Episode Details

The Raising of Dorcas to LifeThe readings that take place in the Octave of Easter are all about people coming back to life. Today’s reading from the book of Acts is an example. The story is simple enough: a disciple of the way called Tabitha dies for no apparent reason. Some other disciples hear that the Apostle Peter is nearby. Peter comes, puts out the mourners, kneels down and prays. Then he says to her, “Tabitha, arise”.‘And she opened her eyes, and when she saw Peter she sat up…Then, calling the saints and widows, he presented her alive.’This story, in almost all of its details is remarkably similar to a story that people told about Jesus when he walked the earth. In that story, it was a little girl, the daughter of a ruler of the synagogue named Jairus who died as Jesus was on his way. Like Peter, Jesus went into the house of the dead girl and put out those who were mourning and went in to her. Jesus took her by the hand and said, “Talitha, cumi,” which means, “Little girl, I say to you, arise”.‘And immediately the girl got up and began walking (for she was twelve years of age), and they were immediately overcome with amazement.’For all the similarities there is a crucial difference: in the story of Peter, Peter kneels down, interceding and beseeching God to raise this girl from the dead. In the story of Jesus, Jesus does no such thing. Unlike Peter, Jesus simply takes the dead girl’s hand and says two words, “Talitha, cumi”. This is most important because it indicates that even the great Apostle Peter never possessed the authority by himself to do what he did. Only Jesus of Nazareth, who truly was the Christ of Israel, could command the power of death with only a word and death itself would flee at his voice.This power that Jesus demonstrated is the same power that enabled him, after his bloody and awful crucifixion and after his three days lying dead in the tomb, simply to stand up and walk away. The Christian claim is that this power is still at work today in this world and that we can know this power in our own lives.A Great Multitude from Every NationWhat about our reading from the Book of Revelation? Anyone who is familiar with this book will know that it is laden with symbols that can be very confusing, even for those who have knowledge of Scripture. What we can see quite clearly here is that John, who wrote Revelation, is a having a vision of heaven:‘After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”’Now, the Lamb here is a way of talking about Jesus, who is not a literal lamb but one who was slain as a sacrifice for sin as a lamb might have been in Old Testament times.Let’s put these two readings next to each other: the story from Acts and the vision from Revelation. We might rewind slightly the story from Acts to the beginning of that book. The disciples were, at that point, a small band. They had indeed seen the risen Jesus and they were waiting for the promise of the Holy Spirit, though they did not know what this meant. They were waiting, tiny in number and alone, probably scared that they too might be targeted by the Roman authorities, certainly not a group that imagined that they would have some kind of significant impact upon the world.How is it that this tiny band of believers grew to the great multitude from every nation, tribe, people and language that the Apostle John describes in the Book of Revelation? What happened in between to make that possible?It is very easy in the secular West to dismiss Christianity as a spent force, to believe that the Church is in decline, that one day soon it will no longer be of relevance and that some other over-arching philosophy or even religion perhaps might take its plac