Acts chapter 8, let's give our attention to the word of God. And Saul approved of his execution. And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem. And they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria except the apostles. Devout men buried Stephen and made great lamentation over him. But Saul was ravaging the church and entering house after house he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison. Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word. Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ. And the crowds with one accord paid attention to what was being said by Philip when they heard him and saw the signs that he did. For unclean spirits crying out with a loud voice came out of many who had them, and many who were paralyzed or lame were healed. So there was much joy in that city. But there was a man named Simon who had previously practiced magic in the city and amazed the people of Samaria, saying that he himself was somebody great. They all paid attention to him from the least to the greatest, saying, this man is the power of God that is called great. And they paid attention to him because for a long time he had amazed them with his magic. But when they believed Philip as he preached good news about the kingdom of God in the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women. Even Simon himself believed, and after being baptized, he continued with Philip. And seeing signs and great miracles performed, he was amazed. Now when the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent to them Peter and John, who came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit. For he had not yet fallen on any of them, but they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they laid their hands on them, and they received. the Holy Spirit. Now when Simon saw that the Spirit was given through the laying on of the apostles' hands, he offered them money, saying, Give me this power also, so that anyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit. But Peter said to him, May your silver perish with you, because you thought you could obtain the gift of God with money. You have neither part nor lot in this matter, for your heart is not right before God. Repent, therefore, of this wickedness of yours, and pray to the Lord that, if possible, the intent of your heart may be forgiven you. For I see that you are in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity. And Simon answered, Pray for me to the Lord that nothing of what you have said may come upon me. Now when they had testified and spoken the word of the Lord, they returned to Jerusalem, preaching the gospel to many villages of the Samaritans. Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, rise and go toward the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza. This is a desert place. And he rose and went. And there was an Ethiopian, a eunuch, a court official of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, who was in charge of all her treasure. He had come to Jerusalem to worship, and as returning, seated in his chariot, and he was reading the prophet Isaiah. And the spirit said to Philip, go over and join this chariot. So Philip ran to him and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet and asked, Do you understand what you are reading? And he said, how can I, unless someone guides me? And he invited Philip to come up and sit with him. Now the passage of the scripture that he was reading was this. Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter, and like a lamb before its shearer is silent, so he opens not his mouth. In his humiliation, justice was denied him. Who can describe his generation? For his life is taken away from the earth. And the eunuch said to Philip, about whom, I ask you, does the prophet say this? About himself or about someone else? Then Philip opened his mouth, and beginning with this scripture, he told him the good news about Jesus. And as they were going along the road, they came to some water. And the eunuch said, see, here is water. What prevents me from being baptized? And he commanded the chariot to stop, and they both went down into the water, and Philip and the eunuch, and he baptized him. And when they came up out of the water, the spirit of the Lord carried Philip away, and the eunuch saw him no more, and went on his way rejoicing. But Philip found himself at Azotus, and as he passed through, he preached the gospel to all towns until he came to Caesarea. Amen, thus saith the Lord. Well, it can be a little jarring to have the stories of Stephen and now Philip thrown into Acts following all that has been going on in Jerusalem for the first several chapters, particularly the refusal of the apostles to obey the council's order twice now, both in Acts 4 and in Acts 5. We really want to know what happens next in Jerusalem. And so it's a little bit jarring to come to the stories of these two men, which clearly Luke has paired together. But it helps us understand that Luke has purposely arranged his history to trace the apostolic fulfillment of the Lord's commission given to the apostles in chapter 1 verse 8, where Christ, as you know, appointed them to carry his gospel not only to Jerusalem, but beginning there, out of Jerusalem, he says, to all Judea, Samaria, and ultimately to the whole world. And that means Stephen and Philip are not sideshows to what is going on. to the progress of the gospel. Rather, Luke is telling us they're the main event now. Luke is drawing our attention to these two men because of their significance. We heard, of course, that they had diaconal responsibilities in Jerusalem, so they were plugged into the Jerusalem church, if you will. But they were the men, Luke is making clear, they were the two men whose ministries the Lord used to get the gospel out of Jerusalem and pave the way for the Gentile mission, for the worldwide mission. Stephen, by his spirit-filled teaching and then his God-honoring death, and now Philip, by his proclamation of the gospel to the Samaritans and his evangelization of an Ethiopian eunuch. And like Stephen, what's interesting, of course, about Philip is that he's not an apostle. He's a preaching evangelist. But he's not one of Christ's apostles. Peter and John, and that explains then why the Holy Spirit wasn't poured out upon the Samaritans at Philip's ministry, but Peter and John came and corroborated his ministry afterward, and we'll get to that more in a moment. And yet the point Luke is making, and the point the chapter makes so clear, is that Philip was the Lord's chosen instrument to take the first step toward taking the gospel out of Jerusalem across its first major threshold to non-Jews. And so let's begin by looking at verses one to four. Luke here highlights, obviously jumping straight in and picking up from the martyrdom and the death of Stephen, Luke highlights three things which the Lord used to get Christ's gospel and Philip out of Jerusalem. First of all, it's the persecution itself. Look at verse one. Luke says, there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem. Luke says it was on that very day It's the idea that it started directly on the heels of Stephen's death. In fact, all we're told that there was time for was for devout men to bury Stephen. Beyond that, we're ushered immediately into this persecution that took place on that day, he says. And he says it was a great persecution. And undoubtedly so, because up to now, remember, it was just the Sadducees who were persecuting the church and wanted the apostles killed in chapter five. But now that the Pharisees have bloodied their hands with Stephen's swift execution, the two parties have suddenly joined together now, and Luke no doubt says the persecution was great. He doesn't go into much description other than what we see next. He wants us to know, of course, that it was spearheaded by Gamaliel's own disciple, Saul of Tarsus and Cilicia. Verse one jumps in. And of course the chapter and verse breaks are made by man. Luke writes continuously. So verse 1 jumps in and says he approved, that is Saul approved of Stephen's death. It means he was pleased with it. It means he applauded it. He didn't throw any stones as far as we know. He stayed to the side. He kept the coats of those who did, no doubt the first witnesses. And he applauded what took place. Now remember in chapter 5, Gamaliel told the council to leave this movement alone. If it's of man, it'll go nowhere. If it's of God, well, you don't want to be fighting against God. So just leave it alone. Give it time. Give it space. It'll fizzle out, no doubt. But obviously, the young, zealous Saul couldn't disagree more. Verse 3 presents the image, a terrible image. It says he ravaged the church. laying it to waste. The image is one of a wild boar that would rip through and tear through an open vineyard without gates providing or fences protecting it. The image of Psalm 79. So Saul is ravaging the church, this beastly image. It's a dark, terrible word that is used. In fact, Luke goes on and says, he even dragged men and women out of their homes. He hauled them off to prison to be condemned and killed. And as soon as he had them in chains, as soon as he had them in prison, he went out to go get yet more. A terrible image. His rage was merciless, it was unmitigated, it was utterly terrible. It helps you realize why Paul was convinced that he was the chief of sinners. Because he says in 1 Timothy, I persecuted the church. What a euphemism for what is taking place here. Even behind these very few words, Surely it was more terrible than Luke describes. But as terrible and deadly as that persecution was, what we're being told here, as redemptive history is being recorded, is that that persecution was the means by which the Lord loosened the hold of the Jerusalem Christians on their homes and their possessions so that they could let all that go and leave it all behind. You remember in chapter one, Jesus told them not to leave Jerusalem until they received the power from the Father on high. But the day of Pentecost is long past. And no one's going out. Everyone's comfortable. And it's beautiful, Acts 2, Acts 4, the koinonia, it's glorious. It's a template for our worship and community and unity in that community, our fellowship. What a glorious picture. But that's not the end. Christ didn't come to save the Jews only. with the Gentiles. The gospel's got to go out. So they're still there. And so the Lord used Saul to push the church out. The second impetus, therefore, is that. It's caused by the first. In verse one, Luke says that they were scattered. They were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. The very attempts of men to snuff out the movement are used by God to inflame it. The very reason they condemned and martyred Stephen was to put an end to this kind of preaching and healing ministry. And all it does is inflame it. And the same thing here now. People are scattered. It reminds us of Psalm 2 where the nations rage against the Lord and His anointed only to have God laugh and exalt His Son as King in spite of them all. I've set my King on my holy hill and there's nothing you can do about it. He is Lord. Because for all the Christians that they put in prison and killed, there were hundreds and maybe even thousands who escaped. And look at what Luke says, wherever they went, verse four says, they went about preaching the word, which of course is the third great impetus. The great persecution led to great scattering, and wherever they went, they bore witness to the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so now we can see, looking back now, we can see how effectively God used Stephen's death in the development of the worldwide Christian mission. A terrible thing, an evil thing. Where was the Lord, one might say? Where was the Lord when Stephen was all alone? Where were the apostles, remember? But where was the Lord when Stephen was alone and being martyred and condemned, an innocent man? Where was righteousness? The nations in Psalm 115, where is your God now? He's in the heavens. As we sang, he does as he pleases, and he did just as he pleased. He brought his son home. He brought Stephen home and used his very death to inflame the worldwide Christian mission. It was a terrible thing, as was the death of so many more in that persecution, as was the scattering of people away from their homes and their possessions, their belongings, all that they had ever known, their father's heritage. What a terrible thing to have people run out of town, and leave everything behind that has been entrusted to them from generation to generation to generation. But again, the Lord was in it. And he sovereignly overruled Satan's efforts to destroy the church as the very means to grow the church, as the very means to take the gospel, the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ, outside both the walls of Jerusalem and the nation of Israel. God has bigger plans than men. And it was just as Stephen said, remember. Remember the thrux of Stephen's message. God's presence isn't temple-bound. God's presence isn't Jerusalem-bound. It isn't Jewish-bound. Even as Peter himself preached on the day of Pentecost. Everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. And that promise, said Peter, is only for you and your children, but for as many as the Lord our God shall call. Even in Acts 2.39, Peter is envisioning that extension in the commission given to them in chapter one, to as many as the Lord our God shall call. Israel's Messiah came to bring the salvation of God to all nations. In fact, that's what God promised in the Abrahamic covenant. Your seed shall be a blessing to all the world. How many years has it been since that promise has been made? Where's the fulfillment of that promise in this close Jewish circle? It's outside those walls. And Jesus has come to bring that to pass. And now through his apostles and through Philip, it will go forth. The way to God the Father, the apostles have been saying, and Stephen said, The way to God the Father is not through a Jewish temple. It's not through becoming a proselyte to Judaism. It's through faith in Jesus Christ who stands at the right hand of God in all the glory of the risen Messiah as Lord and God over all creation. And so we see where we are. Martyrdom led to persecution, led to scattering, led to the first non-Jewish evangelism. which is where we meet Philip. Look at verse five. Now you need to understand and recall this morning that the Samaritans were deeply hated by the Jews. In fact, the hostility between them traced all the way back to the days of Jeroboam when the 10 tribes apostatized from Judah and made Samaria their capital. We have no lot in Judah. to your tents, O Israel." And so it's been a thousand years. A thousand years of hostility. And it's gone from bad to worse. They were despised in this day as half-breeds and schismatics. Just remember the shock of the disciples in John 4, when Jesus was not just speaking to a woman, but to a Samaritan woman. And yet here, being led by the Spirit which filled him, Philip goes to Samaria, and he proclaims to them that Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah they've been waiting for, the Messiah that Moses spoke about in Deuteronomy 18. Remember, the Samaritans rejected the entire Old Testament except for the books of Moses, the Pentateuch. That very one about whom Moses spoke, he has come, and his name is Jesus. Philip proclaims the Christ, it says. Now you'll also remember that after Christ evangelized that woman in John 4, we read in that chapter that he went and spent two days with the Samaritans. They urged him to stay and he did. Shocking. He stayed two days with them and we read that many believed and no doubt many were also healed. And now it's as if God is sending Philip to bring in the harvest of the seeds that Christ had planted earlier. What amazing providence. What a wonderful preparation and now closure in a sense upon this people to whom Christ himself first went when the Jews would not step foot. And Luke says now that they paid attention to Philip's message because he was performing signs and wonders among them. And we notice again, it's another instance of signs and wonders and now preaching and in the next story baptizing, all being done by someone who's not an apostle. but someone who's clearly, as we said last week, more than a deacon. But remember, as we began, the first message I gave in this book, remember that one of the most important distinctions to be made in Acts is, in order for proper interpretation, proper application, is between historical record and historical precedent. And what we find in the accounts of both Stephen and Philip is there is a lot going on here relative to the unfolding of redemptive history, which means not everything here is to be taken as a precedent for the church today. Verse 12, Philip goes to Samaria and it says, as he preached good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, the people believed and were baptized. Now we've already read the story just a few moments earlier. You've read it yourself many times. There are several interesting circumstances surrounding Philip's ministry in Samaria. Let me just list them for you quickly. First of all, in verse 13, we are told that even Simon the magician believed and was baptized. And then we're told also, notice that he traveled around with Philip for some time, being amazed at what Philip could do. Number two, in verse 14, we're told that when the apostles heard of Philip's ministry there, they sent Peter and John to them. And number three, apparently the reason, Luke tells us even, the reason is because even though the people had believed and been baptized, Luke says they had not yet received the Holy Spirit, which they then did receive when Peter and John came and laid hands on them, which looks sort of like a two-part Christian experience, doesn't it? Number four, look at verses 18 and 19. We learned that after Simon saw how many people, or saw how the people received the Holy Spirit when Peter and John laid their hands on them, he asked if he could buy that power with money. That's where the word Simon he comes from. And then number five, in verses 20 to 23, we learn surprisingly that as a result of trying to buy the Spirit's power, Peter rebukes Simon and tells him he has no part in the gospel, which means his profession of faith was false and his baptism was nothing but water. There's a lot here. I want to address two of the larger issues on the surface before we come to the story of the eunuch. And the first is this. The fact that Simon professed faith and submitted to baptism only to be exposed as a hypocrite a little later teaches us what we have been learning and looking at in our afternoon study. And that is that not every profession of faith and church membership is legit. Of course, we can't see the heart any more than Philip could. And that's why we take people at their word, and then we hold them accountable to their word. But sooner or later, a false profession will expose itself. And that's what happened here. Eventually, Simon's heart revealed itself. Eventually, the pride and the self-aggrandizement that motivated his church membership on the surface, and it came, and it came to the surface. He was seen for the proud, self-seeking hypocrite that he was. He had no sense of sin or guilt. He had no sense of need for a savior. Even after Peter rebuked him, what was he afraid of? The troubles come upon him. He wasn't asking, pray for me that I may be forgiven of my sins. He had no conviction of sin or a sense of guilt before God. He had no need for Christ as a savior. He only wanted the power that the apostles manifested. Power, first of all, that Philip manifested. And now the apostles displayed, and he wanted, of course, for his own exaltation. I want that. He had already been fooling the people, convincing the people that he was someone great, that he had this power that was great, and yet here, obviously, in the face of what's truly great power, his power was no power at all. His own powerlessness was exposed. But here, here is true power. And that's what he wanted. And it's not that Peter saw something Philip didn't, it's that the occasion for its exposure didn't arise until Peter and John came and laid their hands on the people so that they received the Holy Spirit. It's also a sober reminder of another thing we've been studying in our afternoon service, and that is that we are not to seek our assurance of salvation in our profession of faith, in our baptism, or even in our church membership. Rather, as we have said repeatedly in that study, we're to take our assurance from the promises of God and his word to those who believe. Secondly, from the inner testimony of the Holy Spirit to our spirits that we are the children of God and thereby cry Abba Father. And thirdly, the evidence in both our heart and life of the graces and the fruits of the spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ. So it's important we don't misunderstand who Simon stands for here in this chapter, in this story. Simon's not a standing testimony to the possibility of losing our salvation. Simon is a standing testimony to false conversions. He's a standing testimony to what Christ described in the parable of the sower as the rocky and the thorny soil, which springs up and looks great for a time and shows flashy signs of apparent faith, but will never produce fruit, will ever be barren because they were never truly converted. The second thing I want to note here in this section is to deal with this issue of this two-step process. It's very interesting and, of course, unusual. First of all, we need to recognize that it does no good to try to explain away what essentially is a two-step Christian experience on the part of the Samaritans. The text is very clear that when Philip preached to them, they believed and they were baptized. But then it's also equally clear that what they experienced was some sort of pre-Pentecost conversion in which they didn't receive the Holy Spirit until after Peter and John came and laid their hands on them. And I said it does no good to try to explain it away because that's what a lot of people do. That's not really what's happening here, it's suggested. They want to guard against this idea of a two-step process. But the text clearly is showing that there were two steps. Something was accomplished by Philip, Something was not accomplished by Philip and therefore accomplished by Peter and John when they came. So the text is clearly showing that there are two steps, two parts. So the question is, why did it happen to the Samaritans in this way? And what does that mean for the church today? Again, it's an interpretation question. And because it's an interpretation question, it's also an application question, very important for the church. In some circles, of course, this is a proof text for the understanding of the way salvation works. First, you get saved. Then you get the baptism of the Holy Spirit. First you become a Christian, then you get Spirit-filled. There's a second experience, a second blessing, it's called, in a lot of circles. How do we know? Where do we get that? Acts chapter 8. It's exactly what happened. But that would contradict Peter's first groundbreaking message in chapter 2, preaching to the 3,000 who cried out, what shall we do to be saved? They cried out, and Peter responded, repent, and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. Not something later, not a first and then a second. Repent and be baptized and you will receive. It's all one part. It's all in one season and one time, he is saying. And Peter's the one directly involved in this two-step experience. So surely we need to keep that in our minds. Secondly, it would also contradict what Paul himself says later in Romans 8, 9. who does not have the spirit of Christ, does not belong to him. And that means it's impossible to be saved without receiving the indwelling Holy Spirit. So it's clear that the Samaritan's experience is exceptional. That's where we're left. Something unusual is happening here. This is unusual, it's not a paradigm, it's not a precedent, it's record, it's history. The clarity comes when we ask why this is. The clarity comes when we remember the whole thing we've been arguing all along. This is the first instance of the gospel being proclaimed to non-Jews. This is the first instance of the gospel going outside that smaller circle, which means this is the crossing of the first major threshold in the fulfillment of the Great Commission of Acts 1 verse 8. In other words, Luke is summarizing a lot of time here. Luke is summarizing many, many, many years in the early church in Jerusalem to rush us forward to Saul and his ministry, which of course is the very next chapter, Saul's own conversion and then his ministry beginning in chapter 13 and taking up the rest of Luke's considerations. So for all the stories that Luke could have recounted from the early days of the Christian church, he chooses suddenly breaking into the wonderful account of what's going on in Jerusalem breaking in with two critical stories between Jerusalem and Saul in the worldwide mission. He breaks in with Stephen and Philip. The rationale we see for telling the story of Stephen and now the story of Philip is because of their critical importance to the way the gospel spread out from Jerusalem to the world. How did it get out? How did it catch fire? How was it then said that they were turning the world upside down. The half-breed Samaritans were a kind of halfway house between Jews and Gentiles. Calvin says the conversion of Samaria was like the first fruits of the calling of the Gentiles. Now remember, the Gentiles will not be officially called until we get to chapter 10 with the house of Cornelius. His family becomes the first Gentile converts to Christianity. And so this is what's going on in this unique situation. Let me sum it up this way. The reason that the Lord uncharacteristically withheld his Holy Spirit's fullness from the Samaritan converts until the apostles came was in order that their solidarity with the Jews and the Jerusalem church might be beyond question. A thousand year hostility, a thousand year division, nothing would overcome that. except this. If it had not been done just this way, there would have been a Jewish Christian church and a Samaritan Christian church for another thousand years. Peter and John, when they came, they not only endorsed Philip's ministry on the other side of that Samaritan curtain, but when they came and laid their hands on the Samaritans and they received the Holy Spirit, and although Luke doesn't say, we can probably add the words, just as it fell on us at the beginning, which is what he says, Luke, how Peter describes it with Cornelius. But when they laid their hands on the Samaritan converts and they received the Holy Spirit, that iron curtain was effectively torn down and the Samaritan converts had all the assurance they needed that they are bona fide Christians. That they were incorporated into the redeemed community on the very same terms as the Jewish converts. This is exactly as Paul words it. The difference between Jews and Gentiles, they're saved by faith just as we are, says Paul. It had to be demonstrated to all that they had become members of the one church, having believed the one faith, received the one baptism by the one spirit of the one Christ. There was no other way to show this unity of the church and the unity with that blessed and beloved church in Jerusalem that we have witnessed and seen testimony to except by this. And so Philip may have been the means of getting the gospel across the threshold. But Christ commissioned apostles from Acts 1-8 were the means of getting the spirit and the walls of the church of Jesus Christ across that threshold so that it now encompassed even Samaritans. In fact, don't miss verse 25. Interesting. Notice how Luke highlights this reality, this extension and acceptance by the apostles themselves when he says, on their way to Jerusalem, Peter and John preached the gospel in many villages of the Samaritans. So now they're evangelizing Samaritans. They're extending the gospel. It's not just we've endorsed what Philip is doing over there, but they themselves participate in that evangelism and extend the gospel. Well, let's come to the next section and I'll jump right into some observations here. The first thing to note is that this eunuch from Ethiopia was a worshiper of God. And there's several things that note that, of course, first of all, In verse 27, Luke says he came to Jerusalem to worship. Secondly, we also are told that he had a scroll of Isaiah. Obviously very costly, very rare for him to have a personal copy of that. He had a scroll of Isaiah and he was reading it. Thirdly, it was the eunuch's suggestion that he be baptized. Here is water, what forbids me, he says, you remember. which proved that he understood the religious significance of baptism and its connection to his faith in Jesus Christ, which Philip then had just preached to him. So the point we want to make here is that this man is obviously a Jewish African. In fact, his family may have been deported to the upper Nile region as far back as the Assyrian conquest of Israel in 722. But the significance of this account for Luke is that it's another instance of the Spirit's saving work outside the walls of Jerusalem and eagerly on the verge of bursting forth into Gentile territory. First we have Stephen, where Stephen preaches to his dying breath that God is not temple-bound, Jew-bound, Jerusalem-bound, Israel-bound. Never has been. And then you have Philip, and that very same gospel led by the Spirit goes forth upon these outreach these edges reaching out, eager to go forth, and then we have Saul in Acts chapter nine. Second thing to notice here is there are several things that we can take note of as it relates to the gospel ministry. Several homiletic points here that are very important. First of all, we see the need that the church of Jesus Christ has for regular pastoral ministry. When Philip comes up to the chariot, he asks the man if he understands what he's reading, and of course the man says, how can I? unless someone guides me or accurately explains this to me." And then, of course, he invites Philip into the chariot to do just that. It reminds us of the way Nehemiah described the ministry of the Levites in Nehemiah 8, verse 8, when he said, excuse me, they read from the scriptures clearly. They read from the scriptures clearly. They gave the sense so that the people understood the reading. It also reminds us of how the Lord described the priestly office in Malachi 2, verse 7. He says, the lips of the priest should guard knowledge And people should seek instruction from his mouth, for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts." And so we see that the ministry of preaching and teaching the word of God is a ministry appointed in the church by God for his people's good, and therefore one that the church can't do without. And that means we're to be thankful not only for the scriptures, but we're to be thankful for what Paul calls in Ephesians 4, the very gifts of Christ to the church. namely pastors and teachers called and gifted by God to open up for us to explain and expound and apply the scriptures to our lives so that as Paul describes it there so beautifully that we might grow up into the fullness of the stature of Jesus Christ. Bless God for the ministry of the word. The second thing I want to point out here is that in verse 35, I want you to notice how Philip took the very text from Isaiah 53, which this man was reading, And Luke tells us he preached from that very text. He preached the gospel of Jesus Christ as its fulfillment. Again, it takes us to our evening study, particularly that big picture study we did for so many weeks. It teaches us that the New Testament gospel of Jesus Christ has its roots and its beginnings in the types and the shadows and the prophecies and the promises of the Old Testament. Which means there's an inherent unity to the two testaments, a unity. which finds its clarity and finds its explanation, the apostles are now saying, in the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus of Nazareth, whom you killed, but whom God raised from the dead. Thirdly, we see that as the gospel goes forth in its missional context, the sign of baptism isn't given to anyone unless and until he repents and believes. Now this doesn't take anything away from the other portions of God's word, which teach us that the children of believers are also to be baptized. But it does establish the fact that as a gospel comes to those who are strangers to the covenant community, baptism follows faith. And fourthly here, I think it's worth pointing out that verse 38 isn't as strong a proof text for baptism by immersion as people like to think. It's claimed, that since verse 38 says the eunuch went down into the water, and verse 39 says he came up out of the water, that the biblical mode for baptism is immersion. He went down and he came up. It would make sense, except for the fact that a careful reading of even the English text, but especially the Greek text, shows that what Luke is actually saying is that both Philip and eunuch went down into the water and came up out of the water. And so unless Philip also baptized himself, Luke isn't talking about immersion. He's not describing the mode. Luke is not concerned here to describe the mode of baptism. Instead, what Luke is saying is that they both walk down into the water in order for Luke, in order for Philip to baptize the eunuch. He says nothing about how much water he used. So this isn't a proof text for immersion because they are both going down in that verb, and they're both coming up. A final point I want to make on this is that just as the Spirit led Philip to the eunuch in verse 26, so in verse 39, he led Philip on to Azotus, and then at last to Caesarea, which is where Philip settles down, and we'll find him again in Acts chapter 21, where Luke and Paul will go to the house of Philip. And Luke tells us here that in every town he passed through, Philip continued to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. And undoubtedly, we're to assume with the same success he had had in Samaria. And what this does is it just highlights the uniqueness of Philip. It highlights his role in redemptive history in the early church. Think of it this way, there were obviously 12 apostles. And Luke tells us in chapter eight, verse one, that despite the persecution which drove so many Christians out of Jerusalem, the apostles stayed in Jerusalem. And we're on the verge of the conversion of Saul of Tarsus in chapter nine, who accompanied by Barnabas and Silas and Timothy will eventually become the church's great missionary to the Gentiles. But what we're being shown is alongside the 12 apostles and alongside Paul the apostle, the great missionary, Luke introduces Philip the evangelist. Nothing more it would seem than a deacon. Philip the evangelist, the first man with that pioneer spirit, the first man with that pioneer spirit who not only won to Christ the first Samaritans in the early church and the first African in the early church, but also, says Luke, preached wherever he went, taking the gospel from town to town, regardless of race or station. I love how this chapter and its lessons dovetails what we've been learning in our afternoon study on evangelism. I think it is so kind of the Lord to give us such wonderful examples in his word on how we can share the gospel of the Savior with the world around us. This morning I want to make that connection and I want to close by suggesting four lessons that we learned from this evangelist. First of all, we learn that there is only one gospel that gives sinners any hope in this world. Luke says, when Philip was with the Samaritans, he preached the good news about the kingdom of God and Jesus Christ. And when he was with the eunuch, Luke says, he told him the good news about Jesus. It's a reminder again of what we have seen so well in our afternoon study, that the gospel has a fixed truth content that centers on the person of Jesus Christ, and the good news that Philip is preaching, the good news, as Paul describes it, that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners. That's the message. We're free to alter the presentation, as no doubt Philip did. From Samaritans to a eunuch, from town to town, we're free to alter the presentation. Even Paul did that, from one person to another, depending on the situation and the place from which that person is coming, even Jew or Gentile and Paul's experience. But we're not free to alter the basic gospel message. We're not free to alter that content, that truth content. It has an unchangeableness to it, because it has a once-for-allness to it, because it has a finished character to it. The gospel is not something that people need to accomplish, go out and do. The gospel is something Christ has finished and that people need to receive by faith and rest in and surrender to and accept and bow before and adore and stand in awe of God's grace and goodness in the Lord Jesus Christ, a sinner such as we are. And that's what's so good about it. It is finished. It's done. It is a finished work. Rest in this is the message of the gospel. There is only one gospel that gives sinners hope. And therefore, secondly, we also learn further that this one gospel is therefore sufficient for all peoples. The differences between the Samaritans and the Ethiopian eunuch could not be greater. And yet, the gospel was what they both needed to hear. No matter what a person's rank or heritage or race might be, the gospel were being shown here through this grand evangelist, this premier evangelist, the gospel transcends every social barrier. The gospel speaks to the deep needs of the common human condition. No matter who we are, where we are, what we've done, what our family, our upbringing. It's a reminder that what man needs today is what man has always needed. which is to be reconciled to the God he's offended. Go back to 2 Corinthians 5. We appeal to you, therefore, on behalf of God, be reconciled to God through the gospel, your only hope, your all-sufficient hope, your need above all others. And it's the glory of the gospel, then, that the apostles preached, that Philip is preaching here as this premier evangelist. It's the glory of the gospel. that it offers such a savior and such a mediator and such a reconciliation with God, all in one, Lord Jesus Christ, the Jesus of Nazareth, whom the apostles preached. Thirdly, this morning, we learn that the only way to get the gospel out to a dying world is through proclamation. If it needs to be heard, then it needs to be proclaimed. And of course, there's the pastoral proclamation that takes place each week in a congregation. In fact, the word used for Philip, when it says he proclaimed the Christ to them, is a different word that then was used for the Jews that went forth, and it said they preached Christ. It's a different word. But what we read here, and what we understand by this, is that Philip shows us that it's also God's pleasure to send men forth as lay evangelists. That's what Luke is making clear here. Sometimes he sends them to whole towns and sometimes to a single individual. Many were scattered, hundreds, thousands were scattered out of Jerusalem. And wherever they went, says Luke, they all preached the gospel. So that should encourage us not only to pray for the regular preaching of the word by our pastors, but also to pray for a heart and pray for a burden to go forth sharing Jesus with others, the very thing that we're trying to cultivate in our afternoon study. Because we don't have to be ordained evangelists in order to evangelize. Again, just look at all the scattered believers. They went forth preaching and pointing people to the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember what Paul says in Romans 10. How are they to believe if they never hear? And how will they hear if no one ever tells them? If the gospel is to be heard, it has to be proclaimed. And we ourselves should be the instruments of that. in our circles and spheres of influence. Lastly this morning, we learn to trust that the Lord knows how to get the gospel to his elect. Not only did he use persecution to get Philip into Samaria, but he used an angel to send him to a particular road in the middle of the desert to bring the gospel to a single person. Now this was a desert place, says Luke. How would he have found him? Who would go there? What purpose would one have? How far apart these two men are, how unlikely the circumstances could be brought together that they could ever meet, and the eunuch could hear the gospel from the mouth of Philip. And yet, that's exactly what God did. You see, we're often tempted to despair when we think of our lost loved ones or our lost friends, and how resistant they are to the gospel. When we think of how lost and blind some people are to the truth, When we think of how impossible the circumstances are in which people have been brought up, or born, or raised, or educated, we think there's no way that the gospel is ever getting through to them. There's simply no inroad for the gospel into this or that dark circumstance. Well, that's when we need to think on Acts 8, and we need to remember that no one is out of God's reach. Not the hated Samaritans, not the far-off Ethiopian eunuch, not even hateful Saul of Tarsus, as we'll soon find. Wherever God's elect are in the world, in whatever culture, in whatever dark condition, whatever family circumstance, this chapter affords us tremendous encouragement as we pray for and finance our missionaries, our evangelists, our local pastors. The Lord knows where his elect are. And he will either bring the gospel to them, or he will bring them to the gospel. Because it's the Savior's promise. All that the Father has given to me will come to me, and not one of them will be lost. So praise God for the preaching of the gospel, the spread of the gospel, that it ever came to us Gentiles, and that it is able still yet to go forth, even from us. That we, like the Macedonians, encouraging the Corinthians and giving So we, ourselves, might be an instrument in the Lord's hands for the yet further evangelization of those in our lives, in our community, and around the world by God's grace. Amen. Let's pray.