Loving Seekers Deeply: Experiencing Biblical Community
Acts 8:26-40
Intro:
After the resurrection of Jesus, the believers experienced the incredible outpouring of the Holy Spirit. With the Holy Spirit came power, which was evident in miracles and in changed lives and in the incredible growth of the church; and with the Holy Spirit came community. By community, I mean the deep, loving, caring relationships that the believers shared together. As we read through the book of Acts, we see how they ate together and prayed together and worshipped together and witnessed together.
In the beginning of chapter 8 we saw how God began to take the incredible good news of the resurrection of Jesus beyond the small circle of believers in Jerusalem, and how they embraced the people of Samaria. (map). That brings us to today’s passage of Scripture, Acts 8:26-40.
How Much Love?
How much did God love this Ethiopian eunuch? Think about it for a moment: God had obviously been at work in this man’s life previously, drawing him to Jerusalem to worship in the temple. And now, here he is, on a desert road, reading Scripture. And God knows he is ready, he knows what is going on in this incredibly powerful man’s life and heart at that moment, and God knows he is ready to respond to the Gospel of Jesus. So God plucks a powerful servant of His out of a highly successful Samaritan evangelism campaign, with all kinds of new converts who need to be discipled and organized and trained for ministry, and sends him off to a deserted road in the middle of nowhere. How much did God love this man, how much effort did God go to to make sure that he was able to hear the good news of Jesus?
Now think about this: does God love you any less? Reflect for a moment on all that God has done in your life to bring you to Himself; does God love you any less? Think about your journey, whether it was one where you were (or are) fighting God’s call on your life, or it was dramatic the way God reached into the middle of a messed up life and brought you out of a miserable place, or whether you were gifted as a young person with people around you who loved God and loved you and modeled Christian faith. Think about how much God has done in your life to get you to this place, where you have come to worship him. God certainly does not love you any less than this Ethiopian official!
Let me take that one step further: does God love your neighbour, your coworker, your family member any less? The last little while, I have found myself praying that I would see other people the way that God sees them, through His eyes rather than my own. It is especially useful when finding myself annoyed at another driver or a noisy neighbour or a slow cashier. “Lord, how do you see this person?” Invariably, I am reminded of the depth of God’s love for
People, especially those who are not in a relationship with Him. Especially those whom the Bible calls “lost”. God has gone to extreme measures to restore humanity’s lost relationship with Him – and I really believe that if it those “extreme measures” were not so familiar to us we would shake our head in complete amazement.
Ambassadors:
God has entrusted to you and to me the incredible privilege of being His ambassador in our lost world. For reasons of His own, He has chosen to use us to declare the message of salvation, the good news of forgiveness and hope and love, to people around us who have an incredible need for good news, for forgiveness, for hope, and for a love that is pure and constant and full of power.
George Shultz was sworn in on July 16, 1982, as the sixtieth U.S. Secretary of State and served until January 20, 1989. During this time in the Reagan administration, Shultz kept a large globe in his office. When newly appointed ambassadors had an interview with him and when ambassadors returning from their posts for their first visit with him were leaving his office, Shultz would test them. He would say, "You have to go over the globe and prove to me that you can identify your country." They would go over, spin the globe, and each time they would put their finger on the country to which they were being sent. When Shultz’s old friend and former Senate majority leader Mike Mansfield was appointed ambassador to Japan, even he was put to the test. However, this time Ambassador Mansfield spun the globe and put his hand on the United States. He said: "That’s my country." Shultz said: "I’ve told that story, subsequently, to all the ambassadors going out. ’Never forget you’re over there in that country, but your country is the United States. You’re there to represent us. Take care of our interests and never forget it, and you’re representing the best country in the world.’ "
As ambassadors for Jesus Christ, we must never forget that we live here, in the kingdom of this world, but our kingdom is the Kingdom of God, our King is the King of Kings, and we are here to represent Him.
Not Typical, But Still A Pattern:
The story in Acts 8 gives us a great example of being an ambassador. And while it may not be a typical example of how we should expect to witness for Jesus, there is a great pattern and some solid principles for us.
A Partnership:
The first is that it is a partnership. Of course not an equal partnership, not a 50-50 kind of thing, but still a cooperative partnership between us as ambassadors and the Holy Spirit as the only one who can bring salvation and power and joy. We see that in Philip and the Ethiopian: First, God sends: “Then an angel of the Lord said to Philip, ‘Get up and go towards the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.’ (This is a wilderness road.)” (vs. 26). Now this probably didn’t make a lot of sense to Philip, who was in the midst of a successful evangelistic crusade in Samaria, but he did not hesitate. He got up and went.
Second, God directs: “Then the Spirit said to Philip, ‘Go over to this chariot and join it.’” (vs. 29). And again, Philip obeys. But now notice this: that is the last mention of the Spirit until the very end of the encounter! From here, Philip uses the gifts he has been given, he speaks of what he knows and has seen and experienced – he basically shares his testimony.
Do you see the cooperation? The Spirit sends and directs, and then we use our gifts and tell others about what God has done for us. That is the Biblical pattern. God still sends, God still directs. He provides opportunities, and if we will listen for His voice we will be a part of those incredible “divine appointments.”
The Importance of Scripture:
The second thing I want to point out is the importance of Scripture. The official was reading the Word of God, and Philip began with what he was reading and led him to understand who Jesus is as the fulfillment of Scripture.
The same is true today. There is absolutely no substitute for the Bible in sharing the story of Jesus. Yes, there are lots of really good other resources, but none of them have the same power as the Word of God.
About a month ago I had an opportunity to share a little bit with a non-Christian man. We had a good conversation, and at the end I encouraged him to read about it himself in the Gospel of John, and he was interested enough that he committed to do that. If he follows through, I have no doubt that God will use that time to take him another step along his spiritual journey. Whenever you can get people to read the Word, you open a huge door for the Spirit of God to work.
And notice that Philip had a role to play here, also. In verse 30 the eunuch admits his need for a guide, for someone to help him understand. This also is true today: as you encourage people to read the Bible, make yourself available to help them understand what it is they are reading.
Acting on it:
The passage continues: “Philip began to speak, and starting with this scripture, he proclaimed to him the good news about Jesus. As 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?’ He commanded the chariot to stop, and both of them, Philip and the eunuch, went down into the water, and Philip baptized him.” (vs 35-38).
This is the climax of the encounter: the man hears the good news, the Spirit moves him to faith, and he acts on his faith immediately. I love his question: “Look, here is water! What is to prevent me from being baptized?”
This is a great question, one which I want to turn around to us this morning. What is to prevent you from taking the next step in your faith? Maybe that step is baptism. Maybe it is in being more open and honest about your faith at school or work. Maybe it is obeying something that God has asked you to do, but which you have been resisting. Maybe it is letting go of something. The eunuch saw the water, and took the plunge. We need to do that also.
On Friday night I was here working on my sermon, and had a great opportunity to connect with some of our teens who were here for youth group. We laughed about meat lovers pizza and chocolate cake and the difference between “pastor” and “pasture”, and “blah blah”. Didn’t get much sermon writing done, but that was ok. One of them was talking about baptism, and she said, “I kind of want to wait until things are really perfect in my life and my relationship with God – like I want to be at a really solid place spiritually before I take that step. But I know that is probably never going to happen, so maybe I should just go ahead and do it.”
There is great wisdom in that. Sometimes we want to wait, sometimes we think we need to have everything together in our lives before we step out in faith and take that next step, whether it is baptism or sharing our faith with someone else or something else. We think of all kinds of reasons why we shouldn’t, how we aren’t ready or don’t know enough or aren’t obedient enough. I love the perspective of the Ethiopian: “Look, here is water! What is to prevent me from being baptized?; why don’t we do it right now?; why wait?” And I love Philip’s response: “God is moving here, now: let’s do it!!”
Think for a moment about a soldier. His superior officer gives an order, gives a command; what is the response of that soldier? “Hmmm, let me pray about that for awhile and I’ll get back to you…” Or, “that sounds like a pretty big step. I’m not ready yet, ask me again next week…” No! The officer knows the soldier, knows her abilities, and wouldn’t command a first year air cadet to jump into the cockpit of a CF-18 Hornet and fly into battle. Our commands from God are the same: He knows us, our abilities, and won’t put us in a situation which we cannot handle with God.
Specific to the baptism issue, let me simply say this: if you believe in Jesus and have accepted Him as your Lord and Saviour, baptism is the next step commanded by God. Peter put it this way in Acts 2:38: “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Baptism is, quite simply, a step of obedience: it is something God has commanded us to do. To those of you who have not yet been baptized, I pose the eunuch’s question: “What is to prevent you from being baptized?”
Leaving it in God’s Hands:
The final thing I want to point out from Philip’s encounter that still applies to us is this: the results are up to God. We need to leave it in His hands. You notice how the story ends: “When 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.” (vs. 39). What about follow up? What about discipleship? What about organizing the next great phase of mission to the country of Ethiopia? It was up to God… and Philip probably wouldn’t have found out until he got to heaven exactly what God did next. That is also true for us: we need to leave the results in God’s hands.
Conclusion:
The first part of our church vision statement is that we believe we are called to be like a hospital – a place where people’s broken relationship with God is healed and restored. It is a vision of evangelism. The very first step in that direction is to have God’s heart for people. To see them as God sees them, and to be filled with God’s love for those around us. Then we recognize our role as ambassadors of Jesus Christ – not out of guilt but out of the love of God for others and our joy at what we have found. Then, like Philip, we recognize our role in the partnership: to listen for God’s sending and guiding, and then to use our gifts. We take Scripture with us. We act on what we hear, and we encourage and allow others to act on it also. And we leave the results up to God.
I want to close with a story, from a book called Intercessory Prayer by Dutch Sheets, p.42-45:
In 1977, while praying about an upcoming journey to Guatemala, I heard the words: On this trip, represent Jesus to the people. Be His voice, be His hands, be His feet. Do what you know He would do if He were there in the flesh. Represent Him.
Suddenly I understood. I was not going to represent myself or the ministry with which I was working. In the same way that Jesus represented the Father-speaking His words and doing His works-I was to represent Jesus. And if I really believed I was functioning as an ambassador or a sent one, then I could believe it wasn’t my authority or ability that was an issue but Christ’s I was simply representing Him and what He had already done.
Once in Guatemala I traveled with a team to a remote village far from any modem city. There was no electrical power, no plumbing, no phones. Our purpose in being there was to build shelters for the villagers whose adobe homes had been destroyed in the devastating earthquake of 1976. It had killed 30,000 people and left 1,000,000 homeless. We had trucked in materials and were building small, one-room homes for them during the daylight hours. In the evenings we would hold services in the center of the village, preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ to them, explaining that His love was motivating us to spend our time, money and energies helping them.
We had been ministering for one week with very few people coming to Christ. The people were listening, but not responding. I was to preach on the final night of our trip. Just as the service was about to begin, a team member told me about something he and others had found on the far side of the village-a little girl, six or seven years old, tied to a tree.
Not believing what they were seeing, they asked the family that lived there, "Why is this small girl tied to that tree?" It was obvious she lived there, much like a dog, in the back yard-nasty, filthy, helpless and alone.
"She is crazy," the parents replied. "We can’t control her. She hurts herself and others and runs away if we turn her loose. There is nothing else we can do for her so we just have to tie her up." My heart broke as the member shared what he had seen. It was on my mind as we began the service. A few minutes into my message, standing on a folding table under the stars, the same voice that had spoken to me before the trip began speaking to me again. Tell them you are going to pray for the little insane girl across the village tied to the tree. Tell them you are going to do it in the name of this Jesus you’ve been preaching about. Tell them that through Him you are going to break the evil powers controlling her-that when she is free and normal, they can then know that what you are preaching is true. They can believe that the Jesus you are preaching about is who you say He is.
I responded to the voice in my heart with fear and trembling. I believe the words were something like, WHAT DID YOU SAY??? Same instructions. Being the man of faith that I am, I replied, What is plan B? Rebellion and failure, came the response. Remember what I said to you before the trip began? Represent Jesus.
Faith began to rise. The emphasis is not on me in this situation, I thought, but on the One who sent me. I am simply His spokesman. I merely release what He has already done. He has finished the work of delivering this little girl; my prayers release the work. I’m only a distributor of what He has already produced. Be bold, sent one. Enforce the victory!
With new assurance I began informing the people about what I was planning to do. They nodded in recognition as I mentioned the girl. Expressions of intrigue turned to astonishment as they listened to my plans.
Then I prayed. On a moonlit night in a tiny, remote village of Guatemala with a handful of people as my audience, my life changed forever. Jesus came out of hiding. He became alive: Relevant... Sufficient ...Available! A "hidden" Jesus emerged from the cobwebs of theology. A yesterday Jesus became a today and forever Jesus. A Galilee Jesus became a Guatemala Jesus.
And a new plan unfolded to me. A new concept emerged Jesus and me. For the first time I understood the heavenly pattern: Jesus is the Victor-we’re the enforcers; Jesus is the Redeemer-we’re the releasers; Jesus is the Head-we’re the Body.
Yes, He set the little girl free. Yes, the village turned to Christ. Yes, Jesus prevailed through a sent one. So the partnership goes on-God and humans. But the correct pattern is critical: My prayers of intercession release Christ’s finished work of intercession. His work empowers my prayers-my prayers release His work. Mine extends His-His effectuates mine. Mine activates His-His validates mine. In Kingdom Enterprises we’re not in the production department. We’re in distribution ...BIG difference. He’s the generator. We’re the distributors.
