Day 25 – Issue 12

Be Still Know

Acts 3:8 NLT

He jumped up, stood on his feet, and began to walk! Then, walking, leaping, and praising God, he went into the Temple with them.

Yesterday we considered the lame man who was healed at the Gate Beautiful. Today we discover that he used his new-found mobility to walk, to leap and to praise God as well he might. He also made his way into the Temple to pray. Prayer and its dramatic impact upon his life caused him to explore the meaning of this Jesus-inspired faith. His way of discipleship had begun.

Here, at the Beautiful Gate, a lame man sits and begs as he has done day in, day out. He thinks of himself as no more than on the margins of Jerusalem society, eking out a few coins so that he can survive and start begging all over again the next day. But when Peter and John pass by and call him to stand up in the name of Jesus, he responds with every fibre of his being and in this instance is physically healed.

As we approach prayer, we can find that there are burdens that sit upon us which we can’t see beyond. Our vision is obscured and we haven’t the eyes of faith. Or we are wedded to just one answer that we demand from God, rather that yielding to God’s purpose for us in the reality of life experience. Yet God works with the pliable heart, as the potter moulds the malleable clay upon his wheel.

The challenge of the ‘now’ of this world and the ‘not yet’ of God’s kingdom fully realised is to maintain a sense of perspective, yet a perspective that will choose to look beyond the immediate, to gaze on God and his purpose for you as you sit beneath your burden. Gazing upon Jesus is the surest way to recover the eyes of faith and encounter Christ on the road of discipleship.

QUESTION: Are there burdens that sit on your shoulders as you reach out to God in prayer? Do these burdens obscure your view through the eye of faith?

PRAYER: Lord God, I want to see past the challenges I face, to see you and learn from you.