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All the healing work of the pool was God's work, and His alone; but in our text we have man's work side by side with God's. There were five porches. In all probability these porches were built by some charitable people in the city of Jerusalem, who had argued something after this sort — "We have no power to heal the sick, but we can at all events build a shelter for them when they come seeking a cure. It is not in us to move the water into an all-healing pool, but we can build a place so near the water that when the sufferers come after many a weary mile, they will be able to rest there, secured from the sun, and sheltered from the tempest, and wait in comfort until the angel of mercy stirs it with his wing." Thus, I think, you will see we have in our text the union of God's work and human agency. God digs the pool and man builds the porches.

I. LET US LOOK AT BETHESDA, WITH ITS PORCHES, AS ILLUSTRATING SPIRITUAL WORK. It is a high honour, beloved, to be a co-worker with God, no matter in how humble a capacity. God can do without us. The pool could do without the porches, and do as well without them. It had none of its healing qualities from them. No poor sufferer was ever eased of his pain because of the influence of the porches upon the pool. It was the pool alone that did the work and had all the glory of the cure. But remember, on the other hand, that God so ordered it that the porches should be built by man. God digging" the pool does not exonerate man from building the porches. Let us for a moment look and see how this may be applied in many ways. This blessed book is all of Him. No human hand dug its deep well of truth. From Genesis to Revelations it makes one glorious Bethesda. It is a house of mercy, and in its chapters and verses there is latent healing power, that needs but the moving of the Spirit to heal any. To write this book, and make it a power of healing unto souls, is God's work, and His work alone. But you and I can place this book into the hands of different people, and that is our work. God writes the book, but it is for us to print it, and scatter it on every hand. He makes this pool of Bethesda; but you and I, perhaps through the agency of a Bible Society, have to help build the five porches. Man can neither give himself nor anyone else faith; but man can build the sanctuaries for the gospel to be preached in. Therefore God does not build any chapels by miracles. If men want to have houses to worship in, God says, "that is your work: you must toil, and you must collect, and you must give, and you must pay for it. You can build the brick porch, but it is for Me to make it a Bethesda, a house of mercy unto thousands." It has occurred to me that in many ways Bethesda makes a very beautiful illustration of what a sanctuary ought to be. I will briefly notice one or two points.

1. The first thing we observe is — that those porches were only built for the sake of the pool. You cannot imagine any gentleman in Jerusalem having built them merely for the sake of an architectural display. Most certainly they were not built for lounges and as equally certain is it they were not built for people to sleep in. They were simply built to help men to get to the water that could heal them. Every sanctuary that is built aright is built from the same motive. It is built simply to lead men unto Christ.

2. But observe, secondly, that the porches were only of value as they led to the pool. In other words, the porch was no good to any man except he went beyond it. Do you observe, too, that those who filled the porches were just the very ones we want to see filling our sanctuaries? They were not only sick ones in those porches. They were something better. They were those who knew themselves to be sick. They came there with a special purpose, and that purpose was to be healed. That preacher has delightful work who preaches to a congregation drawn by the same desire. And then you observe that they were poor people that were there, people that could not any way afford to have a doctor. I would that we could see more of the poor and penniless helping to fill our sanctuaries. And observe, lastly here, that there were plenty of them. It is said, "In these lay a great multitude." There is nothing easier than to sneer at numbers when they come to hear the preaching of the Word, though I never heard them despised when the meeting is of a political or secular nature. May God make every porch in this great east end of London too straight for the throngs of the poor and the sick and the spiritually diseased that shall crowd into them.

II. And now, lastly, I desire to use this text as illustrating THE WORK WE MAY DO IN CONJUNCTION WITH GOD FOR THE ALLEVIATION AND HEALING OF BODILY SICKNESS. Alas, that group at Bethesda is but a very small sample of a great multitude — a multitude seeking health. Mark you the means are nothing of themselves. The water was nothing until the angel touched it. The medicine is nothing until God blesses it. The physician of himself is powerless, let him be never so clever in his profession. What is it then that is needed? It is the blessing of the angel of the covenant resting on the means that are used — it is God commanding health through their instrumentality. But you and I may say, "Brother, we cannot make you whole, we wish we could, but there is a Bethesda which, by the Lord's blessing, may, and we can build a porch to help you get and stay there. We know you are poor and cannot afford to have a long doctor's bill come in, and your poverty only deepens our sympathy, so we will build you a porch which shall be free of all expense. We will build you a place where you can obtain just the care, and just the nursing, and just the medicine that you need, without it costing you a penny.

(A. G. Brown.)

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KJV: After this there was a feast of the Jews; and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

WEB: After these things, there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.