Do you want to be made well?

Sixth Sunday of Easter

May 26, 2019

Sermon Text: John 5.1-9

After Jesus healed the son of the official in Capernaum, there was a festival of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

Now in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate there is a pool, called in Hebrew Beth-zatha, which has five porticoes. In these lay many invalids– blind, lame, and paralyzed. One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be made well?” The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; and while I am making my way, someone else steps down ahead of me.” Jesus said to him, “Stand up, take your mat and walk.” At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk. Now that day was a Sabbath.

Back in the summer of 2013 I went on Sabbatical from my former parish.  My focus for that sabbatical was wellness – and my working definition for wellness was from the World Health Organization’s preamble to their 1948 constitution “a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity”.  And what this indicated is that wellness is not just for those in 100% good health, but also for those who have chronic illnesses and health challenges.  Wellness is different from being cured. I chose this topic because I had been working in the fitness field on and off since I was 20 years old.  I had been teaching yoga, Pilates, aqua aerobics, and Group exercise classes at our local health club called “The Wellness Center”.  I was also an associate at All Saints’ Church in Peterborough, NH.  And what I wanted to learn about during my sabbatical is the connection between wellness and spirituality.   So during that three month period, I attended the National Episcopal Health Ministries annual convention, I got certified as a personal trainer, I took my yoga teaching to a new level by getting an additional certification in teaching yoga to Veterans, particularly those with PTSD and Traumatic Brain injury, I made steps toward establishing a Parish Nursing program with two nurses from my parish, and I took Wellness Coaching training.  It was a wonderful, full, three months.

But today I want to talk a little bit about the contents of my Wellness Coaching training.  I learned about working with people who want to implement healthy changes in their life.  I learn how to help people make plans for their own changes, and I learned how to help people harness their own internal motivation to make healthy changes in their lives.  And I also, and probably more importantly, learned what does not help people to change.  More on that later.

And Jesus gives us a good example to follow in the area of Wellness Coaching.  The man who has been ill for thirty-eight years probably had a condition of atrophied limbs.  And it was believed at this pool by the sheep gate – called such because the sheep for sacrificial slaughter would enter through this northern gate to the city of Jerusalem destined for the temple – it was believed that when the water became stirred up from time to time the first one in received all of its curative powers. You had to get there first.  If you are interested in the background details – it was believed that the waters in these giant pools were stirred either by an underground spring or some kind of rudimentary plumbing.  These pools were the size of two Olympic size swimming pools with a barrier separating them.  I had always imagined this pool as being about the size of a hotel Jacuzzi.

And so, Jesus comes along and sees this man – and Jesus, whom the Gospel writer John refers to someone who knows the hearts of men, Jesus sees that this man has been lame for 38 long years.  And he says to the man “Do you want to be made well?”  This is a very important theological question.  What this question reveals is that although Jesus has Divine Sovereignty and can cure anyone totally and fully, there is an element of human responsibility. The man has to say yes to the healing. He has to assent.  And then Jesus, at the end, tells the man to sin no more or he may find himself ill again (that’s in a few verses after our lection ends today).  Now Jesus does not tell everyone not to sin so that they may be cured and stay well – but Jesus knows that this unnamed man, for him to stay well needs to refrain from sinning.

So, what does this have to do with Wellness Coaching?  It has everything to do with it.  In the Wellness Coaching world this sort of question “Do you want to be made well?” is what would be called “A Powerful Question.”  In coaching, the presumption is that most people in terms of making any changes in their lives, already have the knowledge, the resources, and the ability to make those changes.  Within that question there are a whole host of questions associated with it.  For example, implicit in this question is “Do you really want to change?”, “are you willing to give up what it takes to change your life around?”, “are the benefits you get for being the way you are, outweighing the change you seek to implement in your life.”

And one the images I remember most from this training is this: imagine a fence – the fence represents the decision.  And people will jump over the fence from yes, I want to make the change, to no, I’m not doing it.  And you know why?  Because change is hard. We all know that.  Here’s a staggering statistic that I learned in Clinical Pastoral Education 25 years ago – an abused partner on average will leave their abusive partner 7 times before they permanently leave. That’s how hard change is. 

I also learned that one of the fastest ways to get someone to change their mind about changing is if the coach, or their friend, or family member starts telling the person seeking to change exactly what they should be doing – because then, and this is complicated, but essentially you take their self-efficacy away.  They start thinking that they should change because you want it, rather than them wanting to change for themselves. Instead, we need to take Jesus’ lead and ask powerful questions. “Why do you want to be made well now?”, “Why do you want to change?”, “What’s the best way to support you in your change?”, “What do you need from me?”, “What’s your best resource for change?” and “how can I be a friend to you while you make these changes in your life?” Those sorts of questions empower people, they help people take control of their lives for themselves.  These sorts of questions help people tap into their creativity, their power, and their wisdom. We all know how futile it is to try to solve other people’s problems for them. We also all know how awful it is to have someone trying to be an expert in our own lives and telling us what we should and shouldn’t do. What’s our reaction to phrases like this: “Listen to me, this is what you should do…” It’s not to listen.

And so, I have talked a lot about helping others – what about ourselves?  When Jesus asks this man “do you want to be made well” I think it is completely legitimate to assume that Jesus asks us that exact same question.  What is it within yourself that is wanting to be made well, to be healed?  And the second follow up question is “do you really want to be made well?”  What is it going to cost you personally to eat better, to sleep better, to rest better, to get some exercise, to forgive, to get a toxic person out of your life, to manage an illness in the healthiest way possible, to grow toward God through prayer and study, to become more patient, to become more understanding – there is no shortage of things we could be made more well. Jesus gave us these lives and wants us to experience our lives of abundance and wellness – regardless of what life throws at us.

And what that means is that we really have to be thoughtful and deliberate about change, not aspirational.  And if we want to change we really need to think about where we are now, how are we lying in one of those figurative 5 porticoes at the pool of Bethzatha, and then to pray and think –  how are we going to get well? – what do we need to do within our power to get from A to B.

But here is another thing to consider.  And I cannot stress this enough. This whole operation of becoming well, which is a lifelong toil for all of us, this pursuit is one that Jesus wants to be a part of – I’m not sure the ill man could have made himself better all by himself – he needed Jesus to come along and help him – to tell him, you can be well, so just take up your mat and walk and stop sinning.  And that is available to us too.  Ask Jesus to help you, and pray for Jesus to help you, and pray for Jesus to help others whom you know who are struggling – so that in the midst of your and their despair, illness and struggle, we may have in our lives a sense of being well.