"THE POWER OF WATER"

John 5:1-9; Acts 16:9-15

Maybe it's because it makes up about 98% of our bodies.

Maybe it's because it's two parts hydrogen

and one part oxygen.

Maybe it's because we notice it when there's not any,

and we notice it when there's too much.

But for some reason,

we seem to have this fascination with water.

Water is one of the four elements of nature -

earth, wind, fire and water.

Those are things we can't come by or create on our own.

Who knows why the group Earth Wind and Fire left it out!

Water can delight,

like when we race down to theGuadalupe River at Mo-Ranch

or take the houseboat out on Lake Texoma

or go tubing in New Braunfels.

Water can devastate,

as we have seen far too often with Hurricane Katrina

and the Indonesian tsunami.

It can freeze and it can boil,

and it can come in waves.

It can be salty or almost sweet.

It can be transparent,

or muddied,

or sometimes it can be a mirror.

We take water for granted,

like when we turn on the faucets at home.

It's always supposed to be there.

Water can taste funny,

like when we turn on the faucets at home.

(Oh, never mind!)

We bathe with it,

we baptize with it,

we make coffee with it,

we cook and clean with it,

we probably use it a hundred times a day

without ever giving it a second thought.

It's a part of our lives,

it's a large part of our makeup,

it's a requirement for life.

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Back in Jesus' day,

there was this natural spring-fed pool

at a place called either Beth-Zatha or Bethesda,

depending on how you translate it.

If you were reading along in your Bible this morning,

you may have noticed

that the reading jumped from verse 3 to verse 5,

and that there was a large footnote at the bottom of the page.

This is one of those passages

that scholars argue about.

Apparently, some time after John had written the gospel,

there was an editor

who decided that this story wasn't clear enough.

And so he or she added in an explanation

about the water.

Whether or not it's really scripture,

it explains to us

why the paralyzed man was lying there

along with so many other people.

Legend had it

that every so often,

God's angels would come down and stir up the waters.

And if you happened to be the first one into the pool

after that happened,

you were the lucky one who would be healed.

So there were some people,

like this man,

who virtually lived there,

lying in wait for the angels to come down and mix it up.

Archaeologists now think

that it was probably some kind of natural spring

that made the waters bubble from time to time.

And you and I know

that God would probably not be too much in favor

of a healing competition,

where we would have to run over our brothers and sisters

just so that we could be the first ones healed.

I'm not sure that God would set things up that way.

In any case,

the people of that day seemed to think so.

Can you imagine sitting for thirty-eight days,

much less thirty-eight YEARS,

by the side of a pool,

waiting for the waters to begin to move

on some unknown and unpredictable schedule, 

only to be disappointed every time

because another person was quicker than you?

I guess it says something about the man's faith

that he had not given up in all that time.

But even so,

this man had to be a study in futility.

Finally, one day, after thirty-eight years,

he gets his chance.

Jesus happens to walk up

and asks him a very simple question:

"Do you want to be made well?"

Thirty-eight years of waiting

had done their work.

The man couldn't even answer "yes" or "no."

All he could do,

probably in a very whiny voice,

was to give the reasons

why the water hadn't healed him yet.

So John tells us that Jesus gave him the word,

and that word did what thirty-eight years of futility

had not been able to touch.

He stood up,

rolled up his mat,

and left

without even bothering to ask Jesus his name.

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There was water in our other reading today too.

Paul was headed in one direction

in his missionary journeys,

but the Spirit turned him another direction

and pointed him to Macedonia,

to the town of Philippi,

to a river outside the city gates

on the south side of town.

Luke uses the word "synagogue"

to refer to the place where they were,

even though it was out of doors

with no synagogue-like structures.

That tells us

that even though there was no building in place,

it was considered a known place of worship.

It also tells us

that Philippi was probably not very welcoming

of this new group called Christians.

They could meet,

but it had to be outside the city gates

and they couldn't put any signs up,

much less any walls.

On the day that Paul and company showed up,

Lydia happened to show up too.

She was a pretty unlikely candidate to show up there.

In fact,

in many ways

she was the exact opposite

of the paralyzed man in Beth-Zatha.

He had nothing to lose

by waiting at the waters

for thirty-eight years. 

She had much more to lose

by showing up at the river just once.

He was Jewish; she was a gentile.

He was unemployed; she was a businesswoman.

He was a he; she was a she.

Macedonia was a colony of Rome,

and being a Christian in a Roman colony

was not only unusual,

it was unpopular

and often deadly.

To be mentioned by name,

Lydia had to have been pretty prominent.

She was also a well-to-do merchant.

She had to be

because she was selling expensive purple cloth

to people who could afford it.

So here she was,

healthy, wealthy and prominent,

risking her life and her livelihood

hanging out

down by the river-slash-synagogue

to find out what this little band of believers had to say.

It sounds like the Holy Spirit

had directed her to go there

every bit as much

as the Spirit had directed Paul.

It wasn't considered too out of the ordinary

for Jesus to heal a male Jew.

But for Paul to even worship

with a Gentile woman -

well, that was out of the ordinary.

What Lydia heard that day

impacted her so much

that she and her whole household

were baptized in that very river.

And she was so moved by it all

that she invited Paul and his friends

to come spend the night in their home.

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There's some water here this morning too, isn't there?

It's not very much -

more like a bird bath than a pool or a river.

But it is enough for what it does.

How do you and I consider this water?

What do we make of it?

Maybe we think of it like it's magic,

like the pool at Beth-Zatha

that became healing

only when mysterious angels stirred it up.

Some people look at baptism superstitiously,

like it's some magic coat of armor

to protect them from every danger,

or a life insurance policy

that will get them straight into heaven

without passing go.

Looking at baptism that way

makes these waters more like the kind

where the angels have to trouble them

in order for anything to happen.

I'm not sure that baptism is that way.

Even with this small amount of water,

I'd say that, rather than the pool,

baptism has much more in common

with that clear and flowing stream

where Lydia was baptized.

There's always enough.

It's always available.

It's always refreshing.

We don't have to run over anyone else

to get to it first

in order for it to do its thing.

And best of all,

it will make us well.

All shall be well,

and all shall be well.

This morning when you come up for communion,

you're going to have an opportunity

to come by the font

and touch some of that fascinating water.

This will be an opportunity for you

to remember your baptism and be thankful,

to give thanks to God for this elemental need,

and to renew your commitment to Christ

much as Lydia made hers that day.

It is okay to get wet!

Stir it around, splash it a little,

touch it to your forehead,

whatever feels right.

Take that opportunity when it's time

and see what God might have in store for you.

Water in general

still holds a fascination for us,

no matter what form it takes.

THIS water in particular

makes all the difference.

Amen.