Sermon Tone Analysis

Welcome & Announcements

“SOUP”erbowl Watch Party on February 12, 2023.

We’re encouraging everyone to bring a homemade soup, we’ll vote on the best soup, and the winner wins a $50 gift card to Brown Dog Catering in Philipsburg.

Kickoff is at 6:30pm.

Please prepare for the Lord’s Supper on February 19th, 2023.

Josh Dickson will be preaching February 26th, 2023, during the Sunday AM Service.

Worship through Giving

Prayer of Repentance and Adoration

Call to Worship (Ps 71:7-12)

Our Call to Worship continues Psalm 71, which remember is an anonymous psalm written concerning what it means to age and still worship Yahweh.

In the six verses that we’re responsively reading today, we see his request for God not to cast him off in his old age—or in other words, don’t abandon him, but rather be not far from him and haste to help him.

Please stand and read Psalm 71 with me, I’ll read the odd-numbered verses; please join me in reading the even-numbered verses.

Congregational Singing

Oh, How Good it Is (332)

The Solid Rock (381)

Scripture Reading (Gen 17)

Our Scripture Reading this morning is Genesis 17, which shows us both the Covenant of Circumcision and the promise of Isaac’s birth.

Both of these ideas are important for us to remember as we continue reading through Genesis because God repeatedly returns to these covenants as a reminder of His faithfulness.

Natalie, can you read Genesis 17 for us?

Preaching of God’s Word (Acts 9:32-43)

Introduction

If you have your Bible please turn it to Acts 9:32-43.

We’ve been working through the book of Acts on Sunday morning—and we’ve seen how the apostles took seriously Jesus’ command to go and make disciples, that they’ve gone throughout Jerusalem and extending beyond Jerusalem proclaiming the Gospel and teaching the truth as taught by Jesus.

While there has been some pushback, some antagonism towards the Gospel that has extended towards pushback and antagonism towards the apostles, what we see is thousands and thousands of people, hearing the Gospel, being confronted for their sins, repenting and believing in Jesus.

So much so, that even the Pharisees of Pharisees who had gained a reputation for harshly and violently persecuting the church is confronted by Jesus for his sins and he repents and he believes and starts proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

And as the proclamation of the Gospel and the teaching of the truth according to Jesus spreads, Luke, who is the author of Acts, is building up to something vastly important as he records the growth of the church.

This morning, through means of miraculous and spontaneous healings, the message of Jesus is confirmed through Peter as God uses him to heal and to even resurrect someone from the dead; but let me remind you before we read the text, that throughout Scripture, the main idea isn’t the miraculous and spontaneous healing, it’s always about what the miracle confirms—the message that’s being proclaimed at the time of the miraculous event—and in this case it is all about the Gospel being proclaimed to two people that actually might not be Jewish who happen to be quite a distance apart.

Keep this in mind as we read Acts 9:32-43 together.

As we study this passage together, we’re going to break the text into two right along its natural division based on person—(1) in vv.

32-35, we see Aeneas being Healed in the city of Lydda and (2) in vv.

36-43, we see Tabitha/Dorcas being Healed in the city of Joppa.

Now, there are some details that are worth noting in these verses, but I want to be abundantly clear from the onset that the main point of both of these accounts is found at the end of each account—that people saw, they turned to the Lord, and many believed in Jesus.

Prayer for Illumination

Aeneas is Healed (32-35)

Our text starts with the healing of Aeneas, which occurs in the city of Lydda.

And let me say that though these sorts of details may seem inconsequential, there are reasons for them to be included in the biblical text.

In this case, it gives us an insight into how exactly the Gospel spread and it shows us that the Gospel is spreading beyond just Jerusalem and its suburbs.

Most scholars today believe that ancient Lydda is now the city of Lod, which is 22 miles northwest of Jerusalem, which doesn’t sound far until you remember that the spread of the Gospel was through verbal means—meaning its all word of mouth and no one had a car, so they’re all walking to place to place.

The Gospel is expanding beyond just the immediate vicinity of Jerusalem, but the text doesn’t start with the idea of the spread of the Gospel.

Instead, all we’re told is that Peter “went here and there among them [meaning the church spread throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria] when he “came down also to the saints who lived at Lydda.”

In this city, there’s a man by the name of Aeneas, who had been bedridden for eight years due to paralysis—we aren’t given any other details about this man; we don’t know what caused the paralysis; or how old this man was.

We can postulate based on some of the words in the text that Aeneas is an adult and not a child because he’s described as a man and not a child, which tells us that he wasn’t born with paralysis.

And we can deduce that he was probably a believer, based on the fact that Peter went to Lydda to see the saints according to v. 32, but that’s about all the detail that we have about Aeneas.

We aren’t even really told the full details of the conversation—literally, all we see is Peter make one statement, in v. 34, “‘Aeneas, Jesus Christ heals you; rise and make your bed’” and Aeneas immediately rose from his bed.

What we do know from this text beyond the sentence that Peter speaks and besides Aeneas’ name is rather simple:

Aeneas was certainly disabled and unable to heal himself—we see this in the simple fact that he had been completely paralyzed and bedridden for eight years.

It might seem like a minor detail, but when speaking of spontaneous healings in the Bible, we need to see that the healing was from something significant that debilitated him.

It wasn’t an issue that was minor that could be fixed on its own.

Aeneas was absolutely and completely healed—again, it might seem like a minor detail, but there are people today who claim to be healers and they’ll claim to heal someone, but that person won’t be completely healed.

That idea of a partial healing is contrary to every spontaneous healing in the Bible—every spontaneous healing empowered by God is complete and absolute.

Or in other words, if someone was genuinely empowered by God to spontaneously heal you, you wouldn’t be partially healed, you’d be completely healed just like Aeneas.

Peter makes it abundantly clear that the power to heal was not from Peter, but all from Jesus Christ—or in other words, the fact that Peter is the one whom Jesus uses to perform these miracles means nothing whatsoever.

It’s all about Jesus.

So much so, that v. 35 ends Aeneas’ healing with an important statement, “all the residents of Lydda and Sharon [which is the area surrounding Lydda] saw Aeneas, and they turned to the Lord.”

Why exactly was Aeneas healed?

What was the primary reason for this healing to take place in the city of Lydda?

Was it for Peter to build himself up (or to puff himself up in pride)?

Was it for him to build up his brand and his following?

Absolutely not.

From the perspective of Aeneas, was it simply so that he no longer had to struggle and suffer in life?

Some might be tempted to think that, but what about all the times in Scripture that we see God’s people struggle with these sorts of ailments and not get spontaneously healed like Job or Paul or even Jesus?

The key to answering this question, “why exactly was Aeneas healed” is found in v. 35, that they saw and they turned to the Lord.

Aeneas wasn’t healed for Peter’s sake and he wasn’t even healed for his own sake.

He was healed because through the spontaneous healing, Jesus’ power was made evident and it confirmed what was being proclaimed by Peter and the other apostles and really all the disciples.

The miraculous event at hand confirms that what Peter was proclaiming about Jesus was and is absolutely true.

And this confirmation of truth resulted in the people of Lydda and Sharon turning to the Lord.

Now, there’s another important point that needs to be made.

If you’re astute and you’re paying close attention, you might have noticed that the name Aeneas doesn’t sound Jewish.

Now, you can’t read too much into this, but I do want to point out the significance of someone with a Greek name who was a believer, being that up to this point the only other person mentioned in Acts that we’re uncertain of their lineage and believes is the Ethiopian Eunuch, but in that case, there’s an argument to be made that he was a Jewish person who happened to live in Ethiopia, which is why he traveled to Jerusalem to worship Yahweh.

In this case, the person named is named by a Greek name and there’s no effort to give a Jewish name along with the Greek name; the implication is that this person wasn’t a Jewish believer, he was a Gentile who believed in Jesus and happened to be paralyzed.

Or in other words, Luke is intentionally showing us how the Gospel is spreading beyond just the Jewish people and it’s spreading in a way that even Gentile people are believing and turning to Jesus.

The rest of this morning’s text then transitions us to a completely different place—remember, Aeneas was in Lydda, which means Peter was in Lydda, but vv.

36-43 move us to Joppa.

Joppa was another town about 12-15 miles from Lydda and in this town, there are people who believe—and there’s one, in particular, that is experiencing a terrible bit of hardship.

Let’s re-read vv.

36-43:

Tabitha/Dorcas is Healed (36-43)

Now in Joppa there’s a disciple named Tabitha and this person had a reputation of doing good works and acts of charity.

This woman becomes sick and died and the disciples followed Jewish custom by washing her and laying her in the upper room so that her family and friends could come and mourn her death.

And unlike Aeneas, she has an Aramaic name, Tabitha which is then translated into Greek as Dorcas.

Again, we can’t read too much into this, but when comparing Tabitha to Aeneas, the idea is that Tabitha is a Jewish person whereas Aeneas might not have been Jewish.

We’re essentially seeing the impartiality of God on full display—you know, Galatians 3:28-29 “28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

29 And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, heirs according to promise.”

Both were and are believers.

So, Tabitha gets sick and dies and they prepare her body and lay her in the upper room and in v. 38, we’re told that “since Lydda was near Joppa, the disciples, hearing that Peter was there, sent two men to him, urging him, ‘Please come to us without delay.’”

Note that the text doesn’t really tell us what they expected Peter to do—no where in the text do they ask Peter to come and heal Tabitha; it could very well be that they sent for him simply to provide him an opportunity to mourn her passing as well.

But when Peter does come, when he arrives in the upper room, he reacts a bit differently than how we would assume him to act and maybe even a bit differently than they thought he would act and react.

When Peter arrives in v. 39, “all the widows stood beside him weeping and showing tunics and other garments that Dorcas made while she was with them.”

This sentence reiterates the fact that she was full of good works and acts of charity from v. 36—the way that this phrase is worded in Greek, implies that the clothes that they show Peter were actually clothes that Dorcas made with them and for them—meaning, they were wearing these clothes, which would then imply that they were women who needed help and Dorcas provided them help through the clothing that she made.

And they’re showing Peter all these clothes not because they like the designs or the colors, but because these were things that they needed that were given to them handmade by Dorcas for them.

So, Peter arrives, he sees all the things that were made by Dorcas, which is really just a fruit of her being a woman of good works and acts of charity, when he sends all the people out of the room.

And after they all leave the room, he does two things that result in God doing something miraculous—he kneels, prays, and tells her to rise up.

It’s interesting to note that he did literally nothing but kneel, pray, and tell her to rise—he didn’t check her pulse to be sure that she was actually gone, he didn’t say some sort of incantation; all he does is pray and tell her to stand.

It shows us that Peter knows that he can’t really do anything to help Tabitha; it shows us that he realizes the only person that has the power to do anything in her situation is Jesus Himself—so, he prays to the only one that can help.

In doing this, he expresses complete and utter dependence on Jesus to do the miraculous spontaneous healing that Tabitha requires—Peter knows he can’t do it and yet, he has complete confidence that Jesus can and will.

So much so, that he prays and turns to Tabitha and simply tells her to arise and v. 40 tells us that “she opened her eyes, and when she saw Peter she sat up.

And he gave her his hand and raised her up.”

Before calling all the people and presenting her alive.

Much like Aeneas’ situation, in which he had been disabled and physically unable to move for eight years, Tabitha was absolutely dead—this is important because it shows us that Tabitha was absolutely and completely unable to help herself.

There is nothing that Tabitha could’ve done to magically make herself alive again just like there was absolutely nothing that Aeneas could’ve done to heal himself.

And in neither situation could Peter himself have done anything to heal Aeneas or resurrect Tabitha.