Scripture Reading: John 5
In this chapter we will continue to consider the traditional signs in John 5.
John 5:2 says, “Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda, having five porticoes.” The first sign mentioned in this verse is that of the Sheep Gate. The Sheep Gate, one of the gates of the city of Jerusalem, signifies the door to traditional religion’s sheepfold (10:1). This was the gate for the people of God, who are His sheep, to enter into the fold for protection. The city of Jerusalem was a sheepfold to protect God’s people. Jerusalem with the Sheep Gate is also a sign. Only Christ, the living Son of God, can be the reality of what this sign depicts. Christ is our gate and also our city. In John 10:7 the Lord Jesus said clearly, “Truly, truly, I say to you that I am the door of the sheep.” Then in verse 9 He again said, “I am the door.” Christ is the door not for the sheep to go into the fold but for them to come out of the fold. Because we have Christ as our Shepherd, we do not need the fold. Christ is the gate, the door, for us to come out of the fold and enjoy Him as our pasture.
The pool of Bethesda in 5:2 is also a sign. Bethesda means “house of mercy,” and the pool of Bethesda was the traditional place to receive mercy. The pool of Bethesda signifies that the religious people, who tried their best to keep their religion, realized their need for God’s mercy. This pool signifies that the real house of God’s mercy is the living Son of God.
John 5:2 says that the pool of Bethesda had five porticoes. These porticoes were shelters to cover the needy ones. Under these shelters were those who were sick, blind, lame, and withered. The number five denotes responsibility, and the five porticoes here signify traditional religion’s shelter depending on man’s responsibility.
We have seen that these five porticoes sheltered the needy ones. Under the law we are those who are sick, blind, lame, and withered. Now that Christ has come, we are no longer under the law, and we do not need the porticoes to shelter us. The man who was sick for thirty-eight years needed the porticoes to cover him. But after the Lord healed and enlivened him, he could carry his bed, and he no longer needed to lie under the cover of the portico.
Verse 3 says, “In these lay a multitude of those who were sick, blind, lame, and withered, waiting for the moving of the water.” This multitude signifies that under the shelter of traditional religion there are many needy people who lack the life supply.
Verse 4 speaks of an angel of the Lord: “An angel went down from time to time in the pool and stirred up the water; the first then to step in after the stirring up of the water was made well of whatever disease he was being held by.” Here the angel signifies the agent through which the law was given (Gal. 3:19, 21), but which could not give life. Angels occupied an important position in the Jewish religion.
Here in John 5:4 we are told that the angel went down into the pool from time to time and stirred up the water. But this stirring up by the angel was not any help to the impotent man, for he could never be the first one to step into the pool after the stirring up of the water. He could not fulfill the requirement to be healed. This indicates the inadequacy of trying to keep the law. The law is complete and perfect, but it cannot give life to the impotent. In the sight of God the impotent man was dead. The law can do things for us under certain conditions and as long as certain requirements are fulfilled. But how can a dead person fulfill the requirements of the law? No matter how often the angel came and stirred up the water, this stirring up would not be effective for a dead person. A dead man cannot be helped by the stirring up of the water by an angel. He can be helped only by the Son of God who enlivens us and gives us life. The Son of God does not come to stir up the water; He comes to give life.
The stirring up of the water is also a sign. This is a sign of traditional religious practices to make people perfect. The stirring up of the water to make people well signifies the traditional practices of religion that attempt to make people perfect. We should not put our trust in any traditional practices. It is possible to have such practices even in the church life. In your church life you may depend on a particular practice to “stir up the water,” with the thought that this practice will make you perfect. Actually, no practice can help us to be perfect. The only One who can perfect us is Christ, the living Son of God, who enlivens us.
John 5:10 says, “The Jews said to the one who had been healed, It is the Sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to take up your mat.” The Sabbath is a sign of the religious way of rest. The Sabbath, a day of rest, is surely something good. But for the man who had been impotent for thirty-eight years, there was no rest, not even on the Sabbath. Who could give him rest and be his real Sabbath? The only One who could give him this rest was the living Son of God.
It is significant that the Lord Jesus healed the impotent man on the Sabbath day. But the Jews told the one who had been enlivened by the living Son of God that it was not lawful for him to take up his mat on the Sabbath. To them, it was wrong for him to do the work of carrying his mat on the Sabbath day. No doubt, the man who had been healed was happy to carry his mat. He had been carried by that mat for thirty-eight years, and now that he had been healed, he was able to carry it instead. What kind of law forbade him to carry his bed on the Sabbath? Such a law was not an enlivening law but a killing law. The one who had been healed said to the Jews, “He who made me well, that One said to me, Take up your mat and walk” (v. 11). When they asked him who had told him to do this, he answered that he did not know who it was (vv. 12-13).
This incident shows how religion contradicts the activities of the living Son of God. Whatever the Lord Jesus Christ does is condemned by religion. The religion that condemned Him in John 5 was not a heathen religion or a religion of mixture such as that practiced by the Samaritans. Rather, it was the pure, typical religion practiced in Jerusalem. But even this genuine religion contradicted the living activity of the Son of God.
We should not think that because the church life is real and genuine and not a mixture, it in itself can do something for us. Not even the church life in the Lord’s recovery in itself can do anything for us in life. Jesus Christ Himself is the only One who can do everything for us and be everything to us in life.
After the sign of the Sabbath we have the sign of John the Baptist (vv. 33-35). We may say that John the Baptist became for the Jews a sign who was both traditional and new. The Lord said concerning John the Baptist, “He was the lamp that was burning and shining, and you were willing to exult for a while in his light” (v. 35). This indicates that he was their temporary religious trust. For a while, the Jews went to John the Baptist, but they would not come to the living Son of God. John the Baptist came to introduce this living One to them. Nevertheless, they stayed with John the Baptist, but they did not receive the One concerning whom he testified. This means that they took John as a replacement for Christ and accepted John, but they would not receive Christ, the real One.
In principle, a similar thing happens today when Christ is replaced. Many things that have been used by God have become replacements of Christ. This is true of persons as well as things. To some people, Christian leaders like Martin Luther and John Wesley have become a replacement for Christ. As John the Baptist was taken in place of Christ by the Jews, so today certain Christian leaders are taken by Christians as replacements of Christ Himself.
John 5:39 says, “You search the Scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is these that testify concerning Me.” The Scriptures are the holy Word of God. But even the Word of God can be taken as a replacement of Christ. This was the reason the Lord told the Jews that they searched the Scriptures, thinking that in them they could find eternal life, but they were not willing to come to Him for life. Apart from Christ, the living Son of God, not even the Scriptures can give us life.
If it is true that not even the Scriptures can give us life apart from Christ, it is all the more true that the Life-study messages cannot give life apart from Him. I am somewhat concerned that those who have received much help from these messages may, at least to some extent, put their trust in these messages instead of in the Lord Himself. Certain ones may read the Life-study messages without directly contacting the Lord. In such a case, these messages would be taken as a replacement of Christ. But not even the Scriptures, and certainly not the Life-study messages, should ever be used to replace Christ.
In 5:45 and 46 the Lord Jesus spoke to the Jews concerning Moses: “Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father; there is one who accuses you: Moses, in whom you have set your hope. For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote concerning Me.” The person of Moses is also a sign, a sign of a constant religious trust. John the Baptist was a temporary religious trust, but Moses was a constant religious trust. In principle, we may have our own religious trusts today, both temporary and constant. For example, someone may have a temporary trust in the Life-study messages and a constant trust in the writings of Paul. But neither the Life-studies nor Paul’s writings are Christ Himself, and they should not ever replace Him.
The last sign in chapter 5 of John is that of the searching of the Scriptures. This is a sign of the religious way to find eternal life. All Christians agree that we need to search the Scriptures in order to receive the supply of life. However, many read the Bible without obtaining any life supply, because they study the Bible apart from the living Son of God.
In addition to the sign of the multitude of sick, blind, lame, and withered people, we have eleven signs in this chapter: the feast of the Jews, the Sheep Gate, the pool of Bethesda, the five porticoes, an angel of the Lord, the stirring up of the water, the Sabbath, John the Baptist, the Scriptures, Moses, and the searching of the Scriptures. All these signs point to the living Son of God. We need Christ, the Son of God, to be the reality for the supply of life. The signs in this chapter are typical, genuine, and pure. None of them is a mixture or related to anything heathen. But none of these matters should replace the Son of God. Only He can give us life. He works together with the Father as one (vv. 17-20), He gives life to people, and He judges (vv. 21-30, 40).
I am deeply concerned that many of us still have replacements of Christ. We may trust in the church life, we may trust in certain ways or practices, and we may trust in messages. I am burdened that we all realize that nothing apart from Christ can give us life. Only He who is the living Son of God, the One sent by God, is the Life-giver. Because only He can give us life, we must contact Him.
Christ is everything to us. He is not only our Feast of the Passover, Feast of Pentecost, and Feast of Tabernacles; He is also our Feast of Purim, the feast of our lot and destiny. Our destiny is Christ. If we have Him, we pass out of death into life. But if we do not have Him, we remain in death. Christ is also our gate, our city, and our pool. He is the real stirring up of the water. John the Baptist cannot compare with Him. Because Christ is the real Word of God, we must come to Him when we read the Bible, instead of coming to the Scriptures apart from Him. If we come to Him, then as the Word of life, He will give us life. Christ is also our real Moses, the One sent to us by God. He speaks for God, and He speaks forth God. This means that He speaks God into us. We should not put our trust in anything or anyone apart from Christ. Only Christ can give us life.
Because Christ is the unique One who can give us life, we need to contact Him day by day and even moment by moment. He is not far from us, for He is in our mouth, in our heart, and in our spirit (Rom. 10:8). We simply need to open from the depths of our being and call on His name. Whenever we open to the Lord and call on Him in this way, we contact Him and receive Him.
According to John 20:22, Christ is the holy breath, the life-giving Spirit. Because He is this breath, we can breathe Him in at any time. But contacting the Lord in this way depends upon our breathing of Him. If we do not breathe Him into us, we will not be able to contact Him and receive Him. Our need is to contact Christ, receive Christ, and live by Christ.
We should not allow even the best spiritual things to replace Christ. This principle applies to the church life and to any practices that we have. Why do we come to the meetings? We should come not for the sake of the meetings themselves but for the sake of the living One who is ministered to us through the meetings, the only One who is able to enliven us again and again. It is of vital importance that we see that no holy thing, no religious thing, no spiritual thing, and no traditional thing can replace Christ. Not even the most up-to-date practices or the most spiritual matters can replace Christ. Only the present Christ, the living Christ, the Christ we are enjoying and experiencing at this very moment, can be our genuine help. This, I believe, is the significance of all the signs in chapter 5 of John’s Gospel.
John 5 reveals that only Christ, the living Son of God, is the real fulfillment of the tabernacle and the offerings. The tabernacle and the offerings are not fulfilled by such things as the feast, the Sabbath, the gate, the city, the pool, the angel, the stirring up of the water, the Scriptures, or the searching of the Scriptures. Nor are they fulfilled by such persons as John the Baptist and Moses. The fulfillment of the tabernacle and the offerings is only by the living Son of God, the One who is now the life-giving Spirit, the holy breath for us to breathe in so that we may receive Him as our life supply.
In chapter 3 of the Gospel of John we see Christ as the bronze serpent, as the Bridegroom, and as the all-inclusive One. In chapter 4 we see Christ as the fountain of living water and as the reality with which we render genuine worship to God. Now in chapter 5 we see that Christ is everything. Because Christ is everything, nothing in the sphere of religion should ever replace Him.
