Problem In The Body… Or Mind?

“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?’” - John 5:6


It has been said that most battles are won or lost, not on the playing field, but in the mind. If we can conquer the obstacles and strongholds in our thought life, there is almost nothing we cannot do or achieve. I thought about that as I reflected on the story recorded in John 5 about the man at the pool of Bethesda.

If you have spent any amount of time in the church, then you have heard it said time and time again that the man at the pool was physically infirm, that he was lame, disabled, and could not walk. From the traditional perspective then, the miracle in the text is that Jesus enables the man’s legs and feet to do what had not been done in over 38 years.

The meaning we derive from the passage comes from this assumption that Jesus did something to the man’s body and enabled him to walk again, and so consequently we apply that presumed healing in the text to the possibility that God, through Christ, can do the same for you and for me. And there is no doubt that He can. God is a healer.

But many years ago, after reading the story in Greek, I began to think differently about the point of the passage. Many versions of the Bible say that when Jesus saw the man, he knew he had been “in that condition” or “in that case” a long time. But the Greek text does not mention “condition” or “case.” It just says, “When Jesus saw the man and knew that he had been THERE for a long time.”

So Jesus asks the man, “Do you want to be made well?” It is a shocking question because you think that anyone who has been in a bad situation for 38 years would want to be made well, but the fact that Jesus asks this question perhaps gives us clues as to the nature of the man’s problem.

The question Jesus asks speaks really to his mental state not so much to his physical. All of this leads you to at the very least wonder… whether the problem at the pool was not in the man’s body, but in his mind.

Is there something going on in your mind that’s keeping you from “being made well?” Do you need Jesus to heal what’s hurting on the inside of you? If so, my prayer is that you will ask Him to give you that healing and restoration today. He’s asking, “Do you want to be made well?” It’s now time that you answer Him.