“[Philip] asked, ‘Do you understand what you are reading?’ He replied, ‘How can I, unless someone guides me?’”
– Acts 8:30-31

    They called it “the Moses tablet.”  It was one of the most heralded, most heavily-hyped, new technology rollouts of recent years.  Three weeks ago, Apple Computer CEO Steve Jobs stood on a bare stage, a huge projection screen behind him.  Before him was an auditorium filled with the nation’s top technology reporters, hanging on his every word.  This was Steve Jobs – the moody genius who had come up with so many breakthroughs in personal computing, then who’d been run out of his company by others who thought they could do it better.  They couldn’t, and so Jobs came back, to develop first the iPod, then the iPhone – both of them spectacular successes.
    When word got out that Apple was releasing a tablet computer – something between a laptop and a smartphone, that would do everything the Amazon and Sony eBook readers can do, and so much more – the technology world was waiting with bated breath.  Could Steve Jobs and Apple do it again, with the iPad?  Could they go three for three?
    Once the hype was over and the dust had settled, the tech world’s reaction was pretty much ho-hum.  The iPad is a good product, even an interesting product, the experts were saying – but, is it “the Moses tablet?”  Is it the next big thing?  No one seems to think so, now that they’ve seen it.
    We’ve grown so used to these technological breakthroughs, it really takes something remarkable, anymore, to make this tech-savvy culture sit up and take notice.  We’ve come so far in such a short time – and the pace of change gives no sign of slowing.
    The first personal computer our family owned was a Coleco Adam, that I used to type Claire’s papers at Dubuque Seminary.  It had no hard drive and held about ten pages of text on a rattling, whirring cassette tape.  Nowadays, you can put tens of thousands of pages of text onto a flash drive you can carry around on your keychain.
    The monks of dark-ages Ireland preserved much of Western learning by laboriously copying thousands of ancient scrolls in pen and ink, onto sheets of dried sheepskin.  One man could spend the better part of a lifetime producing just one copy of those elegant books (that’s one copy, not one edition).  Today, Google is in the process of digitizing the contents of several vast university libraries.  What seemed unimaginable to the ancients – that the sum total of human knowledge could be available always and everywhere, caught up in what people are calling, euphemistically, “the cloud” – is now almost within our grasp.  These are indeed amazing times in which we live!
    Martin Luther and John Calvin thought they were living in amazing times, too.  Johannes Gutenberg had recently come out with movable type: a remarkable invention, that allowed printing presses to produce dozens of books a day.  For the first time in human history, it was possible for ordinary Christians to hold in their hands an entire Bible – and, not only that, to own their own copy!  No longer would the written Word of God be restricted to a wealthy, educated elite, for them to dole it out sparingly to the common folk.
    One of the first things Luther did, after breaking away from Roman rule, was to take advantage of Gutenberg’s new printing technology.  He personally translated the Bible into German, so Christians who knew how to read could make up their own minds about what it says.  Next Sunday, we’re going to hand out Bibles to our third-grade Church School students. It would have been hard for those first-generation Protestant believers to have imagined a world in which children – mere children! – could own their own Bibles (let alone a world in which those same children could sit down at a computer and access not only the Bible, but all manner of other books electronically).
    I happen to own this handy-dandy little device, that lets me read e-books.  I’ve got the Bible in it, and lots more besides.  If I want to buy a new book, all I have to do is turn the thing on, search for the title I want, and press a button to tell the folks who sold it to me to please charge it to my credit card.  Less than a minute later, the book has traveled, electronically, from God-knows-where into this little device for me to read.  Should I ever lose my e-book reader, I’ll be out the cost of a new one, but I don’t lose the books I’ve purchased.  Backup copies live somewhere on the Internet, and they’ll be instantly downloaded the first time I turn the replacement unit on.
    ***
    Today’s story from Acts also takes place in a time of rapid change.  There are new developments at that time that have set the whole Roman province of Judea a-buzzing.
    Specifically, they have to do with Jesus of Nazareth – whom, his followers claim, God raised from death.  Not only that, they’re saying his Spirit is still active and present in the world.  Every once in a while, that Holy Spirit – as his followers call it – pulls off some miraculous feat.  Sometimes it even brings his followers a message from their Lord himself.
    There are many miraculous elements to the story of Philip and his encounter with the Ethiopian eunuch, but perhaps – to the first-century Jewish mind, anyway – the most miraculous thing is that the conversation takes place at all.  This is because this man from Ethiopia is a foreigner in every sense of the word – and the Jewish people have strict regulations about interacting with the likes of him.
    In the story, the apostle Philip is directed by the Holy Spirit to head out of Jerusalem and begin walking south, on a road that heads through the wilderness.  Philip is walking this lonely road on foot, when he hears the rumble of wheels and the footfall of horses behind him.  It’s a man, riding in some sort of wagon or cart.  Luke uses the word “chariot,’ which we know as a two-wheeled military vehicle, but it can’t be like that, because this man is seated, not standing.  He’s also got a driver, because he gives orders for the vehicle to stop.  This is obviously a rich and powerful individual.  He’s probably got an entourage of servants with him as well.
    The man is holding in his hands a valuable treasure that no ordinary person would own.  It’s a scroll – a book, in other words.  It’s the scroll of the prophet Isaiah, from which the man is reading aloud.
    Philip hears the familiar words, and feels a sudden impulse to run alongside the cart (later he would come to realize that impulse came from the Holy Spirit).  Before the man’s bodyguards have a chance to push Philip aside, he shouts out a question: “Do you understand what you are reading?”
    “Not unless someone explains it,” the man replies, and motions to Philip to come sit beside him as he travels.
    The man is truly a foreigner – as foreign as foreign can be, to the Hebrew mind.  He hails from Ethiopia, in Africa.  His dark skin instantly identifies him as one who is not of the tribes of Israel.
    Not only that, the scriptures identify him as a eunuch – half a man, according to the Hebrew way of looking at things.  At an eaqrly age, this man was rendered surgically unable to have children.  It was done so he could carry out a special duty.
    Luke tells us he’s a member of the court of the Queen of Ethiopia.  He’s her Secretary of the Treasury – in charge of her entire fortune.  It was a common thing, in some countries of the ancient world, to place a eunuch in charge of the treasury – and for a very good reason.  A eunuch was unable to father children, so he’d have no heirs to whom to leave his personal fortune.  No heirs to provide for, less temptation to steal.
    It doesn’t sound like such a thing would happen with this man, in any event, because he’s a man of principle, a deeply religious person.  The scroll he’s reading, in the cart, is a portion of the prophet Isaiah.  It’s from one of the famed “Servant Songs,” a passage Christians have traditionally considered to foretell the suffering of Christ:

    “Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter,
    and like a lamb silent before its shearer,
    so he does not open his mouth...”

    The question the Ethiopian asks Philip is one that has troubled Hebrew scholars down through the centuries: “Just who is this suffering servant of whom Isaiah speaks?”
    Philip, of course, has an answer readily at hand: the prophesied servant is Jesus of Nazareth, and the sufferings are his torment on the cross.  Philip, goes on to tell the Ethiopian “the good news about Jesus,” which surely includes the resurrection as well.
    Looking at a small pond of water by the side of the road, the Ethiopian says to Philip, “What is to prevent me from being baptized?”  Which is exactly what happens.
    ***
    This would have seemed a peculiar tale indeed, from the standpoint of the Jewish tradition.  This unnamed Ethiopian is on his way back home from Jerusalem, having gone up to the Temple “to worship.”  The peculiar thing is that he would not have been permitted to do much in the way of worship, for two reasons.  First, he is not of the tribes of Israel.  This man is a black African, strikingly different in appearance from most anyone else who might have shown up in the Temple precincts.  Second, he is a eunuch – and the law of Deuteronomy strictly forbids any man lacking, shall we say, the usual equipment from setting foot in the Temple.
    And so, this man’s trip to Jerusalem was very likely a frustrating and disillusioning experience.   He would not have found the spiritual enlightenment he was seeking.  He would have seen his way barred at every turn.
    Here’s where we begin to get a glimpse of how wonderfully efficient the Holy Spirit can be.  Here’s Philip, hanging out in Jerusalem, who suddenly feels an urge to go on a road trip, south of the city.  It’s while he’s walking along this road, following what he’s sure must be the Lord’s leading, that he happens upon a man whose heart has already been prepared for exactly the message he has to share.  This man is deeply hungry for good news.  He’s gone looking for it in the courts of Solomon’s Temple, but has found there only legalism and rejection.  Philip shares the good news, baptizes the Ethiopian, and then – Luke tells us – the Spirit “snatches him away” so he may go on his next assignment.
    ***
    If there’s one trend we can identify, from our reading in the Book of Acts so far, it’s that the reach of Christ’s gospel is growing steadily wider.  The master plan for this expansion is found in Chapter 1, verse 8, with these words Jesus speaks just before he ascends into heaven: “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
    Could Philip and the others have imagined just how far-reaching the impact of that promise would be?  The Spirit would lead them to move far out beyond their comfort zone as devout Jewish men, to speak with people who were not only outside the children of Abraham, but whom their tradition considered unclean.  The Ethiopian eunuch was just one of many.
    ***
    One thing that interests me about this passage is the way God’s word is living and active, and cannot be turned aside by the human prejudice.  Psalm 33, our Hebrew Bible lesson for today, captures the power of God’s word in creation by these words:

    “By the word of the Lord the heavens were made,
    and all their host by the breath of [God’s] mouth....

    For he spoke, and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood firm.”
    [Psalm 33:5,9]

    At creation, God speaks a word and it accomplishes something.  God says “Let there be light,” and there is light.  And it is good.
    Not far from the place in the book of Isaiah where the Ethiopian was reading, there comes this line, spoken by God:

    “...so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
    it shall not return to me empty,
    but it shall accomplish that which I purpose...”    [Isaiah 55:11]

    As the Ethiopian learns in conversation with Philip, the word of God in the Bible is so much more than mere words on a page.  God’s word, in the scriptures, is a living word.   Now, there are some people today – just as there have always been, down through the centuries of church history – who would rather make God’s word into something static, rigid and unchanging.  It’s a lot easier to practice Christianity if you imagine the Bible is a simple rule book, that prescribes, for any given situation, exactly how we’re supposed to behave.  Yes, there’s no shortage of laws in the Bible, but we Christians believe the law is always tempered by grace.  More than that, we’ve gained, in recent centuries, a greater understanding of the scriptures as not merely a book, but a whole library of books.  We’ve learned how the message in those books fairly blazes into life when we understand something of the people who wrote them, and the communities for which they wrote them.  We’ve also learned how important a principle it is to let scripture interpret scripture, to test what we’re reading on one page against the great, gospel message that’s present throughout the whole.  
    I began this message by reflecting on the ways our lives have changed in recent years, on account of the burgeoning growth of technology.  We used to say we were living in a wired world, but now, with the advent of wireless technology and the freedom it brings, it’s more accurate to say we’re in an unwired world.  The thing I find fascinating is how that development was anticipated and paralleled – spiritually speaking – by the mission and message of Jesus Christ.  Jesus took the hard-wired legal system of first-century Judaism and unplugged it.  He insisted on testing the prescribed legal requirements against the higher principles of God’s love and justice.  He challenged some of the greatest theological minds of his day to embrace this way of understanding the scriptures – and, when they refused, he turned to humble, ordinary people, teaching them in unforgettable parables and pithy sayings.
    In Ray Bradbury’s futuristic novel, Fahrenheit 451, a totalitarian government has decreed that all books are to be destroyed – for, without books, the people find it hard to think for themselves and are easily controlled.  There are “firemen” who play a major role in the story.  Their job is not to save houses but to burn books.
    In the story, there’s an underground resistance movement, dedicated to saving human culture from the assault of the firemen.  Each of these resistance fighters has taken on the task of memorizing entire books.  One of them has taken on the name “Dante,” because he’s memorized much of Dante’s poetry.  Another is “Milton.” Still another is “Shakespeare.”  More than just bearing these names, these resistance fighters have, in a certain sense, become the authors whose works they have learned.  With so many printed books already destroyed, the survival of human literature is dependent on them.  They have become living books.
    That’s the reason Jesus Christ came into the world.  He came to be, for us, the living word.  It is in his life, death and resurrection that we see the love and justice of God lived out.  Shall we, who have tasted of the freedom of his Holy Spirit, become legalists once again, treating the Bible as a static rulebook, frozen in time – an idol to be worshiped?  Or, shall we come to see it as a dynamic, living story, a play whose curtain has not yet fallen on its final act, in which each of us finds our own place as characters?
    How shall we understand, without someone to interpret for us?  That interpreter is Jesus Christ – and it is in the common life and worship of his living body, the church, that the ongoing task of interpretation is carried on.
    Let us pray:

Living God,
help us so to hear your holy Word
that we may truly understand;
that, understanding, we may believe,
and that, believing,
we may follow in all faithfulness and obedience,
seeking your honor and glory in all that we do;
through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Copyright © 2010 by Carlos E. Wilton.  All rights reserved.