|
God’s Open Door Policy Keith McFarren August 30, 2026 Acts 8:26-40 Sometimes you can’t talk about one person without talking about another. You can’t talk about Abbott without Costello. You can’t talk about George Burns without Gracie Allen Paul Winchell and Jerry Mahone Roy Rogers and Dale Evans Batman and Robin Bert and Ernie And then there is Philip and the Eunuch – there are times when you can’t talk about one person without talking about the other. At the time of our scripture reading there was a tremendous amount of persecution being led by a man named Saul that was taking place against the Christian church in Jerusalem. The nation of Israel had been divided into three main regions, Galilee to the north, Samaria in the middle and Judea in the south…and the Bible tells us that during this time of persecution all the Christian believers, including Philip, fled into either Judea or Samaria…and that’s where we find Philip this morning…preaching the Gospel in Samaria. Preaching the Good News to, of all people, the Samaritans, a group of people who for centuries had been hated by the Jews and looked upon as being enemies of Israel. In the 1st chapter of Acts, Jesus told his disciples: “When the Holy Spirit has come upon you, you will receive power and will tell people about me everywhere – in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (Acts 1:8) When the Spirit came upon Philip, he “went to Samaria and told the people there about the Messiah. Crowds listened intently to what he had to say because of the miracles Jesus did. Many evil spirits were cast out, screaming as they left their victims. And many who had been paralyzed or lame were healed. So there was great joy in that city. (Acts 8:5-8) Philip had been doing exactly what Jesus had commanded. Evil spirits were being cast out, miracle after miracle was taking place. The lame could walk, the blind could see and the deaf could hear again and the people were giving their lives to Jesus one right after another. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, during the biggest, most evangelistic revival to ever hit Samaria…and angel shows up. And what does the angel tell Philip to do? Pack your bags and head south. Go south of here. Go south of Jerusalem. Go to Gaza. The guy is on a roll. The people love him. The people are changing their lives…they’re making a commitment to Jesus. And now he’s being told to leave what you’re doing here behind…and go south on a desert road that leads through the wilderness…and go to Gaza. But that’s what God does sometimes. He doesn’t want us to get too comfortable…to maybe take things for granted. God always has a plan for us…and being good disciples we are to follow God’s call to where he wants us to go or what he wants us to do…and that’s exactly what Philip did. None of this makes much sense until we begin to understand what the wilderness is all about. You see the wilderness is a place where people are lost and are looking for direction. It’s a place of loneliness, of heartbreak and pain and despair. The wilderness is a place where people need help. It’s a place where people need comfort. It’s a place where people are desperately searching for peace and love and acceptance. Sometimes we have to end up out in the wilderness, out in the middle of a dry, dusty desert, out in the middle of nowhere, to have a life changing moment. It was way out there in the wilderness, that Philip met an African man traveling in a chariot. Talk about two different kinds of people! ·Philip looked like he came from the eastern part of the Mediterranean. The Ethiopian man’s skin was pitch black. ·Philip was a man of very modest means. The Ethiopian, on the other hand, lived the life of a modern day Wall Street investor dressed in a HSM suit and wearing Johnson and Murphy shoes. ·Philip, the traveling missionary, knew very little about the political world. The man riding in the chariot would have been like the Secretary of the Treasury or the head of the Securities and Exchange Commission. Ethiopia was a very powerful kingdom and the Ethiopian was right in the center of everything that went on in his country. But there is one more difference that I want to focus on this morning. The well to do Ethiopian was a eunuch. He had been castrated, emasculated, surgically altered. He was that way because it was a requirement for one to serve as a government official in the court of the queen of Ethiopia. Luke, the writer of Acts, wants us to know this. It may not seem important to us right now, but knowing this about the Ethiopian tells us something that is very important. It’s important because in the eyes of the people of Israel, being a Eunuch would have had a profound impact on the man’s relationship with God. If you turn to the Old Testament, to Deuteronomy 23:1, you’ll see what the Bible says about men who have been castrated and how it not only affects them personally but how it affects their relationship with God. “No one who has been emasculated by crushing or cutting may enter the assembly of the Lord.” To be emasculated caused one to be permanently separated from God…forever. Despite his situation, here is a man who has traveled well over 300 miles, all across northern Africa…just to get to Jerusalem. He wanted nothing more than to get close to God. To worship him. To be a part of a congregation. He wanted to be accepted as a child of God so bad that he could almost taste it. But here is the thing. He already knew when he left home what was going to happen to him. He knew he wasn’t going to be allowed in the temple. He knew he couldn’t go in and worship like everyone else did. He had flaws. He wasn’t perfect. He had already been told that his very presence near the temple was enough to embarrass both God and God’s people. Here was a man who had been told that God didn’t love him…and never would love him because of what he looked like…because of what he had done to himself. Stay away. Keep your distance. You’ve got blemishes and imperfections. You’re not like us. And because you’re not like us…you don’t deserve the love of God. It kind of makes you wonder how long he stood there, and how much pain he felt on the inside, before he turned and walked away and headed back home. Did you notice what part of the bible the Ethiopian was reading? He’s reading from the 53rd chapter of Isaiah (7-8) but he doesn’t fully understand what he’s reading: “He was oppressed and treated harshly, yet he never said a word. He was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a lamb is is silent before the shearers, he did not open his mouth. Unjustly condemned, he was led away.” Isaiah is talking about someone who knows what it is like to be an outcast. He’s talking about someone who knows what it’s like to be humiliated. He’s talking about someone who knows what it’s like to hurt and be treated like a total failure and told that God didn’t love him. “Who is this person, the Ethiopian asks, who knew, just as I know, what it was like to be humiliated? Who was this servant who suffered and endured so much? Who was this servant who was told he wasn’t good enough for God’s love. Who is it whose life was taken from him? You see, don’t you, why the Ethiopian was reading this passage? What’s the old adage? Misery loves company. So it’s here, in the middle of the wilderness, on the way to Gaza, that Philip tells the Ethiopian about Jesus. He tells the story about the shepherd who lost one sheep out of 100 and how the shepherd loved the lost sheep and went looking for his lost sheep. He tells the story about the man with two sons. One son took his inheritance and left home only to wreck his life and eventually came crawling home to his father. The other son, in the meantime, stayed at home and was obedient to his father. Yet the father loved them both equally and welcomed his son back home. He tells of how Jesus healed the lepers and ate lunch with the sinners and of how he loved all people…especially those that were lost, those that were down and out, the outcasts of society and those that were broken. Of how he was crucified and of how he rose again three days later and by the power of God…he was alive. Of how he is alive today and how he still loves those that come to him no matter who they are or what their past is like. Of how you can change your life and become more like him if you give your life to him. The Suffering Servant, Philip tells the man, is Jesus and he did what he did for you. He did what he did simply because he loves you. Because in his eyes you are special, you are a treasure. You are not damaged goods…but you are loved. Isaiah goes on to say, “Don’t let anyone who commits themselves to the Lord say, ‘The Lord will never let me be part of his people.’ And don’t let the eunuchs say, ‘I’m a dried up tree with no children and no future.’ For this is what the Lord says, ‘I will bless those eunuchs…who commit their lives to me. I will give them - within the wall of my house - a memorial and a name…for the name I give them is an everlasting one…and will never disappear.’ (Isaiah 56: 3-5] It’s now wonder the Ethiopian was excited. The man had been shut out from the world around him. He had lived his life as an outcast and had been he told he was unloved by God…all because he was different. But the prophet Isaiah announces that God is eager to gather up all his people…no matter who they may be…even people like you and me…and all the other so called “outsiders” in this world and bring us into his house…bring us into his kingdom…and welcome us into his family. It becomes abundantly clear in all of this that wherever you go, whatever culture you come to, whatever situation of human need, sin, exclusion or oppression you may find, the message of Jesus remains the same. It’s the message of Jesus, the message of inclusion, that meets the needs of all people. |
Bethel United Methodist Church
|
|