JONI AND THE POOL OF BETHESDA

Lately, my wife discovered a way to play Youtube videos on our television set.

You would have to know us. While I possess some pretty impressive computer skills, and my wife is “passing fair,” we still have a long way to go in terms of other media devices, and their interaction with desktops and laptops. I mean, I still use a flip phone.

At any rate, we were watching a Youtube video today which featured Joni Eareckson Tada. Many of my readers are, no doubt, aware that Joni experienced a life-changing accident at the age of 17; when she broke her neck in a diving accident. As a result, this precious lady has been a quadriplegic for a full half century.

Mrs. Tada is a wonderful Christian radio host, speaker, and artist. (She holds the paintbrush in her mouth). Her ministry is to the able-bodied and disabled, alike. One charitable work, in particular, to which this ministry devotes itself involves raising moneys for wheelchairs that are donated to paraplegics and quadriplegics around the world.

In the video to which I alluded Joni is seated in her wheelchair on the stage of a church. And during the course of forty minutes she shares her life story. What an absolute inspiration. If I am ever prone to feel sorry for myself, I have only to think of this dear woman of God; her years of patient fortitude, and commitment to the Lord of her life.

One portion of Joni’s message seemed especially poignant to me. Following is the jest of her words.

“If any of you out there think I’m a spiritual superwoman, and that I have this quadriplegic thing all figured out, I hate to disappoint you. Not long after the accident my sister was tending to my needs. Waking me up, bath-rooming me, getting me dressed, getting me into my wheelchair, spending time with me, and encouraging me during my day.

It was about this time I prayed,

‘Lord, I can’t face a lifetime of quadriplegia. I can’t even get through one day without overwhelming pain, and having to depend on other people to take care of the most embarrassing facets of my new life. I simply can’t do this!’”

Pt. 2

Joni continued.

“My friends, I can tell you I was at the bottom of the proverbial well, and it was at this point that I told my sister to leave me in bed. For two weeks I only got up to use the bathroom. I can so identify with the man in John Chapter 5.

You remember. Let me read it to you.”

‘During one of the Jewish feast days, Jesus went up Jerusalem. Near the sheep gate in Jerusalem is a pool surrounded by five arches; which has the Hebrew name of Bethzatha; the Pool of Bethesda.

Under these arches, a great many sick people were laid. Some of them were blind, some were lame, and some had withered limbs. They used to wait in this place for “the moving of the water.” At certain times it seems an angel would appear, and enter the pool, and disturb the water. And then, the first person who stepped into the water after the disturbance would be healed of whatever malady from which he was suffering.

One particular man had laid there for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there on his back, knowing that he had been like this for a very long time, he said to him,

"Would you like to walk again?"

"Sir," replied the sick man, "I have no one to put me into the pool when the angel stirs the water. While I'm trying to get there, someone else gets down into it before me."

"Get up," said Jesus, "pick up your bed and walk!"

At once the man felt strength in his legs, got up, picked up his bed, and walked.’” (John Chapter 5. McDonald Paraphrase)

Pt. 3

“I have often asked Jesus to minister to me the way he did to the man at the Pool of Bethesda. But He has always seemed oblivious of my needs. Once I attended a Kathryn Kuhlman crusade, and sat in the wheelchair section. After her sermon Miss Kuhlman came down from the platform and prayed for the sick. But somehow, she never managed to find her way over to my area. And I almost said out loud, ‘C’mon lady, exercise your faith, and come on over to the excruciating section.’

I don’t know, but I think maybe I quit expecting a healing touch of God after this experience. I consigned myself to live this way. It was what it was. Then, a few years ago my husband and I visited Israel, and after we had toured Jerusalem’s marketplace, we found ourselves at the Pool of Bethesda. That same pool which I have so long thought about, and where Jesus spoke to the quadriplegic man, and spoke healing words to him.

You can imagine I was overwhelmed with emotion. Ken pushed me up to the short fence which surrounds that body of water, and he proceeded to climb over this small barrier to get a better look. And as he momentarily disappeared from sight, the most poignant thought came to me.

If I had never experienced that awful diving accident, broken my neck, and become a quadriplegic, I might never have known Jesus the way I know Him today. I may well be working on my third divorce, and my ‘Joni and Friends’ ministry would have remained a twinkle. All those wheelchairs we have given away, and all those folks God has given me the wherewithal to speak with, encourage, and assist in various ways would still be a theory.

I don’t have all the answers, and I don’t know why Jesus hasn’t healed me, the way he healed the disabled man at the pool, but I know that He is much more concerned with my spiritual healing, than my physical healing.

I don’t love this wheelchair. And I don’t relish quadriplegia. This entire experience has come as an unwelcome, unbidden guest. But I count it a privilege to suffer with Him; and no one ever suffered the way He did the day He voluntarily surrendered Himself to the pain and shame of the cross. I am all too aware that He has chosen me to participate in His sufferings. And I will gladly bear my cross for Him.

Yet, I am thankful that this isn’t all there is. And on the other side of this life, I will rise from this wheelchair, and I will walk again. Meanwhile, I am inestimably grateful that our Lord has given me the privilege of making a difference in the lives He daily sets along my pathway."

by William McDonald, PhD. Excerpt from "McDonald's Daily Diary." Vol. 73. Copyright pending.

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