Jesus said to him, “Stand up, take your mat and walk.” At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk. (John 5:8-9, CEB)
For those of you who were here last Sunday, you may be wondering if I forgot to change the Gospel passage for today, and accidentally read the same passage as last week! Whoops! That’s embarrassing!!
Except, I didn’t forget to change the Gospel passage. I chose to stick with this passage for another week. When I went home last Sunday, after worship and then the “God Sightings” discussion, I felt like there was more to consider, more that needed to be said. Which is true, of course, with every scripture passage, always! There’s never a time when everything has been said that needs to be said about any one scripture passage. It’s the Living Word. There’s always more to say…because God is still speaking.
But with this passage in particular, at this particular time, I felt the need to have another go. So…here we go!
Because not all of you were here last week, and because this past week has been…well, it’s been quite a week…I’m going to start with a very quick review of the gist of last week’s sermon. (Part 1)
Those of you who were here will likely remember the story I began with, about growing up on a farm in upstate NY, and a specific memory of my dad asking my then-teenaged brother, one wintry day, if he’d like to help him bring in some wood for the wood stove, and my brother saying, “Umm, no,” and my dad getting mad and my mom telling my dad that if he wanted my brother to help him, then to just tell him to help him, don’t ask him! Remember??
Well, as you can see and have heard, all three of those family members are here this morning! And all three of them will confirm the veracity of that story after the service, if anyone was thinking I made it up…
But then I shifted from the question my dad asked my brother, to the question Jesus asked the man in today’s passage: “Do you want to get well?”
And I pointed to how the man didn’t respond with yes or no, but with some of the reasons he hadn’t gotten well up to that point, some of the reasons he was still sick after thirty-eight years of sitting by the side of the pool…
And I imagined some of what the man might have been feeling: hopelessness, discouragement, despair. I imagined that he might have felt like being well would take more courage than he had, that doing things differently than he had done them for his whole life would take more strength and commitment than he had, that stepping into a new way of living would be hard and uncomfortable and scary–even if that way of living led from sickness and a diminished self to healing and wholeness–and that changing, even for the better, would take more patience and practice than he thought he could find.
And I imagined how Jesus might have responded, from his heart to the man’s heart, taking into account his fears and his despair, his excuses and his stuck-ness, his reluctance to say, “Yes! I want to be well!”… And I wondered if we, too, might need to hear that response, because we, too, can be reluctant to commit to being made well; we, too, aren’t always sure that we have the courage and strength we need to be made whole; we, too, can doubt that healing is worth the hard work and discomfort and commitment that are required…
And just quickly, here’s what I suggested Jesus might have communicated to the man by the side of the pool in his hopelessness, and what he might also be communicating to us in our own stuckness:
Yes, it will be hard to be well. Harder than it has been to be sick.
Yes, it will require courage. Remaining stuck is easy.
Yes, it will require strength. It takes no effort to keep doing what you’ve always done.
Yes, it will require patience and commitment and practice. I will get you started; you will have to keep choosing to be well. Day after day, hour after hour, moment by moment.
Yes, it will be uncomfortable and unfamiliar and scary.
And it will be hard! Or did I mention that already??
Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.
Stop watching others participate in the world around you, and step more fully into living yourself. Live life more deeply and be who God created you to be more fully.
Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.
What you’ve been doing all these years that’s comfortable? Do less of that. Leave that behind.
What you’re considering doing right now that feels uncomfortable? Do more of that. Walk toward that.
Those thoughts of “It’s too hard. I’m scared. It doesn’t feel good!”? Acknowledge them, name them, say them out loud. And let go of them. They are not going to make you well.
Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.
Walk forward. One foot in front of the other. One step at a time.
Walk toward healing. Toward wellness. Toward being whole.
And step into Life.
Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.
So, a lot of that was me taking literary license. Imagining what might have been going on in the man, and, yes, in Jesus. Imagining what it might have been like for someone who had been sick, who had been incapacitated, who had been diminished in his self, in some way, for 38 years, most of his life–and at that point to be offered healing… And I imagined what that healing might have looked like, what that healing would feel like, what, really, it was that Jesus was offering.
And we are told, after Jesus said to him, “Stand up, take your mat and walk,” that “At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk.” (Jn. 5:8-9)
And again, I can’t help but wonder!! Did it really happen like that? Was the man completely healed, once and for all? Able to walk with confidence and strength, without a single stumble or misstep, without needing to rest? Simply getting up and stepping into this new way of being, with no looking back?
“Stand up,” Jesus told him. “Take your mat and walk.” And “At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk.”
I wonder…because in our lives and in our world, we need healing. Desperately. In our lives and in our world, we need to be made well. There’s so much pain, so much brokenness, so much suffering, so much chaos, so much darkness…
We need healing, so that as people of faith we can stand up.
We need healing, so that as people of faith we can stand up and begin to walk.
We need healing, so that as people of faith we can stand up and speak up.
We need healing, so that as people of faith we can stand up and be light in the darkness.
We need healing, so that as people of faith we can stand up and fight for justice.
And, we need courage. And strength. And commitment. And patience. And practice. Because while maybe the man in today’s passage was completely healed, once and for all, never to stumble again, my experience has generally been otherwise, and I suspect yours has been, too.
We can say yes to healing and stand up–with God’s help–and begin to walk toward healing–with God’s help–with courage and strength and commitment–with God’s help–and we still stumble. We still take missteps, maybe even falling flat on our faces. We still need to rest from time to time.
But then we can say yes to healing again–with God’s help. And we can stand up again–with God’s help. And we can begin to speak up, with courage and strength and commitment–with God’s help! And then we stumble and misstep and fall and need to rest. Again.
And then we can say yes to healing again–are you seeing the pattern??–and stand up again, and be light in the darkness and fight for justice–all with God’s help.
All, and always, with God’s help.
With God’s help, always.
With God’s presence, always.
With God’s power, always…
Hear these words once more, from God’s heart to ours, knowing that as God reaches out to us and offers healing and wholeness, God knows our fears and our despair and the comfort we find in our familiar stuckness. And God continues to call us to new life:
Yes, it will be hard to be well. Harder than it has been to be sick.
Yes, it will require courage. Remaining stuck is easy.
Yes, it will require strength. It takes no effort to keep doing what you’ve always done.
Yes, it will require patience and commitment and practice. I will get you started, and will be with you; you will have to keep choosing to be well. Day after day, hour after hour, moment by moment. Again and again and again.
Yes, it will be uncomfortable and unfamiliar and scary.
And it will be hard! Or did I mention that already??
All of that is true. And I am here, I am with you, and I want you to be well!
Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.
And this morning, hear these additional words:
Get up and walk–and when you stumble, which you will, reach out for me and steady yourself, and keep going. Get up and walk–and when you take a misstep, which you will, look for me and reorient yourself, and keep going. Get up and walk–and when you fall flat on your face, which you will, let me help you up and brush you off, so you can take a breath, and keep going. Get up and walk–and when you need to rest, which you will, rest. Find the sacred in your rest. And when you’ve rested, keep going.
Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.
And know that I am with you, always.
May each of you, and me, and all of us, and our world, find the healing we so desperately need, the healing God offers us in Jesus Christ.
Amen.
