The Works That Reveal Jesus’ True Identity

Welcome to the teaching ministry of Kungsvinger Lutheran Church. Kungsvinger is a beacon for the gospel of Jesus Christ and is located on the plains of northwestern

Minnesota. We proclaim Christ and Him crucified for our sins and salvation by grace through faith alone.

And now, here's a message from Pastor Chris Roseberg. The Holy Gospel according to St. John, chapter 5, verses 1 -9.

After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is in Jerusalem by the

Sheep Gate a pool in Aramaic called Bethesda, which has five roofed colonnades.

And in these lay a multitude of invalids, blind, lame, paralyzed. One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty -eight years.

When he saw Him lying there and knew that He had already been there a long time, he said to Him, Do You want to be healed?

The sick man answered Him, Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up.

And while I'm going, another steps down before me. Jesus said to him, Get up, take up your bed and walk.

And at once the man was healed and he took up his bed and walked. Now that day was the

Sabbath. In the name of Jesus. Amen. Alright, has anyone ever told you a joke but only told you part of the joke?

You know, like got midway through it and then stopped? Let me illustrate. Alright, so there was a Lutheran pastor, a

U .S. congressman, and an attorney. They were adrift at sea in a small dinghy in shark -infested waters.

So the pastor turns to the congressman and he says, Yeah, I see it's not very satisfying, is it?

Yeah, by the way, I don't know how that joke ends. I forgot the punchline years ago. So, we must move on.

Okay, now today's gospel text is sort of like that. The makers of the lectionary sometimes do things that don't make sense to us mere mortal pastors.

So I've decided to tell you the whole story rather than just part of it because it kind of matters. I don't want to tell you part of the story and not actually get to the punchline.

So in our gospel today, we're going to hear about the healing of a paralytic. Along the way, we're going to see how the place and details of the healing prefigure

God's healing work in the waters of our baptism. But that's not really the main point. The main point is that on the day in which

Jesus did this healing, it was the Sabbath and Jesus provocatively ignored the

Pharisaical Sabbath restrictions and by doing so ended up revealing who he really is.

And that's kind of the whole point of the story. So with that, we return to our gospel text today in the gospel of John 5.

And it begins with, After this there was a feast of the Jews and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. By the way, there were three festivals which the men of Israel were required, according to the

Mosaic covenant, to travel to Jerusalem. These would be the Passover, Feast of Booths, and also

Yom Kippur. The men had to show up. This was absolutely necessary. Now, funny thing, this text doesn't tell us which of these things it is.

So we're not exactly sure. But it does tell us this. Now there is in Jerusalem, and you might want to say there was,

There is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool in Aramaic called Bethesda, which has five roofed colonnades, and in these lay a multitude of invalids, blind, lame, and paralyzed.

Notice at the time that this was written, this place still existed. Now, you read the

Church Fathers on this and it's absolutely fascinating. They can see all the biblical themes and motifs in the location itself.

I won't dig hard into it, but just let me give you a couple of highlights here. The Sheep Gate, by the way, this was a small opening in the north wall of the old wall there near the temple.

And this was the place where the sheep were washed in a pool before they were, well, herded up to the sanctuary in order to be sacrificed for sins.

Bethesda, this is Imperial Aramaic. This isn't even Aramaic. It's Imperial Aramaic. It's like the

Queen's Aramaic. And this word means, check this out, house of grace, house of mercy.

And then there are some who see the fact that there are five roofed colonnades as somehow a symbolic, well, allusion to the

Torah, the five books of Moses. And so what does it all mean?

It means pay attention. Something important is going on here. The story then continues.

One man was there who had been an invalid for 38 years. And when Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, do you want to be healed?

Now, he'd been there a long time. And notice, it said there were a multitude of invalids. Jesus singles this guy out.

Now, I have to explain what's going on here so you kind of get it. We know from this text and from other texts outside of Scripture that there was a periodic miracle that took place in the pool of Bethesda, the house of mercy near the

Sheep Gate, right? And, well, what would happen is, in the days before there were hospitals and hospices and good medical facilities to take care of those who suffered from such, well, malities, that God provided a special miracle.

From time to time, an angel would descend from heaven, stir the waters up kind of like a jacuzzi.

First one in is healed. Second one, no. And so this is why they were there.

Another thing, I need to make a note here. There are two schools of thought regarding this man who had been there for 38 years.

And this fight goes way back. All right, let me explain. Theodore of Mopswestia, I know you all just love him and you read him every night, but he was a church father who argued that the paralytic really was kind of a, well, a bad character, if you would, and that the reason why he was there for 38 years is for lack of effort on his part and he really didn't want to be healed, and in the end he ends up ratting on Jesus.

We'll find this out. But John Christostom, well, he spearheaded the other school of thought and said, no, absolutely,

Jesus would never heal anybody who was allowed. All right, that's kind of the basic argument. And the two schools of thought exist to this day and they continue to fight with each other.

So I've decided to, well, not engage in the hostilities. So we'll just tell the story straight and we'll leave this guy out and we'll give the details of what he's done and I won't try to divine his motives, well, because it's kind of not the point anyway, right?

So here we have Jesus. He asks this guy, do you want to be healed? So the sick man answers,

Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred, and while I'm going, another steps down before me.

Now, keep in mind, it was God who provided this miracle to take place. So Jesus says to him, get up.

Take up your bed and walk. And this man who had been an invalid for 38 years, at once, he was healed.

Kind of think new creation stuff here. And he took up his bed and he walked. And see, every miracle like this in the

Gospels, in a sense, prefigures and points to the resurrection that is coming.

It's a little mini -resurrection. This man has been recreated, but here's the other thing, is that Jesus has this really interesting habit.

When he heals somebody physically, he also heals them spiritually. Because it's our spiritual issues that have caused our physical problems.

And so Jesus, when he heals somebody physically, he also gives them faith. And we'll see this in a little bit.

But all of this prefigures, if you would, kind of in type and shadow, what's coming. And that is the miracle working

God in the waters of our baptism. If you think it's cool that God provided for people to be healed of physical maladies when water is stirred by an angel, well, you're going to be excited to find out what's going on in baptism.

So by comparing the two here, we see that the pool, in every way, was a type and shadow.

That pool, the Pool of Bethesda at the House of Mercy near the Sheep Gate, was moved only once in a while, while the waters of the church's baptism is always ready to be moved.

Always. We don't need to wait. That water, well, it was moved in only one place, the

House of Mercy. This water is moved throughout the world in every truly

Christian church, which are now the many houses of Christ's mercy.

There, it was an angel which came down here. It's the Holy Spirit Himself.

There, the water cured only one person. The waters of baptism saves many people each day.

That water healed the body only. The waters of baptism saves both body and soul.

Right? So this water is always ready to cure.

And those who have been baptized, you have been cured. Your sins have been forgiven.

You have been washed by Christ. Keep that in mind. Now, the story turns dark.

You know, like in the movies, when you get that really serious music going on, you can almost hear, dun, dun, dun, boom, boom.

It starts to get dark here. It says, now that day was the Sabbath. And the Jews said to the man who had been healed, it's the

Sabbath. It's the Sabbath. It's not lawful for you to take up your bed on the Sabbath. Did the police officers in those days do this?

I mean, you can almost see like the blue lights spinning, right? We're taking a report here. We saw a man carrying his bed on the

Sabbath. We have to report this, right? By the way, it is true,

Scripture forbade, under the Mosaic Covenant, work on the

Sabbath. Notice the operative word here though. Work. Let me read to you from a couple passages of Scripture.

Exodus 31, 14 and 15 says this, You shall keep the

Sabbath because it's holy. Everyone who profanes it shall be put to death. Whoever does any work on it, that soul shall be cut off from among the people.

Six days shall work be done. But the seventh day is a Sabbath. Solemn rest.

Holy to the Lord. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath shall be put to death. Yeah, that's right.

Capital crime for breaking the Sabbath. Jeremiah and Nehemiah both talk about, well, bearing loads on the

Sabbath. Let's take a look at that. Jeremiah 17, 19 through 23 says this, Thus says the

Lord, Go and stand in the people's gate by which the kings of Judah enter and by which they go out and in all the gates of Jerusalem and say,

Hear the word of the Lord, you kings of Judah and all Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem who enter by these gates.

Thus says Yahweh, Take care for the sake of your lives that you do not bear a burden on the

Sabbath day or bring it in to the gates of Jerusalem and do not carry a burden out of your houses on the

Sabbath or do any work. But keep the Sabbath day holy as I have commanded your fathers.

So burden bearing is, well, forbidden according to Scripture. Nehemiah makes the same point, chapter 13, verse 19,

As soon as it began to grow dark at the gates of Jerusalem before the Sabbath, I commanded that the doors should be shut, gave orders that they should not be opened until after the

Sabbath, and I stationed some of my servants at the gates that no load might be brought in on the

Sabbath day. Now if you pay close attention to what's going on here, keep in mind, back in the day, these are the days before 18 -wheeler trucks, before freight trains and large container ships.

So how was commerce conducted? How did you move your merchandise? You bore a load.

Put it on the back of a wagon. Had your beast of burden pull it, right? That's how this was all done.

This is the context here. In other words, the Scriptures forbid burden -bearing associated with work.

But the Pharisees, they had tightened that down even further. If you're familiar with the

Pharisees and how they worked, it went kind of like this. God has given us 613 commandments.

We're going to add a thousand more to that. You keep our commandments and you'll never break

God's and then you'll be righteous. So this is how this worked. And so in Mishnah number 2, we find out that the

Pharisees added 39 more commandments regarding the

Sabbath. This is what they called the Melachot. This is the 40 minus 1. I will not read the whole list, but let me share with you some highlights of extra commandments regarding the

Sabbath. This includes, there will be no sowing, plowing, reaping, binding, sheaves, threshing, winnowing, sorting, grinding, sifting, kneading, baking, shearing wool, whitening wool, combing wool, dyeing wool, spinning, weaving, making two loops, weaving two threads, separating two threads.

Right? There's more. I'll save you the rest. But let me get to one of the 39.

Carrying from one domain to another any burden whatsoever. So was this man ordered by Jesus to sin?

No. Jesus didn't recognize the Mishnah and the 39 extra commandments regarding the

Sabbath. Right? So Jesus would never command this guy to sin, but Jesus was being very provocative, by the way.

By commanding the paralytic to take up his bed and walk, Jesus was intentionally, well, trying to send a statement, if you would.

He knew that this would create conflict and the conflict would point to his true identity, which is really the whole point of this text.

So the man who had been, well, pulled over by the authorities and was now being ticketed, right?

He answered them, alright, the man who healed me, that is the man who said to me take up your bed and walk.

So with police cap on, gun at the side, they asked him, well, who's the man that said this to you?

Take up your bed and walk. We have to file a report. Now the man who had been healed did not know who it was.

For Jesus had withdrawn. And there was a crowd in that place. Pause.

This is what's going on in the text here. It says the word afterward. The Greek is probably better translated after some time.

So after all of this goes down, things have settled down a little bit, if you would. After some time,

Jesus found this fellow in the temple. Notice Jesus is looking for him. Because Jesus didn't just heal his body.

Jesus also gave him faith. So he finds him in the temple and Jesus wants to care for this man spiritually.

So he said to him, see, you are well. Sin no more, so that nothing worse might happen to you.

Now those are some strong words. But keep this in mind. It is absolutely true that we are totally forgiven of all of our sins by Jesus Christ.

And Scripture warns us very sternly to not turn the gospel into a license to sin.

In other words, it doesn't work like this. I like to sin. A lot. Sin's kind of fun.

Cool, right? Jesus likes to forgive sins. Wow, this is great! So I'm going to just sin like there's no tomorrow.

Live like hell. Oh, and Jesus is going to keep me from going to hell. Yay! This is fantastic.

See, that's not how that works. Okay. And here's the reason why. Forgiveness of sins presupposes repentance for sins.

Sin is not freedom. Sin is slavery. Sin is likened to and described by Scripture as the fruitless deeds of darkness.

And you know why they're fruitless? Because it's all about you. I'm going to look out for me.

I like to do this. I want to do this. I deserve this. Therefore, I'm going to go ahead and take care of myself.

Forget about my neighbor. Forget about my wife, my husband, my friends, my family.

I've got to look out for number one. Or as Frank Sinatra said, I did it my way.

Right? But see, Jesus tells us here, and He warns us through this man, do not continue in sin.

Do not continue in sin. Sin is not your friend. Sin desires to master you, to enslave you, and then drag you into the fires of hell.

For what is worse than 38 years of being a paralytic? What's worse than that?

An eternity in the lake of fire is what's worse than that. So Jesus lovingly and firmly tells this man, you are well.

You've been forgiven. Do not continue in sin so that nothing worse might happen to you.

Gregory of Nazianzus, another great church father, his sermons are fantastic.

He summarizes Jesus' words this way. Kind of a paraphrase. Yesterday you were flung on a bed.

You were exhausted. You were paralyzed. And you had no one when the water should be troubled to put you into the pool.

Today you have Him. Him who is the one person, man and God, or rather God and man.

You were raised up now from your bed, or rather you took up your bed. And you publicly acknowledge the benefit of this.

So do not again be thrown upon your bed by sinning and in evil rest in a body that is paralyzed by its pleasures.

But as you now are, so walk, mindful of the command.

Behold, thou art made whole. Sin no more, lest something worse happen to you. And thus prove yourself bad after having received such a blessing as that.

Wise words. And so understand this. Christ truly bled and died for your sins.

And when you pray the Lord's Prayer, which is a daily prayer, by the way, how do I know? Oh, the words, give us this day our daily bread.

I sometimes fear that if I don't pray the Lord's Prayer every day, my refrigerator's going to get empty. And that would be terrible for me.

But also in that daily prayer are these words, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.

And so here's kind of the mystery of being a Christian, is that Christ does understand and anticipates that you will not keep

His law perfectly daily. This is true. And it is also true that the

Gospel is not a license for you to sin and carry after and chase after sin.

The Christian life is one of repentance. And repentance is not a one -time thing. Repentance is daily.

Daily acknowledging that we have not made the mark. We have fallen short. And are in need of God's mercy and favor.

Hating our sin itself. And mortifying our sinful flesh through the means of grace.

Through the Word of God. Through the Lord's Supper. Through the absolution. So that the new man continues to come forth day after day.

So, after hearing Jesus say these words, go and sin no more.

And this is where the controversy really heats up on the two camps, by the way. The man went away and told the

Jews it was Jesus who had healed them. Theodore of Mepswistia says, see, see, he ratted on Jesus.

And I tend to agree. But, the other side said, no, he was just announcing. Okay, whatever.

He went and told the authorities, hey, you know the guy who healed me on the Sabbath? It was Jesus. Thank you, we'll take care of it from here.

Right? Now, to be sure, the action of Jesus in contravening the

Jewish Sabbath strictures, the additional rules, if you would, he was being intentionally provocative in commanding the healed paralytic to carry his pallet in and of itself, which is an unnecessary task.

Jesus was intentionally provocative. And, well, what he was trying to do by his actions was claim to have the freedom and authority over the

Sabbath. Because remember, in other passages, Jesus says he's the Lord of the Sabbath. Oh, and by the way, the

Sabbath was made for man. Not the other way around. Right? So, it says this in the text then.

This is why the Jews were persecuting Jesus. Because he was doing these things on the

Sabbath. Now, here's kind of the irony of this. Let's do the math. Alright? A guy who's an invalid for 38 years.

38 years, unable to care for himself, seeking a healing from God, is there at the pool of Bethesda, near the sheep gate.

Right? Jesus himself shows up, not an angel, and he heals the guy. Tells him to take up his bed and walk, and he does.

And rather than say, praise God, there's been a miracle among us, here's how their math works. Jesus heals guy on Sabbath, equals blasphemy.

He must die. That math doesn't add up, and plus I've already told you math is evil.

Right? Yeah, but see that's the thing. The religion of self -righteousness hates

Jesus. Because he has this really bad habit of not obeying our self -made rules.

Really bad habit. And that's his prerogative, by the way. And that's kind of the whole point of this text.

So Jesus answered them, my father is working until now, and I am working.

You're thinking, what did he just say? Well, let me kind of explain it this way, because we're getting now to the punchline.

You see, you read in Genesis, Genesis 2, after God spends six days speaking the world into existence, it says this, on the seventh day

God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all of his work that he had done. So God blessed the seventh day, made it holy, because on it

God rested from all of his work that he had done. Now, if you really want to be blunt, kind of using biblical typology, we're still really still in that seventh day.

We're still in God's Sabbath rest. But Jesus is saying that God is still working, and that he's working too.

So let me ask you this, by God working, is he sinning? Let me put it to you another way.

The Sabbath technically is on Saturday. It begins at sunset on Friday, ends at sunset on Saturday.

Does God close up shop in heaven? You know, like they do some of the stores in town, right?

Sorry, be back on Sunday. If you have any prayers, hold on to them. I'm not answering any prayers on Saturday.

Is this how God works? No. Does God sin by answering prayers on Saturday?

Is that not work? Right? Well, it is. I would think it's a lot more work than I've ever done, right?

So because of the fact that God doesn't stop working on any particular day of the work and is continuing to work until now, which, by the way, the

Jews, if you read their literature, they understood that God still continued to work even on the Sabbath, and yet did so without sin.

Jesus is basically taking their concept and saying, my Father is working until now, and I am working.

You know why? Because I'm God. And you know what? They get it. They actually get it.

Here's what the text then says. This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill Jesus, which doesn't make any sense.

Here's the reason why. Because not only was He breaking the Sabbath, which

He wasn't, but He was even calling God His own

Father, making Himself equal with God. And there's the punchline.

All of this, kind of the long way through the sheep gate into the pool, you know, and house of mercy, and five colonnades, and all of this rigmarole with the police and the police report.

And then finally we get to the punchline, and the punchline is Jesus was making Himself equal with God. And why would

He do that? Because He is. And see, that's kind of how Jesus operates.

You will never see in Scripture where Jesus just comes right out and says, all right, listen, boys. I want to make sure we get this out in the clear.

Are you ready? I'm God. Ta -da! Right? You don't see it like that.

Instead, what ends up happening is that Jesus invites you to wrestle with things. For instance, like in Mark 2, the paralytic is let down through the roof, and Jesus says to the paralytic, your sins are forgiven.

First thing out of His mouth. And the Jews are grumbling. Who can forgive sins except for God Himself? And Jesus is all right.

So that you know that I have authority to forgive sins, I tell you, take up your mat and walk. And the paralytic gets up, and he walks.

There you go. And you're sitting there going, wait a second, did He just say that He's...

Then you think about the disciples. They're on this little boat out in the middle of the sea. The waves come up, the wind is blowing and howling, and they're about to perish.

And where's Jesus? He's asleep. And they wake Him up. Don't you care that we're perishing? And He says, shh, quiet, to the waves.

And it goes whoosh. And they're going, who is this? He's acting like He's God.

Wait a second, maybe, right? See, Jesus is doing that here too, regarding the Sabbath.

And this is good news for us. Because look how God is acting. He has not come in His first advent to swing

His sword of justice. He has not come to cut you down and add your blood to the blood of the apocalypse, right?

The great day of Armageddon where the blood is up to the bridle of the horse. No. He's come instead to shed

His blood for you. He's come to heal. He's come to forgive. This Jesus is

Lord of the Sabbath. He's equal with God because He is God. And this

Jesus, He has washed you. He has forgiven you.

He has made you well. And He, like the Father, is working now to save you.

He is feeding you even now with His Word. Sustaining you in the one true faith unto life everlasting.

Today we hear the story of God's amazing mercy and grace in this house of mercy.

I have no idea what Kongsvinger means. I think I'll translate it my own. Make up my own Norwegian.

It now means house of mercy. This is the very house where so many of you were made alive when the

Spirit stirred the waters of this very baptismal font. And this, and it is this

Jesus, who is equal with the Father, He is our Passover Lamb who has passed through the sheep pool in His baptism as He journeyed to the

Temple Mount to be sacrificed for your sins and mine. And it wasn't an angel that saved us.

It was none other than the Son of God Himself, equal with the Father. And because we have been set free, because we have been forgiven, because we have been washed, because we have been given faith, all as a gift, let us then again repent of our sins and be forgiven.

And because of this, renounce the fruitless deeds of darkness so that something worse may not befall us.

In the name of Jesus. We thank you for your support.

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