Who Will You Obey?

Our Lord and God Jesus did a miracle at a feast and it was not well recieved: 

“After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, in Aramaica called Bethesda, which has five roofed colonnades. In these lay a multitude of invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?” The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.” Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked.

Now that day was the Sabbath. So the Jewsd said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to take up your bed.” But he answered them, “The man who healed me, that man said to me, ‘Take up your bed, and walk.’” They asked him, “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Take up your bed and walk’?” Now the man who had been healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn, as there was a crowd in the place. Afterward Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, “See, you are well! Sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you.” The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him. And this was why the Jews were persecuting Jesus, because he was doing these things on the Sabbath. But Jesus answered them, “My Father is working until now, and I am working.” (John 5:1-17). 

What is remarkable is that the lame man must choose between obeying Jesus which healed him or the religious elite that commanded him to not take up his bed: 

“Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked.” (John 5:8-9) 

“Now that day was the Sabbath. So the Jewsd said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to take up your bed.” (John 5:9-10) 

The religious leaders failed to see Jesus healed a thirty-eight year lame man, and only saw that Christ hadn’t followed their rigid interpretation of keeping the sabbath, when the God who ordained the sabbath was the one who told the lame man to pick up his cot! 

The question comes to this, if you are told by Jesus to do one thing and if defies the expectations and rigid views of religious leaders, would you do it? Or would you let a priest, pastor, or person of faith dissuade you? Decide with who you would stand.