The main point: The first two signs in John showed us Jesus the Messiah as the joy-bringer and as the healer, but also foreshadowed what his task and purpose was. This sign, the healing of the paralyzed man and the controversy that followed it, point towards the unique relationship Jesus had as the Son of his Father in heaven. Jesus claims total unity with the Father in this passage, and points to his authority to give life and to bring judgment. And this is the first sign that is specifically rejected.
Chapter 5 of John brings us to Jerusalem, and the action takes place around the pool of Bethesda, locally known for its legendary healing properties. Here Jesus encounters a man who has been paralyzed for 38 years, and who has no friend to help him into the pool for healing. It wouldn’t have mattered if he had made it into the pool though; these waters, just like the water in the jugs at the weeding in Cana, were insufficient to bring about his healing, cleansing and salvation. Only Jesus, the provider of “living water”, could do that.
Jesus asks the man if he wants to be made well, and then commands him to get up, take his mat and walk. The man obeys (just like the servant in Cana and the official whose son was ill), and he is healed instantly. At the most basic level, this is a story of Jesus seeing a man in utmost distress, unable to help himself or find healing, upon whom he takes mercy and brings healing. Later he admonishes the man to stop sinning or something worse may happen to him, not suggesting that he will get even more paralyzed, but that the true healing and wholeness he requires is salvation from sin.
But this is not just a “basic” healing; it is a sign, an act that is full of symbolism pointing to the identity and purpose of Jesus as the Messiah. The nature of this sign is shown to us by the immediate reaction to it. Pharisees, who were Jewish religious authorities concerned with the proper application of the Law and Traditions, saw this man carrying his mat on the Sabbath. This did not necessarily break any Scriptural laws, but it did run contrary to the Tradition, which forbade carrying something from one place to another on the Sabbath. So we know that this sign has something to do with the keeping of the Sabbath, one of the most important of the Jewish religious regulations.
Again, on a basic level one can see the problem with the Pharisees position. Jesus is interested in the welfare and healing and forgiveness of a paralyzed man, while the Pharisees, unable to effect his healing or forgiveness, are interested in whether or not he carries a mat. One concern is compassionate and life-giving, the other seems petty. But there is more going on that that here. Keeping the Sabbath was a commandment from the Lord, and when Jesus is questioned about it he cannot, and does not, say that the Sabbath is unimportant. Rather, he explains why he is permitted to heal and work on the Sabbath. His Father, God, continues to work on the Sabbath. The Father, in fact, never stops working, and his work is effortless. And just as the Father never stops working, Jesus, the Son, does not stop either. The Father has authority over the Sabbath; therefore, so does the Son.
Well, this causes a bit of a reaction. The Pharisees want to see Jesus killed, accusing him of claiming equality with God. This did not necessarily mean that they thought he was claiming to be God, just that he was claiming to be independent of God, or was rebelling against God. But this is the complete opposite of what Jesus is doing. Jesus explains that far from being independent of the Father, he cannot do anything without the Father. Jesus’ actions are actually displaying the activity of the Father in the world. The Father’s love for him is perfect, and his obedience towards the Father is perfect, so that their wills and purposes and actions are utterly united. Jesus is not just claiming equality with God, he is claiming unity with God, as the unique Son of the Father. As such, he is glorifying his Father in absolutely everything he does.
There are some examples of people using the term Father for God in the Old Testament, but Jesus is clearly claiming a unique relationship here. This is a very troubling claim for the Pharisees, who either interpret it to mean that Jesus thinks himself independent of God, or thinks himself the equal of God. Jesus goes onto to clarify what he is saying, though not in a way that makes his opponents any less angry. There are two things that are absolutely, positively the responsibility of God and God alone: giving life (including resurrecting the dead) and bringing judgment. In this passage, Jesus claims that just as the Father gives life, so does the Son give life to whomever he pleases, and that he has life in himself. He is claiming a task that belongs only to God. And then he does it again, declaring that the Father actually entrusts all judgment to him, because he is the Son of Man.
All of this is for the purpose that people would honour the Son (Jesus) just as they honour the Father. The Father and the Son are united, and so honouring the Son is the same as honouring the Father; failing to honour the Son is the same as failing to honour the Father. The implications of Jesus’ statements here are pretty clear. The sign of the healing at the well points to his authority: authority over physical ailment, but also over life and death, and over the Sabbath, and over judgment. He has this authority because he is the one true Son of the Father, and he is in perfect unity with the Father. So true is the unity with the Father that Jesus has the right to be honoured, to be worshipped, just as the Father is worshipped. Those who hear Jesus and believe him will move from life to death, and will not be condemned. And Jesus does all of this out of perfect obedience, in order to please not himself, but his Father.
Wow. It is difficult for us, after 2000 years of Jesus being worshipped by Christians, to gather just how scandalous this is. Jaws must have been dropping all over the place. Hands would have been reaching for stones to throw. Jesus claims to be the very self-revelation of God the Father. He is God, wrapped in human flesh. To reject him is to reject God, to accept him is to accept God. And it is too much for the Pharisees to bear. This sign is rejected, Jesus is rejected. But Jesus does not accept the verdict of people, because God himself has testified about who he is. Not only that, but the very Scriptures which the Pharisees studied so diligently are a sign pointing to Jesus as the Messiah, and the Son of God.
This is where Jesus turns the accusation of the Pharisees back on themselves. They accused him of rebelling against God, of being independent. Their motivation was not the love of God, but the approval of others. They longed for the praise of people, but missed the very revelation of God that their Scriptures were all about. Jesus is explaining here that not only his miracles, but also all of Scripture, were signs pointing to his identity and purpose. The Laws and the Ordinances, such as the animal sacrifices, were not ends in themselves, but signs pointing to the greater reality to come. The Laws of Moses could only point out sinfulness, they could not remove it. Only Jesus, the unique Son of God, the Messiah, could do that. So Moses, upon whom the Pharisees trusted, actually became their accuser, because he prophesied about Jesus in his writings. But the Pharisees did not believe what Moses had written when that prophecy took flesh before their very eyes.
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