Will You Be Made Whole?

John chapter 5, beginning verse 2. Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep market a pool, which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches.

! In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, a blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water. For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool and troubled the water.

Whosoever then first, after the troubling of the water, stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had. And a certain man was there which had an infirmity 38 years.

When Jesus saw him lie and knew that he had been now a long time in that case, he saith unto him, Wilt thou be made whole?

The impotent man answered him, Sir, I have no man when the water is troubled to put me into the pool. But while I am coming, another steppeth down before me.

Jesus saith unto him, Rise, take up thy bed, and walk. And immediately the man was made whole, and took up his bed, and walked.

And on the same day was the Sabbath. If you go down to verse 14. Afterward Jesus findeth him in the temple, and said unto him, Behold, thou art made whole.

Sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee. And for just a couple minutes, I just want to preach about this thought, or a question, I guess.

Will you be made whole? Will you be made whole? Let's pray. Lord Jesus, we thank you for your word. We thank you that it's always a timely word. It's a word that can penetrate our hearts.

And I pray that that's what it does today. God, give us the spiritual ears to hear, and spiritual eyes to see what it is that you have for us today. And God, help this word be applied to our lives, that we would be fruitful from it, and pleasing to you.

In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. And everyone say, in Jesus' name. In Jesus' name. Amen. You may be seated. All right. So, the healing Jesus performed at the Pool of Bethesda is, to me, an amazing example of someone being in a bad condition for a very long time, a hopeless situation.

And as the Bible described, even to his own testimony to Jesus, no man would help him. It seems like there's just no one available from, no help available from anyone else.

But then as he has this encounter with Jesus, and then everything changed for him because of that encounter that he had with Jesus.

And I don't know about you and where you are in your life or where you were in your life when you had your encounter, your first encounter with Jesus. But I remember the time.

I remember the place where I was. I remember a lot of the details about my first encounter, my first real encounter with Jesus. But most of all, I remember the condition that I was in before I met Jesus in that way, and then the condition I was in following that encounter with Jesus.

And I thank God that I had an encounter with Jesus that changed my life forever. Amen. Amen. The condition I was in before Jesus entered into my life is a lot different than the condition I am in now.

And I thank God for all of the things that he has delivered me from and the place that he has in the path that he has me on today. Amen. We are all born in iniquity.

Iniquity is sin. We are born into sin. Iniquity is moral crookedness. We are born with a twisted character, a sinful nature.

We are born with a condition and a nature to which we are willing and comfortable crossing boundaries that God would not want us to cross.

Amen. From as innocent as Miles looks, he's, from the time he was born, he's been full of trouble. It's just in the nature of every human.

We can't help it. And if your parents here today, you know, or if you're an older brother, you probably remember some things too, that you may have recognized that very early on in life.

As innocent as a child can be, they're still human and still have a nature about them that can be stubborn and other things, right?

And so this condition, it keeps us from being able to be or do good in the eyes of the Lord from our birth. It's just the way it is.

We're born into this condition. We're born into a condition of guilt and born into a condition that would, basically, there's a promise of damnation for us because of the conditions that we're born into.

When a human is born, they're born into a condition of iniquity and it's an infirmity of sin. That's the infirmity I'm talking about today. It's an infirmity of sin. And there is no hope outside of Jesus.

We're not going to find anyone just like the man at the pool. There was no one else that was going to be able to help him in his condition. There's no one else that's going to be able to help anyone in the condition that they're in of sin other than Jesus.

Amen. Jesus is the only hope. So in Romans chapter 5 verse 12, it says, Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world by death and by sin, and so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned.

One more time, I'm going to read it. Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world and death by sin. So sin and death entered into the world because of one man.

It passed upon all men. And because of that, all have sin. And so you can, we can thank Adam and Eve. We can thank the devil. Amen. And so, you know, we're going to thank Adam and Eve.

And so, you know, I don't care how good you think you are or how good I think I am.

We are born in a way that you will come short of the glory of God. We're going to always come up short of the glory of God. And we're sinners. That's just the fact of the matter.

It doesn't matter how good you think you are. You're a sinner. I don't care how much money you donate to the Red Cross and how many people you, how many houses you build in Haiti after a hurricane or whatever.

You can do all kinds of good things, but it's not good enough for salvation. And it's always going to come up short. And God said that the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth.

Psalms 58 and 3 says, The wicked are estranged from the womb. They go astray as soon as they be born speaking lies. You and I are part of a human condition of iniquity, an infirmity, a sickness, of sin.

And we're born that way. And until there's an encounter with Jesus, nothing can be done for you to be made whole from that infirmity. There's no other cure.

There's no other solution. There's no other way to get around it. It requires an encounter with Jesus. And so, like the example of the man with the infirmity, we have an infirmity, the infirmity of, but it's of sin.

Romans chapter 6, verse 23 says, For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life, and it's through Jesus Christ our Lord.

We're born into this world as sinners and with the death sentence attached to our names. But there is a way out of all that, and that is through Jesus.

Amen. Thank God for what he did on the cross for us. Amen. That we would have a way out. And so, I present the question today that Jesus asked the man at the pool of Bethesda, and that lived in his condition, that infirmity that he had for 38 years.

And that question is, will you be made whole? He asked him, will you be made whole? And that's the question for us today, will we be made whole? Will you be made whole once you have your encounter with Jesus?

And the question wasn't, can you be made whole? Jesus didn't ask him, can you be made whole? Amen. Because Jesus can do it. Amen. Amen. All things are possible through him.

And so, we know Jesus can do it. So, it's not a question of can. It's a question of will. It's a question of your will. It's a question, the question is always going to be, will you be made whole?

Because you have a part to play in being made whole. And so, my question is, will you? Will you be made whole? And in reading the story of this man at the pool, I noticed quite a few different things.

I noticed that there were a lot of people there in a similar condition. And in John chapter 5, verse 2, it says, now there's at Jerusalem by the sheep market a pool, which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches.

And right here it is in verse 3. And these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water. And so, there's a great multitude there.

There's a lot of people out there that recognize that they have an infirmity, and they're wanting that infirmity healed. They recognize that they have an infirmity, and they go to the place that they know that maybe they could get healing.

And so, that's important. It's an important note to understand that, yes, I have an infirmity. And yes, I need to be cured of this infirmity.

And so, it is a good thing to recognize your need. And until you do, your need's not going to be met. If you don't understand, you can't grasp it.

You can't come to the fact or the conclusion, somehow you overlook it, that you are a sinner and that you need God, and that you need that encounter with God, and that you need to be made whole, and that you have an infirmity of sin.

You're never going to be able to be cured from that. And so, it's a good thing to recognize your need. God rebuked the church of Laodicea. He said there was a problem.

Their problem was that they have no need of anything, and they didn't know that they were wretched, and they didn't know that they were miserable, and they didn't know that they were poor, and they didn't know that they were blind, and they didn't know that they were naked.

That was a rebuke to the church of Laodicea. And so, recognizing your condition of the infirmity of sin is important to God.

And so, I thought, and I asked myself, was everyone that was in Jerusalem that had an infirmity at the pool?

And I would guess, I would venture to guess probably not. Not only do you have to recognize that you have an infirmity, you have to believe in the supernatural healing that God can provide.

See, not all those that had an infirmity in Jerusalem were there at that pool of Bethesda. But those that believed in the supernatural moving of the waters by the angel there, they were there.

And so, those that tried everything, they tried everything else. Those that found that no man could help them. Those that heard there were angels that could stir the waters, and they believed the stories of those that may have experienced that.

Or even if it was just a rumor of a chance that the angels could stir the water, and the first to step in would be healed. And so, those that believed in miracles were there.

In other words, those that had faith, they showed up to the pool of Bethesda. And it begins with recognizing that you have an infirmity, and then having faith that you can be healed in a supernatural way.

That's what needs to take place. And so, the truth of the matter is, that without faith you cannot be made whole. Hebrews 11 and 6 says, But without faith it is impossible to please Him.

For he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. Ephesians 2 and 8 says, For by grace you are saved through faith, and not of yourselves.

That it is a gift of God. Romans 5 and 1 says, Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Without faith we cannot please God. Without faith we cannot be saved, and we cannot be justified or have peace with God. It requires faith. Recognizing your need as a sinner in your sinful condition, and having faith that your condition will be healed in an encounter with Jesus is required.

And so, my question today is, Will you be made whole? Will you be made whole? Will you be made whole? When Jesus encountered the man at the pool of Bethesda, He provided the man with a prescription for his infirmity.

How many of you have ever gone to the doctor, and they check you over, and they diagnose you, and then they give you a prescription? Amen. Usually, if they're right about it, because that's why they call it practicing medicine.

Amen. They're just practicing, and hopefully they get it right on you. But they give you a prescription, and then you take it, and it will work or it won't. But God is not practicing anything.

Amen. Amen. When He shows up, and He gives a prescription, you can trust that that's going to be what you need to do. Amen. And that's exactly what happened to the man at the pool of Bethesda.

God in the flesh showed up, and He wasn't practicing anything. He gave him the prescription of what he needed for his infirmity. And Jesus saith unto him, Rise, take up thy bed, and walk.

It's in John 5, 8. He said, Rise, take up your bed, and walk. That was a prescription that Jesus gave. Jesus made him whole.

But look at the instructions Jesus gave him. He said, Get up, pick up, and walk. For 38 years, the man couldn't get up. And so to rise up from that condition, it would have taken a complete opposite mindset and a complete opposite action than that what the man had been doing for the last 38 years.

38 years. You have to try to put yourself in his shoes. 38 years of living and expecting one thing is a long time. But the mind had to be changed in an instant, regardless of the last 38 years of all the evidence and all the experience of 38 years of being in that condition.

It had to have been ingrained in him so deeply in his life. But in the moment, he had to change that. And so I want to compare that today with repentance.

For in him, there had to be a change of thinking and a change of action. That's exactly what repentance is. When we repent, there has to be a change of thinking.

There has to be a change of action. If we're going to be made whole, we have to have repentance. We aren't going to be made whole if we don't recognize, one, that we're sinners.

If we don't have faith to believe in the supernatural experience with God, and we don't repent and change the way that we think and the way that we act. We have to turn around and go the other direction that our life had been going.

We don't keep going the same way. We don't think the same way we used to think. We don't do the same things we used to do. Amen. It's a new day for us in Christ Jesus.

There has to be change in us. We have to repent. We have to rise up from the condition that we're in. Rise up above the sinful life that we used to live.

Your God is here to make you whole. Amen. And to free you from the infirmity of sin. And then the next part of this prescription, Jesus said, take right.

He said, rise up. And then he said, take up your bed. That bed is where you used to live and the way you used to live. When you're baptized in the name of Jesus for the remission of sins, it's like cancer.

It was like cancer. The sin was like cancer. When you have the infirmity of cancer, there's a prescribed treatment. And then there's a state in which the cancer is not active anymore in your body.

And it's called remission. And it's a term that you hear. There are cancers in remission. They're in remission. Remission means the signs and the symptoms of cancer have decreased or have disappeared.

And the cancer is responding to the treatment. Or in other words, the cancer is under control. It's under control. And for the cancer patient to hear that they're in remission, that's very positive news.

It doesn't mean that there's a full cure. They haven't been cured of cancer, but it's in remission. The potential still remains, but it is now under control.

It's under submission. It's in remission. And as long as we are in the flesh until that great glorious day of the Lord, when He returns for His church and for His bride, and we're transformed in a twinkling of an eye, and this mortal puts on immortality, and this corruptible puts on incorruption, and that twinkling of an eye, until that day comes, we're always going to have to live with the sin as part of the human condition.

Amen. You may have been baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of your sins, but as far as that goes, yes, it's under control. Amen.

The blood is covering it, but we're going to have to carry the bed. In other words, we're going to have to carry that condition with us still. I mean, we're still going to have to pick up that condition and walk with it.

We're not to live in that condition anymore. We're not to sleep in that bed anymore, but we're going to have to carry it with us, and the potential is always there, unfortunately, until that day comes that we're transformed.

And that is baptism in Jesus' name and your sins being remissed. Your sins are under the blood, but that doesn't mean that you're perfect. That doesn't mean that you've been transformed in the way that we're going to be.

And so you have to carry it, but the sin should be under control. And that man would have had to have been a fool to go back to the same condition.

He would have had to be a fool to go back to that pool of Bethesda and just, you know, I got used to sleeping there for 38 years on my condition. I'm going to take my bed and go sleep there. He would have to be a fool to do that, to go sleep in that bed.

He had been made whole in that situation. It would be a shame for you or for me who have experienced a miracle of God in our lives, who have had our sins put in remission by being baptized in the only saving name of Jesus Christ, to go back to the same conditions that we were miraculously saved out of.

We would have to be fools to do that. It would be a shame to do that. And so we have to rise up and we have to pick up that bed. Amen. Amen. We're going to have to carry it with us, but we don't ever want to go back to that condition.

And so he said, walk. He said, rise up, pick up that bed and walk. And we have been given a new life and we need to walk in that new life.

And we're to walk in the Holy Ghost. The baptism of the Holy Ghost is what gives us the power to walk in that new life. It's a miracle to be baptized with his spirit.

It's a gift from God and it gives us the power that we need to live an overcoming life. In Galatians 5 and 16, Paul said, walk in the spirit and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.

If you don't want to live in that condition anymore, we have to get, we have to rise up, we have to pick up that bed and we're going to have to walk. Amen. We're going to have to walk.

And we're going to have to walk in the spirit. Romans 8 and 13, for if you live after the flesh, you shall die.

But if you, through the spirit, do mortify the deeds of the body, you shall live. It is the Holy Ghost that gives us the power to put the infirmity of sin away and to live victory over that sin.

Rise up, pick up, and walk. Walk, repent, be baptized in Jesus' name for the remission of your sins and receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. Amen. Walk in the spirit.

The Holy Ghost gives you the power to deny ungodliness. It doesn't force you to. The Holy Ghost is not a possessor. It will not possess you and force you to do something that you're not willing to do.

But it gives you the power to do it. And so you have to choose to walk that way. But the Holy Ghost gives you the power to do it. And when you have the spirit of Christ in you, you can do all things through Christ.

It strengthens you. Amen. In Titus 2 and 12, it says, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world.

We're not left to fight our infirmity alone, but the spirit of Christ in us, we have the power to do it. Amen. In Jude 24, it says, now unto him that is able to keep you from falling and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy.

Amen. That's talking about the spirit of Christ in you. The life of the disciple of Jesus Christ is not complete, sinless perfection, but walking in the power of the Holy Ghost to refuse sin and walk in the spirit to overcome and to win.

Amen. It is the new birth experience. Because in 1 John 5, verse 4, it says, for whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world. And this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.

The same spirit who raised Christ from the dead dwells inside of us and gives us strength to say no to sin and to live for God.

Amen. Thank God for that today. After that encounter with Jesus that changed that man's life, an encounter I think we can all relate to in our encounters with God where he's changed our lives.

Jesus later on bumps into that man in the temple. And I'm glad that man went to the temple to worship God after he was brought out of that condition.

And we ought to be faithful and go into church after we encounter Jesus. But notice what Jesus tells them in John 5, verse 14. It says, Afterward, Jesus findeth him in the temple and said unto him, Behold, thou art made whole.

And he says, Sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee. And that's, I mean, that's a good warning. That's a little blunt.

And look, you've been made whole. Congratulations. You're not dealing with that infirmity anymore. Congratulations. Be thankful over that. And go and sin no more.

Because if you do, a worse thing is going to come on you. I don't know how you interpret that, but I interpreted that that was a very clear warning that although you have had a miraculous encounter and you have risen up out of your infirmity and you have taken up that infirmity and now you have the power over that infirmity, don't ever lose that power over your infirmity.

Don't let it go. Don't let the power of that infirmity go. Don't let the leading and guiding of the Holy Spirit go. Don't let that infirmity overtake you again because if you do, a worse thing is going to come upon you.

And it's just a few verses later that Jesus is teaching out of that whole context. It's just a few verses later that Jesus is talking about end times and judgment.

And he says, For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son, that all men should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father.

He that honoreth not the Son honoreth not the Father which hath sent him. So he's saying, yeah, you guys are looking at flesh covering a spirit, the Spirit of God.

You're looking at the Son and if you don't honor the Son like you would honor the Spirit, the Father, then, you know, that's not a good idea because all judgment, when we're judged, it's going to be of Jesus.

We're going to see Jesus judging us. Think about that. The judgment that you will face comes from the one that you had the encounter with. Amen. It's Jesus that saw your condition before.

It's Jesus that you had the encounter with. It's Jesus that performed the miracle in your life. It's the Spirit of Christ in you that you got. And then it's going to be Jesus alone that judges you based on how you lived after that encounter with him.

He's the one. Jesus is in every part of this thing and he sees it all. What you were before, what he did for you, and then what you did with that afterwards.

And that's what you're going to be judged by. In John 5, verse 27 and 29, it says, And hath given him authority to execute judgment also because he is the Son of Man.

See, we had to have a Redeemer that was kin to us as human. That's why he's called the Son of God because his Spirit was covered in flesh.

He was fully God and fully man at the same time. We had to have a kinsman Redeemer. And so that's what gives him the authority to execute judgment because he is not just the Son of God.

He's God. But he's the Son of Man. He was fully man. He experienced the same things that we experience as humans, but he was without sin.

And so it says, Marvel not at this for the hour is coming in which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice and shall come forth and they that have done good unto the resurrection of life and they that have done evil unto the resurrection of damnation.

And so, those that are going to hear the voice of Jesus in that first resurrection of life are going to be the ones that were led by his Spirit in their life.

Amen. Amen. Let's all stand. There were two encounters with Jesus that day and with that guy and I believe that in essence there are two questions although only one question was really asked.

You know, the first question Jesus asked him is will you be made whole? And then later in the temple inside, it's a statement but it's, there's really a question in that statement I think.

It says, he said when he gave him the warning you know, about going and sinning no more, I believe there's a second question in that to be asked and is that will, and the question is will you stay whole?

So, the first question that Jesus really asked him was will you be made whole? and I think in that statement Jesus gave him in departing because after that the Bible says he departed and I've looked all through scripture and I can't find any other reference to this man.

We don't know what happened after that. It just says that he departed and that he had told the Jews that Jesus healed him and so, but in that statement that Jesus gave him I just believe there's a question that's like will you stay whole?

And we don't know if he did or he didn't. So, my question today is, was will you be made whole? And similar to Jesus' second encounter with him later in the temple in essence I want to follow up that with the question is will you stay whole?

See, there's no further understanding if he did or not. But what, like I said, what a fool would he have to be or how shameful would it have to be that he would encounter Jesus like that in such a life-changing way and then just go back and, you know, depart and then go back to where he was and go back into things that he, type of person that he was in that situation.

And God doesn't want us going back where we came from after an encounter with him. When we have that encounter with him and our lives are changed, we need to be on that, that trajectory of continual change and what I've been calling apostolic advancement in our lives.

Amen. And so, 2 Peter 2, verse 20 says, For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, isn't that what we've done?

We've escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. It says, if they do that, they are again entangled therein and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than the beginning.

We're not to get entangled back into the things that we were delivered from. Is it not a, it's not a threat, it's a warning.

You know, and please hear the word of the Lord today. Do not go back. Do not get entangled in the things that God had once delivered you from or kept you from. before you encounter with, your encounter with Jesus, you had no choice.

You had no choice. You were, you were born into the infirmity of sin and death was the, the sentence that we had on all of us. But after your encounter, you rose up, you took up your infirmity and you walked and, and were born again.

Amen. I believe everyone here of, of, of the age of accountability has been born again. and, and, and we were given power over sin through the Holy Ghost.

So if we continue to live in sin, that's a choice that you're making now. See, before we didn't have a choice. But after you've received the gift of the Holy Ghost, now it's a choice because you have the power of Christ in you.

You have the power to overcome sin. You have the power to say no where you didn't have that before. And so if we continue in sin and living a life of sin, I'm not talking about making a mistake every now and then because, again, we're not perfect, but if you're going to continue to live in sin, that's your choice.

You're making that choice in the face of what God has done for you. Hebrews chapter 10 verse 26 to 27 says, for if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for the judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries.

See, my healer is also going to be my judge and I want to be thankful for the healing and I want to be thankful for what God's done in my life and I want to make the resurrection unto life.

If I'm dead and gone when that trumpet sounds, I want the voice of God in that trumpet to wake me up out of my grave. I want to hear the voice of the Lord, amen, when He comes back for His church.

I don't want to not be resurrected in that time and so I'm opening the altars today. If you would like to come and pray and I think it would be good today to consider our first encounter with Jesus, amen, that miracle healing encounter that we had that helped us in our infirmities of sin and has put us on a certain trajectory in life that's better than what we had before and that experience that we had of rising up out of that sin and picking up that sin and walking with it in the power of the Spirit, amen.

And so, yes, I want to be made whole. That's the answer to the question today. Yes, I want to be made whole and the answer to the second question is yes, I want to stay whole and is there anybody with me today, amen, that wants to be made whole and if you have been made whole, you want to stay whole, amen.

If that's you today, why don't we find a place to pray, amen, and let's connect with the Lord today before we leave today, amen. Let's connect this word to our hearts today. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.