The Secret to Love: Dependence on God -- John 5:1-20, 30 • Geoff Bradford

Good morning. I'm gonna read from John chapter five verses one through 20 and then verse 30. Let's listen to God's word.

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. In these lay a multitude of invalids, blind, lame, and paralyzed. One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew he had already been lying 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 mat and walk." And at once the man was healed and he took up his bed and walked. Now that day was the Sabbath. So the Jews said to the man who had been healed, "It is the Sabbath and it is not lawful for you to take up your bed." But he answered them, "The man who healed me, he said to me, 'Take up your bed and walk.'" They asked, "Who is the man who said to you, 'Take up your bed and walk'?" Now the man who had been healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn as there was a crowd in the place. Afterward, Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, "See, you're well. Sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you." The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him. And this was why the Jews were persecuting Jesus, because he was doing these things on the Sabbath. But Jesus answered them, "My Father is working till now, and I am working." This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God. So Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son could do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise. For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing, and greater works than these will he show him so that you may marvel." In verse 30: "I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just because I seek not my own will, but the will of him who sent me."

This is the word of the Lord.

Have you ever heard of the Coca Cola secret formula? It's been an incredibly well guarded family secret. John Pemberton, who invented Coca Cola back in 1886, had that formula in his head for a lot of years. It wasn't even written down until 1919 when the company was sold and documentation of the formula was needed as collateral for a loan. Since 1925, it's been kept in a vault in a bank in Atlanta, and only in 2011 was that vault brought out in such a way that people could see behind glass—there was a vault with the formula in it—but couldn't see what was inside. This is a secret, well guarded formula.

You know, this fall we've been looking at the compassion of Jesus over and over in the gospels. We see him going with breathtaking compassion after people, after notorious sinners, after those who are sick or lame or even dead, after the religious leaders of his day. And John five is no different. And every week, if you've been paying attention to what we've done week after week, the application has been this question: How can we, who've been compassioned by Jesus, show compassion to others?

But I recognize that this series actually may be really frustrating for some people. And you may feel like I'm asking you to do something impossible, like, "Hey, could you do me a favor and go into the kitchen and just make me up a batch of Coca Cola?" when we all know that the formula for that is top secret. You know, it may feel like that way. "Hey, how can I expect the people of Christ the King to take this example of Jesus in his incredible compassion and replicate that in their own lives toward other people?" If that's you, if you've been frustrated, this passage is for you. John five is for you.

The Mission of Compassion

Again, we see Jesus as the model of compassion. He's on a mission of compassion. This time, he is going to this pool in Jerusalem, this pool of Bethesda by the Sheep Gate. And around that pool, it says that there were these colonnades, these porches in which there were many people who had physical impairments—lameness, blindness, they were paralyzed. They hoped to be healed by the stirring of the water. So there was this idea that an angel would come and stir up the water, and if you were the first into the water when the water started bubbling, you would be healed.

Now I want you to notice that Jesus chooses to go to this pool on this particular day. He didn't stumble into it. He didn't happen to be going that direction. Jesus is on a mission of compassion.

Just like he was with the woman at the well in Samaria, just like he was in Galilee pursuing this man—this king-like leader who had a son who was sick. See, Jesus moves over and over again toward need, not toward comfort, toward those who are broken, those who need his aid, not toward those who are well, not toward the righteous. And Jesus chooses this particular man, this man who had been laying for thirty-eight years.

You know, in the first Gulf War, some CNN correspondents were watching from the upper floors of their downtown Baghdad hotel room, and they watched an American missile come flying down the street and do something bizarre. It came flying down the street and turned a corner so that it could go into a particular window of a particular building to go after a particular target. Now that was 1991, and that was the first introduction to the entire world of something that's come to be known as precision guided munitions—these smart bombs, precision guided munitions.

You know, as I read the gospels and I look at Jesus and all his interactions with people, Jesus is like a missile. He is so precise. He is so locked onto this man. He's so very specific in the targets of his compassion. That's what we see in his compassion. Just as Dax taught us last week about the woman caught in adultery, we see these two elements combined: grace and truth. And as Dax told us last week, truth without grace can be really mean. Grace without truth can be meaningless, but grace and truth together—that's Jesus' compassion. And that's what we see in this passage. The grace of Jesus in both of these areas. The compassion of Jesus in grace and in truth.

The Man's Lack of Faith

So notice this man has about zero faith before his healing. There's nothing here that makes him a particularly strong candidate for Jesus to recruit. He's not one of those people to whom in the gospels Jesus says, "Go. Your faith has made you well." This man has no faith. He's not like the centurion who had some kind of faith. He's not like this Syrophoenician woman who argues with Jesus about the character of God being generous. He demonstrates no knowledge of who God is, no knowledge of who Jesus is. He doesn't seem to know Jesus by sight or by reputation. There's zero that seems to qualify this man for the mercy of Jesus.

In fact, the only thing recorded here that Jesus does say to him before the healing is this question: "Do you want to be healed?" I think, what kind of a question is that? The question is Jesus' precision guided munition. Jesus knows this man has been crippled for thirty-eight years. I mean, think about that. Thirty-eight years. "Do you want to be healed? Do you want to be healed?" But wait, does this man really want to be healed?

I mean, notice, even when Jesus asks the question, the man can't quite comprehend what Jesus is offering. He says, "Well, you know, I'd like it if somebody can get me down to the water quicker, that's what I really want." And he's not even thinking in the categories of Jesus. He's not even understanding what Jesus was offering. See, that's the very nature of grace. It is entirely undeserved. And if it was deserved, it would cease to be grace. It doesn't fit our categories, just like Jesus' offer here doesn't fit the man's category.

I heard someone joke this way. He says, "You know, I know that Five Guys, the restaurant—you know, hamburgers and fries. The restaurant Five Guys, they believe in grace because they always give me more French fries than I deserve." But that's not grace. Grace is like ordering French fries at Five Guys and the manager comes out and hands you the deed to the restaurant and says, "This is yours from now on. Make as many fries as you want to. Bless the world with fries." You know, that's grace.

Grace and Truth Combined

But it's not just grace that we see in this passage, it's also truth. Which brings me to the strange statement here. Did you notice this? Verse 14: After the healing, Jesus goes and finds the formerly sick man and he warns him:

See, you are well. Sin no more that nothing worse may happen to you.

I mean, that is not exactly a heartwarming statement, is it? I mean, that's not what we expect from Jesus. He's about mercy and grace, right? I mean, this is obviously a warning. I can't even really think of how you could read this any other way than as a warning. Something worse than thirty-eight years of paralysis might happen to you. I mean, what could be worse than thirty-eight years of paralysis? Well, Jesus seems to think it's thirty-eight years or an eternal lifetime of hell.

This man needs to know what's really at stake in his existence. I mean, Jesus doesn't say to this man, "Hey, friend, you've been healed as an act of my grace. And from this moment forward in your life, you're just going to have nothing to worry about. I mean, you'll never have to make any hard decisions."

You'll never have to express any courage in your life. I'm never gonna require anything of you. There's nothing I really wanna change in your life. I'm never gonna say or do anything that's gonna make you feel uncomfortable. Jesus doesn't say that. Jesus wouldn't say that. He never said that.

I wonder sometimes for Christians if our understanding of grace fits with Jesus's. He did say, "sin no more that nothing worse may happen to you." What in the world does he mean by that?

We're confident of this: everything else the Bible tells us means these words—sin no more—can't mean that from this point forward, this man has to be perfect or even could be perfect. Jesus is warning this man though not to go back to a lifestyle or a decision or the sin that got him in trouble in the first place.

Apparently, this man's suffering was a result of some sinful action he had done in an earlier moment in his life thirty-eight years before. I know that may be disturbing to some, but I find that immensely comforting.

The other sufferers, all those other people that day at the Pool of Bethesda, were presumably innocent of a sin that caused their suffering. The Bible is actually filled with stories—some of whom are innocent sufferers and some who are guilty sufferers. Read the book of Job in the Old Testament, and it's very clear: this is a godly man. This is a man who had done nothing to deserve his condition, and yet he seemed to just get body slammed. Life was so hard. There's no sin that he did that caused his suffering.

There are some sufferings that come as a result of sin in the Bible. And apparently that's true of this man. I find this comforting because it's to this man that Jesus went like a precision guided missile. He goes after this guy, the guilty one. The guilty sufferer, not the innocent sufferers. There's no record that day that Jesus went and healed anybody else, any of the innocent sufferers. He didn't go after anyone, but he went after this man.

This man who didn't deserve anything from Jesus—rather the opposite—and nobody else would help. Yet Jesus signals him out for mercy and added a warning as part of his mercy.

Warning as Love

How much would Jesus have to hate us to not give us warnings about the landmines all around us in our lives? Warning is something that love does. We warn our children: "Don't go off with a stranger." We warn a guest who comes over for dinner: "There's traffic on that road. Go this other way." We warn colleagues at work: "There's this really hard client that you're gonna have to deal with."

Warning is a sign of love and a lack of warning is a sign of indifference. Why would we be so offended by a God who would warn us? Why would we be so offended by God as if somehow his warnings would diminish his grace?

If we've understood God's grace in such a way that he has to affirm everything we think, if all we want to hear from him is hugs, if all we want to hear from him is reassurance and pleasantness, we're actually blocking out God from some forms of his grace in our lives, some forms of his compassion. Because grace and truth is compassion. Grace and truth.

There's this verse in First Corinthians 11 where Paul warns the Corinthian church. They had this thing going on in their celebration of the Lord's Supper where some people were showing up and getting drunk at the Lord's Supper. Paul says this:

But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned with the rest of the world. — 1 Corinthians 11

I know that is probably nobody's favorite verse in our church. Nobody's got that written up on their fridge with a magnet. But listen, this is what the Lord shows us: if Jesus has to shake us to awaken us to the dangers of our decisions, that also is his grace. That's also his compassion.

It's my observation, and you could disagree with me on this, but unbelievers who are in the process of becoming believers—who are crossing the threshold from resistance to openness toward Jesus, or even new Christians who've just made that crossover—often they're the people who are most open to hard words from Jesus.

But really, a lot of times it's long-term Christians. Those who have listened to a lot of sermons and podcasts and done a lot of Bible studies, who are most resistant to hard words from Jesus. Jesus doesn't say everything the way we wanted to say it with all the nuance. We're really offended. We don't wanna have anything to do with what he has to say.

And let's be careful that we don't edit Jesus. That our understanding of grace doesn't tell Jesus what he's allowed or not allowed to say. See, until we are in heaven with the word or he comes back, we are always—you and I—we're always five minutes away from a destructive decision that could shipwreck our lives. We need to be careful that we have a posture therefore of open ears, of a willingness to hear truth from God at all times because his mercy is grace and truth.

Some of you are probably too young to remember this, but growing up, there was a Reese's peanut butter cups commercial that I loved. And the tagline was "Reese's cups, two great tastes that taste great together." So these two guys are walking toward each other, and one of them is holding chocolate, the other one's holding peanut butter, and they bump into each other, and the chocolate gets dipped in the peanut butter, and they pull it out. And one guy says, "Hey. You dipped your chocolate in my peanut butter." The other one says, "You got peanut butter on my chocolate." And they taste it. And of course, they're like, "Oh, this is amazing. This is Reese's peanut butter cups. Two great tastes that taste great together."

So with grace and truth. This is the compassion of Jesus. It's this immense—because it's both, together—grace and truth.

You know, what we see in this passage is not just Jesus the model of compassion, but Jesus the model of something else. And I think this is really surprising. So look at verses 17 through 20. This passage continues and we're given a glimpse into, I don't know how else to say this, but the psychology of Jesus. It's like he opens the hood on the car and shows us what's going on under the hood, what drives him, or he pulls back the curtain. Remember the Wizard of Oz? They pull back the curtain to see the little levers and the buttons and the dials. And Jesus does this in this passage. It's fascinating. Listen to what he says:

Truly, truly, I say to you, the son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees his father doing. — John 5:19

You know, imagine that you're out at a restaurant with a group of people, and you know how the conversation tends to rise up and then there's a lapse in the conversation—a bulb in the conversation. And you happen to, at that moment, hear someone talking at the table next to you. And there's this guy, and he's talking really loudly, and he says something like this: "I can't do anything on my own. Only what I see my father doing." What would you think of that person? Well, I can tell you what I would think of that person. What a weirdo. I mean, what low self esteem. What lack of confidence. What a maybe codependent person. That guy is really odd. I can't do anything unless I see what my father is doing? And yet, that's almost verbatim what Jesus says here.

And this isn't just one place that he says this. In fact, John five, John six, John seven, John eight, John 10—Jesus keeps saying these statements like:

I've come down from heaven not to do my will, but the will of him who sent me. — John 6:38

I've come not of my own accord. He who sent me is true and him you do not know. — John 7:28

When you have lifted up the son of man, you will know that I am he. — John 8:28

I do nothing on my own authority, but speak just as the father taught me. — John 8:28

I and the father are one. — John 10:30

You know, codependent, low self esteem—those are not words we would usually use to describe Jesus. There's something more going on here.

Jesus as the Model of Faith

I think if you look at the pattern of Jesus' life, you see really three characteristics. First, one is powerful. Jesus is regularly bold and confident with people, just like we saw in this passage where he goes up and he heals this man, and yet at the same time he exhibits these other qualities of being childlike and dependent on his Father. So he's powerful and he's childlike. You know, once when the disciples were arguing, he brought a child in among them and said, "If you wanna be the greatest, be like this child." And then he goes on to show us that. He doesn't just say it, but he reflects that.

And finally, he's also dependent. This is a description of Jesus's faith. You know, we tend to think of Jesus as the model of compassion and he is. But here's what else we see in this passage. He is the model for us of faith. You know, I think that might blow some people's categories. I know that how could Jesus need faith? I mean, he's the son of God. He's the second person in the Trinity. He's perfect. I mean, he's God for crying out loud. How can Jesus need faith?

Well, see, I think that when we ask that question, it actually reveals that maybe some of our categories for what is faith are off. See, sometimes we think of faith as the content of what we believe, like a statement of faith. Or we think of faith as wishing or hoping, like the phrase, "Just have a little faith, why don't you?"

You know, that's not the biblical definition of faith. Jesus is dependent. Dependent faith, trusting. And here's the second person of the Trinity, the infinite God. No beginning, no end. By his own direction, he made all things in this world, the creator of all things. And this isn't a man who's beaten down by life or shattered, whose confidence is shattered. This is not a man who's frustrated or giving up. It's hard to imagine someone who had the kind of power that can create the world, yet saying, "I don't do anything of my own accord. I only do what I see my father doing."

Is that a contradiction? I don't think so. Jesus drew his strength from God the Father. His relationship with his father is one of absolute trust and dependence. And so if Jesus needed that kind of faith, how much more us? How much more do we need to become people who are more dependent on God?

I think sometimes we think of being dependent as weakness. In many people's minds, independence is where it's at. It's very American to be strong. Strength is independence. And yet, I think it takes an incredible amount of courage and strength to submit yourself regularly, purposefully, over and over to the will of another person. To be dependent on another person—that takes a tremendous amount of strength, not weakness, but strength. And that's what Jesus' example shows us. He was a man who was radically dependent on his Father. And this becomes actually the pattern for us of discipleship.

If you would abide in me, whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit. Apart from me, you can do nothing. — John 15:5

This is what Jesus actually wants for us: to become people who are dependent on the Father. Jesus is the model for us of love, of compassion. Jesus is the model for us of faith.

The Secret to Compassion

Here's where I want us to go today. I want to put those two things together. And this, friends, is the secret to compassion. This is the secret formula—the Coca-Cola secret formula that's right here for us. Dependence on the Father is the secret to compassion. Dependence on the Father.

This is the reason we get to see the miracle and then the curtains pulled back, the hood is lifted, and we get to hear Jesus say, "I don't do anything of myself. I do only what I see my Father doing." That's not some throwaway statement. Jesus is connecting the dots for us. He's showing us: if you want to know how to love unlovely people in your life, if you want to know how to reach out and move toward people that are hard to love—dependence on the Father. Dependence on the Father.

By contrast, self-will tends to ruin love. Self-will either makes us people who are graceless or who distort the truth. Let me end the sermon today with three real-life scenarios, and we're gonna look at the Jesus way and the self-will way. I want to use the analogy of a computer. So we're gonna boot off the self-will drive or boot off the Jesus drive.

First scenario: imagine that someone is really, really frustrated and angry with you—a spouse, a friend, your boss. They're annoyed with you. It comes out in their tone of voice, maybe in their body language. They roll their eyes, hands on their hips. Maybe it comes out in the way that they speak—they're sarcastic. Maybe their voice raises in accusation. Just like the religious leaders of Jesus' day who come after him, what do you do when you're criticized?

Well, if you boot off the self-will drive, what does that look like? You're ready for a fight. You're defensive. You're angry. You raise your voice back. Is there love for a person who's attacking you in those moments? Who's criticizing you? No way. You're ready for a fight.

What would it look like to boot off the Jesus drive? What would that feel like or look like? Well, it starts with dependence on the Father. I can only see what my Father is doing. What's been going on inside of you? You're looking to the Father. Grace and truth.

What is the truth about me? The reality is I'm far worse than my critic even knows. They don't know really half of what's wrong with me. There is way more detail that could be given about the mess that I really am than they're even vocalizing in this moment. Their criticism—that's nothing compared to the reality.

God sees all of it and he knows all of it and yet he loves me. He loves me. He tells me the truth but gives me grace. He's so compassionate toward me.

So out of an overflow, an abundance of his compassion, depending on the Father, I can respond to my critic in love, in compassion, not defensive or angry, not listening or responding—not reacting, but waiting, listening, responding. You see how different that is?

Let's try another one. What about this situation? You have to confront someone. You need to say something that's going to be hard for that person to hear. You know that they could feel judged. You know that they may be really angry with you. So let's test this one out. What does it mean to boot off the self-will drive?

Well, many of us, when it's time to confront someone, our people-pleasing kicks in. And so we either don't really say what we need to say or we lessen it, try to soften the blow, or we just avoid the conversation. Or others of us may tend to be harsh or angry or communicate the truth in a way that's overbearing or way too intense. Self-will and confrontation usually creates a big mess.

But what would it look like to boot off the Jesus drive in confrontation? What would that feel like? Well, again, you start with dependence on the Father. You remember that the person you have to confront is a broken, sinful person like you are. You remember that the love of God is honest and truthful, that warning is actually a grace of God in your life. You regularly need grace and truth from Jesus. You remember that you yourself are always five minutes away from a life-destroying sin in your own life. So you recognize that Jesus actually may be using you as a mouthpiece in the life of your friend or your spouse, your child, your coworker, and so you humbly and boldly say what's true.

Finally, let's do one last one. This one's a little bit more gritty. What about eating Thanksgiving dinner with a person with whom you disagree vehemently about politics? I know that's a hard scenario to imagine, but let's stretch the imagination and see if we can do this. You know, that person in your family, your extended family, of whom you regularly say, "How can they think that way? Did you see what they posted on social media?"

Now, look. If you boot off the self-will drive, this is what you're probably going to do. You're probably going to shut them down, avoid the conversation, make sure you're sitting on the opposite side of the room, or cancel Thanksgiving altogether. You know, there's no way you can love a person like that.

But if you boot off the Jesus drive, what would that look like? Again, it starts with dependence on the Father. He loved his enemies. Who is that? Oh, yeah. That's me. He took the first step toward those who sinned against him. Who is that? That's me. And you know, you just know that you're right and your family member here is so wrong. But look, you don't have to be right this Thanksgiving dinner. You know why? Because God has already made you right through Jesus Christ. He's made you righteous. The death of his Son on the cross has made you permanently and unchangeably righteous. So you can show up to Thanksgiving dinner and you can enter into conversations, but you don't have anything to lose this Thanksgiving. You can just show up and instead of trying to win a fight, you love a sinner.

Paul Miller says it this way: "Self-will is like a skunk in the basement of a designer home. I mean, it's got a beautiful kitchen. It's got an amazing great room. But if there's a skunk in the basement, everybody smells it, and it ruins everything."

And contrast that with the compassion of Jesus. Jesus' compassion is so disarming, and it's so beautifying in its grace and truth. I think the world needs more of that.

Invalids in Need of Healing

Let's go back to this man and wrap up here. I think we are more like this lame man than we think. Just like him, you and I are so often—what's the word there in verse three? Did you see it? It's not a very nice word. It's not a PC word. We're invalids. Invalids. John describes a multitude of invalids, blind, lame, and paralyzed. I can't think of a better description of us, CTK. We're a bunch of compassion invalids. I think a lot of times we think we're actually good at loving people, but we're crippled lovers. We're paralyzed lovers. We're invalids when it comes to compassion. We're mostly uncompassionate and unloving, defensive, self-righteous, judgmental.

And so along comes Jesus. Along comes Jesus in our worship service. Along comes Jesus in our lives and he is present to us all the time by his Spirit. Along comes Jesus and he draws near to us. He's here with us and he knows—where people like this man, terrible compassion, always asking God for the wrong things, absolutely terrible about loving other people. And just like this man, we who can't get into the water, we can't fix ourselves.

And Jesus comes and says this to us this morning: "Do you want to be healed? Do you want to be healed?"

Like the lame man, we often ask Jesus for way too little or the wrong things entirely. We want a little comfort and security and Jesus wants to change us utterly from the inside out and make us people who are transformed. Can we let him do his work in us?

Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for this passage from John chapter five. Thank you, Lord, for showing us how much we need your grace, how much we need your truth. Thank you, Lord, that you are such a compassionate one toward us. Thank you, Lord, that you are also the model for us of faith.

We pray that we would become people who are more and more dependent upon you. And we pray, Father, that we would become people who learn the secret to love, the secret to compassion, which is depending more and more on what you've done for us, who you say we are in Christ, what you've given us. We pray, Father, that that would overflow out of our lives into the lives of people around us all the time.

We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.