That I may Know HIM - A Devotional

Day 14: A REPROACH AT THE GATE

Day 14: A REPROACH AT THE GATE

-------------------------------------------------

Once upon a time there was a famous temple. A king had built it lavishly, as affluent kings would do. Its walls were such a wonder; kingdoms would war to steal the stonework. It had a gate so splendid the gate was simply called "Beautiful." Ironically, that gate was manned daily by an unsightly cripple who had been born that way.

He was the last thing anyone saw as they went into the temple. His shameful picture stuck and loomed large before the worshippers, blurring their vision of the good God they had gone to adore. He was the first thing they saw as they left the house of God – a keen image of ugliness that stabbed the joy with which they stepped out unto the threshold of the waiting world. He was a puzzle of ugliness at a gate called Beautiful; crippled by nobody knows what, even before he had been born. You could not miss him if you went through the gate.

 1 Now Peter and John went up together to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour.

2 And a certain man lame from his mother’s womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask alms from those who entered the temple (Acts 3:1-2, NKJV).

O, how somebody’s spirit often fell at that visual reproach; a prominent monument that tirelessly mocked the might of the Omnipotent, at His own gate! Like an ineluctable billboard his disability seemed to announce what God had been unable to do. He was a prominent "daily" contradiction to the Beautiful name of his location which was the busy passage to the place of regular payers.

Some sceptics are sure to have queried, "If God is in that place; if He answers prayers; if He answers their hourly prayers at all, why has He been unable to heal that man for as long as we all can remember? Or will anyone say that they are blind to his condition? No, their God does not exist, or at best he is weak."

Thus that man became Satan’s propaganda, "daily" questioning God’s love and ability in the eyes of the helpless worshippers who so frequently saw the scandalous scene.

Is there a reproach at your gate? Something of shame that no eye could miss that comes into your temple? Something prominent that people see, and ask spitefully, "Where is your God"? Has Satan placed at your gate an image so disgracefully conspicuous that it has become the object of a community gossip, much like the congenital blindness of the man in John 9, of whom his village rumoured, that he was the product of his parents’ notorious sins, as well as his, before he had been born (John 9:2,34)?

19 …your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and…

17 If any man [anything] defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy… (1 Corinthians 6:19, 17).

The gate had a name: "Beautiful," but the sight of that cripple, who reported there "daily," made nonsense of the name. He was an evident badge of ugliness on a holy thing of beauty; yea, his condition mocked the Gate’s claims to beauty. The Evil One seemed to have ordained him for that mission, by breaking his little legs while he was yet a feeble foetus in "his mother’s womb."

But God was going to remove that reproach, as publicly as it had stood all those many years to challenge His love.

6 Then Peter said, "Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk."

7 And he took him by the right hand and lifted him up, and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength.

8 So he, leaping up, stood and walked and entered the temple with them—walking, leaping, and praising God.

9 And all the people saw him walking and praising God.

"[A]ll the people" had known the shame; now "all the people" had to see a public display of God’s love, in spite of how long the enemy had stolen the show.

God may not have responded yesterday, but that does not mean that He will do nothing today to take your shame away. Yea, may He send you those who can lift you up by the hand, and take you "with them" into the house of the Lord.

There are certain places you may never be able to enter by yourself, unless by the aid of those ordained by God to give strength to your feeble feet; there are certain beautiful gates through which you may never pass, no matter how close you get or how frequently you sit by, unless accompanied by somebody ordained as your divine master-key, who goes "with you" to cause the gates to lift up their heads (Acts 12:10; Psalm 24:7,9).

For the first time, that man was going to enter into the house of God, and show himself to those who might still have been praying about his condition; he was going to announce to them, "Be of good cheers; the good God has done it again!" Whatever had stranded him at the gate had had to leave him alone. He was no more going to await the crumbs of the gifts which people flung at him whenever it suited them as they passed through that passage of regular prayers. Now he also was going to be a partaker. He was no more going to remain outside, listening to the scraps of their joyful songs; now he also was going to join in the worship.

"And all the people saw him." His story had changed. People used to read the devil’s signboard off his life; now they were going to read the handwriting of God’s love in the same pages that the enemy had so long mutilated to his mischievous advantage.

Then they knew that it was he who sat begging alms at the Beautiful Gate of the temple; and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him (v.10).

God is going to make you a wonder and an amazement, irrespective of your old story.

Now as the lame man who was healed held on to Peter and John, all the people ran together to them in the porch which is called Solomon’s, greatly amazed (v.11).

He who used to be a repulsion, whom people dumped "daily" at the Temple gate, had become an attraction, to whom "all the people ran" in amazement. By a single stroke of encounter, his company had also changed automatically. He was now to be found in the company of apostolic revolutionaries and change makers, not helpless beggars. He, too, was a wise man who knew the source of his help, and he was not going to do anything stupid to lose that rare company, so, with all his life he "held on to Peter and John." Are you holding on? To what? To whom?

Is there a reproach at your gates, which has been a daily source of worry to your worship all these years? Is there a prominent disability that seems so long to have questioned the love and power of the God you have so faithfully served? God is sending somebody your way; somebody armed with the name of the Lord Jesus of Nazareth. They might have neither silver nor gold, but what so long has been your shame shall become your praise. Amen.

 A Prayer:

Make me, Lord, a sweet fragrance. For all my ashes, clothe me with a garment of praise; and for all my reproach and woes, anoint me now with the oil of joy. Make me a sweet, sweet fragrance, Lord, in your sight. Amen.

Prophetic Action:

Furthermore, take this prophetic action to the gates of your house, with a partner if you can.. Stand there and pray against all the crippling spirits that stagnate you and make you a beggar in front of and in spite of the beautiful open doors around you, through which others go in and out with ease. Whether their roots be from birth or before or after, rebuke these reproachful spirits in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, then begin to command everything in your life to rise up and walk: your finances, your marriage, your ministry, your health, everything, then call forth the Hand of the Lord to reach down and lift you out, to turn around the lingering reproaches into amazing testimonies. Amen.