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It is a bright picture of happy and prosperous Church life that here opens. Peace "lay like a shaft of light athwart the land" of Judaea, Galilee, and Samaria. The work of edification, ever silent and sure like the growth of the tall palm, went on. There was the spirit of reverence and the sense of comfort and of joy in the presence of the Holy Spirit. That nation is happy whose life contributes few incidents that startle, changes that dismay, revolutions and wars that attract attention. Who can calculate the value of a day's sunshine to the earth? Who can tabulate the results of a year's peaceful intercourse? Quiet Church life is not resultless; and to obtain it demands and implies more of prayer and effort than that which is spasmodic and sensational.

I. THE VISIT OF PETER TO LYDDA. He finds there the paralytic AEneas. The bedridden sufferer may be viewed as a type of all prostration, physical and moral, which Christ comes to heal. "Jesus Christ is healing thee!" such is the abiding word of the Christian apostle and minister, further reaching in its application to the inward than to the outward life. And if it be a fact that healing energy is ever flowing from Christ, a moral hope and a moral energy is derivable from the fact. "Rise and act for thyself" is the command which the Christian minister may give, founded on the fact that the energy is imparted to the will in trust on Divine power. "And straightway he arose." The rise of any soul out of weakness into strength, out of self-despair into confidence and freedom, implies two things -

(1) the Divine agency to heal;

(2) the human will co-operating with the Divine. In the absence of either of these factors there is no transition from one state to another. Whenever such a conversion takes place and is observed, the minds of the spectators are turned towards that higher source of power. They "turn to the Lord" in reverent recognition, in devout thankfulness, in earnest expectation.

II. THE RAISING OF DORCAS.

1. The sketch of a useful life. Dorcas is full of good works and aims. The "eye for pity, and the hand open as day for melting charity," was hers. Pity, compassion, the feeling for those who are less happy than ourselves, is the habit which above all the gospel teaches and cultivates in the soul. The loving simple heart has a place not less important to fill in ministry to others than the clear intellect and the powerful will. The tears and gratitude of the widows were a noble testimony to Dorcas and her character. She was a center of the true "sweetness and light" in the community, a fountain of pure Christian love. "In the possession of one such example a Church has a great spiritual capital. When such a one dies, God will raise up followers, for love never dies."

2. The office of raising from the dead. Was not this entrusted to Peter, that it might be a parable to all times of this truth - that God gives to chosen men in the Church the power to raise others out of death into life, that is, instrumentally? The Resurrection is spiritually repeated whenever the word of power reaches the conscience. Peter puts all the mourners out of the room, kneels down and prays. This was after the example of the Master. Solitude, silence, and prayer prepare for all exertion of spiritual activity. However great the power entrusted to the minister of God, he must still use it in dependence upon him. However urgent the call from men, the Divine will must first be consulted before it is obeyed. From dependence on God comes all independence of other conditions. To use the imperative mood with others, we must have learned the submissive mood before him. The word, "Tabitha, arise!" and the stretching out of the hand to the prostrate one, - these acts had their antecedents in the spiritual sphere. We cannot comprehend a miracle; but we may be well assured that it follows a Divine though hidden law. God has reason in all his acts. In the giving of the lost but restored one again to her friends we have a prophecy of future restoration of those whom we have loved and lost. There arc moments when the power of God is put forth to realize our most loving wishes and to satisfy the unquenchable aspirations of the heart. Our friends "live in God" as Dorcas and Lazarus lived in him, and death is but a semblance for pious souls. Would that we had that profound knowledge of the power and love of God which should enable us to see the wondrous in the common! Faith will be produced and will be increased wherever our passage through the world, our visits and our words, are followed by a joy like that reflected on the Church at Joplin by the visit and ministry of Peter. - J.

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KJV: Then had the churches rest throughout all Judaea and Galilee and Samaria, and were edified; and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied.

WEB: So the assemblies throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace, and were built up. They were multiplied, walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit.