The Saving Power of Scripture, Part 1 (Acts 8:25–40) · GTYtv

0:04 We've been moving phrase by phrase, verse by verse, paragraph by paragraph, chapter by chapter through these great truths. Open your Bibles with me. Let's go to the Word of God in the eighth chapter of the book of Acts, the Acts of the Apostles under the power of the Holy Spirit. Philip is the key instrument of God in the narratives in this chapter. Philip, not Philip the Apostle, but Philip the Deacon from the sixth chapter, a non-Israeli Jew, a Jew who was a non-Palestinian Jew, who was from the Hellenistic world, who was part of the church.

1:01 He was brought to Christ along with many, many thousands of others in the early church. And he was one of those noble men who were chosen to provide service and leadership to the church. He was a very powerful man, a godly man, a spirit-filled man, a powerful preacher, and the Lord even did miracles through him, an amazing man. We're going to see his encounter with the Ethiopian eunuch starting in chapter 8, verse 25. In this chapter, we see Philip as the instrument of God, confronting, first of all, Simon in Samaria and demonstrating what a false faith looks like. And now we find Philip confronting an Ethiopian eunuch and showing us what a true faith looks like. Pick it up in verse 25. So when they had solemnly testified, after the account about Simon, when they had solemnly testified and spoken the Word of the Lord, they started back to Jerusalem and were preaching the gospel to many villages of the Samaritans.

2:06 Peter and John who had come, you remember the Holy Spirit had not come even though Peter people had believed under the preaching of Philip. The Holy Spirit didn't come until Peter and John arrived, so the Jews would know that the same Holy Spirit fell upon the Samaritans that had fallen upon them on the day of Pentecost, and there was a repeating of the same phenomena and the presence of the same apostles who'd been there at Pentecost to make sure everybody knew the Jews and Samaritans were in the one church. Peter and John have come, having heard about this amazing response by the Samaritans to the gospel, they come up to authenticate it, to lay an authoritative hand on it and validate it and then go back and say it's really happened as it has been told. They leave. Philip stays. He stays in Samaria to continue the gospel work that he began there, which was now affirmed, validated, and approved by Peter and John and with new energy.

3:05 Why? Now, and the purposes of God, the Holy Spirit has come on all those believers. Now, as I told you last time, if you believe any time past the early part of the book of Acts, if you believe at any point in time in redemptive history, past that transition, the Spirit comes at the moment you believe. But in that early transitional period, it was important for the Holy Spirit's coming to be attached to the presence of the apostles with the same kind of phenomenon that happened at Pentecost, so all the barriers were broken down and everybody knew that all were one in Christ. With the arrival now of the Holy Spirit, things really begin to happen. Philip is about to encounter an Ethiopian eunuch. This is a great day for the church of Jesus Christ.

4:00 This is the first time the church expands into what we could call the uttermost part of the earth. Israel as a nation had always been called to be God's missionary people. Israel had always been ordained to reach the nations, to tell the world about the true and living God, to tell the nations around it. But they sort of vacillated between a Jonah attitude of isolation and the bitterness and animosity toward the nations around them to what you could call a kind of a Baal worshiping attitude which was nothing but idolatry and compromise. It seemed like they were eager to shut out the nations or they were eager to suck up the nations and create some kind of syncretistic idolatry that God hated and brought judgment. But the one thing they wouldn't do was evangelize the nations, which was what they had been called to do.

4:55 So the goal of God to reach the world through Israel hit a terrible stalemate. And God in the church cuts out a fresh channel, a new people, and sets Israel aside. And they're still set aside, even to this very hour. And they're not going to be back into the mainstream of taking the gospel to the world until you get to the future, to the time of the tribulation when God saves 12,000 out Out of all the 12 tribes of Israel, you have 144,000 Jewish missionaries pouring out the gospel to the world, finally fulfilling what they were originally called to do. So the goal of God to reach the world was unfulfilled by God's allowance through the nation Israel.

5:50 But it now begins to unfold on a desert road initially with one person. And I remind you of what I often say, the kingdom of God advances one soul at a time, right? Not in groups, not in nations. The kingdom of God advances one soul at a time. Now as we look at this, we could just read the narrative. You could read the narrative yourself and it would be pretty straightforward. You can read the story. It's a wonderful story. I hope you will read it. But as we read the story, I want to go a little beyond what you can read and let you know that this story in and of itself presents to us a picture of the elements and the components and the features in a saving faith. Everything you need to know is here by illustration, by implication. So I want to break the story down.

6:45 It runs to the end of the chapter. We'll go through it fairly quickly. There are three categories that help us sort it out. There's the preparation in this encounter, that which is already in place before the encounter even begins. And then there is the presentation, how it is that Philip addresses this individual. And then there is the personal response. And that's just kind of a simple and somewhat universal perspective on any encounter, any gospel encounter. There is the preparation which is necessary. There is the presentation which is necessary, and then there is the correct personal response. As we look at those three headings, we're going to see the components of a faith that saves. Let's look at preparation, first of all, alright? Verse 26 through 29.

8:12 Now that's enough to let us know that this is a very well designed and prepared encounter, and the one who is preparing this is none other than the Holy Spirit. So let's start there. The proper preparation for salvation, for true salvation, begins with the sovereign work of the Spirit. It starts with divine preparation. It starts with God's Spirit preparing the soil. God's providential working. Salvation is God's work, is it not? It is not man's work, it is God's work. It is initiated by God. It is a reflection of His will. No man seeks after God. The natural man is dead in trespasses and sin, ignorant, alienated from the life of God, hopeless, helpless, indifferent, disinterested.

9:10 But what happens is by the purpose of God and the power of God, the glorious light of the gospel begins to shine into the darkness. And it shatters the blindness that is natural blindness, sinful blindness, and it shatters that second blindness which is satanic blindness, the blindness that the God of this world imposes on sinners. This is at the very outset the most important fact regarding salvation, that it has to be initiated by God. We saw that powerfully demonstrated in Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus, did we not? All the way back in John 3, and some of you remember that. From time to time people tell me how memorable that was, that you must be born of the Spirit. You must be born from above, Jesus said to Nicodemus. And when we ask, how does that happen? Jesus gives the answer. The Spirit does what He wants, when He wants, to whom He wants, the way He wants, like the wind.

10:07 You don't know where it's coming from, you don't know where it's going, and you have no control over it. Salvation is, first of all, a sovereign work of God. God is the one who chooses. God is the one who calls. God is the one who activates the human heart. We don't aid the Holy Spirit in this. We don't aid God in this. We don't help God make a decision about this. Dead men have no recognition. People who are blind in the darkness of sin and Satan can't see the truth. That's why in John 6, 44, Jesus said, no man comes unto Me unless the Father, what? Draws Him. The preaching of the cross is to those that perish foolishness. So there is an absolute and utter incapacity and indifference on the part of an unregenerate sinner whether he's a Jew or a Gentile.

11:10 Total incapacity of the unsaved to see, understand, feel, receive, or believe has to be overcome by the Holy Spirit. And essentially, we know this is happening here because an angel of the Lord speaks to Philip and tells him to go directly to this individual who's a court official of Candace, queen of Ethiopia, for the sake of the gospel. Here in this case, we have an illustration. And here it's graphically laid out for us, whereas in most cases in our lives, or in In all cases, we have no idea that that is going on. But in this case, it is recorded for us that this was all the preparation of the Holy Spirit. Now on this occasion, the Holy Spirit used an angelic messenger, and the orders are very specific to Philip.

12:06 Get up, go south to the road that descends from Jerusalem to Gaza. This is a desert road. Gaza, or what today is called Gaza Strip, a city of the Philistines, by the way. It was given by Joshua to Judah. It was there at Gaza, or Gaza. You remember that Solomon in Judges 16 took the gates, picked up the city gates and walked off with them. This is a location about 60 miles southwest of Jerusalem. It was originally a fortified city on the road to Egypt. In 96 B.C. it was totally destroyed, and although a new city was built a few miles away, the road to Egypt ran through for centuries an old fortress in ruins. So it really was a desert road even at that time.

13:04 It was much traveled, however, because there was a constant flow of people going from Jerusalem to Egypt and the other way around. They would go out of Jerusalem through Bethlehem down to Hebron and over to Egypt. So the Spirit commands Philip to go on that somewhat familiar road. And as he goes, he is instructed that he is to be obedient. And so he goes, verse 27, he got up and went. All he knows is he's to go. And there was providentially an Ethiopian eunuch, a court official of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, who was in charge of all her treasure, and he had come to Jerusalem to worship. He's on His way toward Jerusalem, coming from Ethiopia through Egypt and up this very familiar road.

14:00 This is the divine encounter that is prepared by the Holy Spirit. Philip didn't know that. He only knew to be obedient. He only knew to get on the road, and God would determine His purpose. We act, but the Spirit initiates. What a wonderfully encouraging reality that is. It is evident that God already had chosen this individual, this man. God had ordained him. God had written His name down in the Lamb's Book of Life, if you will, from before the foundation of the world, that the conversion of this eunuch was in the purpose and plan of God from eternity past, as is true of everyone who is saved. The salvation of this single sinner was the very clear purpose of God for Philip's trip, Reminding us that the salvation of a single sinner is worthy of the attention of God and the dispatching of angels and the action of the Holy Spirit.

14:58 Whenever a sinner is converted, we conclude that God chose that sinner, God formed a plan and a purpose and brought about that sinner's salvation. And salvation doesn't happen to anyone unless they hear the truth about Christ, right? Whoever calls on the Lord can be saved, but how are they going to call on one they don't know? to know unless there's a preacher. How's there going to be a preacher unless somebody's sent? Somebody has to go and preach because faith comes by hearing the Word concerning Christ. We are all born of the Spirit because the Spirit is the divine regenerator who fulfills the Father's purpose, the Father's will, and brings to reality the Son's atoning work. So the faith that does save begins with the right preparation which begins in the sovereign purposes of God in the work of the Holy Spirit.

15:54 The second is this, the submissive will of a servant, the submissive will of a servant. How are they going to hear without a preacher? How are they going to hear if somebody isn't sent? The Lord has chosen to do His work through human instruments, human instruments. God uses human tools. It was Peter on the day of Pentecost in chapter 2 who preached the gospel and 3,000 people were saved. Again, the gospel is preached in chapter 4 and 5,000 are saved. And then the gospel continues to be preached by Stephen, and it's always been that way. The apostles are everywhere preaching the gospel. The persecuted church is scattered everywhere preaching the gospel. Still that way today. People can't know the truth unless they hear the truth. Faith comes by hearing the truth. So the work of the Spirit has to be married to the submissive will of the servant. He has to be the tool.

16:54 And that is why, of course, the apostle Paul writes words to Timothy that are instructive for all of us, and we need to take them to heart. Listen to these words, 2 Timothy 2, now in a large house there are not only gold and silver vessels, but also vessels of wood and earthenware, some to honor and some to dishonor. Therefore if anyone cleanses himself from these evil influences, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified and useful to the Master prepared for every good work." So you want to be a clean instrument. You want to be a useful vessel. That is a critical plan in God's gospel advance. But all God had to say was, go. All He had to say was, go.

17:49 And verse 27 says, Philip got up and went. That's enough. He got up and went. Even though it didn't appear sensible or logical, he could have made an argument that there were more important things where he was. He obeyed. And of course, he ran into an Ethiopian eunuch who was a court official of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, in charge of her treasure, coming to Jerusalem to worship. He was returning and sitting in his chariot, and of all amazing things, was reading the prophet Isaiah. And if you want to know how eager Philip was to do what he had been called to do, check out the command in verse 29, the Spirit said to Philip, go up and join the chariot. chariot. Verse 30, Philip did what? What did he do?

18:41 He ran. There's no hesitancy, there's no reluctance. This is boldness. And by the way, if there's any characteristic of early church evangelism, it is boldness. You see that all the way back in the book of Acts in chapter 2 where they're boldly preaching the gospel to a hostile city of Jerusalem. You see it in chapter 4 where they preach the gospel, they preach Christ resin from the dead with boldness even though they've been threatened with prison and already have been literally taken captive by the powers that be. But there is a boldness in the early church. There's an explosive boldness in the early church. God uses that boldness. Philip is a demonstration of that boldness. So salvation preparation, what are the necessary elements of preparation? There's the sovereign work of the Spirit and the submissive will of the servant.

19:37 Somebody has to go with the message. And then there's a third element, and it's an obvious one. There's the searching of the sinner. There's the searching of the sinner. Now we come to the individual. There's not going to be any real salvation take place unless the sinner is searching for that. Now I say that to people all the time. You can't give the gospel to people who aren't interested in it. But I want you to notice down in verse 27, this Ethiopian eunuch is reading, verse 28, The prophet Isaiah. Now, Ethiopia, you think of Ethiopia as a country. Ethiopia is a term in biblical times for all Africa south of Egypt through all those massive deserts.

20:37 So we don't know exactly where he was from. It could have been anywhere south of Egypt. That term covers all portions of northern Africa, massive northern. It would include Ethiopia. It would include Libya. It would probably stretch even beyond that. We really don't know where in particular it came from, but the kingdom of Ethiopia was massive in those days. A little bit of background on that. The king of Ethiopia was venerated. He was so venerated that people thought that the king of Ethiopia was a child of the sun, S-U-N, that he was some kind of divine being, and it was determined that because he was a divine being, he was too sacred to work. He was too sacred to work. They couldn't see him demean himself by getting involved in the functions of royal, secular royal leadership.

21:35 So according to history, the duties of royalty were passed to the queen mother. While her son, the king, did nothing, she was responsible for everything. The name Candace is not a proper name, it's like Pharaoh. It's a feminine name for a queen mother. So this is the queen mother who's basically running things in the Ethiopian kingdom. This man worked for her as she was doing the work of the king. He is a eunuch. He'd been castrated to serve in a harem. People in ancient times were castrated and then served the king in the harem. Sometimes they served as priests in some pagan religious rites.

22:31 Very common. Eunuchs were very common in ancient lands and pagan courts. Now this man is not just another eunuch among many. He is the official chamberlain. There's an old English word you might remember from history. The man who is responsible for the treasury. This would be the CFO, the chief financial officer of Ethiopia. Trusted, respected, honored. By the way, God has a dim view of this castration. It was crystal clear that God forbid that, not only for its own sake, because it is a That's basically, it is abusing, it is maiming the image of God. But also, it was associated with paganism. This would be another way to prevent the Jews from engaging in pagan religion.

23:31 Now he's come to Jerusalem to worship. The best guess is that's a thousand miles. That's a thousand miles. Just imagine walking a thousand miles or being carried a thousand miles all the way to Jerusalem. What do you have here? You have a searching heart. Something's going on in this individual because he's coming. He's coming to Jerusalem to worship. Somewhere along the road, he has heard about the God of Israel. Some Jews must have migrated into that area. We know they were in Egypt. We know there was a great rabbinical library in Alexandria, and it probably extended its influence. And he had found out about the true God. The answers to his heart questions weren't being answered in paganism. He wasn't getting the answers his heart was crying for.

24:26 So he's going to make a thousand, some even say a 1,200-mile trip. He's weary with his own gods. He's weary with the assorted elements of his own religion. He's weary with the loose morals of paganism. He's weary with the suggestions of other nations. He's maybe wandered through various religious options. He's come to Judaism. Some people think he may have been a proselyte. That would be a Gentile who actually was circumcised and joined Judaism. Maybe took the law upon himself. Maybe he even found another group of Jews that he could be associated with and attended some kind of synagogue in Ethiopia. We don't know that. Whether he was what they called a God-fearer, a Gentile who had converted to Judaism or not, we don't know.

25:20 But he was certainly drawn to the God of Israel. He had it in his heart to know the God of Israel. He had come all the way to Jerusalem to worship the true God. He was empty, however. He was unfulfilled in his search. All he found, no doubt, in Judaism up to this point was ceremony, ritual, routine, cold formality, no answer to his searching heart. So here's another component in what issues in true salvation, a genuine hunger for the truth, a genuine hunger for the truth. That's a prerequisite. a desire for the truth, a longing for the truth. That's the beatitude attitude, isn't it? Blessed is the man who hungers after righteousness, who thirsts after righteousness, for he will be filled.

26:17 God meets the heart that has been prompted to hunger and thirst and seeking, which is not natural to the sinner. Second Chronicles, we read this, these are good things found in you in that you have taken away the idols out of the land and have prepared your heart to seek God. That's a good thing. You're weary with your idols. You're done with false religion, and now you're seeking God. Second Chronicles 30, the Lord God pardon everyone who prepares His heart to seek God. Or 2 Chronicles 30, a couple of verses later of Hezekiah, to seek His God He did with all His heart. Or Psalm 119.2, blessed are they that seek Him with the whole heart. Or Hosea 6.3, you shall know if you follow on to know the Lord. Or Jeremiah 29.13, and you shall seek Me and find Me when you shall search for Me with all your heart." Or those wonderful words of John 7 in verse, I think it's verse 17, if anyone is willing to do his will, he will know of the teaching, whether it's of God or whether I speak for myself.

27:35 So a willing heart, a seeking heart, a hungry heart, a longing heart. Salvation comes to those who hunger for it. This man sought for salvation. So what is the preparation for a true salvation? The sovereign work of the Spirit, the submissive will of the servant who will be God's instrument, and the searching worship of the sinner.