John 5

Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Arameic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. Here a great number of disabled people used to lie - the blind, the lame, the paralyzed. One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, "Do you want to get well?"

"Sir," the invalid replied, "I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me."

Then Jesus said to him, "Get up! Pick up your mat and walk." At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked.

The day on which this took place was a Sabbath, and so the Jews said to the man who had been healed, "It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat."

But he replied, "The man who made me well said to me, 'Pick up your mat and walk.'"

Sometimes, I feel like everyone thinks I'm weird or sick or something for being furry. And sometimes it's too much for me and I start thinking they could be right. I start trying to suppress those parts of me, and start thinking that something is wrong with me. If it continues for too long, it can really start to tear me apart. And it has before.

But not too long ago, God revealed something to me in this scripture. A parallel to my own life. See, I was sick too. I was stuck in a horrible darkness and depression, and God used furriness to pull me out of it. He healed me. I am very grateful that I didn't have to wait thirty-eight years.

This man didn't even know who had healed him when he stood up to those Jews. All he knew was that he had been healed, and the man who had done this amazing and wonderful thing for him told him to pick up his mat and walk. So who wouldn't do that?

Sometimes the world says to me, "This is the real world. Society forbids you to do something so weird."

But now I can confidently say, "The man who made me well said to me, 'Go and be furry.'"