This tape contains the seventh teaching in the series entitled, Empowered for Ministry. The speaker is the Rev. John W. Howe, Rector of Truro Episcopal Church in Fairfax, Virginia. The seventh teaching is titled, Miracles. The scripture reference is John 5, verses 1-19. 

Some of you have heard part of this teaching before. and that's okay. I think it bears repetition.

I believe the key, the key passage, or certainly one of them, regarding the ministry of Jesus is found in John chapter 5, and you might like to turn to that with me. We're studying the ministry of Jesus, in particular how, as he ministered, he exhibited the giftings, the manifestations of the Holy Spirit that are spoken about as for us. The gift of the Spirit that Paul mentions in 1 Corinthians, you find them being manifested in the life of Jesus.

And we've been going through that list, and we come to the gift of miracles. And, of course, miracles are many things, and they may overlap. Some of the other manifestations are gifts of the Spirit.

often a healing is a miracle as well. It's a healing in terms of healing somebody. It's a miracle in terms of it being assigned to that person and others.

And I think this passage is a key passage. And if you've heard any of the teaching that John Wimber has been doing, this is a key passage to his teaching as well. So I want to just kind of go quickly through this story and then come to what I consider to be one of the most important verses in the whole of the New Testament.

I'm starting at verse 2, John chapter 5, verse 2. It says, Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, in Hebrew called Bethzatha or Bethesda, which has five porticos. In these lay a multitude of invalids, blind, lame, paralyzed.

one man was there who had been ill for 38 years. When Jesus saw him and knew that he'd been lying there a long time, he said to him, do you want to be healed? Well, that might strike you as a very strange question.

That's the reason the man is there. The reputation of the place was that folks got healed there. Now, I don't know how much of that reputation was based on fact and how much of it was a kind of a legend that had generated and people wanted to believe it was so.

We know that there are things like that down through history. Folks have flocked to where healings have been reported and they hope they might get in on those healings. The legend was that from time to time an angel would come down from heaven.

You couldn't see him, but you'd see that he was there because the water of the pool was being stirred up. And whoever got into the pool first would be healed. now how many healings had taken place?

I have no way of knowing but folks believed that came great distances sometimes at great personal difficulty sometimes their families had to haul them there and they'd lay around this pool day after day hoping that they'd get into the water and that's what you see a multitude of folks blind, lame, paralyzed and this man had been paralyzed for 38 years how long has he been coming to the pool how does he get there folks bring him and leave him there all day long day after day i don't know how long he's been there but obviously the desire of his heart the deepest concern in his being is to be healed and jesus comes up to him says do you want to be healed funny question isn't it and yet i i'm not sure as i think about it that it is so strange because people sometimes say they want to be healed, and the truth of the matter is I'm not so sure. If you've ever been around long-term invalids, you know that folks begin to cater to them, begin to wait on them, begin to kind of make excuses when they're obnoxious, excuses you'd never make for anybody else. You sure you want to give that up?

Do you want to be healed? If you get healed, that means you've got to go to work. and start earning some bread and taking care of your family instead of them taking care of you, are you sure you want to be healed?

Notice the sick man's answer. He doesn't really answer the question. He doesn't say, yes, of course.

He implies that, but he doesn't say that. He says, sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is troubled, and while I am trying to get there, another steps down before me. Yes, I do want to be healed.

But notice he has a presupposition. It's got to be this way. This is the way God heals.

God has done it here in the past. This is the way he's going to do it here today. I can't be healed because nobody will help me into the pool.

Somebody else always gets there first. And Jesus said to him, it doesn't have to be that way. Rise, take up your pallet, and walk.

And I wonder what that man felt as he heard those words. I wonder if, for a moment, he was enraged. What, are you mocking me?

I just told you I can't move fast enough to get into the pool, and you're telling me to get up and walk? Can't you see I'm crippled? Ever strike you that Jesus doesn't seem to notice that kind of problem?

You know, I mean, this guy's been sick for 38 years, and he says, get up and walk. Another guy's walking around with his withered hand, and he says, stretch out your hand. You know, he doesn't notice the problem.

Says to Lazarus, come on out. The guy's been dead four days. Doesn't notice the problem.

I wonder if he thought that he was being mocked for just a moment. And then maybe he looked more deeply into the face of Jesus and something stirred inside him. This man has the power to pull it off.

And it says, At once the man was healed and he took up his pallet and walked. He took a risk there. He had to trust Jesus.

He had to trust that indeed he had the power to pull it off. He had to roll over off that sickbed and ease his weight onto his spindly little withered legs that hadn't supported his weight for nearly four decades. How can they possibly support his weight now?

Maybe they're going to crumple beneath him. Maybe he's going to hurt himself worse than he was before this all started. At best, he's going to be a laughing stock if this doesn't work.

you know faith is always like that faith is always taking the risk that Jesus is right in spite of the evidence and he dared to believe that Jesus had the power to pull it off and he took the risk and lo and behold those legs which hadn't moved in 38 years were suddenly strong and supple that's impossible that cannot happen you know if you strap your leg or your arms so that the joint doesn't move. It'll calcify in six months and you'll never move it again. This guy hasn't moved his legs in 38 years and immediately he's able to leap and dance and pick up his bed.

I'm interested that Jesus says, pick up your bed, because that's part of the sign. See, he could have just slipped into the crowd and disappeared and it wouldn't have been noticed, but he's carrying his bed around and that's calling attention to himself. Jesus did that very deliberately.

He wanted people to see this. And it was very provocative. I think that Jesus usually does that.

He usually gives back to us the thing that has supported us or the thing that we've been laying on. Have you noticed that? I mean, if you've had an alcohol dependency and Jesus heals you of it, more likely than not, he's going to give you a ministry to alcoholics.

He's going to tell you to pick that up and carry it. If you've had terrible problems in your marriage, Jesus is likely going to tell you to pick that up. You're going to have a ministry to other folks who are having trouble in their marriages.

That's part of the reason, I think. But the other part we read in the next verse. Now that day was the Sabbath.

Why couldn't Jesus heal folks on Tuesday? He goes out of the way to heal them on the Sabbath. And the Jews invariably get angry at that, and they accuse him of breaking the Sabbath.

He didn't break the Sabbath. He broke their understanding of the Sabbath. And I think he did it deliberately.

The Jews said to the man who was cured, It is the Sabbath. It's not lawful for you to carry your pallet. But he answered them, The man who healed me said to me, Take up your pallet and walk.

they asked him who is the man who said to you take up your pallet and walk now the man who had been healed did not know who it was I love that how many times have people been healed without realizing that it was Jesus for Jesus had withdrawn as there was a crowd in the place afterward Jesus found him in the temple and said to him see you are well sin no more that nothing worse befall you. That may imply that this paralysis was somehow the result of a sin previously. That's interesting.

Sometimes Jesus says this illness is not related to sin. You remember when they asked him about the blind man? Who sinned? This man or his parents? And he said it wasn't either one. It was that the glory of God might be revealed.

I think he's implying here that this may have been the result of sin. He says sin no more that nothing worse might befall you. What could be worse than 38 years of being an invalid?

Missing out on salvation could be worse than that. The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him. And this was why the Jews persecuted Jesus, because he did this on the Sabbath.

But Jesus answered them, My Father is working still, and I am working. I want you to see that Jesus is making two statements at the same time. First of all, over against their understanding of the Sabbath, Jesus says, This is the kind of thing my Father loves to do.

This is the work of my Father. My Father loves to heal people on the Sabbath. You have totally missed the point.

man wasn't made for the Sabbath but the Sabbath was made for man and God delights to heal people not only on Tuesday or Wednesday but on Saturday God loves to heal this is the work of my father but at the same time he's making a claim about himself in calling God my father he's claiming a relationship to God that was unique no good Jew would ever say that They might occasionally, very, very rarely, speak of God as the father of the nation, our father. But never my father. Because that would claim a oneness with God that as far as they were concerned was blasphemy.

And Jesus is either exactly who he claims to be or indeed this is the worst kind of blasphemy that he could ever speak. My father is working still and I am working. notice verse 18 this is why the Jews sought all the more to kill him because he not only broke the Sabbath but also called God his own father making himself equal with God and now the verse this leads up to what I consider to be one of the most important verses in the whole of the scripture this is Jesus answer to them truly truly the Son can do nothing of His own accord, but only what He sees the Father doing.

For whatever He does, that the Son does likewise. My Father is working. This is the kind of thing my Father does.

And He is my Father. And I, as the Son of God, can do nothing but what I see Him doing. Whatever the Father is doing, That the Son does likewise.

Now one point that Wimber makes over and over and over again in this ministry that we're learning about is that what we've got to do is we've got to see what God is up to. You know, what is God doing in this particular moment, in this particular need, in this particular person that asks our prayer? What is God doing?

We find out what God is doing and we'll agree with it. We'll begin to bless it. We'll put ourselves in line with what God is doing and then how can you lose?

I don't want to be doing one thing if God is doing another. But Jesus is making a blanket statement here. He says, I do nothing of my own accord.

Only what I see the Father doing. Whatever he does, that the Son does likewise. And I've thought about that.

In terms of the great miracle signs, the word miracle simply means sign. It points to something. it points to a conclusion the miracles of Jesus are pointing to the conclusion that he is who he claims to be if it's a healing it's a blessing to the person who's healed but it's also a sign to everybody who sees it and Jesus did other kinds of miracles and his miracle signs he says are of exactly the same nature and order as what the father is doing I began to think about that and suddenly that began to unlock scripture for me in a wonderful way I'll give you an example every year God sends the rain to refresh the earth and it sinks down into the soil and plants send down roots into the soil and they drink up that water and it comes up through the root system and through the trunk the center part of the plant and out into the branches and at the end of the branch it produces flowers and leaves and fruit.

And that takes a long time. That takes the whole growing season. And months go by, weeks and months go by.

And if it's a good season, there's a rich harvest of fruit. At the end of the growing season, we go out and we gather the fruit, whatever it might be. We go out in late September, October, and we gather grapes that have been produced over the whole course of the summer.

And then we squeeze the grapes and we get grape juice out of them. And then if you're Episcopalian, you put that away and you let that ferment a while. If you're like Willie, if you're a Baptist, you drink it right away, see?

But if you're an Episcopalian, you put that away in your cellar for a while and that grape juice takes more time and ferments into wine. Do you realize what has happened? in the course of weeks and months and sometimes years, water has been transformed into wine.

Only nobody noticed that it was a miracle. They say that's just the way it is. That's Mother Nature.

Or maybe they'll attribute it to Dionysius or Bacchus. Until God Himself in the person of His Son steps onto the stage of human history and does exactly the same thing in an instant. And suddenly the mask is off.

This isn't Mother Nature. This isn't Bacchus. This isn't Dionysius.

This is God transforming water into wine. Or every year we go out in the springtime and we scatter corn and wheat and barley. Now we could have taken that same corn and ground it into flour and it would have made a little bit of bread.

But instead of that, we scatter it on the ground and cover it up and once again, the rain falls and the sun shines and we weed out the weeds and it grows and it produces a crop and months go by and then we go out and we harvest the crop and a little bit of corn has become much corn. What would have been enough to feed a couple of people with a little bit of bread is now enough to make bread for a multitude. A little bit of bread has become enough to feed thousands.

Only nobody noticed it was a miracle because it took so long. You got it? Or else they attributed it to Ceres or Adonis or said it's Mother Nature until God himself steps onto the stage of human history and takes a little bit of bread and breaks it and breaks it and breaks it and breaks it and feeds a multitude.

And the mask is off. Every year a couple of fish get together. And two fish produce enough fish for a banquet.

That's no miracle, that's just the way it is. until God himself in the person of his son takes two fish and breaks them and feeds thousands. Every miracle of Jesus is like that.

I challenge you. Go through the scriptures and read them again. They are either things which God has been doing year in, year out from the beginning of our history or in a couple of occasions there are things that he says he will do at the end of this age such as Jesus' ability to walk on water and after the resurrection to go right through locked doors.

Jesus is the first fruits and we're going to have bodies like his. They're either miracles like unto what God has been doing or like unto what he promises to do. We have water turned into wine.

We don't have frogs turned into princes. We don't have witches turned into gingerbread. The Son can do nothing but what he sees the Father doing.

Whatever he does, that the Son does likewise. C.S. Lewis put it this way.

The miracle has only half its effect if it convinces us that Christ is God. It will have its full effect if, whenever we see a vineyard or drink a glass of wine, we remember that here works he who sat at the wedding party in Cana. when you're convinced that Jesus is who he claims to be, the miracle has had half of its effect.

When you begin to see the miraculous all around us constantly, then you enter into the other half of what that miracle was designed to demonstrate. St. Athanasius, way back in the 4th century, put it this way. He said, Our Lord took a body like to ours and lived as a man in order that those who had refused to recognize him in his superintendence and captaincy of the whole universe might come to recognize from the works he did here below that what dwelled in this body was the word of God.

Now, in this series of meditations, I've belabored the point that Jesus operated in the power of the Spirit, not primarily in the power of his divinity. And that that same anointing with power is available to us. Indeed, it's our birthright.

You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. That's been the main theme, the whole point of this series. Jesus operated in the power of the Spirit, And we too are promised that same empowering.

And yet now we see that in his ministry, Jesus performed signs and wonders that pointed to his divinity. That's the way people understood him, and that is clearly what Jesus wanted them to understand. Is there a disconnect here?

I want you to listen to several scriptures. Just listen. The Son can do nothing of his own accord what he sees the Father doing, that the Son does likewise.

For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing, and greater works than these will he show him that you may marvel. John 5, verses 19 and 20. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing, but I have called you friends.

For all that I have heard from my Father, I have made known to you. That's John 15, verse 15. Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in me will also do the works that I do, and greater works than these will he do, because I go to the Father.

Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. That's from the 14th chapter, verses 12 and 13. And then this, Son Jesus Christ and love one another just as he has commanded us.

All who keep his commandments abide in him and he in them. And by this we know that he abides in us by the Spirit which he has given us. 1 John 3 verse 19 and following.

And finally, see what love the Father has given us that we should be called the children of God. And so we are. That's not really a very helpful translation.

It's more like, can you imagine this? We're not only called God's kids, we really are. Utter astonishment.

It's an exclamation on John's part. Let me just put it together. The Father loves the Son and shows him what he's doing.

The Son loves the Father and does whatever he does. His works become miracle signs to us, demonstrating that he is who he claims to be, the Son of God. Jesus loves us and calls us his friends and shows us everything that he's doing.

We love Him, believe in Him, and do the works that He did under the same anointing of the Spirit that was His, and our works of faith and love become evidence that we are who we claim to be. Which is what? The same thing that He is.

Yes. Jesus' miracle signs point to His divinity. but that same anointing he promises to those who believe in him and we do the works he did and that is part of the proof part of the evidence that we are who we claim to be which is believe it or not really God's children not just in name only see what love the father has shown unto us that we should not only be called the children of God but we really would be his kids does that mean that if our prayers are not immediately answered in exactly the way we would wish that we're not his children of course not Jesus most poignant prayer of all was denied father if it be possible let this cup pass nevertheless he did mighty signs and wonders and he encourages us to dare to believe that we can do the same thing for exactly the same reason because the Father loves us, shows us what He's doing, empowers us by His Spirit, anoints us to move into the sphere of the miraculous as we keep our eyes upon Him, see what He's doing, and agree with it.

Father, how incredible that You would not only send Your only Son, for us but then you would invite us to become your sons and daughters just as he was just as he is how remarkable and that you'd invite us to share in his ministry let it be so to the praise of your name Amen.