The Gospel for the Nations: Acts 8:26–40
Acts: To the ends of the earth • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Pray
Pray
We love efficiency. If something is working, we want to maximise it.
We look for trends to boost sales,
Case studies to learn from,
And even systems that work are constantly streamlined.
It’s hard to think of any example, where we want something to keep workint,
Are seeing it work and then just move on.
That’s why Acts 8 seems bonkers!.
Philip has just preached in Samaria,
The Gospel has broken cultural borders,
The apostles have arrived and confirmed all the conversions, bestowing the HS upon the Samaritans, not just the jews.
and the response has been huge.
Crowds paid attention.
Evil spirits fled.
The lame walked.
They received the HS.
They founds salvation in Jesus.
There was much joy in that city .
You can imagine Philip thinking, “This is it — revival has come! This is where God is at work!”
And then the Lord interrupts:
Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, ‘Go south to the road—the desert road—that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.’
From a thriving city to a barren desert.
From crowds in city to one solitary man.
From many rejoicing to one confused foreign official in his chariot.
But this is how Acts unfolds.
Jesus is fulfilling His promise from Acts 1:8 — that the gospel goes from Jerusalem, to Judea and Samaria, and then to the ends of the earth.
And what is clear is that The Spirit directs every step, not man.
And so some encouragements we’ll see along the way:
God is not just about large crowds but is interested in the individual,
not just about insiders but about outsiders,
not just about the near but about the far.
1 - Go where God sends (vv. 26–29)
1 - Go where God sends (vv. 26–29)
Philip is told to go,
So he started out, and on his way he met an Ethiopian eunuch, an important official in charge of all the treasury of the Kandake (which means ‘queen of the Ethiopians’). This man had gone to Jerusalem to worship,
This really is a dramatic change of scene.
Luke underlines the strangeness of the command as we read in v26 - the desert road.
Not a place of opportunity.
Not a centre of influence.
A barren stretch of land where you would expect to meet almost no one.
Granted It was the main route for travellers from Africa into the middle east, but not a place for the faint hearted.
Well beyond the last watering whole and villages for supplies.
Not many would take the journey, and it’s certainly not the place for arranging a meeting.
But that is exactly where God sends Philip.
And notice Philip’s obedience: “So he started out.” He does not argue. He does not delay. He obeys.
John Stott notes: “It is worth pausing to admire Philip’s prompt obedience. He went without question. He did not ask what he would find, whom he would meet, or what he was to do. He simply obeyed.”
That’s the first lesson for us. Mission, even evangelism, is not our idea.
Evangelism is not driven by our strategy.
It is the Spirit’s work,
unfolding in God’s time,
often in surprising ways.
Our JOb? To GO.
And I don’t think we are to assume Philip sets out and that same day he’s done.
It would likely be days or weeks of travel to get to this road!
And the whole time he simply obeys and trusts God.
If we wait for all our plans and ideas and comforts to be in place before we ever went on mission,
Or opened our mouths about Jesus at work or school,
Or dare I say before we even obey the Word of God in any arena,
then we would never begin.
Illust - The young woman who waited 5 years
But if we simply read of God’s command to ‘Go to all nations’, or ‘to be Jesus\ witnesses’, then we can simple obey.
We go, we speak, we tell - we don’t need to know who will respond,
or if it will work, or even who we are talking to.
We simply obey, go and speak.
Many mission autobiographies will testify to not being ready,
not being confident,
not knowing what they will find
- but becasue the Bible says Go,
they have a heartfelt desire to do just that,
and as oppertunity arises, and people groups get put on their heart by circumstance and God’s work in their hearts - they go!
Not every person should be a missionary in a cross-cultural situation as Phil is now,
There are good reasons many should not be,
But I tend to think that more of us should be.
Are you too old,
Too comfortable,
Not comfortable enough,
Too scared?
Too worried about failure,
Too unsure about your abilities?
Too set on what our children ‘need’?
While everyone doens’t have to go, I do think the bible call everyone to ask themselves if they can.
Adn if you can - maybe we should. Come chat.
But at a lower level, How much better we would be at evangelism,
if ratehr than waiting for our perfect ideal situation to arise before we speak,
we simpy spoke - becasue we want to obey our Lord.
And so, on that road, Philip meets a remarkable man.v27
“an Ethiopian eunuch, an important official in charge of all the treasury of the Kandake (queen) of the Ethiopians.”
In the ancient world, “Ethiopia” referred not to modern Ethiopia but to the kingdom of Nubia, centred around modern Sudan.
It was considered the edge of the known world — “the ends of the earth.” Quite literally for them.
The word Ethiopia is from the greek of that time meaning ‘burnt-faced’. In other-words, a black man. Not middle eastern by culture or race.
So when Luke introduces us to this Ethiopian, he is saying: “Here is someone from the ends of the earth.”
He is a eunuch — most likely, but not always, meaning castrated so he is considered set aside and safe to serve in a royal court.
Practically, Eunuchs were trusted officials because they posed no threat to the line of royals.
But for Jews, eunuchs were ritually excluded as we read in (Deut 23:1).
So here is a man of contrast:
A powerful treasurer, yet powerless in his body.
Likely Rich and influential, yet without his own freedom.
A seeker of God, but still an outsider.
And yet he has come to Jerusalem “to worship.”
He has travelled over 1,000 miles for a glimpse of God.
And he is returning, puzzling over the Scriptures.
This is where the Spirit sends Philip.
The first completely non-Jew is to be very much an
outsider, castrated, exlcuded,
from the ends of the earth.
A different appearance,
with worldly control but nothing of his own.
The gospel is for everyone.
This means 2 things:
1 - we must hold no prejudices in sharing the gospel,
we should not let anything allow us to think that God may not want this person or that.
2 - no person is unworthy of our attention or the Gospel - God cares for each individual.
God could have sent Philip by his spirit into the bustling capital the Ethiopians, to speak to the queen herself, and to amass a great following around him as he’d done in Samaria.
BUt no - God has his ways.
A lone man, far from home, on a dessert road, exculded from the temple, excluded from his own right to his own family - God wants that man to know him.
Do you trust God enough to go where He sends, even when it looks barren?
An office where no-one seems to care about God?
A school where friends or even teachers dismiss the claims of the bible?
An unreached people group even?
We may find ourselves in a barren spiritual desert - but God is directing HIs gospel through us. He is in control.
We simply obey.
GO and Speak - you never know.
2 - Speak from the Word (vv. 30–35)
2 - Speak from the Word (vv. 30–35)
In the ancient world, reading aloud was normal,
so as Philip is told to approach the chariot we read:
Then Philip ran up to the chariot and heard the man reading Isaiah the prophet. ‘Do you understand what you are reading?’ Philip asked.
It’s a simple, disarming question, one we can use if someone is reading the bible:
‘How can I,’ he said, ‘unless someone explains it to me?’ So he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.
The man’s humility is striking.
The passage he was reading is Isaiah 53:7–8:
This is the passage of Scripture the eunuch was reading: (ish 53v7-8)
‘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.’
This is the heart of the Old Testament gospel.
The Servant of the Lord suffers in silence, like a lamb,
is unjustly condemned,
is cut off from life —
yet, as the Ethiopian has clearly read in the verse before this,
by his wounds many are healed.
The eunuch asked Philip, ‘Tell me, please, who is the prophet talking about, himself or someone else?’
IF it’s himself - who was he and what happened - and if someone else - perhaps he can heal me before God as well?
Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus.
This is evangelism at its best.
Philip begins with where the man is.
Using the Scriptures.
He points to Jesus.
He proclaims the good news.
And this is a vital reminder: the Spirit says God, and also the Spirit in His Word reveals Christ.
The Spirit and the Word always work together.
I wonder, do we have confidence that when we open the Bible with someone, Christ Himself will be revealed?
We don’t need clever techniques.
We need to point to Jesus in the Scriptures.
The beauty of the scriptures are that they are God’s words - not ours.
And when God’s word is opened, God works by His Spirit!
Here he bring Philip from miles away to answer this mans question,
because he was reading the scriptures!
We can give people bibles, or a gospel, and then ask them what they thought,
or if they have questions.
Or if someone is willing, ask them to read the bible with you.
If we go and speak, make sure we speak the Word,
because people will then see that Christ is the suffering servant.
The one who faces the judgement of God for our sin and rebleion in our place/.
And he did it willingly for those that repent and believe
‘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.
He gave up his earthly inheriatnce, and bouhgt us eternal life and healing before God.
In his humiliation he was deprived of justice.
Who can speak of his descendants?
For his life was taken from the earth.’
With The Word Open, the HS is at work,
And we may well be surprised who responds to God’s word.
After all,
God does,
3 - Welcome the outsider (vv. 36–38)
3 - Welcome the outsider (vv. 36–38)
As they travelled along the road, they came to some water and the eunuch said, ‘Look, here is water. What can stand in the way of my being baptised?’
That question carries centuries of exclusion.
He knows he is a eunuch.
He knows Deuteronomy 23:1.
He has been to Jerusalem, but he could not go fully in.
He knows he’s refered to by the colour of his face,
He knows he has money, but he’s not free,
He is a man on the margins.
But he has just heard about Jesus,
the Servant of Isaiah 53.
Who heals people before God.
And perhaps he is so interested in this passage because he knows in Isaiah 56v4-5 and now releases it is true in Christ:
For this is what the Lord says: ‘To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, who choose what pleases me and hold fast to my covenant— to them I will give within my temple and its walls a memorial and a name better than sons and daughters; I will give them an everlasting name that will endure for ever.
Jesus welcomes the outsider.
Notice the promsie is not that all the eunuchs earthly troubles will be resolved,
but that they - even they, who are excluded from the temple to worship God,
will have a way, through the suffering servant,
to be included as something more than sons and daughters - they will be children of God.
Better than temple worship - an eternal glorious inheritance - despite who they are, and what they have done, and what has been done to them!
Jesus Christ is the one who welcopmes even a man like me!?
Well then I must be baptised into His name he says.
This is the gospel on offer to us all,
This is the gospel that will be received in joy by many as we
go, speak, open the word, show Christ.
The gospel that says
- yes - your life is a problem,
your acess to a holy God is forbidden by your sin and nature,
but - oh - there is servant who has died willingly in your place before God,
so that you and I may become the very sons and daughters of the Most high.
We now have an everlasting name, forever - with the Lord Jesus.
In Christ, the excluded are welcomed.
The cut-off are grafted in.
The outsider becomes an insider.
So he asks: “What can stop me?” And the answer is: Nothing. He is baptised v38 — marked publicly as belonging to Christ.
Who are the “outsiders” in our minds?
The people we think could never belong?
This story declares that no one is beyond the reach of grace.
Christ Jesus welcomes all people.
Even you and me -
Sinners who ought, by all rights, to be excluded from worshipping a holy God -
given free eternal access through the suffering servant.
4 - Rejoice as the gospel spreads (vv. 39–40)
4 - Rejoice as the gospel spreads (vv. 39–40)
When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away, and the eunuch did not see him again, but went on his way rejoicing. Philip, however, appeared at Azotus and travelled about, preaching the gospel in all the towns until he reached Caesarea.
Rejoicing — that’s the mark of salvation.
The gospel has reached the ends of the earth, and it brings joy.
YOu can imagine the excitement the man returns with,
as he begins to tell others of the suffering servant who gives eternal life to those who repent and believe - which is what baptism represents.
A washing away of sin, and a new eternal life.
the big point of Acts is being shown, the gospel is going global.
Church tradition holds that he did return to his region spreading the joy of Christ.
The nations rejoice!
In deed - we ought to rejoice.
God could have kept the salavation of Jesus the servant for the people of Israel.
But in his mercy and according to his glory - he extends it to the ends of the earth.
The first fully gentile Christian is an African. And later we’ll read in Acts of the gospel going to the first European.
If we believe in, repent before, and are baptised in the name of Jesus - we too are a people who rejoice.
The Eunochs life was not one of perfect circumstance - but it was from here on in one of Joy.
Ours ought to be too,
As we think on and obey our suffering servant who makes us children of God.
Meanwhile, Philip is whisked away to Azotus, and preaches through all the towns until Caesarea. The mission keeps moving. The Spirit keeps leading. The Word keeps advancing.
Conclusion: The Gospel on the Desert Road
Conclusion: The Gospel on the Desert Road
On a barren road, God shows us His plan for the world:
His Spirit leads His people where He wills.
His Word reveals Jesus as the Servant who suffered for us.
His Gospel welcomes the outsider into God’s family.
His Mission brings joy to us and to the nations.
Pray
