God's Not Finished with Us Yet!

Rebecca Sheridan
Sunday, May 11, 2025
Acts 9:36-43

Jesus our good shepherd promises us in the gospel for today, “I give them eternal life, and they will never perish.  No one will snatch them out of my hand.”  Present tense – Jesus gives us, not will give us, eternal life.  Eternal life is our present reality, not just our future hope that when we die we will go to heaven. The eternal life that Jesus gives cannot be snatched out of his hands, and we are living it!.  Early on in my ministry, I read Pastor Rob Bell’s book, Love Wins, and the central idea of this book is that eternal life begins the day we place our faith in Christ, the day we confess follow Jesus on his Way as a Christian, not something we wait for when we die.  Eternal life is now!  This is what it means, Pastor Bell argues, for us to pray “thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”  Through how we live our lives and how we experience Christ working in our lives today, we experience eternal life.
It can be difficult, of course, though, to believe that we might experience “heaven on earth” in the here and now.  This past week, we continue to hear about deep political divisions in our country, economic uncertainty for many, a new conflict between India and Pakistan, war that is still not resolved in Gaza and Ukraine, and the list could go on.  Eternal life is now?  Does Jesus’ resurrection actually make a difference?  The answer we confidently give is “yes!”  We still say, because it is still Easter, “Christ is risen, he is risen indeed, alleluia!” And Christ’s resurrection makes a difference because he is living in us and WE have made a difference for someone else.  Christ comes so that we can meet people in their suffering in a suffering world and make a difference for the better!
Our first reading from Acts this morning is about two people who have made a big difference in the world because of Christ working in and through them.  We learn about Tabitha, also known as Dorcas.  Notice that she is named a disciple – discipleship is not reserved for just 12 men long ago in biblical times, but we, too, men and women, are disciples!  We are disciples!  In this miraculous story, we see that God is not done with Tabitha yet.  She has devoted her life to good works and charity because of her faith in Christ, and though she has died, God gives her a second lease on life.  Peter prays, and she opens her eyes and sits up.  She is alive again!  
So first, we can admire the faith of Peter, who as we know is not always the best of the disciples.  He doesn’t understand what it means for Jesus to be the Messiah at first – Jesus actually says, “Get behind me Satan,” to him.  Peter doesn’t want Jesus to wash his feet.  He denies that he knows Jesus three times before his crucifixion.  But just before our reading in Acts for today, Peter has healed the paralyzed man Aeneas in nearby Lydda.  He is preaching and teaching as one of the leaders of the early Christian church, as we will see again next Sunday.  And through his faith in the power of Christ’s resurrection, he even raises Tabitha from the dead.  This had to be an amazing thing to witness for Peter himself and those who saw this.  Look how far Peter has come in living out his faith in Christ because of Jesus’ resurrection!
It's important to note, though, that resuscitation is not the extent of eternal life or the resurrection we share with Christ.  Through Peter, God gives Tabitha more life on earth to live – God isn’t done with her yet.  We assume that she goes on to continue to clothe the needy and do other good works of charity, touching many lives as she did before this miracle, and then sometime, she does die again.  She is given more time in this life to serve, but she trusts in Paul’s words that whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s.  Tabitha is called a disciple, a faithful Christian BEFORE she is raised from the dead for her ordinary acts of service.  Today, we lift up mothers in particular for their ordinary acts of service.  They, too, in big ways and little ways, teach us the faith, show us what it means to serve, and remind us that faithful living in ordinary ways can make a big, miraculous impact.
So how do we live our lives knowing that eternal life begins now – that as God’s resurrection people, we are given this gift of a new life, a renewed life, now?!  What has God created you to do that is lifegiving so that you think, “I could do this forever?”  Are there ways in which you feel like God has given you a second lease on life, a second chance, or where you feel God calling you to serve because God is not finished with you yet?
Peter Drucker, famous author of modern business management strategy, once said that the church is not a business, because the “church’s one essential product is a changed human being.”  Jesus is our positive change agent!  In big and small ways, we can see how both Peter and Tabitha are changed by their encounter with Christ and in their desire to live with the hope of eternal life in the here and now.  Maybe you have struggled with a mental illness or an addiction.  Maybe you have felt the tug to live life differently, to escape the rat race of the competitive, consumerist, comparative culture around us.  Maybe you had a physical health scare and literally were given a chance to live longer, like Tabitha.  No matter what comes our way, no matter how the world tries to get us down and convince us that Jesus’ resurrection doesn’t really matter or hasn’t made a difference, we live as people changed by Christ with the knowledge that we are in his hands – eternal life starts now.  God isn’t done with us yet.  Listen to our good shepherd’s voice, and follow him in the way of eternal life.  Thanks be to God!  Amen.