Inside Out

June 28, 2020

Today’s sermon caught my attention this morning. Pastor Joe was preaching from Acts 3:1-10, the story of the cripple healed by Peter at the temple gate. It wasn’t the healing per se that grabbed me, but the consequences of it. The man was sitting by the temple gate where he had been accustomed to begging for a living. As a cripple, he wasn’t allowed into the temple precincts, so he had to ply his trade on the outside. In spite of the Jewish code of charity that mandated the giving of alms to the poor, it’s quite likely that much of the time this man was ignored. After awhile, he just became part of the scenery, blended into the background.

The healing was astounding enough, as we can well imagine, but what I had never before noticed was that upon receiving his healing, he followed Peter and John into the temple. This man who was an outsider, became an insider through the power of Christ and the ministry of Peter.

Later this morning in Sunday School, the text was from Luke 15—the story of the Prodigal Son. It’s really misnamed; it should be the story of two brothers, for the upright elder brother who never strayed is the real focus of Jesus’ story. The younger left home, wandering in a foreign land, but the elder brother was also outside the household. The father who had been waiting at the gate and ran to his returning son also went outside to the elder brother who was pouting out in the field. The elder son didn’t come in to the father, but the father went out to the son. In both cases, the father went outside the house to meet his sons, both of whom were lost, although only the younger realized it.

These are stories of insiders and outsiders. We tend to think of ourselves as insiders, and in many ways, we are. But how we view the outsider makes a big difference. Peter and John saw the outsider and brought healing and hope. The father who by rights should have expected his sons to come inside to him, instead went outside himself in hopes of bringing his sons inside where they belonged. And the one son who knew he was an outsider repented and became an insider, while the other who imagined himself to be an insider, remained an outsider.

So where am I in these stories? Sometimes I’m the outsider, too often I’m the one imagining myself to be an insider, but finding out I’m not. Only very occasionally am I the Peter and the father, going outside to bring the outsider in. This “inside-outsider” has much grace to learn. May I learn it soon, and well.