Change: Its Not What You Expected

"We've got to get rid of her. She's changing things."

A dear friend of mine recently overheard a couple of women in the church talking about her new leadership role in worship service. I'm sure you can imagine how this hurt. What is it about change that causes us to turn on one another?  Why do we resist it so violently? To answer this, I want to examine a passage found in the book of John.

        Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep market a pool, which is called in the Hebrew tongue
        Bethesda, having five porches.  In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt,
        withered, waiting for the moving of the water.  For an angel went down at a certain season into 
        the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in 
        was made whole of whatsoever disease he had.  And a certain man was there, which had an
        infirmity thirty and eight years.  When Jesus saw him lie, and knew that he had been now a long
        time in that case, he saith unto him, "Wilt though be made whole?" The impotent man answered
        him, "Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool: but while I am
        coming, another steppeth down before me." Jesus saith unto him, "Rise, take up thy bed, and
        walk." And immediately the man was made whole, and took up his bed, and walked: and on the
        same day was the sabbath." John 5:2-9 (KJV, emphasis mine)

There's something about verses two and three that would be easy to miss. First, I find it interesting where this pool is located: "by the sheep market," a place where sheep are gathered together. Think how often God's people are symbolized by sheep in Scripture, and where is that we gather?  In our churches, of course. Second, consider who is found there: the impotent, the blind, the halt (lame), the withered.  And, though we hate to admit it, how many of us in the church feel just like that? Powerless. Unable to see our lives clearly.  Facing roadblocks. Limping along. Faltering in our faith. Withering away inside where no one else can see.

And we are waiting, aren't we?  "Waiting for the moving of the water." Waiting for our lives to get better, for our infirmities to be healed, for the long-awaited answer to our prayers. We have this idea that if we wait patiently enough, God will eventually see fit to answer the way we want him to.

But what if we are missing something in the waiting? Look again at verse 4; I put it in italics so you wouldn't miss it (in fact, to read this verse in the NIV or ESV translations, you will have to look in the footnotes). You see, there's something troubling about it.  We want to cling to the idea that God "leads [us] beside still waters" (Psalm 23:2).  And, at times, he most certainly does.

But what about those times that God troubles the waters instead?

Most of us are probably like the man in the story.  We've been waiting so long, that when the waters begin to move, we don't.  We've been waiting with our need, our infirmity, that never seems to get fixed, and, in all truth, we've lost hope.  We pretend its faith and patience that keep us waiting, but really, we've settled for trying to get comfortable.  We like to think that we are still joining there because that's where the power is, but far too often, we've simply found comfort in being around others where our infirmity seems normal.

That's why, when God starts making waves, we get uncomfortable!  There are those around us who have not lost hope yet.  They sense the Holy Spirit moving, and they start moving.  They wake up, come alive, step out, and it jostles us.  Forces us out of feeling comfortable - like being awakened for school in the morning with ice cubes (I should thank my mom for the analogy. Never thought that experience would be put to good use. 😉).

Again, like the man in the story, all this jostling serves to do is remind us that we've not received our healing yet. Our prayer is still unanswered. And, though, in many cases we try to be happy for them, we typically wind up feeling left out, dissatisfied, defeated, and more alone.  No wonder we violently resist change!

What if, instead, we chose to change? What if, when the Spirit started moving, we were ready?  What if, instead of thinking I'll just get as comfortable as I can here, we thought, God's shown up before, and he'll do it again; this time I'll be watching. Because that's what Jesus does.  He shows up. His heart is for you.

I said, Jesus's heart is for you. Don't read past that without taking time to let it register in your heart.  It could very well be that on some level you accept Jesus's heart is for you, but you believe as though if that were true, things would be different. The thoughts of our heart will determine our behavior.

If you doubt that Jesus wants to show up for you, consider how he responded to the impotent man in the story.  This man was powerless to act on his own (Many of us know that feeling.  We've given it our best shot, done all we knew to do, and things still haven't changed.  Perhaps they've even grown worse.). Jesus looks at the man with compassion, knowing exactly how long he'd been waiting. He could have rebuked him for giving up.  He could have walked on by, shaking his head at the man's lack of faith without saying a word.  Instead, he shows up.  He speaks life into this man's spirit.  He answers the man's prayer, one that had long ago stopped being uttered.   Jesus heals him, though the man had exchanged his hope for self pity, his gratitude for complaints. Jesus heals him, not because of anything the man had done, but because of Who Jesus is. He brings change because he loves the man too much to leave him trapped in the way things have always been.

If I may, let me point out that Jesus doesn't give the healing in the way the man expected.  He doesn't send someone else to help the man into the water.  He doesn't even use the water!  Again, Jesus is operating within change.  Ask anyone...this wasn't the way things were normally done beside the pool.  If we are going to experience healing, we've got to stop expecting God to do it our way.  As he says in Isaiah 55:8-9, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts."  God is beyond our understanding. He defies all our expectations.

You'd better start expecting change to come.  Why?  Because when God moves, it will change everything. When God moves, you have two choices: you can rejoice, or you can resent.  The man in our story had reason to rejoice, and honestly, everyone should have rejoiced with him.  But if you read further in James chapter 5, you'll see the resentment.  Notice verse nine ends with the information that Jesus healed the man on the sabbath.  Certain Jewish leaders didn't appreciate this change in their customs; thus, they opposed Jesus.  In fact, read verse 18, and you can pretty much hear them say:

"We've got to get rid of him. He's changing things."

Whether you like it or not, things are going to change, because when God shows up, things don't stay comfortable. Depending on your heart, you will react to change with either humility or with pride. I guess the real question is, "Which are you lining up for?" 

         The line to receive the healing?                                            Or the line for the execution?
       
You see, change isn't what you expected.  Its not a choice of being comfortable or not. Its not your choice at all. Change has its origin in the will of God, not the will of man.  When the water moves, the only choice is whether you will flow with it, or resist the flow. The first option comes with power. The second with defeat.  There is no in-between.