“When we’re talking about God, how can you claim to understand? For if you could understand, you’d no longer be talking about God!”
These powerful words come from none other than Saint Augustine himself, one of the most influential Christian theologians in the history of the Church.
After a lifetime of studying Scripture, walking with God, and writing theology, Augustine concluded that it was unwise for anyone to ever claim that they had understood God.
Because our minds are finite. We are finite. God is infinite.
While God has revealed parts of God’s self to us as humans, so that we might know him and know how to relate to him- it is the height of arrogance for any human to claim that they have understood God.
God is untamable. Undefinable. Infinite. Eternal. Mysterious.
God constantly presses against our boundaries and borders and humans and invites us to expand our perspectives on who God is and how God works.
That is the journey of faith- not arriving but evolving.
In today’s New Testament reading, we have a beautiful example of God working in unexpected ways- including people into the church that the earliest Jesus followers weren’t sure should be included.
This account is about the inclusion of a man who is traditionally named Simeon, who we’re told is a Eunuch from Ethiopia.
First some background: The early followers of Jesus were all entirely Jewish. What we find out in the book of Acts is that most of the early apostles believed that Jesus only came to redeem the Jewish people, primarily.
And throughout the Book of Acts, we have story after story of the ways the Holy Spirit moved among the early Jesus followers, challenging their narrow and limited understanding of Jesus’ mission and forcing them to expand their understanding of who they believed was to be included in the church.
Simeon, the Ethiopian Eunuch, was not someone who was expected to be included in the early church.
Simeon was, first and foremost, Ethiopian.
This means he was likely not Jewish. He was likely a Gentile. And he was a person with dark skin.
All of these things would have made him an unlikely candidate for being included in the early Jesus movement which again, was perceived by the Apostles to be a Jewish movement for Jewish people- an Ethiopian was not a candidate for inclusion.
On top of being Ethiopian, we’re told that he was a Eunuch.
This means a few things. First, in the first century a eunuch could be either: A man who was castrated as a punishment- this seems unlikely, because from what the text says, our Eunuch was a wealthy man of influence.
Second, a eunuch could have also been a sexual or gender minority- meaning a person who was either born intersex, meaning they had both genitals and thus were androgynous, or could have been what could be called “an effeminate man”- a man who didn’t align with ancient standards of masculinity.
These last two options seem to be most likely in Simeon’s case. He was a sexual and gender minority.
And the Hebrew Bible was clear that eunuchs were not welcome among God’s people- at least initially. Leviticus 23:1 says eunuchs are not welcome in the assembly.
But later on in the Old Testament, God makes it clear that God’s plan was ultimately to redeem not just the Jewish people, not just men and women, but all people- including Gentiles and Eunuchs.
In Isaiah 56, we read these words of prophecy:
Do not let the gentile joined to the Lord say,
“The Lord will surely separate me from his people,”
and do not let the eunuch say,
“I am just 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 my covenant,
I will give, in my house and within my walls,
a monument and a name
better than sons and daughters;
I will give them an everlasting name
that shall not be cut off.
God says that in due time, Gentiles and Eunuchs would one day be welcomed among his people- and even given a name better than natural born sons or daughters.
But most people forgot that inclusive promise of God.
Most people didn’t understand Jesus own ministry as he reached out to gentiles and even said eunuchs would be welcomed in to his own movement.
His disciples, like many of us, thought they understood God.
Thought they knew how God worked.
Thought they knew who was in and who was out.
They even had Scripture to back them up.
But God was not bound by their interpretations.
God was not limited by their understanding.
God was never only about redeeming a select few people. God always intended to include all kinds of people in the Kingdom of God.
And so when Philip encounters Simeon, the Ethiopian Eunuch, he initially doesn’t think this is a person who is about to join the Jesus’ movement.
He doesn’t think the church is for someone like Simeon.
But the Spirit moves in Philips heart.
The Spirit prompts Philip.
The Spirit tells Philip to go over to Simeon and to share the good news of Jesus.
And he does.
Philip opens up the Bible and explains the message of Jesus and God’s plan of redemption to Simeon, and the Spirit moves in Simeon’s heart and Simeon asks Philip to baptize him.
To initiate him into the church.
To mark him among God’s people.
But Philips theology said this wasn’t possible.
People like Simeon weren’t supposed to be included.
Yet here Simeon, a Gentile Eunuch was, asking to be baptized because he believed in Jesus.
What would you have done?
How would you have responded?
If your beliefs said “these people are not right, they’re not included”, but then one of those very people was standing before you saying, “I believe, I want to belong”.
This is a question many Christians are faced with in our day, too.
Many Christians in our day believe that they have God figured out.
They believe they’ve fully understand the work and mission of Jesus in the world.
And they fully know who God wants to accept and who God condemns.
And so thousands of churches around the world put up a barrier around inclusion.
Only certain kinds of people are to be welcomed in.
Only people who look a certain way, love a certain way, present a certain way, believe a certain way are to be included.
And even when people who are outside of those approved categories show up and declare “I want to follow Jesus”, too many churches say “You’re not welcome here.”
Yet the witness of the story of Philip, as well as the entire message of the book of Acts, is that we cannot know the mind of God, and that the only response of followers of Jesus is to look at where God is moving and to respond faithfully.
Philip doesn’t hesitate.
His theology says Simeon shouldn’t be baptized.
But he sees the Spirit moving in the heart of Simeon, he sees his profession of faith, and so, he takes Simeon to the river and baptizes him into the church.
And the Ethiopian Eunuch, as far as we can tell, becomes the first gentile, the first African person, and the first sexual and gender minority to be welcomed into the Church of Christ.
This story is an important reminder for all of us who follow Jesus, who care about the truth, and who want to be faithful to God.
Because it reminds us that faithfulness isn’t black and white.
The questions of our faith often do not have clear cut answers.
The commitment to being a follower of Jesus is a commitment to be a person who seeks to live in alignment with the Spirit of God, who sometimes will call us to places beyond our understanding, beyond what we expect, to people and places that we never imagined we’d be interacting with.
The journey of faith is a journey to trust in the wild wind of God’s Spirit and not on our own understanding- to resist the temptation to put up boundaries and borders that box God in.
Whenever we feel like we’ve understood God, or know the boundaries of how God can work, we’re not worshipping God, but an idol.
Idols are formed whenever we think we have understood God.
Idols are formed whenever we believe we can shrink God down to a manageable size that we can easily understand.
God cannot be boxed in.
God does not have to play by anyone’s arbitrary rules.
And God has made it clear that God’s mission is always to include more, to expand the reach of redemption more, to break down any barriers or borders that are causing division and strife in our world.
From the very beginning, in the Book of Genesis, God tells Abraham that his mission is bless all nations of the earth- that means everyone- not just a certain sector of people.
And that, my friends, is the challenge of being a follower of Jesus.
We’re called to tear down our own inner boundaries and borders of who we think deserves to be included, deserves to be loved, deserves to be forgiven.
We are called to check our own biases and prejudices, and realize that they never come from God, because the Scripture is clear time and time again that there is no partiality or favoritism with God.
And if we are truly living in step with God’s Spirit, we, like Philip, will be called into relationship with the most unlikely and unexpected people- and through them, we will get a glimpse at aspects of God that we’ve never seen before.
That’s the beauty of the church. This is meant to be a microcosm of the Kingdom of God, a Kingdom made up of people from every nation, tribe, tongue, color, sexuality, gender, background, belief, socioeconomic status.
It’s meant to be a place where we are challenged by the different ways people see and experience the world, and where we allow God to transform our lives through relationships with those who are different.
If there is one thing the story of the conversion of the Ethiopian Eunuch invites us to remember this week it is this: To expect the unexpected with God.
To understand that the life of faith is a life of adventure- a life of constant surprise at the new ways God shows up in our lives and in our world.
The journey of faith is to be led by the wild Spirit of God towards the expanding of our hearts and our minds to include, and love, and embrace more and more people, just like God does.
It’s to always be weary of ourselves or anyone else who claims to have gotten God figured out or who draws boundaries and borders around who God loves and who God welcomes- because God’s love always blows up our boundaries and borders.
We worship a God of the unexpected, which means in our journey of faith, we should always expect the unexpected.
May our hearts and minds be open to the leading of God.
And may we always be a people who draw the circle wider and wider to welcome more people into God’s grace and love.
Amen?