Bethesda was mentioned in John 5:2, New Testament:

" Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep market a pool, which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches... The impotent man answered him, Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool: but while I am coming, another steppeth down before me. Jesus saith unto him, Rise, take up thy bed, and walk. And immediately the man was made whole, and took up his bed, and walked..."

That was one of the miraculous healings Jesus gave, in Bethesda.

In 1850, Presbyterian church built a meeting house at a little hill close to currently Rockville Pike at Capital Beltway 496. It was called Bethesda Meeting House, and the name became the namesake of the entire surrounding community in the 1870s. The building still stands there to these days.

Around that time, for examining sick mariners, a laboratory for the study of bacteria, the Hygienic Laboratory, was established at the New York Marine Hospital on Staten Island. Over time, the laboratory evolved to become National Institute of Health (the singular form), and relocated to Washington, D.C. in 1930.

As NIH expanded with the newly added institutes, it became National Institutes of Health (plural form) and was seeking a bigger place to be the new campus. At that time, Luke and Helen Wilson own a family dairy farm in Bethesda. They learned about NIH and were motivated by its goal to heal people. Therefore the couple decided to donate their 70-acre estate, "Tree Tops," to the federal government. In 1938, NIH moved to Bethesda. The family house of the Wilsons still stands on the top of a hill next to Building 31 nowadays, and NIH and Bethesda become each other's namesake.

Since those days, the biomedical research in NIH has attributed to the cure of many different diseases. It has done what the name of the place implies: to heal those who desperate to get help. Is this a coincidence? Maybe. However, I would rather believe that the Wilsons felt the calling from Bethesda in the story, and passed the generosity and kindness to NIH. By doing so, they helped countless patients in the world. This is the true miracle happened in Bethesda.