"What Is to Prevent Us?" April 29, 2018

John 15: 1-8 Acts 8:26-40 Years ago as Continuing Education, there was a Seminar offered for 10 Preachers, taught by three of the former pastors of Riverside Church in Manhattan: Ernie Campbell, William Sloan Coffin and Jim Forbes. Their first word of wisdom to us was that if there is a text, where the people in the pew know more about a subject than the preacher, you need to find another Scripture! Last week, we had the Good Shepherd, and I was reminded, several of our parishioners grew up on family farms, one raising sheep, and others who in in recent years raised goats. SO this morning, knowing we have landscapers and gardeners in the congregation, and the Skaneateles Garden Club plant, prune and harvest, far better blooms than I can ever hope; even more that we are in Finger Lakes Wine District and that I might surely offend someone by describing my knowledge of grapes, which has more to do with the wine than the vine! I chose to go with the passage from Acts. Not that I have any experience with Eunuchs, Ethiopians, High Priests of Candace, or Chariots! But that there was greater chance of your listening to something you knew less about! Phillip had been one of Jesus’ 12 Disciples with primary relationship with the Savior. We know from an earlier passage that in addition to being Jewish, and a disciple of Jesus, Phillip was Greek, trained and educated in philosophy and languages, as well. Following the Stoning of Stephen, Phillip was told by an Angel to go South from Jerusalem toward Gaza. There on a deserted road, Phillip encountered a stranger. Have you ever been on a long journey, perhaps a trip on a plane, a train or a cruise, and rather than ignore each other, you struck up a conversation with the stranger beside you? Having seen Ben Hur several times, with the Derby next Saturday, we know horses can sprint, but I have to believe that on this long journey, the horse drawn cart was just walking along, Phillip could walk beside to talk to the occupant. What Phillip can know from context, is that this man is coming from having been to the City of Jerusalem, the center of Judaism, now the new locus of Christianity, a mecca for those seeking God. He is by appearance not a Jew, and therefore clearly a stranger not only to Phillip, but to what he has encountered. From ancient drawings accompanying this text, different from the Egyptians who were drawn small and slender, the Rulers of Cush were often depicted with scars across their foreheads, and larger than anyone around them, a people familiar with fighting to win. Observing a stranger beside us reading, our first question might be: “What are you reading?” or “What is your book about?” But clearly, Phillip recognizes that this is the Book of Isaiah. Instead, in Good Socratic method Phillip asks “Do you understand what you are reading?” And the Ethiopian, seeking a guide asks: “How can I, unless someone guides me?” When traveling in a foreign land most often we would hire a tour guide, to explain what the Via Della Rosa is, or Herod’s Temple, or which of the many places is the Upper Room. Yet, we miss the point, that Christian faith cannot be discerned in solitude. Over and over again, I have heard from couples, “We want to wait until our child can decide for themselves what faith they desire before Baptizing them”; or individuals who have been struggling who tried reading the Bible from beginning to End, even just the New Testament from Matthew to The Revelation, but got lost. Our faith is communal, personal and real, this is not philosophical ideas, or scientific theory, a curriculum you can buy, a video to watch, faith requires a community of trust. This stranger read aloud from Isaiah: As a sheep led to the slaughter or a lamb before its shearer is dumb, so he too opens not his mouth. In his humiliation justice was denied him. Who can describe this generation? For his life is taken from the earth.” He asked, “About whom does the prophet say this, about himself or someone else?” In the time of Isaiah the Prophet & Priest of Jerusalem watching the fall of Israel; in the time of Phillip watching the crucifixion of Jesus, knowing all had abandoned him; so also today, We have a hard time imagining that a person, not only a larger-than life individual like Martin Luther King or Gandhi, but someone like us, of faith and conviction, might care more about others than about themselves, being willing to lose everything, their life, career, home, friends, future, to have everything they love taken from them, rather than fighting win, with the costs of conflict. Then Phillip does something so simple, yet so profound. The only other place I recall this in Scripture is by Jesus on the Road to Emmaus, the day of Resurrection, “Phillip opened his mouth and beginning with the scriptures, he told the good news of Jesus Christ.” Somehow, perhaps by memorizing the stories of Jesus’ Birth and Easter’ Resurrection as facts, we have forgotten how to do this. I believe too often we have memorized Creeds, instead of questioning faith in our own lives. Recently, I have had a number of people tell me, they have no problem with God. That there could be one God, Creator, Supreme being, Judge over all time and space; they may have argued with God, and wrestled with God. The problem they have is knowing what to do with Jesus? So he lived and died, and rose from the dead, so what? As a preacher, that makes my heart break, because what we just named is God loving the world so much as to become perfectly one with us, accepting our struggle, AND different from anyone before in history, he remained true to the Covenant with God, to love God with all his heart, mind, soul and strength and to love neighbor as he loved his own life; that he suffered for all the sins of all the world, AND that not even death, nor any power, could stop him from acting in love and forgiveness. The first day, in Seminary, we were given a writing assignment, any of us here could do. The Early Church had been taught the Scriptures, they knew passages of the Old Testament; they also knew the life and teachings of Jesus, including his death and resurrection; Each of the Gospel writers, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, as well as Phillip here, took their Understanding of the Scriptures, the Story of Jesus, and their own current struggles, and from these 3 wrote a Gospel story. Wrote the story of Jesus, the Lamb who being led to Slaughter did not protest, and through retelling Jesus’ told their own life story, as means of convincing others to believe. That is what we are each to do. The response of this stranger to Phillip, becomes “Here is water, what is to prevent my being baptized?”