Sunday, May 11th, 2025: "Resurrection People: Tabitha"

 

Watch the Sermon here

 The First United Presbyterian Church

“Resurrection People: Tabitha”

Rev. Amy Morgan

May 11, 2025

Acts 9:36-43

Now in Joppa there was a disciple whose name was Tabitha, which in Greek is Dorcas. She was devoted to good works and acts of charity. At that time she became ill and died. When they had washed her, they laid her in a room upstairs. Since Lydda was near Joppa, the disciples, who heard 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, and when he arrived, they took him to the room upstairs. All the widows stood beside him, weeping and showing tunics and other clothing that Dorcas had made while she was with them. Peter put all of them outside, and then he knelt down and prayed. He turned to the body and said, “Tabitha, get up.” Then she opened her eyes, and seeing Peter, she sat up. He gave her his hand and helped her up. Then calling the saints and widows, he showed her to be alive. This became known throughout Joppa, and many believed in the Lord. Meanwhile, he stayed in Joppa for some time with a certain Simon, a tanner.

They were not mourning the death of an individual woman. When Wangari Maathai died at the age of 71 from ovarian cancer, a college president who had never met her issued a statement saying, “she left us too soon.” Memorial services were held in Kenya, New York, San Francisco, and London. Dignitaries from around the globe offered condolences. 

While many testified to the warmth of Maathai’s personality, what the world lost when she died was a force for justice, an essential resource, and a safeguard against oppression. 

In the 1970s, Wangari Maathai, who had grown up in rural Kenya, started a movement. She saw how communities, and especially the women and girls of those communities, were suffering from mass deforestation in her home country. As land was cleared by the government to make way for more profitable farming, precious firewood was lost, and local water sources were polluted. Women and girls had to make longer, more dangerous treks to collect these household necessities. 

Maathai empowered these women and girls to plant trees, starting what became known as the Greenbelt Movement. More than 51 million trees have been planted since the movement began. These trees have restored not just the environment in Kenya and other countries. They have restored the lives of people experiencing poverty, injustice, and oppression. They restored the hope of communities robbed of life’s necessities by corrupt systems. 

And when Wangari Maathai died, all those she had helped grieved and shared what she had done for them. 

When we read the story of Tabitha in the Book of Acts, it is easy to read it as the story of a woman who died and was brought back to life. But there are two problems with this reading. One is the questions it leaves us with, and the other is the questions it fails to ask. 

We are left with questions like, “Why was Tabitha brought back to life, but my loved one who died was not?” It just makes death seem that much more unfair. Even if we admit that Tabitha was especially good and helpful to her community, there are many good and helpful people in the world, and throughout history, who have died and not been brought back to life. What’s the point of Peter bringing this one particular woman back to life?

The questions we fail to ask are things like, “What is resurrection doing in this story? What is really coming back to life? How is the power of the resurrected Jesus operating in this story?”

From the first sentence of this story, there are clues that there is more going on here than an individual, bodily resurrection. First, we’re told there was a mathetria, the female form of the word for “disciple.” This is the only place in the entire Bible this female form of “disciple” is found. That should make us sit up and pay attention. This is a story about the first and only named female disciple in all of scripture. 

Then we are told this disciple has two names. Now, we often see people in the Bible get new names, a second name. Abram becomes Abraham. Jacob becomes Israel. Simon becomes Peter. But that’s not what’s happening here. Tabitha is an Aramaic name meaning “gazelle.” And then we’re told that the Greek translation of that name is Dorcas. 

Aramaic is the language of the first-century Jewish people, the language Jesus spoke. Greek is the language of the Eastern Roman Empire, the oppressive force that, not long before the Book of Acts was written, slaughtered hundreds of Jewish people and destroyed the temple in Jerusalem. The New Testament was originally written in Greek, so the inclusion of Aramaic is something that, again, we should notice. The story begins by drawing to our attention the language of the oppressed and the language of empire. 

And then when Peter arrives at the bedside of the deceased woman, he’s bombarded with widows weeping and sharing what she had done for them. 

They were not mourning the death of an individual woman. They were grieving the loss of a force for justice, an essential resource, and a safeguard against oppression. Throughout scripture, widows are the stand-ins for the most vulnerable people in society. Tabitha’s devotion to good works and acts of charity were not just a testimony to her faith and virtue. They were a form of resistance to a system that enabled the powerful to thrive and kept the marginalized impoverished. Women who were stripped of their livelihoods, their identity, and their security when their husbands died had been clothed by Tabitha. Tabitha’s ministry was subversive. It opposed power structures that had left these women destitute. It sought to address the chronic needs of a marginalized population. 

So when Peter addresses her by her Aramaic name and tells her to be resurrected, what comes back to life is not just a beloved human, it is the resistance to economic oppression. When Tabitha is restored to life, hope is restored to a community. When Peter takes Tabitha’s hand and raises her up, he raises up all those women she is clothing and empowering. 

Tabitha’s resurrection is a testimony to Jesus’s solidarity with the poor, the marginalized, and the oppressed. In this instance, Jesus is present to this community through a disciple named Tabitha, and her resurrection affirms Christ’s power to restore communities and subvert systems of injustice. It is a sign that demonstrates even death cannot keep God from bringing new life and raising people up out of despair.  

Wangari Maathai was not resurrected and brought back to life to continue her work restoring the environment and empowering women. But her ministry did not die with her. The final words of Maathai’s memoir, Unbowed, say, “As women and men continue this work of clothing this naked Earth, we are in the company of many others throughout the world who care deeply for this blue planet…We cannot tire or give up. We owe it to the present and future generations of all species to rise up and walk!” As the Green Belt Movement, and numerous other initiatives Maathai championed, continue to flourish, Jesus stands with those she served. Resurrection continues, not in her physical body rising from the dead, but in every tree that is planted in her memory and from her vision. Jesus is present with the communities impacted by deforestation and climate change and structural injustice in millions of trees providing nourishment and life-giving resources all over the globe. 

Tabitha was raised from the dead centuries ago, but eventually she breathed her last earthly breath and entered the peace promised to her in Jesus Christ. But Tabithas have continued to be raised up throughout history, and still today. Tabitha was resurrected in the generosity and kindness of St. Francis of Assisi and in the late Pope who assumed his name. Tabitha was resurrected in the courage of Oscar Romero and compassion of Jean Vanier. Tabitha was resurrected in a group of French physicians founding Doctors Without Borders. Tabitha was resurrected when Albert Einstein founded the International Rescue Committee to assist Germans suffering from the policies of the Hitler regime. Tabitha was resurrected when seventeen Christian denominations came together to assist refugees after the devastation of World War II. Tabitha is resurrected in the missions that shelter those without housing, in the kitchens that feed those who are hungry, in those who bring healthcare and education and other resources to those who lack these basic necessities for thriving. Tabitha is resurrected every time someone stands up to injustice, rises up against oppression, or is raised up to be in solidarity with the vulnerable and marginalized. 

Friends, we know that many people do not want to see Tabitha resurrected. Bringing hope, empowerment, and resources to those who are impoverished, vulnerable, or suffering is a threat to those who benefit from the status quo. Wangari Maathai was arrested and beaten by the Kenyan government. Oscar Romero was murdered. A dozen employees of Doctors Without Borders have been killed in Gazan hospitals since Israel began attacks there 18 months ago. The U.S. and other countries have eliminated or reduced support for refugees and humanitarian aid, killing life-saving programs around the globe. 

But the Book of Revelation offers a vision of hope that reminds us that resurrection people are those who “have come out of the great ordeal.” This isn’t just some end-times prophesy. This is the ordeal we face each and every time resurrection power threatens the powers of this world. It is always an ordeal. It involves death and suffering. 

But that is not the end of the story. Ultimately, John sees these resurrection people worshiping God, sheltered by God. He’s told that: 

They will hunger no more and thirst no more;

    the sun will not strike them,

    nor any scorching heat,

for the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd,

    and he will guide them to springs of the water of life,

and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

When Tabitha was returned to the widows she cared for, God wiped every tear from their eyes. Yes, she died, and yes, her community mourned. But the name of Jesus is strong. And Jesus stood with those grieving widows in resurrection power. 

We are resurrection people. And so we stand, we rise, and we raise up those who subvert systems of poverty and oppression. We are a force for justice, an essential resource, and a safeguard against oppression. In every laptop we provide for a teenager without stable shelter who has still managed to graduate from high school – we are resurrection people. In every unhoused neighbor welcomed into this building with a smile and a cup of coffee – we are resurrection people. In every child who grows through arts enrichment at Art Hub Camp – we are resurrection people. 

When we are faced with death and despair, when the resources to subvert oppressive powers and the defenses against injustice are taken from us too soon, whether they are people, organizations, communities, or other resources, Jesus is still here, bringing resurrection. Jesus is still here, restoring hope. Jesus is still here, providing new life. Jesus is still here, demonstrating that even death cannot stop God from raising people up out of despair. 

To God be all glory forever and ever. Amen.