They looked, they saw what they needed to do and they did it. Shannon taught seminary full-time in Utah for 13 years, she is now at home raising her family and working on this. In the end, this turned out to be pretty spectacular, but they started with something simple – their interest, their attention, their compassion. This website was founded by Shannon Foster. They didn’t have any money, but they gave what they could. Peter and John had the right idea, because, after all, they’d been hanging out with Jesus for years. Because I’m aware of how often I look in anger and judgement I know how often I refuse to look at all. How we look at people can be a mark of how deep our faith has got into our bones, and frankly this terrifies me. Imagine, say, the looks given by passers-by when your autistic kid has a meltdown in the supermarket, or when your granddad does something inappropriate because his mind is slowly being clouded by Alzheimer’s, or when the friend who comes to church with you at Christmas has one too many tattoos and a flexible attitude to swearing, or when you read the latest tabloid campaign to characterise the disabled as ‘lazy’. Because the alternative to not looking is sometimes to stare in horror and disgust, and in some ways that’s worse.
Let’s not kid ourselves though, it’s about how these guys looked at each other. There’s something going on here, something about compassion and interest and acknowledging the beggar’s humanity. Scores of people must have walked past him every day, some of them throwing him a few coins here and there, and yet how many people actually looked at him? After all, it’s scary how easy it is not to make eye contact when you’re dropping a quid at someone’s feet. I mean, the guy’s begging at the Temple gates, presumably because this was a high traffic area that gave him enough to live on. It’s taken years for me to twig that this seems to be about eye contact. “Peter looked straight at him, as did John. In this miracle, Peter and John heal a lame man. Click the pictures to go to the lame man Bible craft. In the Book of Acts, Philip also healed a man with palsy. One time four friends lowered a man with palsy through the roof in front of Jesus. But here’s the line that I always saw as a strange detail to mention: The Book of Acts also mentions that Peter and John healed a lame man.
They don’t have any, but instead heal his lameness so far, so typical for the New Testament. So Peter and John are going into the Temple in Jerusalem when a beggar asks them for money. There’s a part of me that still hates myself for that, but if I’m being honest, it’s not a very big part, and I can still studiously avoid making eye contact with people begging in places like Derby or Dudley or Birmingham, places I live and work. These skills also served me well in San Francisco, when I found myself stepping over someone sleeping on the pavement. I’ve convinced myself it’s a survival skill for the rare times I visit major cities when I was in Toronto back in 1999, I couldn’t handle seeing the homelessness problem, so within a couple of days I’d trained myself to walk faster, to look straight ahead, to not try and give pathetic scraps of change to the homeless woman standing outside a shopping centre, to the man lying on a sidewalk air vent. So he, leaping up, stood and walked and entered the temple with them – walking, leaping, and praising God.Over the years I’ve somehow made myself good at not looking. Remember, no matter what’s going on, or how hard it might be to stay quarantined, Jesus is always willing to help us. You can even call one of your friends from Sunday School and talk to them about what you both learned!
Talk about what you learned today with your parents, friends and brothers and sisters.
Here are some coloring pages, puzzles and other activities for you to help you learn more about the time Peter and John Healed a Lame Man.
0 kommentar(er)
