Acts 8:26-40 (NRSV)
Read Acts 8:26-40 on biblegateway.com
Verse 26Then an angel of the Lord said to Philip, "Get up and go toward the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza." (This is a wilderness road.) Verse 27So he got up and went. Now there was an Ethiopian eunuch, a court official of the Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, in charge of her entire treasury. He had come to Jerusalem to worship Verse 28and was returning home; seated in his chariot, he was reading the prophet Isaiah. Verse 29Then the Spirit said to Philip, "Go over to this chariot and join it." Verse 30So Philip ran up to it and heard him reading the prophet Isaiah. He asked, "Do you understand what you are reading?" Verse 31He replied, "How can I, unless someone guides me?" And he invited Philip to get in and sit beside him. Verse 32Now the passage of the scripture that he was reading was this: "Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter, and like a lamb silent before its shearer, so he does not open his mouth. Verse 33In his humiliation justice was denied him. Who can describe his generation? For his life is taken away from the earth." Verse 34The eunuch asked Philip, "About whom, may I ask you, does the prophet say this, about himself or about someone else?" Verse 35Then Philip began to speak, and starting with this scripture, he proclaimed to him the good news about Jesus. Verse 36As they were going along the road, they came to some water; and the eunuch said, "Look, here is water! What is to prevent me from being baptized?" Verse 38He commanded the chariot to stop, and both of them, Philip and the eunuch, went down into the water, and Philip baptized him. Verse 39When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away; the eunuch saw him no more, and went on his way rejoicing. Verse 40But Philip found himself at Azotus, and as he was passing through the region, he proclaimed the good news to all the towns until he came to Caesarea.
Devotion
The Living Water of Salvation is deep and broad and available to everyone. The Ethiopian eunuch didn’t understand and knew he needed a guide. As he heard Philip, he became thirsty for the Living Water that would make him, too, a new creation. Nothing was to stop his thirst for the good news, and he was baptized.
A friend of mine regularly prays for a “thirst for the Word.” She wants to read, to hear, to understand, to learn, and she asks God to nourish her eager thirst. She wants the fountain of life that flows from hearing the Truth. She daily returns to the sparkling waters of her baptism to be recreated and to immerse herself in the good news.
Prayer
Living Water of Salvation, make us your new creation. Give us a thirst for the fountain of your word. Amen.