The Gospel - Acts 8:26-40

                         

The gospel news of Jesus is beginning to move out from Jerusalem into the surrounding areas due to persecution against the church in Jerusalem. This began after the stoning to death of Stephen after his witness to the people that Jesus is the promised Messiah. Philip ends up in Samaria where the people respond to his message of Jesus with great joy! While in Samaria, Simon the sorcerer believes Philip’s message and is baptized. Peter and John are sent to see what’s happening and Simon’s true heart is revealed. What Simon really desires is power and influence, Peter calls Simon out, telling him to repent and pray for forgiveness and transformation. This is a reminder for us to reflect on our own relationship with Jesus. Do we follow him simply for advantages and blessing, believing if we give enough to God, he’ll pour out his blessings on us? Simon’s story ends with his plea after Peter chastises him, “Pray to the Lord for me so that nothing you have said may happen to me.”

Now Philip’s sent by an angel to the area of Gaza, a major trade route, and area very much in our news today. Here he meets an official from the queen’s court in Ethiopia, a gentile believer in Israel’s God; the gospel message of Jesus continues to spread. The eunuch had come to worship at the temple, likely for the Passover, meaning he was in Jerusalem during the time of Jesus’ arrest, crucifixion, resurrection, and the pouring out of the Holy Spirit. Now he’s on his way home and reading from Isaiah. The Spirit tells Philip, “Go to that chariot and stay near it.” We see here how God arranges our encounters with others to give us opportunities to share the good news of Jesus and make disciples. When opportunities to talk about faith come up, it’s not an accident, the Holy Spirit places you in that place, at that moment, to help the other person to hear the gospel news of Jesus.

Philip obeys the Spirit and hears the eunuch reading from Isaiah. It’s normal for people to read out loud in this culture as it helps people to remember and reinforce what they’re studying, to think about it more deeply as they see, speak, and hear what they’re reading. Philip doesn’t stand there passively listening, he asks a great question, “Do you understand what you are reading?” The eunuch replies, “How can I, unless someone explains it to me?” He shows a desire to learn, a humbleness in admitting that he has much to learn in order to understand. This desire to earn and study Scripture, asking others to help us learn doesn’t seem to be as present today. The average follower of Jesus today is less biblically literate than even 50 years ago. Part of it may be laziness as we can easily ask Google, some of it may be a lack of appreciation for how the regular study of Scripture keeps us connected with God and Jesus, and how the Holy Spirit uses it to transform us.

This is the heart of the Reformation, a return to the study of the Bible, to trusting in Christ alone, saved by faith alone, grace alone, all to the glory of God, being rooted deeply in Scripture, out of a deep desire to know God and his grace and glory through Jesus. The early church regularly spent time together studying the Scriptures, learning how they all pointed to, and revealed who Jesus is. Luke describes the early church community in Acts 2, “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer…. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.” Our faith is a faith built in community, the body of Christ, the family of God, as we study and learn together.  

We live in a culture and time that often believes we’re wiser than the historical faith community, believing we don’t need the historical church’s wisdom to understand and interpret Scripture. The basic message of the Bible is clear, we’re sinners and we need a saviour who is Jesus Christ, yet there’s so much more depth, wisdom, and life guidance in Scripture. This story of the eunuch calls us to appreciate what more we need to learn, and to discipline ourselves to meet together regularly for the regular study of who God reveals himself to be in his Word, how Jesus is pointed to on every page of Scripture, and how we’re to live as Jesus’ followers, shaping our lives on loving God and neighbour, and making disciples. Scripture reminds us that we live in both a physical and spiritual world, and need to care for our soul life as well as our physical life. Just like we go to the doctor for our physical health, we need to be with the Spirit and in Scripture regularly for our spiritual health.

The eunuch was reading, “He was led like a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb before its shearer is silent, so he did not open his mouth. In his humiliation he was deprived of justice. Who can speak of his descendants? For his life was taken from the earth.” Philip begins with this passage and shares with the eunuch the good news of Jesus. Philip may have begun with sharing how John the Baptist and Jesus himself often referred to him as the Lamb of God, how the sacrificial system of Leviticus points to the destructiveness and evil of our sin and the need for God’s forgiveness found in the acceptance of the sacrifices offered for the sins of the people, with the death of the lambs and goats representing our own deaths for punishment for our sin.

The gospel begins with the story of creation, how everything was created very good, but sin enters into the world through temptation, an alien in the very good creation, even after being told the punishment for sin is death. In order to truly understand the need for a saviour, we need to know the seriousness of our sin, that disobedience is rebellion against God and a disease infecting our souls. Being a royal official, the eunuch would have understood the seriousness of rebellion. However, God never gives up on us, promising a saviour who will crush the head of the serpent whose insidious words tempted Adam and Eve into rebellion, choosing to work his plan of redemption through Abraham and Israel in order to lead the nations back to God. Then, like Jesus shows the disciples on the road to Emmaus after his resurrection, the Spirit shows how all the Scriptures point to Jesus as the promised Messiah.

Dallas Willard wrote about working for money, “But the focus Jesus wanted us to have is the investment we make in people and their character: “As each one has received a gift, minister it to one another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.” 1 Peter 4:10. This applies also to the study of Scripture, we learn so we can help others meet Jesus through the gospel news. In 2 Peter 3:18, Peter writes, “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” We seek to grow in order to make disciples. It begins with filling our lives with Jesus. Our world looks to distract us from what’s important to the things that don’t really matter. Plan your faith life, put it on your calendar whether it’s on your phone, wall, or desktop.

The eunuch believes and accepts Jesus as his Lord and Saviour and Philip baptizes him. The Spirit then takes Philip away while the eunuch heads home to Ethiopia, where tradition says he preached the gospel to the people there. Philip knew the Scriptures and knew Jesus and helps the eunuch to know Jesus too. If we’re going to be disciple makers, a knowledge and passion for Jesus in your life is important so you can teach and lead others to become disciples of Jesus.

The Gospel news can be summarized as: God created everything and it was good, and very good! However, we are all sinners and we don’t measure up to God’s standards. God is just, he can’t simply tolerate our sin, which twists the good gifts good gives us, and pretend it’s not there; as a just God he must punish sin, which is death.

There’s nothing we can do to save ourselves, no matter how good we might be, we still sin. But the good news comes because God’s also love and provides a substitute to take our punishment for us. There’s no creature able to do it, so God sends his own son, Jesus, as the perfect substitute to take our place; completely God and completely sinless human.

Our sin is placed on Jesus who takes it to the cross and to the grave and after 3 days rises from the dead, having completely overcome sin and death. Jesus offers forgiveness and eternal life, a gracious gift, to all those who will believe in him. Jesus then gives us the Holy Spirit to guide us and help us share the gospel news of Jesus. We’re saved to do good works, showing our thankfulness to Jesus, assuring us of our faith so others can be won over to Jesus.

May the Spirit speak deeply into your heart, may your passion for Jesus and the study of Scripture continue to grow so that your witness to others may lead them to come to know and accept Jesus as their Lord.