Wednesday in Easter Week

Acts 3:1-10; Psalm 118:19-24; Luke 24:13-35

If you thought transformation ended with Jesus’ resurrection, think again!  We will be hearing throughout Easter season about the adventures of the disciples, those with Jesus and those who came later.  Today’s reading from Acts really brings home to me just how much transformation is unleashed by the Spirit.

But first we have to back up a bit.  In Luke’s Gospel, and the book of Acts written by the same author, we are led to understand that the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples fifty days after the Resurrection.  In Luke, Jesus leaves them the same day he rises; in Acts, he spends forty days teaching them.  But there’s a definite delay between Jesus’ resurrection and the coming of the Holy Spirit.

In John’s Gospel, Jesus breathes the Holy Spirit onto the disciples that very first Easter day (John 20:22).  No waiting!  So it’s fitting that we start hearing stories of transformed disciples during Easter, not waiting for Pentecost.

But i digress.

The timing of these metamorphoses isn’t the point.  The point is that they happen.

In today’s reading we find the miraculous healing of the lame man.  That’s powerful, and disturbing.  He didn’t ask for healing.  He has just lost his livelihood.  But he seems OK with it, walking and leaping and praising God.  His whole life has just been transformed, and he now faces totally unexpected challenges - challenges that he will be able to face, with the same God who healed him.

But the healing, the miracle that hit me today was Peter.  When did Peter get the gift of healing?  How did he know he could do that?  What made him risk it the first time?  What the **** has happened to Peter?  I am indeed “filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him” (Acts 3:10) - but the other “him”!

This story reminds me that we are often transformed when we aren’t noticing, or looking for it for ourselves.  At some point Peter felt called to use the gift of healing, as children try out new muscles.  As we grow in our journey with Christ, we sometimes feel called to try something new as well.  Desires that we didn’t know we had suddenly move to the forefront.  Abilities we neglected become needed for the good of others.  Courage or love that we didn’t know we possessed move us to try new things.  We are transformed.  We are miracles.

Peter is still Peter.  He will still bumble and protest and stick his foot into things.  But he is Peter touched by the Holy Spirit.  He is recognizable, but new and different at the same time.

Walking our daily roads we may not notice our own transformation.  We may notice that others seem different.  Often, that’s because we have changed.  When I became a Christian, people started being nicer to me.  Funny.

Look around you.  Be amazed.