From today’s reading...
The eunuch addressed Philip and said, ‘Tell me, is the prophet referring to himself or someone else?’” Acts 8:34
Many self-help types and evangelicals are surprised to read this chapter of Acts because they erroneously think they can just read the Bible and know exactly what God is saying, teaching, and thinking, despite examples like this and the fact that there are at least 340,000 cross-references in the Bible, which has taken thousands of biblical scholars thousands of cumulative years to document.
But, yeah, God wants you, the spiritual but not religious biblical genius who is filled with the Holy Spirit and knows the meaning and purpose behind all 340,000 of the Bible’s cross-references, to sit at home, alone, and be inspired by Him because you have this “personal” relationship with Him and because you are too good to hang out with all the sinners and hypocrites at your local church.
I pray you’ll see the dual disaster in this train of thought one day.
It’s a disaster for your community because you might indeed be the smartest, wisest, holiest person to walk the earth since Jesus ascended into heaven, and you are depriving the world of your erudition and pontification, but it’s most likely a disaster for you because the unsurpassed level of your vanity and sloth makes you the one in greatest need of God’s community, love, encouragement, instruction and support, which we all need if we are to...
Stay the course.
Keep the faith.
Endure.
Market like you mean it. Now go sell something.