Jesus had told his disciples that the Holy Spirit would empower them to be his witnesses “in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8). We have seen how the Christians were dispersed throughout Judea by persecution and we have seen Philip in Samaria. The next story focuses on one isolated incident that, again, has important symbolic importance for Luke. It is the story of the conversion of the Ethiopian ‘eunuch’ (which means he was a high official). For the average person within the Roman Empire anything outside the borders of that empire was seen as ‘the ends of the earth’. It was strange, threatening, unknown territory. Ethiopia was the furthest that most people knew about and it symbolised ‘remoteness’. When the Ethiopian Queen of Sheba visited Solomon, it was a sign that his fame had spread to the ends of the earth (1 Kings 10). Now the fame of Jesus is spreading in like fashion, and the scope of that spread is anticipated by the conversion of this Ethiopian official who, according to tradition, founded the Ethiopian church that still exists to this day. Luke wants to show us that the Holy Spirit is moving in an ever-widening radius, always wanting to move his people further out to the ends of the earth. There is a truth in this for each of us. The Holy Spirit wants to constantly move us beyond our ‘safe zone’ and widen the radius of our influence. He wants to take us on a journey out into what we might see as strange, threatening, unknown territory. Are you ready for this?
Ask God to expand your vision and lead you out to new experiences.
Read Acts 8:26-40
