Acts 9:32-35--The Healing of Aeneas

Acts 9:32-35
English Standard Version
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The Healing of Aeneas
32 Now as Peter went here and there among them all, he came down also to the saints who lived at Lydda. 33 There he found a man named Aeneas, bedridden for eight years, who was paralyzed. 34 And Peter said to him, “Aeneas, Jesus Christ heals you; rise and make your bed.” And immediately he rose. 35 And all the residents of Lydda and Sharon saw him, and they turned to the Lord.

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The Christians for the most part have scattered and started to return back to their homes because of persecution, but in a twist that only God could have planned, the one who was persecuting the Christians has now become one of them.  The one that was driving the Christians away to the nations would become the apostle to these nations.  However, there was still work to be done in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria, and Peter seems mostly focused on that effort in the book of Acts (though we know that he travelled other places as well as we study the New Testament epistles.

For now, Peter is going from town to town visiting the churches in each area and this story focuses on his time that he spent visiting the congregation meeting in the city of Lydda.  Lydda is southeast of Joppa (Peter's hometown).  When Peter got there, there was a man there named Aeneas who had been bedridden for eight years.  No additional details are given by Luke other than the fact that the man was paralyzed.

Peter speaks to him and says, "Aeneas, Jesus Christ heals you; rise and make your bed."  This command seems similar to when Jesus healed the paralytic man in Luke 5:17-26.  This again was a miracle that accompanied a message.  When the residents of this city and the ones that came from another nearby city saw this miracle, for the probably all knew of the man and that he was paralyzed, they turned to the Lord, because they knew only God had the power to do these kinds of miracles, but they were done in the name of Jesus which had to mean at a minimum that God approved of Jesus and His gospel message and it could even be inferred that Jesus was God in the flesh.

Next time we'll see another miracle done by Peter in the town of Joppa.  Again the focus here is not the miracle, but the message, and God is using the miracles to validate the message and the messenger, that both came from Him.  God can and sometimes still does use signs and miracles for the same reasons today but we get into the same kind of trouble the Jews did with Jesus when we are just constantly looking for signs and wonders without giving thought to the message that the miracle is validating.  Let's be careful to not worship the miracle or the messenger and make make sure that we worship the Lord who is the one who is the source and provider of both the miracle and the message.