Echoes and Reverberations

Texts: Acts 8:26-40; 1 John 4:7-21; John 15:1-8 Someone has described Easter Day as being for Christians what the Big Bang is for cosmologists.  When Jesus was raised from the dead there was a vast explosion of spiritual power released into the world, which to this day is expanding outwards to fill the universe – until the moment comes when all is in Christ and Christ is in all.  I find this image helpful in many ways, and one of those ways concerns what scientists call echoes of the Big Bang.  In ways that are far beyond my ability to comprehend, these clever people claim to be able to hear echoes of the original Big Bang, and even to see almost that far back in the history of the universe. I must leave that to them; but increasingly, as I have read and studied and reflected on the Scriptures, I have found time and again that a particular passage that I am looking at is full of echoes of some other passage; and in this Easter Season that seems to happen more often still.  We have an excellent example of that in our first lesson this morning; so I want to start today with this story about the Ethiopian official and his encounter with Philip, usually known (because of this story) as Philip the Evangelist.  As we read or hear this story, what other stories or passages of Scripture might echo in our minds? Well, let's have a look.  The most obvious feature of this story is that it takes place on a road, and is an encounter between somebody on a journey and a stranger who interrupts him.  So what other story comes to mind in this Easter Season as we read this story?  Surely, St Luke's story of the disciples on the road to Emmaus.  And there's a coincidence, isn't there?  St Luke is also the author of the Book of Acts, so he has written this story of Philip and the official, and shaped it along the lines of his story set on the road to Emmaus. Watch what happens.  The official has been to Jerusalem and is now going home: he is journeying away from the city.  What about the disciples in the earlier story?  They had left the city and were on the way (home?) to Emmaus.  Suddenly, a stranger, Philip, catches him up and asks him a question; just as the stranger, the Risen Christ, caught up with the disciples and asked them a question.  And very soon a bible study is underway, as Philip explains to him how the Scriptures have been fulfilled in Jesus Christ; which, again, is exactly what happened on the road to Emmaus.  In this story we have the Holy Spirit taking up and continuing the ministry of the Risen Christ.  In St Luke's terms, during the period between Easter and Pentecost the divine agent was the Risen Christ, and after Pentecost it was the Holy Spirit; but, of course, it's all one and the same God working his purposes out.  Or, in terms of the image I started with this morning, the ripples of power spreading out from the Big Bang of Easter washing over the disciples on the road to Emmaus and the official on his way home to Ethiopia. What other echoes might there be in this story for us? Well, after the bible study comes the baptism.  The official has well and truly heard what the Spirit was saying to him through the Scriptures, and wants to be baptised.  So when they come to some water, he brings his journey to another (temporary) halt, and Philip baptises him.  Then St Luke continues this part of the story in these words: When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord...[did something].  Where have we heard words like those before?  We have heard them in the various accounts of Jesus' own baptism...  So this baptism this morning reverberates with the sound of Jesus' own baptism, and reminds us that this Gentile, this Ethiopian official, is simply following in the footsteps of Christ; and the same is true, of course, of every other baptism including yours and mine. Is there anything else?  Yes, there is, even if, to modern eyes and ears, St Luke is pushing his luck a bit far here.  He writes this: The Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away, and the eunuch did not see him again, but went on his way rejoicing.  Again, it is an almost exact parallel with what happened in the Emmaus story: as soon as the penny dropped with the disciples, the Risen Christ vanished from their sight and they returned to Jerusalem in high spirits! The point of all this is that Easter is being repeated or fleshed out in this story this morning; the ripples are spreading out.  And it's interesting that, having finished this story, St Luke then turns immediately to an even more famous "road story" – this time set on the road to Damascus.  It is, of course, another unexpected encounter – a journey interrupted in a life-changing way.  This is not the occasion to go too far into that story, except to draw attention to the link between what the Risen Christ says to Saul on that occasion, and today's passage from St John's gospel. Last week, you will recall, Bishop George preached about the image of Jesus as the Good Shepherd: the Good Shepherd looks after his sheep, searches for the lost, leads them into good pasture, and so on.  And he stressed that this passage was about the relationship between Jesus as the shepherd as his followers as the sheep.  The ideal pastoral relationship, loving, caring, intimate, but still a relationship between two distinct parties, as it were – the shepherd and his flock. So when the Risen Christ confronts Saul on the road to Damascus, we might have expected him to say, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting my flock?  Why are you scattering my sheep?"  That would make perfect sense in terms of that image Bishop George was preaching about last week.  But that's not what the Risen Christ says to Saul, is it?  He says, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"  Not my sheep, my flock, my followers, or my church – but me.  The Risen Christ now identifies himself with his followers.  Here, surely, is the basis of St Paul's theology of the Body of Christ.  Christ is now present in the world as his church, his believers and followers. And I think in this extraordinary image of the vine and the branches that St John gives us in this chapter 15 (which we will be looking at in more detail next week) we have his version of the same idea of Christ "comprising" his followers.  If we are the branches and he is the vine, then any damage to any branch is also damage to the vine itself.  Hence, in persecuting any of us Saul is persecuting Christ himself. This same idea seems to have been in St John's mind when he wrote his first letter, from which our second lesson was taken this morning.  I must confess that I don't find this letter particularly easy to read – it borders on the repetitive, if not the downright tedious in places.  But the central thought is very beautiful and profound.  To be in love is to be in God.  When we love, he says, God's love is made complete in us.  That's a very challenging thought, as we can see when we look at it from the other side.  When we refuse to love, when we withhold our love from someone, then we render God's love incomplete.  That's quite a thought, particularly in this Easter Season. We are called to receive the ripples from the Big Bang of Easter, but also to let them flow on past us to reach others.  We are called to continue our journey along the road to faith, to be interrupted by the good news of Christ, and then to share it with others.  That's what the disciples on the road to Emmaus did; that's what the Ethiopian official did; and that's what Saul of Tarsus did.  Now it's our turn.