A Warning to the Restored
H. Harris, B. D. John 5:1-18 After this there was a feast of the Jews; and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.… We are not told what the effect was of this warning; whether it restrained the man, as it was intended to do, to a moderate enjoyment of his restored health. But, for the sake of illustration, let us suppose that he did not profit by Christ's warning, but that he made the most, as it would be called, of his newly acquired health and strength; that he let himself loose in the enjoyment of everything that came within his reach; that he gave free play to the long pent-up desires of his youth, just like one who has unexpectedly come into the possession of a large fortune which he sees no bounds to, and accordingly determines to enjoy to the uttermost, so that he comes again to the old disease. And now let us compare his second illness with his first. As far as his mere bodily state is concerned, we may imagine him to be in much the same condition as when he lay by the side of the pool of Bethesda, waiting for the stirring of the waters. But what must be the state of his feelings now in this second stage of his infirmity, compared with what they were before? What a use to have made of Jesus Christ's great kindness to him and of His words of warning; what an end to bring himself to after having thus come close to his Deliverer; how bitterly would he repent of ever having been healed; how he would wish with all his heart that he had gone through life the impotent cripple that he was when Jesus Christ first met with him! I may seem to be putting an unlikely case, but, indeed, it is a far too common one. Some of us have had occasion to thank God for a recovery from a bad accident or dangerous illness; after weeks, or perhaps months. of pain or weakness, we have, by God's blessing, got quite strong and well again, and have gone about our old occupations and amusements as before; we have felt an increased delight in everything, from the very fact of having been for a time deprived of it all. Well, then, on every such occasion Jesus Christ meets us with the same warning which He addressed to this man, "Behold,. thou are made whole; sin no more, lest," etc. He has given you your health again, or rather, He has lent it to you again, on certain conditions. And the chief of these is, that you should make a better use of your powers than you did before, that you should spend them more freely and heartily in His service. He sent you your sickness because He saw you making a bad use of your health; He sends you health again, that you may have an opportunity of showing that you have learned the lesson which your sickness was sent to teach you. But if you go on after your recovery just as you did before, if you still go on living to yourself and to your sins, and not to God, then you must expect this worse thing to come to you, of which your Saviour has warned you. And it will be well for you if God, in His mercy, sends you a still severer sickness, or still heavier misfortune, to force you away from your sinful enjoyment of this life, and to make you at least, give the days of your sickness to God, since you will not give Him the days of your health. But there is a worse thing still in store for us, if we neglect to hear Jesus Christ when He calls us. We may go through life with all our powers of body and mind in their full strength; we may enjoy all that this world has to give us, down to the very dregs; we may go down at last to the grave with no sign of the fulfilment of Christ's warning; and then it is reserved for the warning to fulfil itself in all its awfulness in another world than this. Oh, may none of us have to wait for this worst thing of all to happen to us; let us beseech God to visit us with every kind of suffering here, rather than leave us to bear the accumulated weight of our sins in eternity. (H. Harris, B. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: After this there was a feast of the Jews; and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. WEB: After these things, there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.