Health Care at Bethesda General (John 5:1 -6ff)
Friday, November 20 2009 @ 03:29 PM EST
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The Rev. Dr. H. Beecher Hicks, Pastor, Metropolitan Baptist Church, Washington, DC It was a hospital the likes of which you have never seen. And they came because this hospital was their last hope. It didn’t start out as a hospital – it was really intended as a health spa, the kind with natural whirlpools and soothing baths – but it wound up that way, a gathering place for the hurting and the helpless. This is where they came – some incurable, some contagious, some cancerous, some terminal, some with malignancies, all suffering with the peculiar infections, fevers and odors associated with suffering and the indignities of human filth. This is where they came for there was really nowhere else to go. And they called it Bethesda General but it was a hospital the likes of which you have never seen.
John is the one who tells this story. He tells it better than most. He sort of folds it in along with the rest of the stories he tells about some strange goings on in and around Jerusalem.
He starts off, as you know, with the story of a wedding reception down in a little place called Cana of Galilee. I don’t know how it happened but it turns out when the wine ran out Jesus took six water pots and turned water into wine. No doubt, that’s when somebody said, ‘Let’s get the party started!’
While He was on His way he stopped by the home of a preacher named Nicodemus. He woke him up at midnight; Nicodemus still had his preaching robes on. And Jesus wanted to talk with him over the issue of whether preachers needed to be saved. Jesus wanted to raise an issue with this preacher on the subject of preaching without conversion. The conversation didn’t last very long. All He said was, “Nicodemus, you must be born again.” (3:3)
It wasn’t long after that Jesus found Himself in a city of the Samaritans, one Sychar by name. He wound up out by the well in the center of the city at high noon holding a conversation with the local prostitute. We do not have a complete transcript of their conversation. We do know, however, that He asked her for water but she told Him He had nothing with which to draw. And that’s when it started. He read her like a tabloid. Got all down in her business, told her about her husbands, and then raised some questions about who she was shacking with now. And when it was all over the last time we saw her she was running through town shouting as she went: “Come see a man which told me all things that ever I did!” (4:29)
That’s why John begins anew in the fifth chapter of his writings with the words: “After this…” This story John tells has context. It’s after the wedding and the wine, after a midnight meeting with Nicodemus, after an encounter with that sordid Samaritan woman, it’s after all of this that Jesus makes his way to Jerusalem and on His way He stops by the Bethesda General Hospital.
And what He saw was disturbing. No doubt, He had seen sickness before. But this gathering at the Pool called Bethesda General was something exceptional. John does not call them by name but he does call them by condition. First of all, says John, you must understand that this is not a minor gathering. What we have here is a “multitude.” Make no mistake about it, this health care issue is not one man’s issue, there’s a multitude out there. And John calls them one by one: the impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water.” (5:3)
You must understand who these folk are. They would not have been there if they had any choice. Their situation of sickness was not one that they chose.
They were there because there were more patients than there were doctors.
They were there because they had no money to buy the treatment they needed.
They were there because poverty made them patients.
They were there – at the Baths of Bethany – because their insurance had lapsed or because the health care providers they had never seen had declared them ineligible for the treatment they required.
They were there – a Bethany General – because the insurance company had decided that because of pre-existing conditions they were not qualified for coverage.
They were there because they needed more than emergency triage; what they really needed was intensive care.
They were there because everyone else had walked away and now they had nowhere else to turn.
They were there because they had heard a rumor that over by Bethesda there is a pool of water.
Over by Bethesda – they thought it was a hospital but it really was just a pool of water.
Over by Bethesda there’s a pool of water and rumor has it that every once in a while an angel comes down and stirs up the water. I don’t have your attention.
Over by Bethesda there’s a pool of water and rumor has it that every once in a while an angel comes by and troubles the water and whoever steps down first into the water will be made whole.
Now then I come today with the Bible in one hand and with the Newspaper in the other. There is this issue of health care reform that is abroad in the land and the prophet in me says that something needs to be said. The church cannot be silent; preachers cannot hush their mouths. Authentic prophets are called to speak to God on behalf of man; but more especially are they sent to speak to man on behalf of God. Authentic prophets must speak because the issue before us is more moral than monetary and more ethical than political. I stand today, I tell you, with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other, confident that ultimately God’s word will speak to man in tones than cannot be avoided and must not be escaped.
The careful exegete among you will be swift to detect that the meaning of John’s writing is never on the surface but is hidden deep beneath the soil of this word. When John speaks of “the impotent, the blind, the halt and the withered” he is not addressing the issue of a few people whose maladies are obvious. He speaks of them not because of whom or what they represent individually but because of what they represent collectively. The crisis of their health care was not indicia of their isolated pain but an unmistakable sign that not only they but the nation was sick. “The impotent, the blind, the halt and the withered” – all represented the magnitude of the misery faced by the nation. Those who gathered in the hospital in Bethesda were, by their very presence, a judgment upon the nation. And as long as the impotent, the blind, the halt and the withered were permitted to remain where they were, as they were, not only they but the nation would be seen as invalids – or, to say it differently, the nation would be in-valid.
And may I pause long enough to tell you parenthetically that when you see the patient list – the impotent, the blind, the halt and the withered – you might as well go ahead and put your name in there as well. You might be hale and hearty now but I thought I ought to rise to tell you that sickness is on the way. You may be young and handsome, fat and fine, but somebody needs to tell you that the day will come when you find yourself sick in your body, sick in your mind, sick in your spirit, and the health care you need will be the health care you cannot find.
Did I tell you that when you read John 5 you will detect that the meaning of John’s writing is never on the surface but is hidden deep beneath the soil of this word? Come here for a minute! I know where I am but is it alright if we have church in here?
There’s a multitude that is sick. Their pain is not individual; their pain is collective. The sickness of the multitude is but a visual demonstration of the sickness of the nation. They have come from every quarter and what they want is to make their way to the water.
You didn’t understand. I need to get your attention. There’s a multitude that is sick. Their pain is not individual; their pain is collective. The sickness of the multitude is but a visual demonstration of the sickness of the nation. They have come from every quarter and what they want is to make their way to the water. And do not miss the point that there is symbolism in the water. The one thing with which all Israel was familiar was water.
In the morning of creation God brought life to His garden when He showered it with water.
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