John 5: 7 "'I can't sir,' the sick man said, 'for I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred up. While I am trying to get there, someone else always gets in ahead of me.'"
In Jerusalem there was a place called Bethesda's Pool. Tradition said that every so often an angel from heaven would come and stir the waters of the pool. The first person in would be healed of whatever ailed him. In John 5, Jesus comes across a sick man who had been waiting near the pool for 38 years. He claims he has never been healed because others always get in ahead of him and no one helps him. Jesus tells him to get up and walk-and he does!
You have to love this story! Here is this man who for 38 years has been forgotten, left out and neglected. Yet Jesus comes to him, has compassion and heals him. This story illustrates the power of our Jesus and also his mercy. He calls us to care for the unlovable, the downtrodden and outcast as well. This is how we show love to him.
Dear Jesus, help me to follow your example. Help me to see the outcast and forgotten around me and give them a shove into the pool. Amen.
