A Miracle Defended
Elaine Poproski Download: Audio
Scripture: Acts 4:1 – 22
While Peter and John were speaking to the people, the priests, the captain of the temple, and the Sadducees came to them, 2 much annoyed… Read more…
Looking to Sunday
by Elaine Poproski
I’m writing this in the last hours of the American election. There’s been a video circulating showing Trump supporters surrounding Biden’s campaign bus in Texas in what is obviously an intimidation tactic. Speculation is rampant about what kind of fall-out there will be after the votes are counted and the electoral college names the next president.
I’m writing this after major roads around and through the town of Caledonia have been barricaded by indigenous protestors camped on unceded land sold by the Ontario government to a housing developer back in 2006. The protest gained fresh momentum in the last week after an Ontario Superior Court judge granted a permanent injunction against the protestors.
Conflict. Confrontation. Violence. All responses of powerbrokers who sense their power being challenged. All responses of the powerless demanding to be heard and seen.
The gospel story is one of conflict, confrontation, and violence. It’s a story of life and death in which death appears in the role of powerbroker and life appears powerless. But it’s a story with a surprise. Life, it turns out, is not powerless. That’s because the creator and author of Life is none other than almighty God who brought Jesus from the grave. This is the same God who healed the lame man’s legs. It’s the same God who amazed and astonished those who listened to Peter and John in Solomon’s portico in the temple. As we continue the story of lame man that began in Acts 3, we are reminded that God is greater than entropy and death. God is greater than crushed limbs and lives.
On Sunday the story continues in Acts 4:1-22. We’ll see that conflict and confrontation continue. And we’ll be reminded that God, the Author of Life, is never at the mercy of death. We’ll be reminded that we who are this God’s adopted sons and daughters, are never at the mercy of death.
As you prepare for Sunday, where do you see proof of this truth that life is not powerless? What causes you to question the power of God in the face of evil, sin, and death? What do you need from God as you live in the conflict that is a world in which God’s kingdom has come but is not yet fully realized?