Do you want to get well?

God first posed that question to me in 1995. The church I was attending then, MCI, had invited Sadhu Sundar from Jesus Ministries to preach and he spoke on John 5:1-15 (Jesus heals the Man at Bethseda Pool). Recently, SJSM has been doing the Book of John again and this passage was one of those picked for discussion in my cell group. It has been many years later, but again I felt God asking me the same question - "Do you want to get well?"

When I first read the passage in John, my reaction was - what a strange question! Surely Jesus knew the man wanted to be healed? He had been lying beside the pool at Bethseda for 38 years, surely for no other reason but the desire to get well! In fact, my initial reaction was one of admiration for this man who had waited so patiently for God to come and heal him.

But when Sadhu Sundar spoke I realised that there was an important point to Christ's question - Do you want to get well? Jesus knew He could heal the crippled man, but He also wanted the man and His disciples to understand that beyond the physical healing, there is an emotional and spiritual healing that needs to take place. While we pray asking God to deliver us from some situation or other, many times we are not ready to face the real cripple inside us.

Many of us pray for something over and over again and think that it is not God's will when something we pray for does not materialise. Yes, some things we desire are not according to God's will. But when God does speak, like the unerring Physician He is, He puts His finger right on the spot. Do you want to get well? Do you want to invite God into the situation or are you happier licking your wounds? Do you want to get well or are you actually happier being a suffering victim and enjoying the sympathy of others?

Do you want to get well? It is a searching question and if we want to grow as God intends us, we need to press in and look for the answer. Do I want to do something about the situation or am I in a way really not doing anything about it because it gives me something to gripe about, to feel sorry for myself, to complain about, to blame my bad mood on?

Do I want to get well? Because like the crippled man at Bethseda, when God sets me free from the trapped situation I am in, I will no longer be able to whine "Sir, I have no one to help me into the pool". I will no longer be able to blame someone else for my situation and say "While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me." I will no longer receive sympathy and no one will say what a brave Christian I am. So maybe, there is a part of me that is not really asking God to heal me, because I am secretly enjoying my crippled state?

Then, when I am healed, there is another difficulty - Jesus will say "Get up! Pick up your mat and walk!" What will that mean to me? After years of lying there feeling sorry for himself, the crippled man had to act. He had to demonstrate that he was healed. That means - no more excuses! No more postponing of what God has called me to do. No more telling God, "I will do this after..." or I will do this when I am ...". I will have to give God the glory and share His power and love with others. I will have to pick up my mat, the symbol of my crippled state, my pain and shame and walk that all may see God's work in me. Am I ready for that public gaze into my life?

Do you want to get well? The question has made me re-think about all my prayers & requests. To dig deep and ask God to search me and show me my thoughts and prayers for what they really are.