You Have a Part to Play in Your Healing
By: Kyle Chastain
Tags: Bible, Scripture, Faith, Jesus, Christianity

Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between what’s your responsibility and what’s God’s responsibility.

Let me explain what I mean.

It’s reasonable to pray for healing, or a breakthrough and expect God to answer your prayers. One of the major tenants of the Christian faith is that God hears your prayers and responds to them. But a lot of times you get caught between the ask and the answer.

It’s in these times that you have to figure out what’s in your power and what isn’t. What’s in God’s hands, and what’s in yours?

Sometimes, we unconsciously refuse to play a part in being an answer to our prayers. But if God answered all your prayers, you would have to give up the system you’ve built around your sickness.

It’s possible that you intellectually want to change or overcome some obstacle, so you do all the “right things” to make it happen. Your spiritual practices are on point while you

pray

read your Bible

fast

have a quiet time

go to church

lead a Bible study

You put on a show, but you don’t expose the roots of what’s holding you back. Then you want to throw your hands up when God doesn’t answer your prayers.

It happens to everyone at different points in life. But there’s a story in the New Testament that can help you understand how your dedication to your comfort might be greater than your dedication to transformation.

The miracle man and the invalid

What if there was a miracle pill you could take to make all your troubles go away?

Humans have long been infatuated with miracle cures, and things were no different in Jesus’ day two thousand years ago.

Near the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, there was a pool called Bethesda. Professor and Bible scholar N.T. Wright says the pool was known far and wide as a place of healing. You might say it was a healing pool.

In the Gospel According to John, chapter 5, Jesus came to the healing pool which was surrounded by many sick people. Many had been there for a long time, which makes it reasonable to assume that they’d formed some sort of community there — a system of survival.

Once a year, so the legend goes, an angel came down and stirred up the water in the healing pool. The first person in the pool got healed.

On his casual stroll through the sick ward that day, Jesus met a man who’d been at the pool for thirty-eight years. How is it that in thirty-eight years, this man hasn’t made it into the water?

Jesus must have wondered the same thing because he asked the man one of the strangest questions in the whole Bible: “Do you want to get well?” (John 5:6, NIV)

Then something interesting happens.

“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.” (John 5:7:NIV)

But the man doesn’t give Jesus an answer to the question. He gives an excuse.

You have a part to play in your answer

Jesus doesn’t need a pool to heal the man. He only needs a word. But to experience healing, the man has to put aside the system that he’s created for his life.

That means he has to give up his identity as an invalid and the mindset that goes with it.

When you’re in a dysfunctional or even toxic situation, you learn to create a system so you can survive. Even in bad circumstances, there comes a point when it’s easier to stay than go because at least you know what you’re going to get if you stay.

As N.T. Wright observes, the man that Jesus found at the healing pool had made a way of life out of waiting for his healing.

Let that sink in for a second.

The man is sick and has no one to take care of him. He lies feet away from healing for thirty-eight years, but he’s more bought into a system of victimhood than into the possibility of healing.

So Jesus does what he does best–he challenges the system. He tells the man to put aside the system that’s holding him back and get moving.

Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked. The day on which this took place was a Sabbath… (John 5:8–9, NIV)

When Jesus says “Pick up your mat and walk,” it isn’t just a command to get better. Remember, the man didn’t even ask Jesus to heal him. It’s a command to discard the system he’s relying on, and move on with his life. But that’s not even the best part.

Don’t let your system hold you back

The word that Jesus uses when he says “Get up” comes from the Greek word egeiró which means “I raise up.” This same word is used throughout the New Testament in reference to resurrection.

So Jesus commands the man to be resurrected from the dead system he’s created for himself. The system of victimhood, excuses, and the very system he’d grown accustomed to was preventing him from experiencing healing.

What if the reason God hasn’t answered your prayers is that you’re clinging to a system that’s keeping you stuck?

The idea of change is always alluring. But it’s also scary. It’s easier to pray for God to change something than it is to give up the mindset, habits, attitude, or identity that’s keeping you bound.

Jesus isn’t a miracle drug. He isn’t interested in zapping your problems one-by-one. He’s interested in you as a whole person. So he has to change your system to change your life.

Is it possible that you’ve become accustomed to the system you’ve built to survive?

When Jesus commanded the man to get up and walk, he didn’t just heal the man, he changed his entire way of life. As Wright says:

He now finds himself launched on the much harder, but much more satisfying, way of life that goes with no longer being a cripple.

Maybe that’s the reason the man spent thirty-eight years at the healing pool without getting in. Maybe deep down he was afraid of what the change would mean for his life. The man’s healing was right in front of him for nearly four decades, but it took Jesus’ authority to resurrect him from the dead system the man had created for himself.

Final thoughts

Sometimes you wait for God to move on your behalf, and all the while He is waiting for you to move.

One of the most striking things about Jesus’ interaction with the paralyzed man is that Jesus didn’t pull him up on his feet. He gave the command and left it up to the man to take action. But to get a new life, the man had to let go of the system he created to keep his old life in place.

God is more than willing to answer your prayers. But you have a part to play in your healing.