To Be Graceful

To Be Graceful.

The grace of God continues for those who are already demonstrating the fruits of grace in their life.

Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound (cf. Romans 5:20), but in the instance before us we see how God’s grace also continues to abound for a woman who is already a “disciple”. Doctor Luke, the author of Acts, is at pains to make sure that his Hebrew and Greek readers all understand the meaning of the patient’s name: “Tabitha, which is translated Dorcas” - which we in our turn may translate as “Gazelle”: a graceful kind of antelope. This name fits, because the fruit of God’s grace was seen in her “good works and charitable deeds which she did” (Acts 9:36; cf. Ephesians 2:10).



Now this woman lived - and died - at Joppa, the only truly Jewish seaport in the Roman province of Judaea. Joppa was where Jonah had fled from his mission, with a view to catching a ship to Tarshish (cf. Jonah 1:3). Joppa was about 11 miles north-west of Lydda, where the Apostle Peter was to be found: the same ‘Simon surnamed Peter’ (Acts 10:5) whom Jesus once addressed as ‘Simon son of Jonah’ (Matthew 16:17).

Tabitha’s case history is briefly summarised: “she became sick and died” (Acts 9:37). Nothing unusual about that: but evidently the disciples in that place expected something else. They washed her and laid her in an upper room (a prayer room, perhaps?); then they sent two men to fetch Peter (Acts 9:38).



Peter reportedly said to Dorcas, “Tabitha, arise” (Acts 9:40) which if spoken in Aramaic would have been ‘Tabitha koum’. The result was the same: she opened her eyes and sat up. Peter took Dorcas by the hand, just as he had seen Jesus do with Jairus’ daughter - and just as Elijah and Elisha had done, he presented the hitherto dead person alive (Acts 9:41).