For the next few days, I want to blog about the story of Peter and John healing a man outside the temple, the consequences of that, and the story around it. It's found in Acts 3 & 4.
Acts 3:1-9 - The Healing.
As I read this story the first thing that pops out to me is that Peter and John were still going to the Temple. I guess I thought they should be going to a church, but it only makes sense they would be going to the temple. They were Jewish and Christ to them was the Messiah. It was a part of the faith they knew, so going to the Temple and continuing to be a Jew was what they knew was right. It wasn't until later they started calling follower of Jesus "Christians".
The next thing is that the beggar is out by the Temple gate, aka "Beautiful Gate". The commentary at the bottom of the page in my bible says that the act of giving money to beggars as you enter through this gate was considered praiseworthy. It was for show. So the beggar being here, wasn't out of the norm. He was wisely putting himself there because he knew the Jews would give him money.
As Peter and John are walking in, they don't give this beggar money instead they give him much more. They heal his legs and life with Jesus Christ. They are very specific as to who they are doing this for. They don't say be healed by God or YAHWEH. They say Jesus of Nazareth. Specifically Jesus of Nazareth. What a statement to make outside of the Temple!
"Walking, leaping, and praising God". How many times has God healed me like this man? I ask for petty change and God gives me new legs. I ask for a quick fix and God gives me everlasting life! When this man recieves his gift, he doesn't just say thank you. He celebrates. He rejoices! He's jumping around praising God.
One note I made as I read this was that we don't read at the end of this nice little story, "and he lived happily ever after" Sure this man was healed. He was given the opportunity of a lifetime. He had his 15 minutes of fame. But life went on for this man. I don't know what he did after this. Maybe he got a job in construction. Maybe he delivered mail (if they had mail back then). Maybe he became a Olympian runner. I don't know. And that's the point, we don't know. But I think it's safe to assume, this guy had atleast one more bad day after this. He probably had atleast one more time where he was asking for God's help.
If he's anything like the rest of us, he had his fair share of those days after he was healed. God fixes our soul. He fixes our eternal life. He fixes our empty hearts. But life will still go on and happen. He doesn't promise to take away all of our struggles and hardships. In fact, he says we should embrace those! I think we can read a simple story like this and get a picture of God as this genie that will fix any problem we have whenever things go wrong. God is the God of the living. He WILL heal us like he did the man in this story if we cry out. He will even heal us beyond what we ask or imagine. But it's not a fairy tale after that. Life goes on and God goes on with us. He continues to heal us as we go along. He lived his life here on earth and he understand our pain and struggles. It would only make sense the God of the living would live with us.
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