In John 5, Jesus asks a man who’s been lame for 38 years, “Would you like to get well?”

It’s a “yes” or “no” question. Either the man wants to be well or he doesn’t. But that’s not how he answers. He begins to explain to Jesus “why” he can’t be healed. That wasn’t the question though.

This had nothing to do with what the man could or couldn’t do. It had everything to do with what Jesus could do.

Your situation may feel as impossible as the man’s who’d been paralyzed for 38 years. Your finances may be a mess. Your marriage might be in even worse shape. Your health isn’t good. Things aren’t going well at work.

Could it be that Jesus is asking you the same question? “Would you like to get well?”

I wish I could say that would always result in immediate healing of whatever you’re facing. That might be the way Jesus will work, but what I’ve seen more often is God working slowly. As we trust Him and cooperate with Him by walking in His ways, we see things begin to change little by little.

Make no mistake about it though, it is God working in us, through us and for us to bring about the change.

In John 6, Jesus asks another very simple question. A large crowd of people has been following Him and so He turns to Philip and says, “Where can we buy bread to feed all these people?”

Remember taking essay tests in school? Those could be trickier than multiple choice, true-false or fill-in-the-blank questions. There was just a question and a blank page staring back at you. If you happened to study the information asked for in the question, then it wasn’t too bad. But sometimes you read the question and realized you had absolutely no idea how to answer it.

I think that’s where Philip was at. He was staring at a question and a blank page and knew he had nothing. Maybe the best thing Philip could have said was, “Good question, Jesus, I have no idea. What do you think we should do?”

But he doesn’t do that. Instead, he answers like the paralyzed man. Just like you and I would have.

“Even if we worked for months, we wouldn’t have enough money.”

Jesus didn’t ask if they had enough money. He asked where they could buy bread. Philip, like the lame man, was answering the wrong question. Jesus asked, “Where?” Philip jumped to their lack of resources.

What about you? Where do you jump to?

Could it be that God wants to make us well, but we’re still focused on what we can or can’t do?

Could it be that God has a way to meet our needs, but we’re still focused on what we’re not able to do?

We answer incorrectly when we have our eyes fixed on our circumstances. The paralyzed man said he couldn’t be healed because no one would help him into the water. Philip explained how they didn’t have enough money.

To answer correctly, we have to fix our eyes on Jesus. We have to listen well to the question…and realize the One asking the question is also the answer.