Getting Well (Guest Speaker: Bonnie Stanfill)

John 5:1-18

We heard from our own Bonnie Stanfill this past Sunday! From Bonnie:

“I have lived in the Pacific Northwest for most of my life. It is one of the most beautiful places on earth! I enjoy walking in green spaces and hanging with my kiddo. I am one of those people who is always busy working on a project, exploring a new hobby, or other productive activity. Lately I've been into home repair.

My day job is in Human Resources. This works well for me as it’s an amazing mix of analytical and emotional work. I've discovered my strengths are communication, process and policy creation, analytics, public speaking, leadership and flexibility. I have a thirst for knowledge, love to challenge myself and have a passion for what I do.

I’ve been involved in church since a very young age. My spiritual journey has taken me many different places and although the journey has been hard, I’m grateful for what I’ve learned along the way.”

John 5:1-18:

1 Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish festivals. 2 Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. 3 Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed. [4] 5 One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?”

7 “Sir,” the invalid replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me."

8 Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” 9 At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked.

The day on which this took place was a Sabbath, 10 and so the Jewish leaders said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat.”

11 But he replied, “The man who made me well said to me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’ ”

12 So they asked him, “Who is this fellow who told you to pick it up and walk?”

13 The man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there.

14 Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, “See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.” 15 The man went away and told the Jewish leaders that it was Jesus who had made him well.

16 So, because Jesus was doing these things on the Sabbath, the Jewish leaders began to persecute him. 17 In his defense Jesus said to them, “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I too am working.” 18 For this reason they tried all the more to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.

Queries:

What, in your life, has helped you to find the courage to say “yes” to healing?  Who or what inspired you to make that choice?

What breakthroughs in understanding or shifts in thinking made healing more attainable or meaningful for you?

What do you think about when Jesus said “Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.”  Is that a reassuring phrase or does it sound scary?