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?”
Most modern translations say that the man had been in that condition a long time, as implied by the context. The Greek doesn’t include that phrase, but it seems a reasonable conclusion. It could also mean that he had been lying by the pool a long time (a substantial part of his life), or he had been there that day for a long time. Whichever the case, the intent seems to be that this man has been helpless for a long time.
The question is a hard one to understand. There are a spectrum of ideas proposed. Jesus wanted to draw attention to what he was about to do. Jesus wanted to inspire hope in this man. Jesus was questioning if this man really wanted help or if he just wanted a lifetime of handouts (Sproul seems to take this position).
Whichever the case, Jesus is initiating the conversation. The man has not solicited help. In fact, it doesn’t seem like the man has any idea who Jesus is (as evidenced later). Was there any reason for this man to expect the miraculous?
I think the man desperately wanted to be healed, as any would in his situation. Like walking into a cancer ward and asking if the people suffering there want to be healed. I don’t think Jesus is questioning the man’s desire. After all, why else is the man at the pool? Why had he been there ‘a long time’ if he wasn’t desperately trying to get well the only way he knew how.
The passage seems to read, Jesus saw that he had been coming to the pool for a long time to be healed and he asks him, do you want to be healed?Maybe the question was intended to identify, or have the man confess, what his hope was in regard to his disability. Something like; you’ve been coming here a long time with the hope of being healed, what do you think is going to save you from your suffering?
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.”
I think Chrysostom understands this passage well when he says:
For when Christ had said, “Wilt thou be made whole?” “Yea, Lord,” he saith, “but I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool.” What can be more pitiable than these words? What more sad than these circumstances? Seest thou a heart crushed through long sickness? Seest thou all violence subdued? He uttered no blasphemous word, nor such as we hear the many use in reverses, he cursed not his day, he was not angry at the question, nor did he say, “Art Thou come to make a mock and a jest of us, that Thou asketh whether I desire to be made whole?” but replied gently, and with great mildness, “Yea, Lord”; yet he knew not who it was that asked him, nor that He would heal him, but still he mildly relates all the circumstances and asks nothing further, as though he were speaking to a physician, and desired merely to tell the story of his sufferings. Perhaps he hoped that Christ might be so far useful to him as to put him into the water, and desired to attract Him by these words. What then saith Jesus?
What pitiful imagery. Apparently this man has seen the pool stirred up in the past and he has attempted to get into the pool to be healed, but is too slow. Maybe he has to drag his body along the ground, while those blind or with less debilitating disabilities can simply run to the pool. What utter hopelessness. It makes you wonder why he even bother comes to the pool at all. Maybe he comes to the pool hoping he can find someone that will give him the advantage he needs, by caring him into the pool. As Chrysostom proposes, perhaps this is what he is hoping Jesus is going to offer him. Otherwise, he must have realized he had zero chance at getting into the pool first. Yet he continues there a long time.Despite the textual issues of verse 4, verse 7 confirms that this man had seen enough to believe that he too could be healed by some sort of miraculous event involving the pool. Most certainly he would have attributed that miracle to God. He has zero chance to get into the pool first, but does he return to the pool because, despite the circumstances, he believes God can heal even him? I wonder if this man’s time spent at the pool is any indication of his faith. Does he have faith?