The Stranger in the Chariot Who Wanted In

After Stephen died, Saul and the men with him went after the people who loved Jesus. Most of the believers ran from Jerusalem in every direction, and wherever they ran, they told people about him. (Chasing them out was like blowing on a dandelion. The seeds went everywhere.)

Philip, who had handed out food to the widows alongside Stephen, went north to Samaria, and crowds there believed. Then an angel of the Lord spoke to him: "Go south, to the desert road that runs down from Jerusalem to Gaza."

Along that road came a chariot, rolling slowly, because the man riding in it was reading. He was an important official from Ethiopia, far to the south in Africa, in charge of all the treasure of Candace, his queen. He had travelled for weeks to worship in Jerusalem.

He was also a eunuch: when he was young, his body had been changed so that he could never become a father. The Law of Moses said a man like him could not join the gathering of God's people, so after all that way, he had worshiped from the outer courtyard.

Now he was riding home with a scroll of the prophet Isaiah across his knees, reading it aloud. (In those days people read out loud, even alone.) Further along in that scroll, though he had not reached it yet, God had written a promise for men like him.

The Spirit said to Philip, "Go over and join that chariot."

So Philip ran beside the wheels, puffing, until he could hear the words:

"Like a sheep he was led away to be killed. Like a lamb that is silent while it is sheared, he did not open his mouth. Who can tell about his children? For his life was taken from the earth."

"Do you understand what you're reading?" Philip panted.

"How can I," said the man, "unless someone explains it to me? Come up here!"

Philip climbed up, and the chariot bumped along.

"Who is the prophet talking about?" asked the man. "Himself, or someone else?"

So Philip began right there, with the silent lamb, and told him the good news about Jesus, who was led away and killed without fighting back, who died with no children to carry his name, and whom God raised to life again.

They came over a rise, and there beside the road was water.

"Look! Water!" the man cried. "What is stopping me from being baptized?"

Nothing was. The chariot halted, the two of them went down into the water, and Philip baptized him.

The moment they came up, the Spirit of the Lord took Philip away. Philip found himself in the town of Azotus, a long day's walk up the coast, probably still dripping.

The official rode on south, rejoicing.

Back in Jerusalem he had been kept in the outer courtyard. Now nothing was stopping him. The lamb in his scroll was alive, and Jesus' family was growing in Jerusalem, in Samaria, and now in a chariot rolling toward the far edge of the map, just as he had said it would.

The promise further along had come true too. God had said through Isaiah, "To the eunuchs who hold on to my promise, I will give them a place in my house, and a name better than sons and daughters, a name that will never be cut off."

The man who could never be a father went home carrying that name. He belonged to Jesus, the lamb with no children of his own, and in God's house there was a place kept for him.