Words of Jesus Podcast - The Bombshell Reveal

Episode Date: December 17, 2021

Over time disability or illness becomes a familiar routine. Expectations from family or others diminish. Perhaps charity or a SSI check comes to relieve the burdens of life. It's easy to blame circumstances, even God, for the condition in which we find ourselves. It should be obvious that wholeness is desired. However, the man who encounters Jesus will not be able to continue in life as usual. Things must change. Things will change. Jesus wants us in the Kingdom of God. ***Wilt Thou Be Made Whole (Part 2)CHAPTER 15:  JESUS HEALS A LAME MANIN JERUSALEM, by the sheep market, was the Pool of Bethesda.  Beside it lay a great multitude of invalids—the lame, blind, withered, and bedridden—all waiting for the moving of the water; because at certain times an angel went down into the pool and troubled the water.  Then, whoever was the first to enter the water after its troubling, was cured of whatever disease or infirmity he had.            Jesus, one day, walked beside the Pool of Bethesda and saw a man there who had been infirm and lame for thirty-eight years.  Realizing that he had been so long infirm, Jesus spoke to him, saying;             “Wilt thou be made whole?”            The lame man answered:            “Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool; but while I am coming, another steppeth down before me.”            Jesus said to him:            “Rise, take up thy bed, and walk.”            Immediately the man was healed.  He took up his bed and walked away.            This miracle came to pass on the Sabbath.  The Jews, therefore, stoppedthe man who had been cured, saying:             “It is the Sabbath day.  It is not lawful for thee to carry thy bed.”            He answered:            “He that made me whole, the same said unto me, “Take up thy bed, and walk.”            The Jews asked him:            “What man is that which said unto thee, ‘Take up thy bed, and walk’?”             But he who had been healed did not know who his benefactor was, because Jesus had left to avoid the crowd in that place.            Later Jesus found him in the temple and said to him:            “Behold, thou art made whole.  Sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee.”             The man departed and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him.

Think Red Ink Ministries presents the Words of Jesus series with Don C. Harris. Hello, my friends, and welcome once again to the Words of Jesus series. I'm Don Harris, your host. Glad to have you. And we are in chapter 15 of our little book, The Words of Jesus. And I hope you're enjoying yourself and I hope you're learning something. Really, my whole goal is for these words and the one who spoke them to be very, very familiar with you. And not that we are going to take what Jesus

thought, believed, and taught, and the way he lived, and try to bend him into our particular denomination, but to bend ourselves to his. You're going to find that you go back and forth from that perfect idea of changing what we believe in order to make our Christian lives more in line with his. You'll find yourself changing what he has to say. Now wait a minute, did he actually say that?

Can't Jesus agree with me? Well, you know, he probably I mean if he can, he will. But if he can't, then we need to change what we believe. We were talking about in chapter 15, we were talking about Jesus healing this lame man, and I dropped the bomb that I don't happen to believe this story. You know, if you are

a Bible reader, you probably, as I was talking about that, you probably thought to yourself, you know, Jesus never, he never acknowledged any angel troubling the water. This was obviously what these people were raised to believe was so. This is the way they were raised. This is what they always believed, that this is exactly the way this happens. And Jesus never really acknowledged that.

I would think that if the story of the angel troubling the water and the first one down would be the one that would be healed, the man asked Jesus not for a healing but for somebody to carry him to the water. I would think that the most positive acknowledgement that this was indeed true, and frankly I would be shocked if I read it in here, is that Jesus said, well sure, I'll sit here and wait with you.

And when the water's troubled I'll carry you down. But he didn't, did he? I think that he had in mind to heal this poor guy and did so right there, him sitting on his little sun blanket there at the pool of Bethesda and sent him home. I think that there's also something to learn for us here.

There's a, today, because I don't know, is it the internet age that we live in? Is it the fact that everybody's got five or six Bibles at home? Is it because church has changed from preaching to teaching? I mean the prophecy of the Apostle Paul was that they would heap to themselves teachers, and we've done that. I don't know, is it our society? I don't know what it is,

but in the day in which we live, there's just a lot of people out there with theories and ideas and things like this that just love to expound them and people love to hear them. And I think that had these fairy tales have been true that the scriptures would have been very clear that they are

indeed true. And Jesus did not acknowledge this. He didn't acknowledge it at all and let it go by. Now this is a lesson for us. I think that as we learn as our Christianity flourishes and we do indeed learn more and our faith becomes not necessarily stronger,

but it's certainly wider, it becomes fuller, I think that we feel an obligation and sadly also a freedom to go to people who believe things that aren't necessarily true and straighten them out about it. There is one thing that, I mean in the Scriptures we find that Priscilla and Aquila took Apollos to the side and the Bible says explain the way of God

more perfectly to him, more completely to him. But you're talking about people who are in the ministry for all intents and purposes, and so theology and doctrine is necessarily important. But you're going to meet people along your lifeline. There'll be friends and acquaintances and family

and things like that that believe some of the goofiest stuff you've ever heard in your life. I think that what we have to do is we have to kind of hold down the teacher in us because as the Scriptures teach when we get tired of hearing, that's what we do. We turn into teachers. And there's just a whole lot of

teachers out there and there's a whole lot of people that know more about these things than you do. And so they're going to sometimes under the guise of helping you, sometimes under the guise of saving your soul from hell, whatever reasons they have, they feel an obligation to straighten out in your thinking something that's not true. Now I realize I'm operating and projecting this idea

based on the fact that I don't happen to believe that the angel troubling the water thing was true. Now I do believe that there were people sitting there at the pool of Bethesda waiting for the angel. Yeah, I believe that. I'm not saying that's not true. I'm just saying the concept, the foundational thought in everybody's mind around there that they're all waiting for an angel to trouble the water.

I think they were mistaken in that. And I realize that what I'm trying to say here is dependent upon that being true, and so therefore I have to qualify what I'm saying. But I want you to notice that Jesus really didn't take any time with that. He didn't take time to explain to this guy that things are, you know, that angel

trouble in the water thing just ain't so, or any of the rest of this stuff, or go through the scriptures and give him scriptures that countermand or counteract whatever it is that he thinks or believes or does. It was, you want to be made whole? That was Jesus' whole idea. That's where we're going with this. You want to be made whole?

I can help you there. I can't necessarily help getting you into the water. I can't necessarily, you know, swallow this whole thing about the angel and everything, but I can make you hope if that's what you want. So I really think that in a lot of cases we cover our lack of spirituality, our lack of power, our lack of communication with God, our lack of spirituality, our lack of power, our lack of communication with God, our lack of understanding,

and unfortunately as well, our lack of love for other people, we cover all this by being teachers, by being correctors, by explaining to people where they're wrong or where they're unscriptural or the Bible says this and the Bible says that. And I think it's a mistake. I don't think that that's just the right thing to do.

Do you know if a person gets on target, gets on track, when a person gets on target, gets on track, when a person is exposed to truth, I think that it naturally occurs to them what's incorrect. I was always impressed with the practices of banks who train tellers, they don't teach them or expose to them every kind of counterfeit bill there is. You know, notice this about this one and this about this one. It would take, well first of all

it would take a lot of time to do that. Second, you know, man's mind can't remember all this stuff. But thirdly, and I think most importantly is that I think it's a good practice to, if you want to make sure that your tellers aren't taking counterfeit bills, one of the best things you can do is all during their training and all during the time that they're learning to do what it is they do, they handle real money. You handle

real money and well it's happened to you, I know it has because there was a change recently in some of the materials that our bills were made out of and you pick up a bill and you think, wow, that's weird. What happened there? Why are you doubting the validity of that bill? Because you have handled only good bills up to that point.

And all of a sudden, this one feels a little different. It perhaps looks a little different. And so it triggers something in your thoughts. Listen, we can learn from this. If we deal in truth and deal in logic and deal in good common sense, do you know what really stands out at that point? Things that are foolish. Things that aren't right. They are counterfeit.

They're not valid. And sometimes it can just be a passing thought or an uncomfortable feeling within ourselves that says something's wrong with that. And I think we need to listen to that. One of the points that I try to make to people in my advice to everyone, keep the commandments, never disobey your conscience,

take time every day to hear the voice of God. That second one, keep the commandments, never disobey your conscience, take time every day to hear the voice of God. That second one, never disobey your conscience. People say, well, what if your conscience is wrong? Obey it anyway. As long as you feel like it's right, obey it. And there's no way you're going to know all truth. There's no way you're going to know what's right in every situation. But you need to be trained to do what you think is right you let the lord change those things that are right or wrong and all he's got to do is just plug into that program that you've already got running that if if i feel like this is the right thing to do this is the direction i'm going you want to energize god on your part all of a sudden he sudden he's thinking this guy's going to do what he thinks is right. I'm going to show him what's right.

And it's really a wonderful way to live. And this is this particular principle that I'm talking about. Living by what is right. Always obeying your conscience. It's like handling valid money. And so when somebody hands you a counterfeit you go, ooh, what is this? This can't be right. You can't have, do you know the scriptures actually say that we can

grow in Christ to the point that, remember we talked about Christ being formed in us? There's a point when Christ is forming in us, when we're taking on the mind of Christ, when we're learning to think red ink, there is a point where there's a switchover that takes place within ourselves. Paul talks about this and he says that it can come to the point that your five physical senses can tell the difference between good and evil.

The way something feels, the way it looks, what it sounds like, really? Oh yes, absolutely. Absolutely. How are you going to get to that point? You're going to keep the commandments of God. You're going to never disobey your conscience. And you're going to take time every day to hear the voice of the Lord. It's just the greatest thing that ever happened to Christianity.

I mean, I don't have to be a Bible scholar to understand what's right and what's wrong. It's within me. And if I'm wrong about that, my Lord God will change those things in me. It's His business. He does what He thinks He ought to do and He really doesn't care so much about whether I believe that's an angel out there troubling the water. He's going to see to it that these things are done. Now as this situation occurred, this fellow

had this crippled condition for a long, long time. The Bible says that, well let's read it. Well for review's sake let's read it again. In Jerusalem by the sheep market was the pool of Bethesda. Beside it lay a great multitude of invalids, the lame, blind, withered, bedridden, all waiting for the moving of the water, because at certain times an angel went down into the pool and troubled the water.

Then whosoever was first to enter the water after its troubling was cured of whatever disease or infirmity he had. Jesus one day walked beside the pool of Bethesda. He saw a man there who had been infirm and lame for 38 years. Now listen to this. Realizing that he had been so long infirm, Jesus spoke to him saying, Wilt thou be made whole? I've read this and

other scriptures, approaches of Jesus like this and wondered, what a silly thing to say. Now no disrespect to our Lord Jesus. He has reasons for doing and saying what he did and said. And it's up to us to contemplate this, meditate on it and see, why did he say such a thing? Well, the Bible actually says why he said it. He says that he realized that he had been in this situation

so long Jesus felt it necessary to ask him not hey bud what do you need? Or I realize that you're crippled it's obvious you look and you see withered arms and you see canes and you see a little pallet that he's laying on. He obviously doesn't move around. It's obvious what he needs. Jesus didn't ask him, what you need, bud? No, he didn't. He didn't just walk over there and

heal him. But he asked him a question. And he said, will you be made whole? Now I know this is hard to believe but if people are honest in their encounter with Jesus many times. The question is not, what do you need?

The question is, will you allow this to be done to you, for you, whatever you're asking the Lord for? Will you be made whole? Will you be made whole? Now this is not will as in present tense like will you be made whole in the future? This is, is it your will to be made whole?

I know this is hard to believe, but there are people and you're going to be surprised when you start looking through your list of infirmities or your list of shortcomings and such that you pray about all the time and you never answer the question that you would hear if you spent time before the Lord listening instead of talking, will you be made whole? Do you really want this out of your life?

Do you know the moment you think about something like that, the very moment you think do I really want to be healed of this? Do I really want this situation out of my life? Do you know, a list appears. Not necessarily appears, but a list begins to form in your mind as to how this situation came about. And immediately you think, if I'm healed of this or

if I'm delivered of this or whatever, this is going to have to change in my life or it's going to come back on me. If I don't do this then perhaps I'm opening myself to a situation that was worse than before. And Jesus said that's a very real possibility. He says, you know, even when I cast a demon out of a man when I leave that house it's clean. It's furnished. It's garnished. It's got pictures on the wall. It's got rugs on

the floor. It's clean. on the wall. It's got rugs on the floor. It's clean. It looks nice. Things are shiny. I do a good job. Then he says, well, that not only appeals to the person out of whom the devil was cast, it appeals to the devil himself. And when he goes out, he says, I got no place to go. Ah, I know what I'll do. Let me go back and check my old apartment. And he goes there and he finds everything looking nice. And he says, cool, this is a nice pad. I'm going to call my friends.

Jesus says the last state of that man was worse than the first because it was unoccupied after this demon was cast out. Look, if you decide to be made whole about whatever infirmity, and I'm saying infirmity because that's on a lot of people's list, but I know you have concerns about spiritually, even your personality and perhaps habits and perhaps social things in your life or you have a list of things that you go before the Lord about. And his question is, do you really want to be made

whole of this? Do you really want this to remove from your life? Well, if we insist, yes, we do. You know, sometimes the Lord answers our prayer against our better good. It happens. And sometimes He gives us what we want knowing that it's going to cause problems later. Well, oh, you don't believe that? Of course he does.

Well, what's Jesus talking about in this situation? He has no idea that if he casts a demon out of this person and this space isn't occupied by the indwelling and infilling of the Holy Spirit, that he's going to end up in worse situations than he was before. Jesus didn't know that, but he did it anyway. Listen, he is all about making you the person you need to be. He's all about making you into the person that he had in mind for you at the very beginning.

And he's not like us. He doesn't raise and teach and guide his children with love and candy and giving them whatever they want. Positive reinforcement. Listen, sometimes he spanks our butt and it stings. But sometimes it's the only thing that'll work. Because his goal is not for you to like him like our goal is as parents. We don't want our kids not to like us.

His intention is to see you in the kingdom of God. And frankly, he hardly cares what it takes to get you there. So, will you be made whole? Do you really want to be made whole? Do you want to be changed? Gosh, do I really have to answer that? I mean, isn't it obvious that I'd rather not have this problem in my life? Sure it's obvious. But you see the problem is you kind of know walking into the throne room, you kind of know

what it's going to take to get rid of it or to keep it out of your life. And it's what you're going to find if you'll spend time every day listening to the voice of the Lord instead of talking his ear off. If you do that, when you're walking into the throne room, you're pretty much walking in there knowing what you need to do. If he confirms it, oh man, you're stuck now. Now

you're just disobeying your own conscience. But I'm saying as you're walking in you're disobeying your own conscience. But when you walk out after having heard from God the confirmation of your suspicion from the very beginning, now you're walking out disobedient. You are in a ripe location for finding yourself in worse condition than when he tried to help you.

Now, I think all these thoughts culminate into a big hairball that kind of gets clogged in our brain and we decide that, you know what, I can probably live with this. I can probably sit on this pallet. What, I've been here 38 years? I could probably do this another 10, 15 years. How much time do I have left? I mean, I'm going to sit here, what, you know, in a few minutes, you know, Sarah's going to come by and throw me a sandwich, and old Joseph's going to come by and throw me a sandwich. And Joseph's going to come by and he's going to throw me a banana. Somebody will give me a little money. And I'll hobble my way home. I've got relatives that come by and put me on a litter and carry me home.

I'll be back here tomorrow. You know, when you just balance that out with actually being the person that God wants me to be, actually having to try, I don't know. I don't know. So Jesus walks up and says, do you want to be made whole? You know, I was just sitting here thinking about that. You know what? Essentially nobody I've ever met has ever been

that honest. But many people that I've counseled this way have looked within and thought, you know, there are some things that I know is going to have to change in my life. And I just don't know that I have what it takes to change them. Yeah, I want to be made whole, but I don't know. Can I think about this? I don't know. He's walking on. He's just walking by the pool of Bethesda. I don't know if he's ever going to turn around and come back here.

I don't know. My advice? Strike while the iron's hot. Perhaps you need to do this now. Well, our time's gone. Join us next time to hear more from the Words of Jesus series. I'd like to hear from you. Let us know how you're listening, what time you're listening. Send an email to me, Don, at thinkwriting.com. Let us know how you're listening, what time you're listening. Send an email to me, Don, at thinkredding.com. You have a question or a comment, or you'd like to write to our post office box,

that is simply Think Redding Ministries, PO Box 718, Pytown, New Mexico, 87827. All right, see you next time. Bye-bye. ThinkRedInc.com. That's ThinkRedInc.com. Join us again for the next episode in the Words of Jesus series. you