Today’s Reflection: Christ is the New Pool of Bethesda!

By Charles Muchiri

Liturgical Year B, Cycle II

Tuesday of the Forth week of Lent (March 20, 2012)

Readings for Mass

First Reading: Ezekiel 47: 1-9, 12

Responsorial Psalms: Psalms 46:2-3, 5-6, 8-9

Gospel: John 5:1-3, 5-16

The background of Today’s reflection is weaved against the story of the pool of Bethesda. This is the water mass that is described by St John in the Gospel as being located in Jerusalem, “at the Sheep Gate, and surrounded by five covered rows of pillars.”

This is the place where the ill, the blind, the lame, and the crippled would await the stirring of the waters – some narratives do mention that an angel would occasionally star this pool waters – after which the first one to enter into the pool would be healed.

In today’s Gospel, Christ so happens to be in Jerusalem. He visits the Bethesda pool, comes across this man who’s been lying there, on a mat. He has been sick for a record 38 years. But he has been helpless, with no one to assist him into the pool and get his healing!

So, the most automatic thing that could cross his minds when Christ approaches him is simple! Bingo! Help is on the way, I have someone who will finally assist me enter the pool, and get my healing.

And at between 30 and 33, Christ must be this strong, healthy-looking gentleman who can easily carry the old, poor man and deep him into the waters, if He so desired!

That could be the reason why when Christ asks him whether he would wish to get healed, the sick man gives a forthright state of his unfortunate circumstances.

"Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; while I am on my way, someone else gets down there before me." By all means, quite an unfortunate state of affair!

The waters of Bethesda have such a healing power that besides this man, there are many others with various conditions who are all competing for this one chance where they would get healed.

But as it transpires, Christ Himself is the new form of the Bethesda waters, which heals, and this time round, without the need to compete in being the first to enter into ‘His pool’; the salvation which He offered to the mankind.

That is why, other than help this man enter the pool, He simply utters healing words, and the man is instantly healed.

Back to the first reading, an angel of the Lord is showing Prophet Ezekiel a scene of water that gushes forth from the Sanctuary.

He seeks to have Ezekiel wade into this waters, at some point the waters are at the level of Ezekiel’s ankles, at another time on his knees, and yet at another point, on his waist. At this last moment, Ezekiel can not wade through the waters, unless through swimming.

Christ came to earth and offered himself to be the gashing water that flows from the Calvary and into the hearts that accept his salvation.

Yet, as it is in the case of Ezekiel who wades through water that are at various levels; and so it is with our salvation; it is a gradual process in which we should daily immerse ourselves until we get to the point of swimming in it!

More importantly, the Church offers us a contemporary Pool of Bethesda, the Confessional, the Sacrament of Penance, through which we can always enter and get healed of our spiritual illnesses!

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