Fascinating people and reading narrative portions of Scripture

by Dan Phillips

As I read through Acts in the morning, I'm struck anew by what fascinating people Luke introduces — and how little he tells us of them.

Take Simon Magus in chapter 8. Wouldn't you like to know a lot more about him, from Luke? When Luke says he used to do magic, what does that mean? Actual magic, or tricks? What kind? And what was his background? Also, what did he do in response to the apostles' rebuke? He figures prominently in post-NT writings, but is any of that accurate? What became of him?

Or the Ethiopian eunuch in that same chapter. What an interesting fellow this man is! We read his story anachronistically, and just think how cool it is that he was in Isaiah 53 instead of Leviticus 21:20. But what about the fact that he had a copy of Scripture at all? How rare was that? How did he come by it, how wealthy must he have been! Or was the scroll Candace's? What became of him? The same Holy Spirit who told Philip to go preach to him also told Philip (in effect) not to do any followup with him. So the eunuch went his way rejoicing, we read... and then what? Wouldn't you love to know?

Or Lydia the business lady in chapter 16, or the demon-possessed slave girl in the same chapter — what different women, yet side by side in the narrative. What was their background, and what came of them after these encounters?

These and many other figures crowd the book of Acts alone, to say nothing of the other Biblical books.

But what we as readers (and particularly as preachers) must remind ourselves is that the text of Scripture is what is God-breathed and profitable, and that must always be our focus. It isn't the stories that hold this place, nor the people. It is the text, the words of Scripture, that must be our focus.

It is the text that reflects and unfolds the mind of God. In that text, God told us everything He wants to know, which means He told us everything we need to know. So we must both discipline ourselves not to run off on rabbit-trails, and to focus on what's there to see the mind of God. What we want to know about Simon, the eunuch, Lydia and the rest is not the same as what God wants us to know — and we must see to it that we focus on the latter, not the former.

In fact, this is all the more arresting and important in proportion to how fascinating the person is. God in effect is saying to us "Never mind all that, don't let the shiny objects distract you: this is what I want to impress upon you."

So it doesn't matter what kinds of snakes bit the Israelites in Numbers 21, or how big the copper serpent was, or how long the pole, or any of that. What matters is that those snakebit Israelites who believed Yahweh's words and looked, lived — and no one else. And on and on.

We know that the main thing is the main thing; we need to remember that the text of Scripture is always the main thing. If it were important, God would have told us. If He told us, it is important.

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