God of all good things, bless this dear reader with all s/he may need today. In Christ Jesus' Name, amen.
We thank God for the unexpected thunderstorm and much needed rain we received on Monday afternoon, but it downed our internet service for most of the morning yesterday thus no ConCafe. I also thank the Lord for my Dad's birthday yesterday as well.
Prayer Request: Please keep The Reverend Francisco "Pancho" Gaytan in your prayers. He is recovering from eye surgery and having to make some major adjustments in his life because of it; ask that God continue to heal him and to give him patience in these changes to his life. Thank you.
Forty years is a long time. Period. It becomes longer or at least appears so, if you get placed in prison, some jokers would say marriage, or a bad job situation. Forty years is a generation. Can you imagine being alive for that long without the use of what most others take for granted? Can you imagine not being able to walk since birth and live to be forty? Such was the case with the man we meet in Acts chapter 3. This man was taught early to get to, through the kindness of family and/or friends, to the gate of the Temple called Beautiful. You can imagine the reference early to that place may have meant the beauty of the entire Temple and thus this particular entrance. It may have also referred to the experience of being able to come through that gate into that holy of all places, the House of God. This particular gate was one of eigth gates. It led into the Court of Women, where the widow entered and dropped her mite as an offering to God. This may have been the "monied" entrance, thus this man's expectation to receive something from those who had something to offer.
One can only imagine the difficulty of such a life. We learn that this man no longer looked at people, he was resigned to his state and there was nothing he could do about it. Haved lived all his life so close to the ground, having begged for all his life, there was nothing about his life that said "look up." But on this one particular day, someone, perhaps a sister, helped him dress, perhaps his brother or a neighbor or two, carried him from his home, if he even had one, to this place to await those who might give him something on which to live. At three o'clock, the hour of prayer, Peter and John come to his station and again, eyes lowered to the ground, not much hope in his voice, calls out begging for alms. Peter and John hear him and the Holy Spirit moves them to action. It is Peter, the prince of the disciples, who says, "I have no silver or gold, but what I do have I give to you; in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, get up and walk!" Peter doesn't walk away and say, that should hold him; Peter gets him by his right arm, lifts him up. The Bible says that "immediately his feet and ankles were made strong." The man jumps up and begins walking toward the House of the One who made him whole. You have to love that Peter and John remembered that the man went "walking and leaping and praising God." His first steps were steps of gratitude and worship; when he could have gone anywhere and showed his family and friends that he could now walk, he walks to Church and gives thanks. And he doesn't come dragging into the building, he enters walking and leaping and praising God! His life was never the same again.
Every Sunday and every day you and I have the opportunity to call upon the name of Jesus of Nazareth to remove from our lives those things that cripple, maim, blind, and kill us. Jesus has the power and the willingness to remove our sin! And when that sin is removed you and I should walk and leap and praise God like never before. Our very steps should be witness to the power of Jesus at work in our lives.
PRAYER: Loving God of healing and wholeness, share with me and my loved ones, that which we need. Remove from our lives the things that have kept us from walking and leaping and praising You. I ask this in Jesus' Name, amen.
Have a great and blessed day in the Lord!
Eradio Valverde
This passage from Acts 3: 1 One day Peter and John were going up to the temple at the hour of prayer, at three o'clock in the afternoon. 2 And a man lame from birth was being carried in. People would lay him daily at the gate of the temple called the Beautiful Gate so that he could ask for alms from those entering the temple. 3 When he saw Peter and John about to go into the temple, he asked them for alms. 4 Peter looked intently at him, as did John, and said, "Look at us." 5 And he fixed his attention on them, expecting to receive something from them. 6 But Peter said, "I have no silver or gold, but what I have I give you; in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk." 7 And he took him by the right hand and raised him up; and immediately his feet and ankles were made strong. 8 Jumping up, he stood and began to walk, and he entered the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God. 9 All the people saw him walking and praising God, 10 and they recognized him as the one who used to sit and ask for alms at the Beautiful Gate of the temple; and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him. 11 While he clung to Peter and John, all the people ran together to them in the portico called Solomon's Portico, utterly astonished.
