Introduction
The late, great preacher and pastor, William Sloan Coffin of Riverside Church in NYC, once said to his people: “I THINK therefore I am? Not for a Christian – no, I LOVE therefore I am!”
St. Paul was clear: faith, hope and love – in the midst of all the changes in the world – these three abide and the greatest of them is… what? Love.
The psalm we heard this morning, Psalm 22, is a heart-broken lament and love song by one who aches for the assurance of God’s love again: My God, my love why hast thou forsaken me?
And dear St. John asks us to remember that as God’s beloved friends: we must continue to love each other since love comes from God. Everyone who loves is born of God and experiences a relationship with God… Remember, no one has seen God, ever. But if we love one another, God dwells deeply within us, and his love becomes complete in us—perfect love!
Jesus tells his beloved that to love by faith is to ABIDE IN ME – that is, to LIVE in Jesus – to make your home in Christ. To rest and trust in the one who was crucified but risen – to let him fill and nourish us from the inside out by grace – to stay connected to the Lord with all our heart, soul, mind and strength just as a grape stays connected to the vine until the fruit is ripe… THIS is what it means to abide.
“And just as we need the air to breathe,” writes Kate Huey (ucc.org) “and we need food and nourishment to live… we need shelter and community; we need a home…. to thrive. The early Christians, who had in a very real sense lost their spiritual homes and perhaps, along with them, their family ties and their physical homes…” ached for a way to stay connected to God’s grace. They yearned to ABIDE in Christ Jesus because they no longer had a home.
Remember: that after Pentecost the early church was scattered all over the world; for a short time after Easter they were waiting together for the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. But then, after Pentecost, they were scattered to the four corners of the earth… They became strangers in a variety of strange lands. So the Spirit of Christ came to them – wherever they were – and trained them in the practice of two spiritual truths that might have some importance for us in the 21st century.
Specifically the Spirit taught them the practice of abiding or living in Christ and building communities of encouragement. Consider the Risen Christ in John's Gospel who warns his followers in every age and setting not to "go it alone, trusting in their own strength. On their own they would be cut off from their life source. They would bear no fruit." (Nancy Blakely)
And I think one of the most fascinating examples of this in the New Testament is the encounter between Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch: it holds some valuable insights for us about what abiding means and what building authentic Christian community really looks like – and why it matters.
So, I’d like you to pray with me – and then take a little time to discern what the Spirit wants us to know about resting and living in Jesus while we build a community of faith – because it could be good news to somebody here today – and is certainly good news for being the church in this town at this moment in time. So, first, let us pray…
Insights
A word of background before we talk about Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch, ok because some people have asked me why I spend so much time talking about the stories of the Bible in worship. On more than a few occasions, some old timers in the church and some new guests too have said: What do these old books in the Bible have to say about how we live today? Isn’t it just tradition that may not be relevant any longer that causes us to keep reading the Bible?
And I think these are important questions – they are not ignorant or disrespectful – they are thoughtful and real: why do we turn to the Bible to guide and shape our faith? What do you think? Before I offer my response, what do you think about the importance of still using the Bible after all these years?
My Grandma Nick – a hard living, hard loving Irish Protestant from Rhode Island – was the matriarch of our family. She was the BEST baker in the world, she had an incredible earthy and vibrant sense of humor, an infectious laugh and… she was a stone cold racist as many of the Irish in America were. She lived and worked with African Americans – loved and played with them, too – but she taught her children and her grandchildren that people of color were morally and ethically inferior to whites because that is how the Lord made them.
“At noon today I want you to walk over to that desolate road that goes from Jerusalem down to Gaza." So he got up and went. He met an Ethiopian eunuch coming down the road. The eunuch had been on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and was returning to Ethiopia, where he was minister in charge of all the finances of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians. He was riding in a chariot and reading the prophet Isaiah. And the Spirit told Philip, "Climb into the chariot." Running up alongside, Philip heard the eunuch reading Isaiah and asked, "Do you understand what you're reading?"
Conclusion
It is clear to me that this story speaks to us about our need for one another: in the 21st century just as in the 1st we can’t abide in Jesus - live faithfully in Christ - all by ourselves. We need others – we need to stay connected to the vine – to learn and practice resting in God’s grace. Sharing Christ’s love. Trusting that God is God and that is enough.
We are grounded in the grace of a still speaking God: so let those who have ears to hear, hear.
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