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Jan 22, 2023
Loved | John 5:1-15
EVEN WHEN YOU’RE A WHINER
Some people seem to have a hard go while others seem to make their own life hard. It’s not always easy to know how to respond, especially when you’re close to the person and want their life to improve.
Jesus, as always, handles that situation brilliantly: affirming but not enabling; healing but not over-involved; calling forth new life and calling out sin. What a privilege it is to be the community known by his Name and empowered by his Spirit.
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John 5:1-15
- How comfortable are you visiting people in hospitals or funeral homes? What makes you so good (or bad) with being around people’s suffering?
- Why would Jesus ask: “Do you want to get well?” Wasn’t that self-evident?
- Some folks imagine that Jesus ‘appeared out of the blue’ but the truth is, his arrival was long-awaited. Read Isaiah 35:3-6. How, if at all, is your faith strengthened by Jesus being the fulfillment of many promises God made?
- What might Jesus be referring to when he says: “Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you”?
- Have you ever had to walk with someone going through a really tough patch in their life? What worked? What definitely doesn’t work when you’re in that role?
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Paul never recovered from God including the Gentiles in the salvation invitation.
Like some of us, perhaps, he felt like some people should be excluded by virtue of where they were born or how badly they have behaved.
More than included, Paul instructs that former ‘outsiders’ should be treated as precious insiders, treated even better than we would treat ourselves. What would it look like if love came to town?
Human beings need reminders about how to get along, and Christians are no exception. We especially need reminders about how to love each other while we disagree. Paul draws the believers' hearts and minds back to what Jesus has done, and that paves the way for loving each other well through conflict.
How do we live with Jesus in a society that opposes him? Paul tells us to wake up to our resurrection hope. When we do that, loving others and rejecting sin in our own lives makes sense.
Romans 12 is the description of what happens when God’s mercy overflows in a church’s life. Lifelong attitudes change, love becomes genuine, mocking enemies are not met with equal and opposite force but, quite the opposite, with peace and gentleness. Be praying even now for how God will speak uniquely to your small group.
All along, we’ve been saying that God’s heart is to see us INCLUDED. That’s why Jesus came, and that’s the subject of Paul’s letter to the Romans. At times, Christians forget God’s radical inclusion of them and go back to the old patterns of competing and comparing. Sadly, that was happening in the Roman Church. Paul has one powerful dose for that sickness.
The resurrection changed everything! The story includes an invitation, a blessing, and a commission for the first witnesses … and for us today.
