What We Cannot Know, and What We Can -- Acts 17:22-31 (6th Sunday of Easter)

Photo credit: Stephan Widua, used with permission via Unsplash

To listen to the sermon, you can click here.

There is a lot that we don’t know about God.       

There is a lot that we can’t know about God.

God is God.      

And we are... well, we’re human.

God is infinite.       

We are finite.

We can know some things, but not all things.

This not-knowing, this something just beyond our knowing – it is at the heart of nearly all religious experience. As part of living human, we move through this world – in these bodies – we move through a world that we can touch, see, taste, smell, feel – a world that we can experience and come to know. AND. As we come to know, we also sense that there is something beyond our knowing – something bigger than us.

Whether we call it religion, or spirituality, or awe, or science... this sense of mystery... it is articulated across traditions... it is not a uniquely Christian claim. Over a century ago, William James set out to describe what is shared across what he called “the varieties of religious experience.” ^[1] As he described it, at the core of religious experience, there is an encounter with an ultimate reality bigger than us. It’s an experience we can’t describe in words. It is an experience – we can’t grasp or hold on to. It leads to questions – big and small – sometimes to insight. And somehow – that experience of what-is-beyond-our-knowing transforms us, changes us.

This past Wednesday, some of us went to the Marin Interfaith Prayer breakfast – and gathered with folks from a variety of religions, as we shared a meal, and prayer, and even singing. What felt shared to me – across those traditions – is that we are all trying to figure out how to live a life of meaning – a life that does some good in the world – in a world so bewildering, and so full of hurt and harm. Across traditions, we ask those very human questions: Who is God? (sometimes “Where is God?”) Who are we in relation to this God? And what, then, does all that lead us to live out in the world? How does it help us live – each of us and together – for the health, happiness, and well-being of all beings? Living for the healing and mending of all creation?

In this morning’s Scripture, the Apostle Paul is walking around Athens noticing how the Athenians are asking those same big questions.^[2] By this time in history, Athens is a formerempire – long past its days of domination. (So note that truth of history: Every empire falls. Every power-over has collapsed. There is not a single empire that raged in Jesus’ day that is still alive today. Empires come, and empires go.) And so it is in Athens in the days when the Roman Empire has come to power.

Paul walks the streets of Athens, all the temples now a bit tattered and worn, and he notices that the Athenians are still asking the big questions. Athens is still a town of philosophers and debate – what we might think of as “a university town.”^[3] Just before this, Scripture says that the Athenians love nothing more than sitting around and talking about and listening to the latest ideas. They are seeking here and there and everywhere – as our Scripture says, “groping around for God.”

The Apostle Paul may be sympathetic to the big questions, but he is “greatly distressed” to see that the city is full of idols – one writer describes it as “a forest of idols.”^[4] And so, as the Apostle Paul does, he goes to find a public place where he can set the people right – talk some good sense in to them – proclaim the Risen Christ. Paul has had a life-changing encountered with the Risen Christ, and he is travelling around the Mediterranean, city to city, sharing urgent Good News.

And so, in Athens, Paul goes to the agora – the marketplace, and day by day, he debates. Now, usually we find him debating in synagogues – because Christianity is still emerging from Judaism – but here he’s debating in a broader space.

And the Greek thinkers seem to be intrigued. At first they wonder, “What is this babbler talking about?” but then they take him to the Areopagus, a place for formal debate^[5] – where they come together and put ideas on trial, and they ask: “May we know what this new teaching is that you are presenting? You are bringing some strange ideas to our ears, and we want to know more.”

And this morning’s Scripture begins – Paul stands up: “People of Athens, I see that in every way you are very religious.” (He begins with flattery.)^[6] “I have been walking around looking at all your objects of worship – I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.”

Now, Paul may be throwing a little shade there – You are so thorough in your idolatry that you even worship an unknown God. But more deeply, the Apostle Paul is naming the big question. He stands with them – and brings them to a shared starting point – an awareness of something beyond our knowing.

Now from that starting point – Paul is clear there is one path not to take – this forest of idols. Broadly understood, idolatry is following or giving oneself to anything or anyone who is not God. In our day, we might think of idolatry of money, or of power – in their day, they would carve their gods out – create their gods with their own hands. And so Paul makes clear: This God-beyond-our-full-knowing does not live in temples shaped by human hands. This God – who created all that is – is not one who can be reduced to gold or silver or stone – designed and controlled by human hands.

(And there’s another caution to us – in our world, where the powers seek to have graven images erected in their own honor – as testaments to their power – triumphant arches, billion-dollar ballrooms, gold-gilded sconces – and this past weekend, gold statues of themselves.)  

The problem of idolatry – powers who demand that we give our allegiance to them, and not to God – the problem of idolatry is not relegated to ancient days.

And so Paul makes clear: The God who made the world and everything in it is the One Sovereign over heaven and earth. God does not live in gold statues or in temples built by human hands. You can’t harness the power of God for your own purposes. God is free.

And then the Apostle says something that would have made the crowd go silent. The God you worship as unknown... you can come to know. The God in whom we live and move and have our being – that God is close at hand. God has created us – all of us – so that we will seek God – and reach out for God – that God is not far from each one of us. That God can be experienced – glimpsed – deeply felt – in the Risen Christ – in the healing touch of Jesus, in feeding the hungry, in good news for the poor, in the release of those held prisoner, in setting free all who are oppressed, in a love stronger than any power – even than death – in this Jesus – who – though crucified by the powers – is Alive in the World.

There is so much we cannot know about God, but – in the Risen Christ, alive in the world – there are some things that we can.

So maybe our first something-to-do this week – is just to sit for a while with those big questions – with those big questions that the Athenians were asking – that humanity has asked from then until now. Maybe take some time this week and just ask yourself what you think of that question: Who is God? You could even take pen and paper and write it out. We come here seeking something. What are you seeking?

Listening to the Apostle Paul, you could then pick up the gospels – pick any story from Matthew, Mark, Luke, John – read it and ask – “What do I experience of God here – in this story of Jesus?”

Or, like the Apostle Paul – we could walk around – in our world – and look for glimpses of this God, alive in the world – or, at the end of the day, look back, and ask – where have I experienced the holy, or love, or purpose? What have I known today... that just might give me a glimpse – of this God in whom we live and move and have our being?

There is so much in our world today that I do not know and I do not understand – maybe you feel that way some days too. The news this past week or so has shaken me – particularly as the Supreme Court has gutted the Voting Rights Act. At the Marin Interfaith Prayer breakfast, we heard Dr. Melba Beals speak. She was one of the Little Rock 9 – the nine brave Black students who volunteered to integrate Central High School in Little Rock – surrounded by soldiers for protection, because of death threats. She is living history.

Dr. Beals reminded us of all the years and lives spent struggling to secure the right to vote for all people – and particularly for African Americans – all the hard, sacrificial work trying to undo the continuing wrongs of slavery and Jim Crow.  This past week we have seen that progress start to be wiped away – with states scrambling to disenfranchise a return to the days of Jim Crow – which maybe we’ve never left. My hope... that our constitutional processes might help to correct what is badly wrong in this nation – that hope has been shaken.

As more and more globally and nationally seems beyond my comprehension, I have found myself looking for meaning and for good... locally. Walking around, looking for glimpses.

We go to those Board of Supervisors meetings, and I see neighbors from across the County coming out to speak up for our immigrant neighbors.

I know some of you went to the Come to the Table fundraiser last night. At those Come to the Table events, I see folks sitting down to share a meal together – to talk about the issues facing Marin City, important to all of Marin County – seeking to find common ground and purpose across difference – seeking together the next something to do in the world.

We go to protests, and I see people like Peter Anderson – holding a sign up – right in front of our Congressman as he speaks – reminding our Congressman that there is a genocide going on in Gaza – a genocide the world would just as soon ignore – or explain away – folks like Peter doing what he can to make sure that the people of Gaza are not forgotten. Folks like Dave, on behalf of this congregation, heading to our national General Assembly next month – asking our denomination not to forget – but to speak truth plainly.

We gather on days like yesterday – for memorial services – and I see the deacons coming alongside families – offering quiet comfort – remembering together – the life and love we have known – the love that never dies.

As the Apostle Paul is dashing around the known world – blurting out his urgent good news. He is also forming and nurturing communities – local communities – Corinth, Galatia, Ephesus, Philippi – helping shape communities who try together to live out the way of Jesus – this love in community – by the power of Resurrection – alive in the world.

I spent last week on retreat with 27 other pastors and chaplains – and I heard – as we talked over meals – how their communities are living life in these difficult days – helping with disaster relief, leading teens on vision quests, standing up to ICE in Minneapolis.

This morning, I don’t have answers to the big questions. What I have to share are these glimpses – of folks asking those big questions – living their way into answers – living life in the Body of Christ – alive in the world.

I think of the Apostle Paul as this all-in, big-hearted guy – willing to wrestle with the big questions, ready to engage with just about anyone, as together we fumble around for God – and all the while proclaiming a love big enough to save the world from everything that does us harm.

Here he is in Athens, walking around seeing these expressions of the variety of religious experience. Here he is – one who has encountered the Risen Christ – waking around looking for glimpses of the God in whom we live and move and have our being, the God who is close at hand, looking for glimpses of this God – alive in the world – in moments of love, and liberation, and grace.

There is so much in the world – so much about God – that we cannot know.

We are human. There is so much that we cannot know.

And, alive in Christ, there is so much that we can.

© 2026 Scott Clark

^[1] See William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902).

^[2] For general background on this text and the Book of Acts, see Margaret Aymer, Commentary on Working Preacher https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/sixth-sunday-of-easter/commentary-on-acts-1722-31-4 ; Justo L. González, Acts (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2001); Paul W. Walaskay, Acts (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1998); Robert W. Wall, “The Acts of the Apostles,” New Interpreters’ Bible Commentary, vol. x (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2002); Demetrius K. Williams, “The Acts of the Apostles” in True to Our Native Land: An African American New Testament Commentary (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2008).

^[3] See Wall, p.243.

^[4] Id.

^[5] See Wall, p.245; Aymer, supra

^[6] See Aymer, supra.