“People to meet in heaven: Tabitha”
Acts 9:36-42
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus.
Val Thomas is a miracle. At least that’s what her doctors say.
On May 17, 2008, at 1:30 in the morning, she woke up with severe pains in her chest, so she called her sister, Sheila and her son, Tim. Then she called an ambulance.
But by the time everyone arrived, it was too late. She had suffered a massive heart attack. Her skin was grey and she was lying face down on the floor.
Hope against hope, she was taken to a hospital in Charleston, West Virginia, where doctors placed her on a ventilator and a machine called the Arctic Sun, to lower her body temperature.
The odds were against her. She had less than a five percent chance of surviving. Even worse, over the next ten hours, she suffered two more heart attacks, and the monitors showed no brain activity.
Her family was prepared for the worst.
Finally, when all hope was gone and her family said their goodbyes, her doctor turned off the ventilator and removed the tubes to end Val’s life.
That’s when, all of a sudden, she coughed, her eyes began to flutter, and she asked, “Where’s my son?” Her pulse was back. Her blood pressure was back. She was breathing on her own.
Later she said: “I thank God for bringing me back so that I can do what He wants me to do; and my son, Tim, it’s incredible the change in him as a result of what has happened to me.” And she said: “Every morning when I get up, I thank God that I have another gift from Him. Every night when I go to bed I thank Him. I say, ‘Thank You, God, for this beautiful day.’”
So it was for a woman named Tabitha in the words of Acts chapter 9.
If you would, please turn with me in your Bible to page 1168, as I read the words of Acts chapter 9. I’ll start at verse 36: “Now there was in Joppa a disciple named Tabitha, which, translated, means Dorcas. She was full of good works and acts of charity. In those days she became ill and died, and when they had washed her, they laid her in an upper room. 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.’ So Peter rose and went with them. And when he arrived, they took him to the upper room. All the widows stood beside him weeping and showing tunics and other garments that Dorcas made while she was with them. But Peter put them all outside, and knelt down and prayed; and turning to the body he said, ‘Tabitha, arise.’ And she opened her eyes, and when she saw Peter she sat up. And he gave her his hand and raised her up. Then calling the saints and widows, he presented her alive. And it became known throughout all Joppa, and many believed in the Lord.”
We’ll stop there for a moment.
Look again at verse 36: “Now there was in Joppa a disciple named Tabitha, which, translated, means Dorcas.”
“Joppa,” it says. It was a coastal town, some thirty miles west of Jerusalem, overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. It’s modern-day Tel Aviv. If you really know your Bible, you’ll know it’s where Solomon floated in the cedars of Lebanon to build his temple, and where Jonah once boarded a boat before he was tossed in the sea.
And since it was a coastal town, a port town, that tells us something. It tells us it was a place where many people, many nationalities of people, would come and go—Romans, Greeks, Egyptians, Syrians and Persians, not to mention a whole host of foreign traders and sailors who all passed that way. It was a multicultural, cosmopolitan place. If you were looking for the rich intellect of the west or the exotic fabrics, incense and spices of the east, whatever you wanted, Joppa was the place to go.
“Now there was in Joppa a disciple…” A disciple? That’s not really a surprise. Some seven years before, Jesus had died and rose again, so all across Israel there were many thousands who believed.
But what was strange is that the sentence continues with this: “There was in Joppa a disciple named Tabitha.”
A disciple named Tabitha? Now I hope no one would accuse me of being a chauvinist, (I’m really not!). Of course, we can call any woman a disciple, a student, a follower of Jesus.
But what makes Tabitha so extraordinary is that, in the entire New Testament, she is the one and only woman ever called a disciple! So for that very reason, whether their name was Priscilla, Phoebe, Junia, Julia, Martha or Mary, whoever they were and however faithful they might have been, Tabitha stands out beyond all the rest.
Even more, look at verse 36: “She was full of good works and acts of charity.” More than anything, her heart beat for the poor, the widowed, the lonely and the oppressed. She was a living, breathing model of Jesus’ words in Matthew 25: “Whatever you do for the least of these, you do for Me,” and of the words of James chapter 1: “Religion that is pure and faultless before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress.”
But in spite of her life of good works and her deep compassion, verse 37 says, “In those days she became ill and died, and when they had washed her, they laid her in an upper room.”
And in that moment, that solemn, gut-wrenching moment, Tabitha stopped breathing and her heart, once so filled with compassion, stopped beating. All of a sudden, her kindness and her love for the poor, came to an end. And now, as she once cared for others, others stooped to care for her.
They took her, then washed and dressed her, probably in one of the many dresses she had made. And they laid her in an upstairs room, peaceful and quiet, and cried their heart-felt tears.
But somewhere deep inside of them was one small glimmer of hope—Peter, the first and foremost of all Jesus’ disciples, the one who walked on water, who saw Jesus risen from the dead—maybe he could come to give some sense of hope in the midst of their deep despair.
Verse 38: “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.’”
Now we don’t know exactly what they expected him to do. Peter had healed many others and could preach like no one else could preach, but, as far as we know, he had never raised anyone from the dead. Still, hope against hope, they sent word: “Please come to us without delay.”
And as he made that ten mile journey from Lydda to Joppa to stand beside her bed, what did he see? Verse 39: “And when he arrived, they took him to the upper room. All the widows stood beside him weeping and showing tunics and other garments that Dorcas made while she was with them.”
They showed him the things she had knitted and sewn—the layettes and the blankets, the sweaters and tunics, the shawls and lap warmers that she had made. And they told him about the meals she brought when a husband died, or when one of their children was sick, or the time they went to the doctor and she sat by their side.
And as Peter stood and held her hand in death--those hands that had knitted so many rows and cared for the lives of so many others--he could feel his own heart mending, a heart that once denied his Savior, that once hid behind locked doors.
Then what did he say? What did he do? Look at verse 40: “But Peter put them all outside, and knelt down and prayed; and turning to the body he said, ‘Tabitha, arise.’”
“Tabitha, arise.” Do those words sound familiar to any of you? They did to Peter.
Remember? For it was in the book of Mark chapter 5, that a girl, a little twelve-year-old girl, grew sick and died. And as Jesus stood beside her bed, with Peter, James and John standing beside, what did He say? “Talitha, cumi.” “Little girl, get up.”
And now, as Peter stood beside Tabitha’s bed, he spoke the very same words that Jesus spoke, all except for one letter. And instead of saying “Talitha, cumi,” he said, “Tabitha, cumi.”
And what happened? By the grace, the strength and the power of God, she got up! It was a miracle!
In 1987, Jack Richmond was driving a forklift at work when the vehicle suddenly rolled over onto him, crushing his leg below his knee. His daughter, Reagan, was just two months old.
He said, “When they first told me I would lose my leg, I said, ‘Can’t you fix it?’ But it couldn’t be saved. And as he thought about his new daughter, he worried how she would feel growing up with a father who had an artificial leg.
But having such a young daughter motivated him to get up and get going. So, two years after the accident, he went back to the hospital to talk to other amputees to tell them it would be okay.
But as he sat and talked with one young man, and said, “You’re going to get through this. You will survive,” the man said, “I’m tired of you people coming in here and telling me I’m going to be okay.”
That’s when Jack put his leg over the side of his bed, pulled up his pants leg and said, “About two years ago, I was in a room across the hall.”
The man didn’t say anything, but tears rolled down his face.
There is that question--why did the Lord allow Peter to raise Tabitha from the dead? He didn’t raise Stephen. Stephen was publicly stoned, martyred for his Christian faith. To raise him would have had a profound impact on everyone’s faith. So why raise Tabitha and not him?
Was it because she was a great teacher that could never be replaced? Was she a huge financial contributor? Probably neither one.
So why did the Lord raise her from the dead?
Maybe it was this—maybe it’s because He didn’t want compassion to die in the church. For of all the things for which the church must be known, it must be known for its compassion. That’s why Peter stood beside her bed and said, “Tabitha, get up.”
And if we will be the church God has called us to be, we too must show compassion. That is, after all, what Paul once wrote to the Colossians: “Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion.”
As Charles Wesley wrote so long ago: “Love divine, all love excelling, joy of heaven, to earth come down! Fix in us Thy humble dwelling, all thy faithful mercies crown. Jesus, Thou art all compassion, pure, unbounded love Thou art; visit us with Thy salvation, enter every trembling heart.”
We thank You, dear Lord, for the privilege of serving the poor, the weak and the oppressed. Help us in our time and place, to have a heart, just like Tabitha, that’s filled with compassion. This we ask in our Savior’s name. Amen