Do You Want to Be Healed?
John 5:1–9
Bartimaeus was blind, sitting by the roadside, and crying out for mercy.
The man at the pool of Bethesda had been in his condition for thirty-eight years, waiting for someone to help him get into the water.
Both men needed something.
Both men needed healing.
Both men encountered Jesus.
But their approach was completely different.
Bartimaeus heard Jesus was passing by and immediately began to cry out:
“Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”
The crowd told him to be quiet, but he cried out even more.
He did not wait for someone to advocate for him.
He did not wait for someone to carry him.
He did not wait for the perfect conditions.
He used what he had.
His voice.
His faith.
His desperation.
But in John 5, Jesus approached a man who had been sick for thirty-eight years and asked him a very direct question:
“Do you want to be made well?”
And instead of simply saying yes, the man began explaining why it had not happened yet.
“I have no one to put me into the pool…”
Now, let’s be honest.
That was a real barrier.
He had a real condition.
A real limitation.
A real reason to feel stuck.
But Jesus did not ask him who failed him.
Jesus asked him if he wanted to be healed.
And that question still confronts us today.
Because sometimes we can become so familiar with our condition that we start defending the very place God wants to deliver us from.
We explain it.
We rehearse it.
We blame people for it.
We build our identity around it.
And if we are not careful, our pain becomes our language.
Have you ever been around someone who constantly complains?
“I can’t do this.”
“I can’t do that.”
“Nothing ever works out for me.”
“People never help me.”
“If it wasn’t for bad days, I wouldn’t have days at all.”
After a while, you almost want to ask:
Do you want to be healed?
Do you want to get better?
Do you want to move forward?
Because although healing belongs to God, our posture still matters.
Our attitude matters.
Our approach matters.
Our willingness matters.
Our faith matters.
Bartimaeus could not see, but he still cried out.
The man at the pool could not get himself into the water, but Jesus was standing right in front of him.
And sometimes that is us.
We are waiting for a person.
Waiting for the right opportunity.
Waiting for perfect conditions.
Waiting for someone to notice.
Waiting for someone to do what only Jesus can do.
But Jesus is asking:
Do you want to be made well?
Not do you have a reason.
Not did people fail you.
Not has it been hard.
Not have you been waiting a long time.
Do you want to be healed?
Because if the answer is yes, we have to be willing to respond differently.
We may have to stop rehearsing the excuse.
We may have to stop waiting on people.
We may have to stop making our condition our identity.
We may have to stop sitting in the same place, saying the same thing, expecting something different.
Jesus told the man:
“Rise, take up your bed and walk.”
In other words, get up from the place that has held you.
Carry what used to carry you.
Move.
That is powerful.
The mat that once represented his limitation became evidence of his healing.
And that is what Jesus can do.
He can take the very thing that marked your stuck place and turn it into testimony.
So yes, cry out like Bartimaeus.
But when Jesus gives instruction, get up like the man at the pool.
Don’t just want healing.
Respond to the Healer.
The question is not whether Jesus has power to heal. The question is: do you want to be made well enough to get up?
Share this with someone who needs to stop rehearsing the excuse and start responding to Jesus.