Easter 5 Year B

Easter 5 Year B Acts 8:26-40 The Rev. Benton Quest

“My, God certainly cooks in some strange pots!”
I had a professor in seminary who would look out over his classes and kind of shake his head. Then he would say what I just said, “My, God certainly cooks in some strange pots!”
The first time this would happen, most of us were kind of taken aback; that was not a very nice thing to say! This was seminary! People were supposed to be nice here. But that was his comment, and to it he would stick. And every class he would say the same thing.
But, you know, after some thought, and really getting to know the people in my classes, I came to realize the truth in that statement. We really were a strange set of pots. In my class, we had a homicide detective, a patrol cop, a newspaper journalist, some folks who just graduated from college, me, a psychologist, some teachers, a few nurses, a lawyer, and hog farmer. We came from all walks of life from all parts of the country. The only thing that really was a common denominator was that we all felt a call to be workers in the church.
And, for the most part, all of us are still working in some aspect in the church. We were not the best, the most righteous, or even the brightest. We were just everyday people. Yes, we were a strange set of pots. But it was with this set of pots that God chose to lead the church.
When I look out upon you today, I see a strange set of pots! I see all kinds of pot! Some of you are pressure cookers; you can function well when the pressure is on. Some of you are saucepans; ready for any purpose that is needed. And some of you are specialized pans; not for everything, but what you do you do extremely well!
You are the kind of people that Christ draws together to spread the word to the world. Christ calls all kinds of people to bring the message to the world. Not just the famous or powerful, but the meek and the humble.
Today’s reading from Acts demonstrates God’s love for strange pots quite nicely. Phillip, a deacon, was preaching to a large group of people when God pulls him away from the crowd and tells him to go along the wilderness road. I would assume that Phillip had no idea what God had in mind but Phillip got up and went.
The person Phillip encountered was probably as different from Phillip as just about anyone could be. There are a couple of translations of the word “Ethiopian.” One is from the country of Ethiopia. Another is that of being darkened by the sun. Either of these translations would lead us to believe that the Ethiopian was very dark skinned, very different from Phillip. The Ethiopian was also a eunuch. Without going too deeply into this term, we can assume that his sexuality was different from that of most other people. The Ethiopian was also the head of the treasury in the queen’s court; in other words, he was of the nobility. He was almost totally different from Phillip, but Phillip was sent to him.
It would seem odd that Phillip would be pulled away from the large crowds and be sent to this one man, but to think that would be shortsighted of us. Some scholars have speculated that the Eunuch is responsible for the spread of Christianity into Africa. This one man, so different from those around him, so different from the people who would be found in Jerusalem, is the one used to spread the message to the people in Africa.
What I think is interesting to note is that when Phillip started talking with the Eunuch, he started with the passage that the eunuch was reading. If we look at that text, it is Isaiah’s song of the suffering servant, a passage that can readily be applied to the suffering of Christ. That seems like some pretty heavy theology to jump into and I probably would have liked to start with something easier, but one of the truths we can derive from this is that we are called to begin our outreach not from where we are but from where the hearer is. We need to meet people where they are, not wait for them to change, to be “good enough” or “worthy.” All that we need is that the person simply be open to listen. AND I believe that if we meet folks where they are, they will be open to listen.
This truth seems to have been borne out in the relative lack of success of early foreign mission efforts. Instead of going to uniquely different cultures and sharing Christ within those cultures, the missionaries often felt that they had to “civilize” the culture – that is – to change the entire structure of the lives of the peoples they wanted to reach. They wanted to “westernize” them and then preach Jesus to them as if Jesus somehow uniquely belonged to a certain class or culture.
There are churches today where people are expected to get their lives in order and only then would the people be considered worthy of acceptance into the body of Christ. Unfortunately, that is not the case. Instead, perhaps, we need to learn and understand something of the culture we want to reach, and once we connect to them in their familiar surroundings and their lives, then we can bring Christ to them: The Christ whose love transcends culture, the Christ who died for ALL people, the Christ who gives himself for us at the table. When we understand those who are different than us, we can bring Christ to all people, even those we talked about last week, the sheep that are not of this fold.
God cooks in all kinds of strange pots, and it is in all kinds of strange pots that we often find the tastiest food. But when we limit ourselves to the tried and the known, we may get fed, but it is not very satisfying. But when we go out, when we move beyond our comfort zones, it is then that we begin to experience the wonders of life.
Phillip could have stayed where he was, or he could have forced the Eunuch to follow a preconceived plan, but then the message of Christ in all of its richness would not have been shared. Phillip could have waited for the Eunuch to show up, but Phillip was sent to the Eunuch. Phillip could have turned the Eunuch away because he was so very different, but God sent Phillip directly to this man, just the way he was.
We have been called and we are sent to spread the good news of Christ’s love to others. We never know, we may be sent to the exotic people of Cascade or maybe to those even farther away, like Bernard! We don’t know. But the one sure thing here is that WE ARE BEING SENT! God has started something great here with St. Swithia’s in the Swamp, but I don’t believe it is supposed to end here. And we can sit here and talk it to death, but I think I will finish now so we can continue with worship and then get out into the world to spread Christ’s love to all those people God should happen to have us meet!