This miracle takes place in Joppa, (modern-day Jaffa), a port city about 35 miles northwest of Jerusalem. Many people have never heard this story – it is read at a Saturday morning Mass. Luke describes it this way:
“Now in Joppa there was a disciple named Tabitha…She was completely occupied with good deeds and almsgiving. Now during those days she fell sick and died, so after washing her, they laid her out in a room upstairs. Since Lydda was near Joppa, the disciples, hearing that Peter was there, sent two men to him with the request, ‘Please come to us without delay.’ So Peter got up and went with them.
“When he arrived, the took him to the room upstairs where all the widows came to him weeping and showing him the tunics and cloaks that Dorcas had made while she was with them.
“Peter sent them all out and knelt down and prayed. Then he turned to her body and said, ‘Tabitha, rise up.’ She opened her eyes, saw Peter, and when he had called the holy ones and the widows, he presented her alive. This became known all over Joppa, and many came to believe in the Lord.” (Acts 9:36-42)
It is clear that the power at work is not Peter’s, but that of the Risen Lord. Note the closing line in today’s passage: “Many came to believe in the Lord”
The earliest Christians were practicing Jews who believed that Jesus was Messiah and Lord. It didn’t take long for this to cause strained relations with other Jews who did not hold the same belief. This is evidenced by the stoning of Stephen – a Jewish Christian – and by the description of Saul in the Acts of the Apostles before his conversion:
“Now Saul, still breathing murderous threats against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, that, if he should find any men or women who belonged to the Way, he might bring them back to Jerusalem in chains.”
A major factor, of course, was the fact that in the beginning (and on into the fourth century) Christians were the minority. But when Christians were the majority, they became the persecutors.