One day I was wondering what it would have been like to live in the early days of Christianity, to hear or see the healings that we read about in the book of Acts in the Bible. How would it have been to have been living in Joppa, or Jaffa as it is known today, when Tabitha died?
Tabitha was a disciple of Jesus, and she was such a good woman, always thinking of others! She is described in the Bible as “full of good works and almsdeeds which she did” (Acts 9:36). So after she died and her body was laid out, people living nearby—especially those that Tabitha had been helping out—got together in the room to talk about her, and all the good things she had done. Two of the men from that group had gone to Lydda to try to get Jesus’ disciple, Peter, to come, and when he came, everybody told him the whole sad story about how Tabitha had done so much for other people and how tireless she had been in sewing beautiful things for people who needed them.
I wondered how it would have been when Peter called everyone back, and Tabitha was there with him, and she was alive. Would it have seemed like some kind of magic? Or some special miracle? Or would it have been a window into the active power of prayer? The account in Acts says, “And it was known throughout all Joppa; and many believed in the Lord. And it came to pass, that [Peter] tarried many days in Joppa with one Simon a tanner” (Acts 9:42, 43).
