondage. Jesus confronted both of these in an effort to set them free. I. THE MAN WHO BELIEVED A SUPERSTITION. John includes this story of the lame man at the pool of Bethesda to show how the opposition to Jesus that was smoldering beneath the surface developed into open hostility toward him. It is this very story and the comments of Jesus after it that led to the crucifixion. We know that Jesus retreated from Judea early in his ministry and lived in Galilee for several months. John interprets these great events around the high holy days of the Jews. He says it happened at a feast but does not say which one. Jesus usually attended Passover, Tabernacles, or Dedication which we know as Hanukkah. This is the only instance that John does not identify which feast he is talking about. It is likely that Jesus arrived in Jerusalem alone, for there is no mention of his disciples in the story.
It is interesting that Jesus found his way to a place of human need. It was by the sheep gate at a pool called Bethesda. Beneath this pool was an underground stream and from time to time the waters were disturbed by fresh water flowing in. Bubbles came up to the surface and a belief developed that an angel had stirred the waters and that the first person who got in after the disturbance would be healed. So around the pool sat a large number of sick people who hoped to be the first one into the pool. Jesus focused on one man who seemed to be a most pitiful case. This man was lame and had been so for 38 years. Although he still held out hope that somehow he could get into the pool, he had no one to assist him. The whole atmosphere of this place was so pitiful that most people would not go there. But Jesus did. Jesus began by asking this man, Do you want to get well? This is an important question for anyone with a long-term illness. Psychologically, we can retreat into our illness and find a certain security there that will relieve us of the greater responsibilities of life. Jesus probed this man to determine if he really wanted to change his life. Listen to his defeated, depressive, reply: 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. Then Jesus spoke authoritatively to him and said, Get up, pick up your pallet, and walk! The result was, Immediately the man became well, and picked up his pallet and began to walk. We are not told how often the man came to the pool or how long he had been coming. We are told that he had been lame for 38 years. We are also told that he believed a superstition about the angel in the water. That was the only hope that he had. But when Jesus spoke to him, he acted. Have you ever thought about the superstitions that you believe? Some are just folklore and are really innocent. Some can be life controlling. For instance, something bad will happen to you on Friday the 13 th. If
you break a mirror, it will bring you bad luck. A rabbit s foot will bring you good luck. Don t walk under a ladder. Don t let a black cat cross your path. Don t open an umbrella inside the house. Knock on wood when you make a statement to make it come true. If you find a penny you will have good luck. When you tell a lie, cross your fingers and you won t be held responsible for a lie. Bad luck, accidents, and deaths come in threes. Of course, it all depends on how you count them. Some people believe that the Bible is not relevant for today. Others think that the Old Testament does not speak to us as Christians. Others view the Bible with some form of magic. For instance, if I let the Bible fall open wherever it will and place my finger on a verse, that is God s authoritative message to me today. Surely God leads us in a specific manner, but does not reveal his will in such a haphazard way. True understanding of the Scripture brings light to the mind and soul. God leads us through his Holy Spirit who lives within us as believers. When you find yourself stuck in a belief that is harming you, listen to the voice of God that tells you to get up, and with determination get out of it, and find the truth. II. RELIGIOUS PEOPLE WHO ARE BOUND BY LEGALISM As the lame man began to walk and was rejoicing in his newfound freedom, the Jews saw him carrying his pallet. They said to him, It is the Sabbath. You cannot do that on the Sabbath. The commandments said, Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of the Lord your God: in it you shall not do any work you or your son or your daughter your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day: therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. (Exodus 20:8-11)
The rabbis made 39 different classifications of work which listed lots of things you could not do on the Sabbath. They actually wrote these words, If anyone carries anything from a public place to a private house on the Sabbath intentionally he is punishable by death by stoning. They said that it was sinful for a man to carry his false teeth on the Sabbath for that would be work. Or, if he had a wooden leg, it would be sinful to wear it on the Sabbath. If a man wore a pin on his garment or a woman wore a brooch on the Sabbath it was considered sinful because it was work. The man said to them, He who made me well was the one who said to me, pick up your pallet and walk. They asked him, Who is the man who said to you, pick up your pallet and walk? And the man said, I don t know who he was. But later Jesus found him in the Temple and said, Behold you have become well, do not send anymore so that nothing worse happens to you. Jesus was not saying here that the man s lameness was due to his sin. He was speaking eschatologically and was meaning that the man who had gotten this life straightened out needed to prepare himself for the next life. This is when the focus of their anger was on Jesus. He was declared a breaker of the Sabbath. But he indicated that God rested from creation and he did not rest from meeting human need on the Sabbath. He would later teach that the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath. Jesus said, My Father is working until now and I myself am working. The die was now cast. John records, For this reason therefore the Jews were seeking all the more to kill Him, because He not only was breaking the Sabbath, but also was calling God His own Father, making Himself equal with God. This claim of Jesus to be equal with the Father is what led to the crucifixion. III. BELIEFS THAT ARE TRUE
Jesus then answered the Jews in a discourse that described his relationship to the Father. This is in verses 19 through 47. I will simply lift out from this passage the main ideas. First Jesus said that he is the Son of God. The Father loves the Son and shows him all things that he is doing. The Son then does the same thing that the Father is doing. The Father does not judge anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son. You must now honor the Son even as you honor the Father. If you do not honor the Son, you do not honor the Father. Everyone who believes the Father sent me has eternal life and does not come into judgment but has passed out of death into life. There will come a time when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. The Father has given to the Son authority to execute judgment. All who are in the tombs will hear his voice and will come forth: those who did well to a resurrection of life, and those who committed evil deeds to a resurrection of judgment. Jesus said that he could do nothing of His own initiative, but He listens to the Father and does what He says. Jesus also indicated that what John the Baptist said about him was true, but His greatest witness is what the Father says about Him through the Holy Spirit. But they will not come to Him and believe in Him that He may give them life. He tells them that they do not have the love of God in them and they cannot see divine truth that is staring them in the face. Jesus told them that if they truly believed Moses, they would believe him, for Moses wrote about him. And if they did not believe Moses, they would not believe him. Imagine how these words sounded to the Orthodox Jews that were confronting Jesus. These are broad, sweeping, eternal truths that Jesus taught. They are tremendous claims of who He is. He is the obedient Son of the Father. The relationship that He has with the Father is based
on love. He tells them that He has authority over their life and death. He also tells them that they are spiritually dead because they have not heard the voice of the Father nor do they understand what he is doing in the world. He rebukes them for their blindness in searching the Scriptures and in not seeing that they speak of Him. They are reading the Scriptures with a closed mind. If they would only believe in Him as Son of God, the Messiah, they would pass from death into life. This same statement holds true today. If you believe that Jesus is the Redeemer, your personal Lord and Savior, you will pass from death into life. That is life abundant here and now and life eternal in the hereafter. Thinking of the fullness and duration of this wonderful life, W. B. Hinson, a great preacher of a past generation, spoke from his own experience just before he died. He said, "I remember a year ago when a doctor told me, 'You have an illness from which you won't recover.' I walked out to where I live 5 miles from Portland, Oregon, and I looked across at that mountain that I love. I looked at the river in which I rejoice, and I looked at the stately trees that are always God's own poetry to my soul. Then in the evening I looked up into the great sky where God was lighting His lamps, and I said, ' I may not see you many more times, but Mountain, I shall be alive when you are gone; and River, I shall be alive when you cease running toward the sea; and Stars, I shall be alive when you have fallen from your sockets in the great down pulling of the material universe!' Have you have passed from death to life? If you have PRAISE BE TO HIS NAME!