The Gospel according to John presents Jesus as the eternal Word of God, who "became a human being and lived among us." This Gospel was written so that its readers might believe that Jesus is the promised Saviour, the Son of God, and that through their faith in him, they may have life. John emphasizes the gift of eternal life through Christ, a gift which comes to those who respond to Jesus as the way, the truth, and the life. A striking feature of John is the symbolic use of common things from everyday life to point to spiritual realities, such as water, bread, light, the shepherd and his sheep, and the grapevine and its fruit.
             In the book, Roots: Finding Strength in Biblical Tradition, Father Michael Mulhall observes that, "John's Gospel addresses people in the Jewish community who cannot be reached through the normal channels of grace." That is, those who are sick and need to be healed, and those who need to find and turn to God's spirit to experience rebirth. Jesus, who in this Gospel is stressed as the being the promised Saviour, Son of God, allows these events of healing and rebirth to occur through the miracles that he performs. Some of the miracles he performs include: turning the water into wine, feeding 50,000 people from five loaves and two fish, healing the blind, the sick and the paralyzed, and raising Lazarus from the dead. All these miracles are referred to as 'signs' in John's Gospel. The signs performed clearly show that Jesus is the Messiah and that he comes from God. For example, Jesus says to the blind man he has just healed, "Do you believe in the Son of God? ...He is the one speaking with you." (9:35,37).
             In the passage, Healing the Paralytic (5:1-9), Jesus went to Jerusalem for a religious festival. There he found a pool with five porches where a large crowd of sick people lay -- the blind, the lame and the paralyzed. One man, who had been sick for many years, had been laying there. Jesus approache...