Note: I recently returned from a tour of Israel sponsored by Houston Graduate School of Theology.
The principal reason I wanted to go to Israel this year was to visit the Pool of Bethesda. The inner attraction to that site began a few years ago in a class on healing taught at our church by Dianna Campbell. As we discussed the story in John 5, Jesus’ healing of the paralyzed man at the pool, I had a little epiphany. I saw that Jesus was acting like the pool in selecting a single person to heal. I almost heard a voice inside say, “I AM the healing pool.”
Then the story began to haunt me, so I did a little research and a lot of meditation. I tried to listen carefully to Jesus’ words and I looked into the translation of his question to the man, “Do you want to be healed?” I found that another reasonable translation might be, “Do you seek healing?” And this version began to resonate within me.
I have been involved in healing ministry for almost 30 years, beginning with inner healing ministry in 1984. I have attended many healing missions, read lots of books about healing, studied various ministry styles, volunteered on healing ministry teams, trained as a hospital chaplain and spiritual director, worked in pastoral care. And for ten years I have facilitated a support group for caregivers and family members of people with dementia. Although I’m never really certain of anything spiritual, I am probably most sure of a vocation to Christian healing.
But with all this experience and training and sense of vocation I have rarely, if ever, seen a miraculous healing of the type described in the gospels and the Acts of the Apostles. It seems to me these “miracles” should happen more frequently in the life of the church, and I know they happen in some places. If God has called me into healing ministry why is my own ministry (not that it’s mine, but you know what I mean) so relatively lame?
Because this is so frequently on my heart, the question, “Do you seek healing?” has great power for me. I hear it as, “Do you seek a ministry of healing?” And this question was, of course, right there in the front of my mind when I went to Israel in search of the pool.
When I arrived at the Pools of Bethesda I found that the site has been excavated all the way down to the original pool. You can see the steps people descended in the first century to get into the water. However, you can’t get down there now. The way is blocked. I took photos from above and walked as close as I could, but that wasn’t very close. Even the photos look flat, two-dimensional, reflecting my own muted emotional response to the place. If anything, I felt disappointed. I had really wanted to get to the steps and touch the water. Without that it seemed a loss.
Next to Bethesda is St Anne’s Crusader Church, where there is a beautiful shrine with candles you can light to offer prayer. I lit a couple of candles there and prayed for those on my heart. This was my substitute for praying at the Pool. But the disappointment did not leave me.
A few days after I returned home I was at the YMCA, and it suddenly occurred to me that the blocked walkway keeping me from the steps to the Bethesda pool put me in a situation identical to that of the paralyzed man. Like him I had a deep desire to get to the water, but I had no way to get there. Like him I am lame – not in body but in ministry. The paralysis is the same.
This second epiphany has given me hope. I am no longer disappointed about my visit to the Pool, because I realize that something powerful did happen there. I just haven’t seen the results yet. If Jesus is asking me, “Do you seek healing, the ability to heal?” My answer is yes! I seek a ministry of healing, an effective ministry of healing, and specifically an effective ministry of healing to those living with dementia. This is what I believe to be God’s call. If I could identify my “mat,” I would pick it up and take it home.
