“The Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it.” Perhaps you have encountered people with this attitude. Perhaps you are one of them. Perhaps you believe that every word in the Bible is divinely inspired—after all, Paul says that scripture is God-breathed and effectual for teaching.
The thing is, the Bible is a thick book filled with stories. Stories are essential to our faith formation. Stories have a richness of meaning that no simple commandment can contain. They are like gems that gleam differently as you turn them in the light.
In Acts 8, we read of an encounter between Philip and an Ethiopian eunuch. The Spirit drives Philip to approach the eunuch and teach him about Jesus Christ. They come to some water and the eunuch is baptized.
Perhaps the story is about baptism. I learned recently that in many traditions, this story is used to prove that only immersion is effectual for salvation. Coming from a tradition that practices infant baptism by sprinkling, I had never heard that interpretation. Perhaps that is one lesson we can draw from it.
Perhaps the story is about Philip. He responded to the call of the Spirit. He was driven to evangelize, to spread the good news that Jesus was the Messiah, to teach people from all nations. Perhaps the story reinforces the importance of approaching people of high status—the eunuch was an important person in the royal household of the Kandake, queen of Ethiopia, so winning him as a convert would have an outsize importance.
But let’s consider the larger context of the story. Earlier in Acts 8, the apostles are converting the hated Samaritans and welcoming them into Christ’s family. They offer forgiveness and acceptance to a sorcerer, who would have been condemned under laws found in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. In Acts 9, Saul, a persecutor of Christians, is converted and welcomed. In Acts 10, Peter has a vision indicating that nothing is unclean, and then he welcomes Cornelius the Roman centurion into God’s family.
In the middle of this sequence, we read about an Ethiopian eunuch being welcomed. The Law in Deuteronomy forbids eunuchs from entering the Temple. Eunuchs were sexual and gender minorities in the ancient world. Most simply, eunuchs could not procreate. As Jesus said, some were born that way, some were made that way by others, and some chose to live like eunuchs. They were outside the norm: they did not marry women and have children. We should avoid imposing modern interpretations on just what that meant, but regardless, their sexual and/or gender minority status kept them on the margins of society.
The eunuch had traveled to Jerusalem as a Jewish proselyte but was forbidden from worshipping God in the Temple. Yet Christ came to break down barriers. He came to welcome everyone into His eternal kingdom. Throughout Acts, we read of people who were thought to be unclean or unworthy being welcomed as equals: Samaritans, sorcerers, Romans, and yes, eunuchs.
There is nothing that makes a person unlovable by God. There is nothing that prevents a person from joining Christ’s eternal family. No aspect of your identity blocks God’s love. No matter what you have been taught, Christ welcomes you as a beloved sibling, as someone of infinite worth in His family.
That’s what the Bible says. And that’s what I believe.