Nowadays people are too much concerned about having fun now and not worrying about paying it later. The paralytic man sinned and paid 38 of his year paying for his deed? The reality is that there is going to be a price to pay for the choices that a person makes. For example, if a teen or a freshman college student get pregnant on a party (Mind you: the behavior is not just a mistake, it is a choice too), how would her life would look like afterward? All pleasure seeking behavior that paralyzed our life comes at a cost. If you choose to charge all the pleasure you make without making sure you have the cash to cover them, then the consequence follow you for the rest of your life. It is like you smoke hookah/shisha now, and later you would be going everywhere hugging a tank of oxygen with a tube in your both nostrils for the rest of your life [ you pay the price, after you enjoy it]. The price are either heaven or hell? How much r we willing to pay - be it close to God - to ask & get mercy from God or avoiding/ignoring it and face the consequences- it is a reality-check up time.
The other lesson we learn from the paralytic man mentioned in the Gospel John 5 is- Here is a guy paralyzed for 38 year next to this FIVE porches in the place called Bethesda. He wasn’t the only person sick in that place- there were multitude sick people, blind, and lame. According to the Church Fathers one way of interpreting the five porches is as -the five books of Moses- the Laws. People in the Old testament, how much devoted and close to God they were, they COULDN’T BRING SALVATION to themselves and their people. They all couldn’t make it to the promised land- Heaven. They have to wait for the Savior of the World. By the same talk- all of us - be Mezumran , church goers or non-believer - will not come close to God and knows His will except through the sacraments the church is offering. The paralytic man signifies that we can’t be right with God just by being church people and living in his House [Bethesda]- be serving as mezumurans, clergy, Kebero lovers, Nigdet visitors or even knowledgeable teacher. In the story our God and Savior, Jesus Christ is inviting all of us to come to Him so that He may live in Us. He is stretching His hand through the Church’s sacraments of Confession and mainly through Holy Communion so that He may start living inside us to overcome the sickness in us. It is cool to live inside the church; But there is no match or equivalence to the happiness and the JOY letting Christ living in Us through the Holy Communion. Like the multitude people in Bethesda- we are many with fault living inside the Church. Don’t ever think that because someone sin differently [living in the world] than you [living inside the church], you are somehow superior. Like the Mestagu- we are being infected with “waiting Syndrome”. Metsagu- even though God was there to heal/cure him, he was still waiting the moving water for healing. Some of us waiting for the “right time” to repent, to take holy communion, and above all to choose/ prioritize Him first in our Life. Mestagu waited 38 years just to miss the golden opportunity presented before him. How long will we waiting to Choose Him? How long are we comfortable just being church people, teachers, mezumran, and not taking communion and live according to His calling? How Long will we be Metsagu living inside the church? How much do we love God to respond to His calling and let Him stay in our heart and body? It is always about how much we Love God.!?.
O! Lord show us Your ways, teach us your path so that we may know the plans You have for us. I believe Your plan are plans to prosper us and not to harm us, plans to give us hope and a future. [Jeremiah 29:11
