Oct 11 2019 Acts 8:26-40 Commemoration of Philip the Deacon

He asked, ‘Do you understand what you are reading?’ He replied, ‘How can I, unless someone guides me?’

Philip the Deacon was one of the seven commissioned to take care of the widows, orphans and poor, frequently referred to as the first deacons. Stephan, also commissioned at the same time was well know for having been the church’s first martyr. The other five early deacons did wonderful things, I’m sure, but we don’t hear much about them.

Philip was sent by the Spirit to walk a particular road. He came across a carriage with an Ethiopian wealthy court official, keeper of the treasury of the Ethiopian queen. Not many people had carriages at that time. The Spirit urged Philip to join the man, so he ran to catch up with the carriage, and the eunuch invited him into the carriage. Just to put this part in modern day context, imagine a wealthy man who works at the Federal Reserve, keeper of the treasury in a fancy car. Running to meet the car is a scruffy and disheveled man, who asks to join him. I cannot imagine a circumstance where this would have been a logical invitation in modern day, save God’s intervention.

So Philip joins the eunuch, and notices he’s reading from the Hebrew Scripture, a story from Isaiah. Philp asks him if he understands, and the eunuch asks how he could without someone explaining things to him. Again, some context. The Ethiopian eunuch was everything that represented ‘the other’ for Phillip and the early Christians. He was serving foreign royalty, likely a person of color, and likely a castrated man. All of these attributes would have made him a stretch to Philip’s understanding of the known new Christian world of believers.

So Philip explains things, and the man is converted. The come upon some water, and the eunuch asks to be baptized. Philip, also converted, baptizes him, and immediately is taken away and the eunuch sees him no more.

Philip is put in a circumstance that stretches his understanding of God’s inclusive and radical love. That happens to deacons still, at least to me. In my head I understand and believe that God’s love and mercy have no limits, that no one is outside God’s love. Then I’m put in a situation where I meet the Ethiopian eunuch, who asks me, “how can I understand if no one shows me?”

In the world, I have a heart for the hurting and forgotten. It’s easier for me to sit with them, to share God’s love with them. In the world, I have a more challenging time with the hurters or the cheaters, or the modern day tax collectors. But God’s love extends to them too. I have served as deacon with people who either were part of the 1%, or aspired to be there. How can they understand God’s love if no one shows them?

In my home, I marvel at the challenges of the unpredictable and cruel nature of schizophrenia. I’m constantly challenged to remember that God’s love extends even to the depths of the confused and frustrated mind of my loved one. That God calls me to love too. My loved one will never utter the words, “How can I understand, if no one shows me?” But it is absolutely true. How can they know of God’s love and mercy if no one shows them. Since they don’t leave the apartment, my husband and I are the only ones who can.   

This story from Acts is often referred to as the conversion of the eunuch. I think it’s equally, if not more, a story about the conversion of Philip. This morning, I’m thinking about all of the eunuchs I am sent by the Spirit to encounter. I think about how much I am converted, every time I’m asked to be the guide or example of God’s love. Every time, my world is stretched, in all the right ways.