The Eunuch and the Foreigner
Sermon for May 10, 2009 Easter 4B
Isaiah 56:3-8, Acts 8:26-40, 1 John 4 7-17
What long scripture readings today! Some of you may be thinking we’ll be here till noon time with Communion and all. It was quite common in India for the service to go a couple of hours. Don’t worry—I’ll make the sermon short and to the point.
The book of Acts shows how the disciples follow Jesus’ instructions to “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you,” (MT. 28:19-20). By the time we meet Philip in Chapter 8, persecution has forced the early Christian community to leave the safe boundaries of the city of Jerusalem. The conversion of the Ethiopian Eunuch, one of the first non-Hebrews baptized as a Christian, falls between the conversion of the Samaritans by Philip earlier in this chapter and then Peter’s preaching to the Gentiles in Chapter 10.
Who is this man? A foreigner from Ethiopia, a black-skinned African, a eunuch, a high official of the queen, her finance minister—the Ben Bernanke of Ethiopia. He does not fit the usual early descriptions of Africans as “ignorant”, “brutish,” “idle,” or “thievish”. He was reading the Bible, probably in Greek. He was a court official with a high rank. One of my commentators mentioned that it was not accidental for Luke to identify him as Ethiopian as his baptism was important in fulfilling Jesus’ promise that his disciples would be his witnesses not only in Jerusalem but “to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:7).
Not only is this man an Ethiopian but he is also a eunuch, meaning he has been castrated. There are two kinds of eunuchs described in classical texts: those castrated from birth and those castrated after reaching physical manhood. Especially for those who are eunuchs from birth, their bodies took on feminine aspects, voices like a teenager, and bodies that were gangly or awkward. This man was probably middle aged due to his high court position.
He was being driven in a chariot and reading Isaiah as he went along on his way to worship in Jerusalem. As a eunuch he was an incomplete male and would have been excluded from any Jewish congregation because he could not have male heirs, yet he had a hunger for God. I wonder if he was thinking about himself as he read those words of Isaiah: “he was oppressed and he was afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth. He was denied justice and taken away, cut off from the land of the living” to paraphrase the scripture. And just as God does so many times, God intervened and had an angel direct Philip to go to exactly the place where he would encounter the eunuch and have the opportunity to help him understand the scripture. Philip jumped from the Isaiah passage, that many believe was predicting the Messiah’s coming, and went on to “evangelize”, to tell the good news of Jesus, the Christ. I wonder how far Philip read with him that day. I wonder if he read to the 56th chapter, the verses Betty read for us today. Here it says both the foreigner and the eunuchs who keep the Sabbath and hold fast to the covenant will be brought to God’s holy mountain and be made joyful in God’s house of prayer. Let me quote the last few lines of that passage: “for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples. Thus says the Lord God, who gathers the outcast of Israel. I will gather others to them besides those already gathered.”
Whatever Philip said, the eunuch heard the call of the Lord. Almost immediately the eunuch saw water on the desert road and asked to be baptized. Philip baptized him and then we are told the Spirit snatched Philip away and the eunuch saw him no more.
I am here to tell you this morning that God is Still Speaking. Just as God spoke to Isaiah, God speaks to us today. Both the eunuch and the foreigner were excluded in the Old Testament times. And I ask you who is being excluded today? How many African Americans are welcomed into some of our churches? How many gays and lesbians feel comfortable in many of our places of worship? What about truck drivers with pony tails and tattoos? Who else is the “other” in our communities? What about those with physical or mental disabilities? Those who have little or no money? If any of these folks came to DCC, would they be welcomed? I certainly hope so. Its progress to be an Open and Affirming Church that says we accept and even desire to welcome and affirm GLBT and others into every aspect of our life together. The true test is how we actually live out that commitment. Inclusivity is at the very heart of who God is. If you read about the disciples’ journey as they went out to witness to Jesus and the Good News, you will see that over and over again they had to be poked and prodded by the Holy Spirit to go past their comfort zones. It’s no different with us. We all have those places where our beliefs are ahead of what we are comfortable with in real time. We all have those old ways of thinking and doing that are hard to change.
In the letter of first John we are told that God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them. An example that I have used before is appropriate to repeat on this Mother’s Day: Imagine the healthiest love possible of a mother for her child and multiply it many times and you have the Love that is God. God loved us so much that God sent his only son into the world to show us how to live. Now it is up to us to open our hearts and minds to love all of God’s children no matter how much of a challenge it may be. The hymn that we are about to sing is about the wideness in God’s mercy. How wide is wide? It’s wider than our hearts have ever stretched. How broad is the love of God? It is broader than our minds have ever stretched. That same Holy Spirit that sent an angel to Philip telling him to appear to the Ethiopian eunuch is present here today. That Spirit is calling to you and to me, calling us to reach out to others, to show them the Love that is God, and to invite them to walk the Way with us. May God bless us all as we keep trying to manifest God’s love to our hurting world. Amen and Amen.
Isaiah 56:3-8, Acts 8:26-40, 1 John 4 7-17
What long scripture readings today! Some of you may be thinking we’ll be here till noon time with Communion and all. It was quite common in India for the service to go a couple of hours. Don’t worry—I’ll make the sermon short and to the point.
The book of Acts shows how the disciples follow Jesus’ instructions to “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you,” (MT. 28:19-20). By the time we meet Philip in Chapter 8, persecution has forced the early Christian community to leave the safe boundaries of the city of Jerusalem. The conversion of the Ethiopian Eunuch, one of the first non-Hebrews baptized as a Christian, falls between the conversion of the Samaritans by Philip earlier in this chapter and then Peter’s preaching to the Gentiles in Chapter 10.
Who is this man? A foreigner from Ethiopia, a black-skinned African, a eunuch, a high official of the queen, her finance minister—the Ben Bernanke of Ethiopia. He does not fit the usual early descriptions of Africans as “ignorant”, “brutish,” “idle,” or “thievish”. He was reading the Bible, probably in Greek. He was a court official with a high rank. One of my commentators mentioned that it was not accidental for Luke to identify him as Ethiopian as his baptism was important in fulfilling Jesus’ promise that his disciples would be his witnesses not only in Jerusalem but “to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:7).
Not only is this man an Ethiopian but he is also a eunuch, meaning he has been castrated. There are two kinds of eunuchs described in classical texts: those castrated from birth and those castrated after reaching physical manhood. Especially for those who are eunuchs from birth, their bodies took on feminine aspects, voices like a teenager, and bodies that were gangly or awkward. This man was probably middle aged due to his high court position.
He was being driven in a chariot and reading Isaiah as he went along on his way to worship in Jerusalem. As a eunuch he was an incomplete male and would have been excluded from any Jewish congregation because he could not have male heirs, yet he had a hunger for God. I wonder if he was thinking about himself as he read those words of Isaiah: “he was oppressed and he was afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth. He was denied justice and taken away, cut off from the land of the living” to paraphrase the scripture. And just as God does so many times, God intervened and had an angel direct Philip to go to exactly the place where he would encounter the eunuch and have the opportunity to help him understand the scripture. Philip jumped from the Isaiah passage, that many believe was predicting the Messiah’s coming, and went on to “evangelize”, to tell the good news of Jesus, the Christ. I wonder how far Philip read with him that day. I wonder if he read to the 56th chapter, the verses Betty read for us today. Here it says both the foreigner and the eunuchs who keep the Sabbath and hold fast to the covenant will be brought to God’s holy mountain and be made joyful in God’s house of prayer. Let me quote the last few lines of that passage: “for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples. Thus says the Lord God, who gathers the outcast of Israel. I will gather others to them besides those already gathered.”
Whatever Philip said, the eunuch heard the call of the Lord. Almost immediately the eunuch saw water on the desert road and asked to be baptized. Philip baptized him and then we are told the Spirit snatched Philip away and the eunuch saw him no more.
I am here to tell you this morning that God is Still Speaking. Just as God spoke to Isaiah, God speaks to us today. Both the eunuch and the foreigner were excluded in the Old Testament times. And I ask you who is being excluded today? How many African Americans are welcomed into some of our churches? How many gays and lesbians feel comfortable in many of our places of worship? What about truck drivers with pony tails and tattoos? Who else is the “other” in our communities? What about those with physical or mental disabilities? Those who have little or no money? If any of these folks came to DCC, would they be welcomed? I certainly hope so. Its progress to be an Open and Affirming Church that says we accept and even desire to welcome and affirm GLBT and others into every aspect of our life together. The true test is how we actually live out that commitment. Inclusivity is at the very heart of who God is. If you read about the disciples’ journey as they went out to witness to Jesus and the Good News, you will see that over and over again they had to be poked and prodded by the Holy Spirit to go past their comfort zones. It’s no different with us. We all have those places where our beliefs are ahead of what we are comfortable with in real time. We all have those old ways of thinking and doing that are hard to change.
In the letter of first John we are told that God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them. An example that I have used before is appropriate to repeat on this Mother’s Day: Imagine the healthiest love possible of a mother for her child and multiply it many times and you have the Love that is God. God loved us so much that God sent his only son into the world to show us how to live. Now it is up to us to open our hearts and minds to love all of God’s children no matter how much of a challenge it may be. The hymn that we are about to sing is about the wideness in God’s mercy. How wide is wide? It’s wider than our hearts have ever stretched. How broad is the love of God? It is broader than our minds have ever stretched. That same Holy Spirit that sent an angel to Philip telling him to appear to the Ethiopian eunuch is present here today. That Spirit is calling to you and to me, calling us to reach out to others, to show them the Love that is God, and to invite them to walk the Way with us. May God bless us all as we keep trying to manifest God’s love to our hurting world. Amen and Amen.
posted by Sermons given at Deering Community Church @ 6:24 PM
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