Episode 326 Two Healing Stories (John 4:46-5:18)

This week BibleWorm reads two miracle stories told in John 4:46-5:18. In the first story, Jesus saves the child of a royal official, who believes Jesus’s word even before he sees evidence of the healing. In the second story, Jesus heals a man who has been sitting by the healing waters of Beth Zatha for 38 years with no one to help him into the pool. We wonder how a community could allow someone to suffer for so long and marvel at the healing Jesus offers him. We ponder the motivations of Jesus, who seems reluctant to heal in one case and heals without being asked in the other. And we struggle with how to read miracle stories in our own day, when all too often those who need miracles seem not to receive them. How do we read miracles stories in a miracle-free world?