Sermon – Acts 8:26-49 – Explain It To Me

Rev. Jeffrey T. Howard

Sermon – Acts 8:26-49 – Explain It To Me

Pitts Creek and Beaver Dam Churches

Fifth Sunday of Easter

May 6, 2012

On this fifth Sunday in the season of Easter we are still looking at the first church. With the coming of the Holy Spirit, and faithful preaching of the resurrection of the dead and the promise of eternal life this church has flourished. After God caused a lame man to be healed in a very public miracle the numbers of church members quickly grew to over five thousand. This required them to setup more structure for the church. The Apostles continued to study scripture and proclaim the good news of resurrection. A board of Deacons was formed to care for the the congregation. And as we will see today specialized ministries were formed to take the good news to the end of the earth. We will look at one the earliest foreign missionary, but first let's pray.

“Grant unto us, O Lord, to be occupied in the mysteries of thy heavenly wisdom, with true progress in piety, to thy glory and our own edification. Amen.” (John Calvin)

The idea of foreign mission work came from Jesus who said, (Acts 1:8) ...you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” So far we have seen the first church obey the command to evangelize Jerusalem and the region around it, Judea. But it wasn't until official persecution started that the church was forced to flee to Samaria. There, one of the Deacons, Philip began to preach the gospel, cast out demons and heal the sick. By doing so he caused a lot of excitement in the region. Many of the Samaritans came to faith and through baptism received the promise of eternal life. Despite persecution, the church continued to grow.

But God had something else in mind for Philip. And so we have this amazing story in the eighth chapter of Acts. Here is how it begins.

Acts 8:26-27 26 Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, "Go south to the road-- the desert road-- that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza." 27 So he started out,

This is how foreign mission gets started. It all begins with a call from God. We engage in daily prayers and meditation on scripture and listen for God's voice. Eventually God tells us where we are to go. God spoke to me calling me to short term mission work through the voice of a man I greatly respected. His name was Don Kruse. Don had been a foreign service officer for the United States government and had served for five years in Israel and Palestine. While serving the country in this far off and dangerous place Don developed relationships with Christians and churches of the Holy Land. Whenever Christian pilgrims came from America he would encourage then to meet and develop relationships with Palestinian Christians. Sadly, few people took him up on this offer. So he decided that in retirement he would work within the Presbyterian church to encourage relationships between American Presbyterians and Arab Christians. I never dreamed that I would one day go to Israel and Palestine, see the places where Jesus went, and worship with an Arabic language church, but with Don's encouragement that is exactly what I did. I responded to God's call.

Let's keep going with Philip's encounter with someone from a far off land.

Acts 8:27 ...and on his way he met an Ethiopian eunuch, an important official in charge of all the treasury of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians. This man had gone to Jerusalem to worship,

So Philip encountered someone very unusual, an ambassador from the Queen of Ethiopia. This man was powerful and extremely rich. And we are told that he had already been in Jerusalem for worship. This is a very important point about foreign mission work. God is already there preparing the mission field before we even arrive. The Holy Spirit is already working in the hearts of non-believer around the world, and just needs us to come along with the proclamation of the resurrection from the dead and the promise of eternal life. This is what make our mission work so effective. Let's keep going with the story.

Acts 8: 28 … and on his way home was sitting in his chariot reading the book of Isaiah the prophet.

This is where the story gets amazing. This Ethiopian ambassador already has a Greek translation of the Old Testament and is reading it out loud trying to make sense of it. You see many people already know about Jesus. They might have heard some stories about what he did. Maybe people have heard that he was a great teacher or even a prophet. Even Muslims are taught this. And this gives us a great opportunity to tell people what Jesus is really all about. The church I visited in Palestine operated a Christian school. Because this school was better that the Muslim public schools many Muslim parents sent their kids there. It is illegal for Christians to evangelize Muslims in Muslim countries and a Muslim could be shot for converting to Christianity, but it's ok for a Christian teacher sin a Christian school to teach Muslim kids about Jesus. And this school would love to have Americans come in the Summer to teach the Palestinian kids English and share our stories of Jesus. Let's get back to Philip.

Acts 8: 29 The Spirit told Philip, "Go to that chariot and stay near it." 30 Then Philip ran up to the chariot and heard the man reading Isaiah the prophet. "Do you understand what you are reading?" Philip asked. 31 "How can I," he said, "unless someone explains it to me?" So he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.

People around the world are hungry for information about Jesus. In many places this information is blocked. In some places it is illegal to openly talk about Jesus. I have a friend who works for a mission organization in California. This organization recruits Christians in America and teaches them how to teach English as a second language. Many countries around the world want their people to learn English because it help them in business. They want Americans to come and teach English to their kids. So they welcome the English teachers from this organization. But all of their teachers are Christian and even though they are not supposed to teach Christianity it is impossible to teach English without sharing your faith and witnessing to what Jesus has done for you. This is a way to get Christian missionaries into places where they could not otherwise go. So let's listen in as the Ethiopian official and Philip have their conversation.

Act 8: 32 The eunuch was reading this passage of Scripture: "He was led like a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb before the shearer is silent, so he did not open his mouth. 33 In his humiliation he was deprived of justice. Who can speak of his descendants? For his life was taken from the earth." 34 The eunuch asked Philip, "Tell me, please, who is the prophet talking about, himself or someone else?" 35 Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus.

Philip explained to this official that Jesus Christ did not just come our of thin air. Rather he was predicted by the ancient prophets. This proved that Jesus was who he said he was, Jesus is the messiah, the Son of God. Whenever we do foreign mission work we have to be very clear about who Jesus is. There will be those who want us to water down the good news so that it will be palatable to those of other faiths. But Christian evangelism is based on the promise of eternal life for all who belief. So to believe in Jesus as God is crucial for those who desire not to perish. And so we have to maintain the integrity of the gospel we proclaim so that the Jesus people believe in is the one who promises eternal life. Let's finish our story.

Acts 8: 36 As they traveled along the road, they came to some water and the eunuch said, "Look, here is water. Why shouldn't I be baptized?" 37 38 And he gave orders to stop the chariot. Then both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water and Philip baptized him. 39 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. 40 Philip, however, appeared at Azotus and traveled about, preaching the gospel in all the towns until he reached Caesarea.

In the space of a few hours the church in Africa was born. One conversation about Jesus with someone who was made receptive by the Holy Spirit was all it took. Church tradition tells us that this official started the first church in Ethiopia and this spread throughout the continent. Today the churches of Africa are rapidly growing. Many of them are made up of the very poorest of people in their communities. They are struggling to proclaim the good news of the resurrection and the promise of eternal life. But they do so with joy because God is with them.

I have recently met some African Christians students at UMES. They are extremely faithful and passionate about evangelism. Their strong desire is to help the American Church regain our passion for the gospel. One of them told me that if we developed a relationship with an African church by just sending them letters and praying for them they would be overjoyed.

Today there are several ways to participate in foreign mission. We can support missionaries of the PCUSA. We can send our own missionaries. David Holland, a child of our church, is preparing to go to China and will be here next week to tell us about it. We can start new churches for people who have come to the Eastern Shore from foreign countries. This church supports my wife, Grace, in her efforts to develop a multicultural church in Princess Anne. A foreign mission experience is available to you by driving fifteen minutes on a Friday evening. By be a part of the Presbyterian Church we also have opportunities to participate in mission work in foreign lands. New Castle Presbytery has a program to help churches here form relationships with churches in the Congo. Presbyterian are sinstalling water filtration systems in Central American churches. Presbyterians are providing disaster relief to tornado victims in Kentucky. So you can see that by being connected we can join with other Presbyterian to do mission work around the world. Let's pray.

Father in Heaven, we thank you for the work of Scottish missionaries who founded and grew our church. Bless us with knowledge of your will for how we can continue the mission work started by Philip. Bless us with the ability to reach out to cultures beyond are own. This we pray in your son's name. Amen.