Waiting at the pool...
I have been listening to Jesus the Christ over the last few days while driving to and from work (about 3 hours a day! Thanks UDOT). As I have listened, some particular incidents in the ministry of the Savior have stood out. Just today I was listening to the story of the pool at Bethesda found in John Chapter 5.
5 And a certain man was there, which had an infirmity thirty and eight years.
What this man's infirmity is never given in detail, but he was sufficiently crippled that he was unable to be the first to enter the water after it was disturbed, thereby benefiting from its curative powers. I can only imagine the frustration that he felt as he watched, time and again, as others entered the waters before him, claiming the prize he so greatly desired. To this man came the Master asking: "Wilt thou be made whole? (John 5:6)" The man looked upon the Messiah and, perhaps hoping that here was one that would help him enter the waters first, explained his situation: "Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool: but while I am coming, another steppeth down before me (John 5:7)." The Master did not set the man into the waters, instead he gave him a simple command: "Rise, take up thy bed, and walk (John 5:8).
How often are we, spiritually or temporally, at the same point as the infirm man. How often do we look to the world for answers to the problems of the day, instead of looking to Him that created all things. The verse in Alma 7:2 is instructive on the scope of Christ's understanding of what we are each going through in our individual lives. He has taken upon himself ALL of our pains and sorrows, that he might know, from first hand experience, how best to counsel, console, chastise or comfort us. We are all able to avail ourselves of His wisdom, but like the man at the pool in Bethesda, do we look for Him to do things our way, in our time frame? Or do we allow Him to provide us with the answers we seek, the healing we need? Let us all rise, take up our beds, and walk.