Most of you know that I tend to want to look at Scripture texts in new and different ways, to see if perhaps the Holy Spirit has some new interpretation or idea to introduce in a text that would otherwise seem straightforward. I was doing a bit of that with our first lesson today, this story of Philip and the Ethiopian. Here we have two men discussing a passage of Scripture, Isaiah to be precise, and interpreting it through the lens of Good Friday. Initially, I thought Sunday’s sermon would be “Good Friday redux,” with us revisiting as they do the events of that fateful day and trying as they are to discern what it all means. While I think there are going to be elements of that in today’s sermon, another idea also came to me: the idea that this story is really a follow-up to the Thomas story from Low Sunday.

You may recall when I preached on Thomas who I spoke about the virtue of doubt, that our questions and the things we don’t know and understand often drive us to seek deeper truths. In this story of Philip, we are being witness to that very process. We have an Ethiopian eunuch, a court official, journeying back to his homeland from a sojourn in Jerusalem. Now odds are good this fellow is a convert to Judaism of some fashion, since Ethiopia and ancient Israel have been interconnected for centuries. One may remember the old story of King Solomon receiving the Queen of Sheba to his court to test his wisdom. Sheba is now Ethiopia. So this eunuch sitting in his chariot reading a passage of Jewish Scripture is not a terribly unusual sight.

He’s reading Isaiah and he’s stumped. He doesn’t get this section about the suffering servant. He doesn’t know who the prophet is talking about. Enter Philip, who has been sent to this place by compulsion of the Holy Spirit. He comes over and the two of them sit down together and work this out. The eunuch brings his questions, his doubt, his hunger to understand. Philip brings his experiences, what he’s been taught, and together they work through this passage of Scripture to understand what God is trying to tell them.

If this isn’t a textbook example of what I was talking about with Thomas, I don’t know what is. The eunuch is open with his doubt and his lack of understanding. He’s not trying to pretend he gets it, as so often people do, afraid that doubt shows weakness or lack of faith. He hungers to know, so when a potential guide or teacher comes along, he asks his questions openly. What does this mean? Who is this about? And in the end, his faith grows, so much so that when they pass a small pond, he asks to be baptized into Christ.

That’s precisely what I was talking about. Commending all of us to work out our doubts and questions, to be not be ashamed or afraid, and to allow ourselves to grow in greater understanding. Let’s be honest here. There’s just a lot of all this God stuff that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. People getting healed of disease miraculously. Oceans parting to allow people to walk on dry land. A guy rising from the dead. Even in this story, Philip displays a knack for teleportation. None of these things are possible and yet we believe that they happened. How?

We believe them because at some point we asked a question and someone answered it for us. A teacher, a pastor, a parent, a friend, someone was there who helped us work through our doubts and allowed us to grow in faith and understanding.

With that in mind, it really occurs to me that there are two parts to this story. It’s not just the eunuch and his questions, but it’s also Philip and his willingness to be that guide. Think about his circumstances. Granted he gets a bit of a push from the Holy Spirit, but I suspect that this Ethiopian is not the company he usually keeps. This guy isn’t just a foreigner from a faraway land, but he’s a high official, the chief treasurer of the royal court. Pretty important fellow here.

And let’s consider the distinct possibility that Philip doesn’t have all the answers either. He’s not one of the Twelve; he’s a new convert himself. He’s not been witness to the resurrection that we know of, may not have even met Jesus. All he has is what he’s been taught by the other disciples. All he has are the answers to his questions that he’s received. But regardless of all these things, he goes, he hops in the chariot, and becomes the guide that the eunuch needs.

I’m reminded of a scene in the movie Kingdom of Heaven. It begins with a knight seeking a son he left behind. When they meet, there’s a moment of mutual confession, the knight repenting of abandoning his child and the son confessing that he has murdered a priest. “It is said,” says the son, “that one can find forgiveness in Jerusalem.” The father nods and says, “We will find out together.”

That’s really the heart of this. Being open to one another, both with our questions and doubts, but also with our answers, our experiences, and what we’ve been taught. The Holy Spirit put Philip in that eunuch’s path for a reason, because Philip had the answers to the Ethiopian’s questions. Maybe we’re here now because we have the answers to our neighbor’s questions. Or perhaps they have the answers to ours. How will we know, if neither ask nor answer?

This is what Christian community is about. Growing together, asking together, seeking together. Too often we treat our faith as our own private little thing and the pressures of society encourage that thinking. Keep it to yourself, they tell us. Perhaps that is why there are so many baby Christians in this world, adult in body and intellect, but with no more understanding of the faith than a 5 year old. That’s the road to unbelief, when our own impulses and vices override our better nature. No, we should not keep it to ourselves any longer, because we need each other. The church needs us to need each other, and the world needs the church.

This is where it begins, with questions and answers and the willingness to express them. We are all doubters and we are all questioners. When we embrace those roles, the church grows and the world is evangelized. We know this because that is the story of the book of Acts; it’s happened before. People asking and answering and the faith spread like wildfire across the world. It could happen again, if we’re willing. Amen.