Thursday in the Octave of Easter

Lectionary: 264

The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob,the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus...
God raised him from the dead; of this we are witnesses.
And by faith in his name, this man, whom you see and know, his name has made strong;
and the faith that comes through it
has given him this perfect health,
in the presence of all of you.

 In this new age of technocratic wizardry, history in general -- and prehistoric names and stories in particular -- seems hugely irrelevant. The patriarchal names of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob may have seemed equally irrelevant to the citizens of Jerusalem. They remembered Moses since the Pharisees pondered and endlessly parsed the Law of Moses; and they could not ignore the tomb of David, the founding king of Jerusalem and their fallen nation. 

But the patriarchs of that ante-Babylonian, ante-Mosaic period stirred little resonance among Peter's contemporaries as they dealt with the Roman occupation and Herodian kings. Why would anyone invoke Abraham in an argument about a healed cripple? You might as well invoke Paul Bunyan or Br'er Rabbit in the U.S. Senate.

The question may be more relevant today as we hear Peter refer to the patriarchs in today's first reading. It's hard enough to cite Jesus in today's world, and those citations are often made without reference to the twenty centuries that have passed since his ascension. For many Christians he is more mythological than historical, a remotely familiar name from the long-forgotten past. People often invoke his name with little reference to the Gospels and New Testament, much less the Old Testament; although he preferred the title Son of David, and personally knew Abraham! 

Ignorance of history, however, does not excuse one for not knowing its powerful influence on everything we do and say. As William Faulkner said, "The past is not dead; it's not even past." And Christians who feel adrift in this new age of climate disintegration and technological chaos must find their prehistoric roots in the study of our scriptures and history. Knowledge of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Eli, Samuel, Ruth, Deborah, David, Hezekiah, Cyrus, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Qoheleth; plus the Apostles, Mary, the martyrs, saints, and patristic fathers helps us know who we are, whom we represent, and how we should respond now. There should be no end to our study and curiosity; and the more we know the more we want to know. 

With that wisdom we will be more delighted than astonished by the healing of a crippled man. We'll say, "Yes, of course! He was healed by faith in his name, and...

his name has made him strong,

and the faith that comes through it

has given him this perfect health.....

In fact, we see God's marvelous presence all around us, and we feel his guiding presence continually. Unlike our contemporaries, we know who we are.