John 5:8,9

Rise, take up thy bed, and walk, &c.— Though it was the sabbath-day, and the doctors affirmed that the bearing of any burden was a profanation of the holy rest, Jesus ordered the man to carry his bed away, because it was fit that the miracle should be rendered indubitable by the suddenness and perfection of the cure, shewed in the vigorous exertion of the man's strength. Besides, when the people, who on the sabbath ceased from working, met the man in their way, and reproved him for carrying his bed, he could not avoid telling them what had happened. It was therefore a very proper method of making so signal a miracle universally known. The evangelist says, immediately the man was made whole; so that the cure being effectuated in an instant, while he was not expecting any such favour, nor knew to whom he owed it, John 5:13 no one can pretend that the power of imagination contributed thereto in the least degree. By the sabbath here must be meant either the first holy convocation in the feast of unleavened bread, that is, the morrow after the passover solemnity, which was one of the greatest sabbaths, ch. John 19:31 or the ordinary sabbath, happening in the passover-week, and consequently the day on which the disciples plucked the ears of corn. We may just observe, that our Saviour did not say to the impotent man, "Rise, and step into the pool," but rise, and walk; to shew that he was himself all-sufficient to do that for us, which the law could not do, and which he fulfilled, and so abrogated; thus manifestly declaring the full completion of this miraculous pool of Bethesda in himself.