A Biblical traffic stop

 

Acts 8: 26-40
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
May 2, 2021

Let’s just get it out there in the open: this is a weird story—not because of its characters but because it is so dramatic and outlandish. Running alongside a chariot because the Spirit told Philip to do it and getting in with a complete stranger because an angel guided Philip to this wilderness road. Then Philip disappearing from the scene and appearing elsewhere. And yet when we consider other stories in the book of Acts and in the rest of the Bible, how is it any more dramatic or outlandish than a couple in their seventies giving birth to their first child or a man parting a sea, or a woman healed of her demons as the one who proclaimed Jesus raised from the dead.



We think that because these are stories of the supernatural, they are not about us or speak to us and our postmodern world. And yet what if supernatural stories are just a way of saying that God, divine love, the Sacred Mystery, acts through us and lives in us? These stories continue to have power because they reveal our hopes, our fears, and what we still have yet to learn about ourselves and the power of God’s love within us.

However, in this story there is an imbalance of power between the two characters. There is the Ethiopian eunuch, a Black gender queer migrant who is curious about the Hebrew scriptures if not a Jew himself, and servant to imperial power with access to great wealth, signified by the chariot and a driver. Philip is a Greek cisgender Jew who is part of a religious communal society whose primary teacher was executed by the state for insurrection. Historically this passage has been interpreted as a blessing for foreign missions to convert whole nations to Christianity and colonize them. There is also the problem of anti-Semitism and supercessionism, of declaring that the covenant made through Jesus supersedes or replaces the covenant God made with Moses. But what if this story was interpreted from the eunuch’s point of view?



Have you ever been in a vulnerable position in which someone has commandeered your attention, whatever the situation, and in your discomfort, your anxiety, you smile and go along with it until they leave? If you have endured harassment, catcalling, entreaties to smile from someone, or someone intruding on your personal space, you know what I mean.

Though the eunuch has means, he is also a migrant, a foreigner, an outsider. Anyone who migrates any great distance is at a disadvantage and in danger of all sorts of exploitation.



Imagine if this story took place today. This would be a biblical traffic stop. This Black man is keeping his hands on the wheel. And he wouldn’t need anyone to explain to him about sheep being led to the slaughter, about being silent and not opening his mouth, about humiliation, about his life being taken away from the earth. A Black man would know all too well what Isaiah meant by a suffering servant, a man of sorrows, despised and shunned, bearing the plague of racism, wounded for our crimes.

Think of the eunuch as a genderqueer individual. Currently in this nation, 33 states are considering anti-transgender and anti-LGBTQ bills in their legislatures. Some of them would limit access to gender-affirming healthcare. Many of these bills would also force teachers to out their students to their parents, even if there is a risk that parents would force their child out of the house. Conversion therapy is still legal in 26 states. Imagine how exhausting it is to live being the focus of not only hatred and vitriol but policy being made to dehumanize and delegitimize you. Thankfully, with some overlap, 20 states are also proposing legislation to protect LGBTQ citizens and their families.



What is important to remember about this story is that Philip was willing to disrupt his life for the Ethiopian eunuch. Not only that but he was willing to disrupt this imbalance of power and privilege so that the two of them would be equals and siblings. Women and genderqueer and genderfluid and non-binary folx can smash the patriarchy with all their might but until cisgender men smash the patriarchy, the patriarchy will remain. The Black Lives Matter movement can disrupt and protest, create community care and demand justice, but until White people dismantle Whiteness and the power structures that uphold it and create antiracist policies, racism and violence will remain. And LGBTQ, intersex, and asexual folx are worn out from having to fight their own fight to safely exist in public space, and this will continue unless heterosexuals are willing to disrupt their privilege and power so that others can breathe just as freely.

This is why we are a Just Peace, Open and Affirming, Earthwise church. This is why we chose to have gender-neutral bathrooms. This is what covenant is all about. Again, this is what this Table is all about. I am willing to disrupt my life for you and for your wholeness. We are willing to disrupt our lives for each other, for the earth and for its wholeness. This church is willing to disrupt its life because of a pandemic. We are willing to disrupt what we think we know to be not only curious and compassionate about the pain and injustice that others suffer but to be in solidarity and do something about it. This is what it means to be on the path of a true human being. This is what it means to be a follower of Jesus. Empire says that violence, death and the cross, the lynching tree, are the ultimate disruption.



No, we say. No. Love is the ultimate disruption. Love that dismantles and abolishes. Love that creates and upbuilds. Love that makes for transformative change is the ultimate disruption.

(Benediction is at the end of the video)

As you go from this place, may God bless you and keep you.

May God's face shine upon you and be gracious to you.

May God give you the grace to never sell yourself short,

grace to risk something big for something good,

grace to know that this world is now too dangerous 

for anything but truth and too small for anything but love.

So may God take your minds and think through them,

may God take your lips and speak through them,

and may God take your hearts and set them on fire.

In the name of our Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer, Amen.