Acts 3: 1-10
One day Peter and John were going up to the temple at the hour of prayer, at three o’clock in the afternoon. And a man lame from birth was being carried in. People would lay him daily at the gate of the temple called the Beautiful Gate so that he could ask for alms from those entering the temple. When he saw Peter and John about to go into the temple, he asked them for alms. Peter looked intently at him, as did John, and said, “Look at us.” And he fixed his attention on them, expecting to receive something from them.
But Peter said, “I have no silver or gold, but what I have I give you; in the name of
Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk.” And he took him by the right hand and raised him up; and immediately his feet and ankles were made strong. Jumping up, he stood and began to walk, and he entered the temple with them,walking and leaping and praising God.
All the people saw him walking and praising God, and they recognized him as the one who used to sit and ask for alms at the Beautiful Gate of the temple; and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him.
New Revised Standard Version, copyright 1989, by the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. USCCB approved.
Seeing with New Eyes
One of the rewards of enduring a long winter is the shock of spring. If intellectually I know that spring will come, how is it that I’m bowled over every April by the sudden appearance of a crocus? Why in April do I feel as though I’m seeing tulips for the first time?
In today’s reading, Peter and John pass the same man they see every day. And the man, a daily fixture at the temple gate, sees them again. But then something different happens. Peter and John “looked intently” at the man, and the man, in turn, “fixed his attention on them.”
Our lives might look the same since Easter—same people, same routines, same paralysis—yet things are different. Stop and realize: Christ has risen!
Will you see with new eyes today? Will routine encounters engender the miraculous?
Lord, open our eyes to wonder and amazement this day.
—Christine Brunkhorst is an alumna of Santa Clara University and Marquette University. A Twin Cities Ignatian Associate, she teaches English to adult immigrants at Learning in Style School in Minneapolis.
Prayer
Risen Jesus, Lord of my life, give me eyes to see, a heart to mend,
hands to strengthen and heal whomever you send across my path today. Expand my spirit
these holy days of Easter. Amen.
—Jesuit Prayer team