Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, "Go south to the road--the desert road--that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza." (Acts 8.26)That must have been exciting. I get the feeling Philip was getting used to this sort of direction by now. He sees a chariot and the Spirit tells him to "go to that chariot and stay near it." Yow!
Then Philip ran up to the chariot and heard the man reading Isaiah the prophet. "Do you understand what you are reading?" Philip asked.How exciting is that? Well, it sure would be exciting to me. This kind of thing doesn't happen to me very often. Anyway, Philip explains it to the guy, who then asks to be baptized. As soon as they're done with that..."How can I," he said, "unless someone explains it to me?" So he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.
Acts 8.30-31
When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away, and the eunuch did not see him again, but went on his way rejoicing. Philip, however, appeared at Azotus and traveled about, preaching the gospel in all the towns until he reached Caesarea.I wonder if Philip got used to traveling like that....Acts 8.39-40
Let me tell you something, tomato lady. Whatever you want the most, it's going to be the worst thing for you.Well, that was apropos of nothing, but after writing a few hundred words here pretty much daily for a year, it feels strange not to write anything for a while.Kingsolver, The Bean Trees
“Stop it, would you? Quit making everybody out to be better than you are. I'm just a plain hillbilly from East Jesus Nowhere with this adopted child that everybody keeps telling me is dumb as a box of rocks. I've got nothing on you, girl. I mean it.”This is just when Taylor (originally, umm, Missy?) is just meeting Lou Ann. Here I've really got to suspend my disbelief, because that prose is so beautiful -- I mean, how could that come out of somebody's mouth unpremeditated?
The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent (change your mind) and believe the good news!The good news has something to do with the "kingdom of God," a concept mostly missing from my version.Mark 1