Sixth Sunday of Easter

In many ways, writing a sermon is not much different from writing any kind of research paper. Obviously, the first thing you need is a topic. Here at Calvary, we usually follow the three-year lectionary, so it's a matter of deciding which of the four readings for the day I want to make the focus of my sermon. Then I study the text itself in various translations and sometimes in the original language and read commentaries on it. As I do this I think and pray and mull things over until I see the way I want to go. When I have an outline in my head, or in rare cases even sketched out on paper, I'm ready to begin writing. Sound pretty familiar? More or less what you learned in high school, right?

Except sometimes something weird happens. As I'm reading over my final version, I realize that the sermon on my paper isn't the one I started out to write. I planned to go in one direction and ended up going a different way. It's rather disconcerting, and I find myself asking, “How did I get here? It's not what I had in mind!” I imagine this feeling is probably not too different from what Paul was thinking as he looked out across the sea from Troas.

The book of Acts describes three missionary trips that Paul took in Asia Minor and Greece over the course of about ten years. Roughly four years of this time were spent in two cities, Corinth and Ephesus, so Paul wasn't on the road constantly. Our reading this morning drops us right into the middle of the second journey, so I thought we might back up a little bit.

This trip actually began at the end of Acts 15, where Paul suggested returning to visit the churches that he had founded during his first trip several years earlier. He wanted to see how they were doing and to encourage their faith. Paul chose Silas, a leading member of the church at Antioch in Syria, to go with him. They set out from that city and went through Paul's hometown of Tarsus and then on to Derbe and Lystra.

In Lystra they met a young disciple named Timothy, who became an important  associate of Paul and a leader in the early church. He joined Paul and Silas, and the three of them went on to Iconium and Antioch in Pisidia.

At this point they had reached the western limit of Paul's first trip, so if they had stuck to the original plan, they would have turned and headed back east. But they apparently decided to break new ground and continue west into the Roman province of Asia toward Ephesus on the coast of the Aegean Sea. We don't really know what happened, but according to our reading, they were “forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia.” (v. 6b)

Luke, the author of Acts as well as the third Gospel, is a little vague on what happened next. It seems that the travelers continued on the way toward Mysia after they abandoned the plan to go into Asia. At some point, they considered going northeast into Bithynia, but once again God intervened and “the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them.” (v. 7b) So the group continued west to the coastal town of Troas, about  400 miles from Pisidian Antioch. This is where I see Paul standing at the edge of the Aegean Sea asking, “How did I get here? It's not what I had in mind!” Even more importantly, “Where to now?”

Once again, God provided direction. During the night, Paul had a vision of a  man from Macedonia pleading with him to come over and help them. So the group set sail from Troas and landed in Neapolis. Instead of staying there, they continued about ten miles inland to the city of Philippi. Although it was only a medium-sized farming community and wasn't even the capital of the province of Macedonia, Philippi was an important crossroads for land and sea travel and trade. It was located on the Egnatian Way, the Roman road that ran from Constantinople in the east through Macedonia and connected to the Appian Way, which led to Rome. Goods which came by sea from the east to the port at Neapolis were brought to Philippi to connect with this major trade route.

Philippi had been founded hundreds of years earlier by Philip of Macedon, the father of Alexander the Great. It was later rebuilt by Augustus and became the home of many former soldiers who had fought in important battles in the area. Verse 12 of our text describes Philippi as “a Roman colony”, which meant that its citizens had the same status as those living in Rome. Archaeological evidence indicates that there were several temples to Roman gods and local deities, but there is no evidence that there was a synagogue in the city.

This meant that Paul could not follow his usual pattern of starting his ministry in a new place by preaching in the synagogue. Instead, he went down to the river. It was customary for places of prayer to be located by running water, so it was reasonable for Paul to expect to find worshipers there on the Sabbath. A group of women had gathered there, and he began to speak to them. Among them was a woman named Lydia. She was a well-to-do Greek woman who was evidently an agent of a purple-dye firm in Thyatira. How ironic! Paul was prevented from preaching in western Asia, the area where Thyatira is located, and went to Macedonia because he saw a vision of a man asking for help. But one of the first people he encountered in Macedonia was not a man, but a woman with ties to Thyatira!

Lydia is described as “a worshiper of God” in our text, or as a “God-fearing woman” in other translations. In the book of Acts, the adjective “God-fearing” refers to “Gentiles who … embraced Jewish theology, worship, and morality, but who did not follow purity laws.” New Testament scholar Mark Allan Powell describes these God-fearers as “prime candidates for conversion to Christianity”. And indeed, this was the case with Lydia. “The Lord opened her heart to listen eagerly to what was said by Paul”, and to respond by being baptized along with her whole household.

The conversion of Lydia was the beginning of the church at Philippi. This was a significant milestone in the history of Christianity because it was the first church established in Europe. Prior to this, all of the preaching of the Gospel had occurred in Asia.

That doesn't mean that Paul received a warm welcome in Philippi. Not everyone was as hospitable as Lydia. In fact, Paul himself said that he had “suffered and been shamefully mistreated” there (1 Thessalonians 2:2). But the Christians in that congregation brought Paul great joy. They were very loyal and supported Paul himself and the church in Jerusalem financially. Not bad for a place he wasn't even planning to visit until the Holy Spirit intervened repeatedly. As the book of Proverbs says, “The human mind plans the way, but the Lord directs the steps.” (Proverbs 16:9)

Throughout this story, and for that matter throughout the book of Acts, we see the fulfillment of the promises that Jesus made to his disciples in our Gospel lesson. He said, “But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you of all that I have said to you.” (John 14:26) A little later in this long conversation with his disciples, Jesus referred to the Holy Spirit as a guide.(John 16:13) And it was because of the guidance and teaching of the Holy Spirit that Paul and his companions were able go into uncharted territory not with fear, but with peace, in their hearts. As the Church grew and spread from Asia into Europe, the Spirit directed the progress of the mission and changed people's hearts. As one commentator put it, “the Spirit opened doors and opened hearts.”

But don't think that the active guidance of the Holy Spirit was something that only happened in the early days of the Church. Or something that happened only at crucial points in the Church's history, like the Reformation. It happens regularly and in lots of little, almost unseen, ways.

As you might already have figured out, that's what's going on when my sermon ends up being a little different from what I'd planned. Like Paul, I wanted to go one way, but was led, or pushed, in another direction by the Holy Spirit. It's an awesome feeling in both senses of the word. It's definitely very impressive, but it also inspires reverence and fear. And it's more than a little disconcerting.

But you don't have to be writing a sermon to have this happen. How about this: you come up with a great ministry idea; it's brilliant, or at least you think it is. But the council doesn't approve. Or you can't get anyone to help implement it. Or you do manage to get it going, but no one comes. When this happens, you know how Paul and his companions felt when the Spirit thwarted their travel plans not once, but twice, and they ended up in some place they never intended to go.

Or maybe you have a gut feeling that you should get in touch with a friend you haven't heard from for a while. You just plan to touch base, but it turns out that this person has had something devastating happen in their life and needs someone to talk to. Suddenly there's a lot more going on, and it's a lot more important, than the simple conversation you'd planned. How did that happen?

Each of us needs to be ready to see God's hand in our daily lives and in our life as a congregation. When we talk about God-spottings or witness instances of realizing Jesus, these are all examples of the Holy Spirit at work. When we as a congregation decide to begin new ministries or expand older ones as we come out of our COVID cocoons, we become what Bishop Ortiz of the Metro DC Synod calls “co-conspirators with the Holy Spirit”. The Holy Spirit gives us the courage to move forward even when one way has been blocked before or when we're unsure of the outcome.

Pastor Sharon Blezard says, “This is the thing about being a follower of Jesus. You never know where you're going to end up next. Following God into this world is a wholly risky holy business.” Did you catch the pun here? It's wholly – w-h-o-l-l-y –  risky and holy – h-o-l-y – business; wholly risky holy business. We can only do it because we have the assurance that God goes with us. We have the promise of the Lord's peace, and we need not be troubled or afraid.

All of this is captured beautifully in one of my favorite prayers. Until recently, I thought that it was one of the really old prayers of the Church that had been passed down for centuries. But then I found out that it was written by Eric Milner-White, an Anglican priest, and published in 1941 around the time of the Blitz. It's included in our hymnal as part of Evening Prayer (p. 317).

Let us pray.

O God, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown. Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.