Focus

Experience silence in the midst of your busy day. Take some time to relax into a time to be with God.

---

Read

John 5:1-9 (NRSV)

After this 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.

---

 

Reflect

Two people I know each survived a cardiac arrest last fall—the first is my mother, who at age 82, had the good fortune to be in an emergency room when her heart stopped. The odds of surviving a cardiac arrest aren’t very good under any circumstances, but the emergency room certainly presents the best advantage. The other survivor I know is a dear friend who was working in the church kitchen at our regular Wednesday evening fellowship dinner when his heart stopped. Fortunately, an observant person recognized what was happening and called for help. Others sprang into action—someone called 911, someone went for the Automated External Defibrillator device, two people began CPR, and someone else escorted the children outside to play.

As poor as the odds of surviving a cardiac arrest in the hospital are, surviving one in a church fellowship hall are even worse—like the odds of the disabled man, who could not manage to get to the stirred-up waters of Beth-zatha before someone more agile stepped in to claim the healing. But the man at the pool was healed without ever setting foot in the water when Jesus intervened.

Despite the poor odds, my friend was saved; by the time the emergency help arrived, his heart was in rhythm and he was awake and alert. My mother’s recovery and my friend’s recovery are no less miraculous than the healing of the man at Beth-zatha, and no less accountable to Jesus’ loving mercy.

---

Pray

Merciful and loving God, thank you for the miracles you work in our lives every day, and for the people through whom you do miraculous things. I know that every good thing comes from you, no matter what hands and equipment and medicines are engaged. Open my eyes to the miracles I witness, the miracles I experience, and the miracles you do through me. Amen.

Go with God.