Ezekiel 47:1-9, 12; Psalm 46; John 5:1-16 In today’s Gospel, at the pool of Bethesda, Jesus heals a man crippled for 38 years. People then had a superstitious belief that an angel periodically disturbed the waters of the pool and that if people plunged themselves into the pool at that time, they would be cured of any malady.