Death by Rules

John 5:6-10

When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?”  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 going another steps down before me.” Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.”  And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked. Now that day was the Sabbath. So the Jews said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to take up your bed.”

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Rules.

Everyone has them. State rules, city rules, traffic rules, dinner etiquette, church etiquette, sports rules. Some rules save lives by preventing and restraining foolish decisions. Like, don't drive the wrong way down a one way street. Some rules are outdated and should change with time and context. Like, don't eat pork (mmmm bacon). And other rules are actually quite deadly. That's what we see in John 5.

For example, when your Maker has shown up in the flesh and starts radically transforming people's lives, your first thought shouldn't be: "Well, we don't do things like that around here! Today is a special day, a religious day! No work allowed, even if it is powerfully loving and kind! No exceptions!"

I say this kind of rule is deadly because of how the passage continues:

And this was why the Jews were persecuting Jesus, because he was doing these things on the Sabbath. But Jesus answered them, “My Father is working until now, and I am working.”  This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God. (John 5:16-18)

Ah, now we see why breaking their rules would make them thirsty for blood. Those rules represented their pride, their self- righteousness, and everything that set them apart as God's special elite chosen ones. They had their identities wrapped up in these rules - to belittle the rule was treasonous to them. The rules had blinded them from the purpose of those rules, which was to point them to their holy and loving God.

Paul makes this contrast in 2 Corinthians 3:4-6. He shows us a way to be right with God apart from self-righteous devotion to arbitrary rules:

Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

The letter kills. We've seen that. But in John 5 we clearly see the life-giving Spirit at work in the healing act of Jesus.

Notice how he initiates the healing, how he notices the man, how this man was overlooked for years. Everyone had given up on him, but not Jesus. Notice how others got to the pool before him. The invisible hand of the free market was not going to do him any favors. But the visible hand of Jesus would.

I come away from this passage challenged. I don't want to fall into introspection, examining how I might be letting my rules and self-righteousness lead to being overly critical of others who are doing genuinely good and loving things. There's a time for that. But I want to run a away from the letter that kills and let the life-giving Spirit change and use me in new ways! I want to show initiating love to someone who is overlooked and undeserving. I want to be like Jesus in this way.

Lord, open my eyes today to the needs around me and use me to initiate the love of the Savior toward them in some concrete way.