ALL SAINTS MARGARET STREET

FIFTH SUNDAY OF EASTER, 2006
The Annunciation, Marble Arch

Fr Alan Moses

The encounter between Philip and the Ethiopian Eunuch shows Luke as a great storyteller. It is a tightly-written piece, with fine attention to detail. We are given the crucial essentials:
• time (noon),
• place (a deserted road, chariot),
• character (the Ethiopian, a eunuch, a minister of the queen, a God-fearer who had travelled to Jerusalem to worship),
• and plot (an inquiring searcher has his questions answered and his life changed).

But there is more than this. The story gives us some of the major themes of Luke’s theology.

1. The Holy Spirit as the primary catalyst in the expansion of the gospel into the world.

Here it is the Spirit who, in the form of an angel of the Lord, speaks directly to Philip, instructing him about his mission. Throughout Acts we see evidence of the Spirit’s direction. As the story begins with the Spirit, so too it ends with the Spirit snatching Philip away for mission work in other parts, The picture here fits with the pattern throughout Acts: even after the Lord ascended, he remained at work through his Spirit, motivating his messengers and extending the frontiers of the kingdom.

2. The universal impact of the gospel as it breaks through geographical and ethnic boundaries, reaching beyond Jerusalem.

This represents a fulfilment of the Old Testament hope that saw a time when foreigners would come to the house of God to worship. The story is inclusive in another sense. The primary character is a eunuch who, according to Deuteronomy, should be excluded from the assembly of the Lord. There is a counter voice in Isaiah 56.3-7:

Let not the foreigner who has joined himself to the Lord say,
“The Lord will surely separate me from his people”;
and let not the eunuch say,
“Behold, I am a dry tree.”
For thus says the Lord:
“To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths,
who choose the things that please me
and hold fast to my covenant,
I will give in my house and within my walls
a monument and name
better than sons and daughters;
I will give them an everlasting name which shall not be cut off.

“And the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord,
to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord,
and to be his servants,
everyone who keeps the Sabbath,
and does not profane it,
and holds fast my covenant -

these I will bring to my holy mountain,
and make them joyful in my house of prayer;
their burnt offerings and their sacrifices
will be accepted on my altar;
for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.”

The eunuch has not only joined other God-fearers who were attracted to the worship of the one God is Israel, but he is baptised and incorporated into the people of God and returns home rejoicing. This incident is one scene in a large tapestry woven by Luke to depict the inclusion of the Gentiles into the people of God.

3. The theme of promise-fulfilment with Jesus as the key to interpret the meaning of the Old Testament.

Just as the risen Lord had interpreted the scriptures concerning himself to the disciples. The interpretation of the passage from Isaiah is at the heart of the story and shows both
how Jesus serves to make sense of the Old Testament
and
how the Old Testament serves to make sense of Jesus as well as the disciples’ experience of Easter faith.
Jesus is presented as the fulfilment of the Old Testament promises, as the one of whom Isaiah spoke.
And at various points he himself makes promises which are then fulfilled.
The preaching of the gospel to the Ethiopian eunuch, taking place as it does in Samaria, fulfils the promise made earlier by the risen Lord:

“You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

Bryanston Street may not literally be the desert road, although the Edgeware Road certainly has the flavour of the Middle East about it. It is a feature of life in our city that many people who have come to live here take religion, the spiritual, more seriously, more naturally perhaps, than many of our established fellow-countrymen. Even then, I have found in my ministry, most of which has been spent in city centres, that coming to a place like this with its degree of anonymity, gives people the opportunity to ask questions which they might have been fearful to ask in their home environment, for fear of being thought odd.

The Ethiopian eunuch can be a representative figure for us:

1. In his initial inclination toward faith in God, seen in his status as a God-fearer willing to journey to Jerusalem to worship;
2. In his searching in the Scriptures and the commendable trait of his questioning spirit, which included not only his willingness to ask searching questions bit ability to ask the right ones;
3. His eagerness for divine guidance;
4. His initiative in following through his quest by requesting baptism.

We might look at Philip in a similar way:

1. His responsiveness to the Spirit. How much are we willing to be directed in mission by the Spirit?
2. His responsiveness in asking penetrating questions. Are we willing to engage in serious discussion about faith?
3. His knowledge of the Scripture and skill in interpretation. How confident do we feel about being able to answer questions about our faith? And if we do not fee very confident, then what are we going to do about it?

We hear no more in Scripture of the Ethiopian eunuch. We might wonder what happened to him. How did he go on in the Christian life? We do know that the Ethiopian Church is one of the oldest Christian communities in the world.

The other readings today point us to the importance of the quality of Christian community life in mission. So the First Letter of John reminds us that knowledge of God is properly defined only in terms of love. God is the source of love: “It is not that we loved God but that he loved us.”

“Knowledge”, as Paul says, “puffs up”, whereas “love builds up”. John’s community had been seared by such arguments. We know in our own time the debilitating effects of doctrinal disputes. If modern examples are anything to go by, people take sides, positions become polarised, heated debates degenerate into personal attacks.

Two messages in the gospel are inescapable:

One has to do with the relationship between Christ and the Church. That relationship is only possible because it is a gift of grace; God’s initiative again That the relationship is necessary is clear from both Scripture and experience. Without it the church is powerless, wordless, prayerless, fruitless, and hopeless. The purpose of the relationship is to bear fruit. What is meant by fruit is not specified but earlier in the Gospel, fruit-bearing refers to preaching and witnessing to the gospel among all nations.

The second clear message centres on the statement that “My Father is the vinedresser”. The vinedresser prunes. Some branches are pruned and thrown away because they are fruitless. Others are pruned so that they will bear more fruit. Pruning is a painful experience: the severing of debilitating relationships, loss of burdensome things, cessation of meaningless pursuits, is often understood by believers as being cut away from God, leaving us hurt, confused and angry. Churches that move through hardships to increased commitment to mission have been pruned. Those that pull back into concern for their own comfort and security, have been removed.