His Mission ALWAYS Moves Forward | Dr. John Ewart

Well, good morning Inglewood. I hate your Bibles this morning

and turn to Acts chapter 8, if you will.

Acts 8 · chapter mention

If you're a guest today, we're so glad that you're here.

We've been marching through these first few chapters of the

book of Acts. Some of you may wonder why we

are actually wanting to see what a biblical church, Biblical

church member, disciple, what the purpose of us being here all

about. Before I dive into that, I'll

catch up to you. Let me just remind you of a

couple things. Vacation Bible School is coming

up in just a few weeks. You can register out in the

lobby for that. Also, we're going to do a little

preparation for Vacation Bible School.

And so I need you back here Wednesday night.

Some of you've been coming to our Wednesday night study.

It's been a wonderful time. This week we're going to do

something different. We're going to meet at 6:30 in

the gym in the Lewis Building and I want to teach you a life

skill. I want to teach you about prayer

walking. And then we'll have some

assignments for those who are willing to go out into

neighborhoods and prayer walk and some who can't do that

physically. Don't worry about that.

You can prayer drive and or some folks who are going to pray

inside the facility. So we also have a guide for

that. Our students are going to join

us and many of them are going to pray inside the facility.

So don't worry about the going out part.

Come learn the life skill and we'll let the rest take care of

itself. Then in a couple of weeks, we're

actually going to hand out about 2000 of these door hangers to

help invite children and families to be a part of us for

VBS. So hope you'll be prepared to do

what's coming up over these next few weeks.

Next week we're actually going to observe the Lord's Supper

together. And I want you to please

prayerfully prepare by examining your own hearts, your own

relationship, your own fellowship with the Lord and

others. I take this very seriously

because I believe the Bible does.

And so in first Corinthians 11 it says this.

Whoever therefore eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in

an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and

blood of the Lord. Let a person examine himself

then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup.

For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats

and drinks judgement on himself. That is why many of you are weak

and ill and some have died. So I pray that this week you'll

spend time in preparation for that.

For those who have trusted in Christ and, and we'll be

prepared. So come next Sunday, examined,

forgiven, committed, and ready to come join the King's mission,

which has been our theme in the book of Acts.

So in a bit, I'll give you an opportunity to begin that

preparation by responding to God's calling in your life, as

Pastor Jordan mentioned. And so just look forward to

that. Speaking of calling, last time

we were together, Stephen, a committed, called follower of

Christ, gave his life for the gospel and for our guests.

Like I say, we've been marching through these early chapters

together. Stephen might seem like a

tragedy to us, and there's certainly tragic elements to it,

but we're also going to see how God takes difficulties and

transforms them into opportunities and opportunities

for us, for our King, for his mission, for the spread of the

gospel. Because one of the things we're

going to learn is his mission always moves forward.

It may move forward with us, it may move forward without us, but

God's will will be done. I've read the book and in the

end, he wins. In the end, he will have his

way, and so he's always going to move forward.

The first 7 chapters of Acts have kind of shown us a group of

believers in Jerusalem closely tied to Judaism, still mainly

reaching out to other Jewish people.

But the church is going to be forced out of their status quo.

The church is going to be forced out of its comfort zone so the

gospel can spread. So change is a coming.

And how? Well, part of our question this

morning is how well do we deal with change?

How well do we work through difficulty in life?

So we're going to learn some lessons today on how to to deal

with difficulties and move through them and move forward

with King's mission. Because Stephen was just stoned

to death for his faith. We pick it up in Acts chapter 8,

Acts 8:1

verse 1. And so 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 lamentations over him.

But Saul was ravaging the church and entering house after house.

He dragged off men and women and committed them to prison.

So for us to move forward in our difficulties, first to fulfill

the mission of God as He wants us to, we've going to have to

recognize that God must move us beyond our comfort.

God's going to do that. The same day Stephen was

martyred. We see violent persecution break

out against the church. Paul was ravaging the church.

This translation would present it.

That word is a very violent word.

It means to seek to destroy. In the Greek translation of the

Old Testament, the Septuagint, this word was actually used to

portray wild beasts tearing apart flesh.

I mean, there's a very violent image.

So house to house, he's dragging off men and women to prison.

This is very consistent with Paul's testimony that he'll

share later in his letters as he talks about his life before

Jesus. And so Christianity early on

begins to suffer intense persecution.

Suffering actually becomes a mark of the faith for many folks

in the early church, but it also continues today.

We may not recognize it here in our comfort.

Yeah, we may think that Christianity is under

persecution in the United States of America, But you need to have

travelled with me where I go, and I can show you places where

persecution takes on a whole new meaning.

In fact, right now in the world, more Christians are killed in

the West African nation of Nigeria than any other nation on

the planet. In fact, in the year 2020, four

3100 Christians were murdered in Nigeria alone.

In fact, just the other day, about June 13th, while they

slept, Fulani militants, which is a tribal group, but it's also

a group known for its radical Islam in West Africa, attacked a

group of displaced believers from all sides and within two

hours, 200 of them were murdered.

And then they tried to attack 700 more in another place but

were stopped. So persecution, real persecution

takes place in our world today. I have friends, if you're

watching the news as I am staying up late praying through

what's happening in the Middle East and I have friends in both

nations. You've got to understand that.

And I've been talking to people inside Iran and, and they're

believers who are there. The fastest growing church in

the Muslim world is there and they're believers and they're

mourning the loss of life, but they're also perplexed because

they're praying that the regime would change so that there would

be freedom and there'd be worship.

I have I'm part of a ministry where we, we hope to start a, a

seminary in Tehran one day, as I've mentioned before.

And obviously we have friends in Jerusalem who are being slain

and attacked. So, so we need to pray for both

sides and think through what this means.

In fact, though, it's interesting because persecution

has never historically ever stopped God from spreading his

gospel, often the opposite is true.

Historically, the church has often grown more powerful when

it was persecuted and forced out of its comfort.

But we also need to stop for a moment.

It's easy to just kind of pass through this passage to get

maybe on to what happens to Saul, etcetera.

But we don't want to. We don't want to move too

quickly to these people who are being dragged off and committed

to prison. These are real people and these

are persecuted people. 200 people that died in Nigeria is

not just a number in a newspaper article.

These are real people. And so persecution is also

something that that is horrific. It's a horrific experience.

And we don't want to pass over the personal pain.

We don't want to pass over the loss flippantly without concern.

Families were being torn apart. People were imprisoned by Saul.

People would die because of this and persecution would result in

that later in church history. But as I stated last week, what

Satan or what what man intended for evil, God is going to bring

good out of it. He's going to use it.

So their pain is not in vain. Their pain is not without

purpose. But sometimes in the middle of

personal pain and loss, we don't understand that.

And we don't understand why this is happening to me.

Some of you are going through things right now.

You've been sharing with me. And why is this happening right

now? And we can even accuse or

question or be angry with God. And to be frank, we may never

fully understand why this happened while we're in this

life, but I guess that's when our faith truly gets tested,

isn't it? We must keep in mind and trust

that God is seeing a much larger, much longer picture and

purpose than we can see. And faith must be, must replace

our fear and, and we must trust in His sovereignty, and that

trust must replace our confusion.

And I never said that was going to be easy.

I never said that was going to be simple.

And I certainly wouldn't tell you that it would be

instantaneous. Sometimes it takes a while.

We have the benefit in this story of looking back through

the filter of purpose. We're going to see how God uses

this to spread his gospel. We can look back at that.

But in the midst of this, you got to think in those moments of

terror, devotion must have been challenged.

And so we now know that without this persecution, they would

likely have never left Jerusalem.

They would never have left on their own.

Travel would not have been a normal part of their life.

Going around the world wouldn't have been normal for them.

They would have likely stayed put in what they knew.

They would have likely just stayed put in that which they

were comfortable. But the gospel had to be spread

around the Empire. And sometimes I worry about us,

Inglewood. I worry about us because

sometimes I think we think we have a luxury of option.

We think we have a choice. I can get up on a Sunday morning

and decide whether or not I'm going to church, and if I don't

like this church, I can just choose another one.

And that luxury of option, that luxury of choice, or in many

places in the world, they just don't have that.

Sometimes I wonder if that doesn't help deepen faith.

Sometimes I worry that our comfort is actually our enemy.

Our luxury might actually be an obstacle.

I worry about that. And sometimes I wonder what God

might have to do about that in order for that to change.

So the gospel had to spread around the empire.

So all except that the apostles were the word is scattered in

English. This would sound familiar.

Diaspora that where you get the word diaspora.

The, the, the word just means seed.

So they're scattered like the seed.

So they got to go fulfil Acts 18 to go to Judea and go to Samaria

and not just stay in Jerusalem. And God is absolutely in

control, even in the middle of great difficulty, even when life

makes no sense, He still is. And we often will quote Romans

828 in moments like that. And we know that for those who

love God, all things work together for good for those who

are called according to his purpose.

But I always look at this verse and I say that doesn't mean that

I'm always going to enjoy God's definition of good.

Sometimes I don't like God's good in the moment.

Sometimes it's a tough, hard to understand good, you know, and

Inglewood, this church has been stretched in her past, but God

can cause that to work together for a much greater good.

So let's not fight as stretching.

Let's learn from it. Let's move forward with him in

his goodness. Because remember, scattered

seeds will sprout and they'll grow.

And that's what we want to see happen.

So we don't have the luxury, we don't have the permission to

just sit comfortably in this room whenever we choose to, week

after week. That's not biblical.

We have to recognize there's more.

We must move beyond our comfort to join His mission.

So how, how does this happen? How do we do this?

Look at verse 4. Now those who were scattered

went about preaching the Word. So to fulfill His mission for us

to move through even the difficult times of life, He's

going to have to move us beyond our comfort.

But secondly, He's going to have to move us to spread His truth.

Persecution did not hamper these witnesses.

The spread of the gospel increased as they came out of

Jerusalem. It got even more and more.

It grew and they shared wherever they went.

Now I know to the point of ad nauseam.

I know to the point of I can't believe he's saying it again.

He says it every week. I know that I'm being redundant.

I'm, I'm purposely repetitively being redundant.

I'm purposely saying the same thing over and over.

Remember, we, we have 74% of those who live all around us who

aren't doing this. They're not even taking

advantage of the choice. They're not in a church, they're

not in a synagogue. They're not in, they're not in

any religious endeavor. 74% of people who live within 10 miles

of you right now, that's a lot of people.

That's a lot of people. And there are 1,000,000 more in

the county and the state and the nation, billions more around the

world like the ones we've prayed about.

And God has planted Inglewood right in the middle of a huge

harvest that is ripe. And that is no accident.

It could be the greatest spiritual awakening to ever

occur in the state of North Carolina if Inglewood will be

the tip of the spear. And today I'm going to be

sharing right after this service, right after Jordan lets

me get done and right after Jordan feeds everybody.

I get to share with all the Connect group leaders and all

the ministry family leaders as soon as Jordan let me about a

new strategy of practical discipleship, outreach, prayer

ministry, and missions that I'm expecting.

Just beware. I said this in the first

service. They almost groaned.

I thought they were going to leave.

I'm expecting 100% participation from everybody.

That's what I'm expecting. I'll be disappointed if I don't

have that. And so I need you to come

Wednesday night to learn the life skill of prayer walking so

we can be praying about this and other things.

And then you just wait. It's coming very soon.

But first, let's look at some specific examples that will

actually help us. Look at verse 5 S Philip went

down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ.

Where did he go? What did I just say?

Samaria? Don't, don't miss that Samaria.

And the crowds with 1 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.

Samaria, you got that right. Samaria is that place where Mama

told you never to go. You can get in trouble over in

Samaria. Samaria is them, not us.

That's them, Samaria. This is a huge step for the

mission. Samaritans were enemy half

breeds of the Jewish believers, but the Holy Spirit's helping

them to see there are no unclean half breeds in the Kingdom of

God. When it comes to the Gospel,

what an amazing the gospel is the great equalizer.

It's the great uniter. So we even spread God's truth to

those who are not like us. That's why we have people right

now. In fact, Pastor Dylan been doing

a tremendous job of shepherding and leading and, and they're

sending constant messages. My phone will be lighting up

even as it's up here because I'm looking at them and I'm reading

them. They're on the ground.

They're that they've had their breakfast.

They're going to worship, they're going to get trained for

ministry. There's going to be about 80

students all together, not all from Inglewood.

We're joining them, we just provide a lot, big chunk of

that, and they're going to be ministering all across Oaxaca

City with people who are not like them because they need the

gospel. So Philips preaching was

undergirded by miracles, by signs of both disease and demon

fleeing before the power of the Holy Spirit.

And every time we see somebody saved.

I got to get you to understand this.

Every time you see somebody saved, or you see somebody

called the ministry or missions, or you see somebody forgiven, or

you see an addiction cycle broken, every time you see that,

you're seeing the same miraculous power.

Don't ever get tired of somebody standing up in that water

testifying to you. It's the same power.

So I'm praying for the miracles of the UPGS we pray for.

I'm praying for miracles this week in Oaxaca.

I'm praying for miracles this week in Rocky Mount.

And there was much joy in that city, not just a little, but

much. What a thing to be able to

testify when this group of students come back over

overwhelmed by the joy of unreached peoples being reached,

churches being planted in Oaxaca, Mexico.

What joy there. We could be in Rocky Mount when

we see people being saved, falling on their faces before

God, committing themselves to him.

What joy. But maybe you're here.

Maybe you're here and you're just going to say, John, I've

already got too much joy in my life.

I don't need anymore. Does anybody, anybody here have

too much joy? I'm just over.

I don't need any more of that. God just it's too much.

God, I got too much joy. I do.

Please don't give me anymore anybody in that place right now.

Did you know that between I don't make this stuff up, study

this stuff. Do you know between 60 and 70%

of the people in the United States of America would be

willing to have a spiritual conversation with somebody 60 to

70%, the majority of people. That's hundreds of millions of

people would be willing to talk about spiritual things and they

need Jesus and they need his joy and his truth.

It would be the largest spiritual awakening in human

history. And we could start that right

here. But we've got to take the truth.

We can't just hold on to the truth.

We have to take the truth. And we're going to bring you a

plan. Look at verse 14.

We'll go to verse 14. Don't worry, we'll come back.

We're going to cover all the verses.

You legalistic people. Hang on, there'll be all right,

everything will be good. Now when the apostles at

Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they

passed out. Is that what it says they

fainted on the spot? No, it says 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 I need you to really focus for a few minutes, and I need

you to really listen for a few minutes because you need to

understand some theology here, OK?

And there's some of that may have come from other traditions

where you learn something else, but I need you to hear what's

really going on here in the Bible, OK?

This is so unique, so new, so different.

The mother church has to check it out.

And Peter and John came to help at this very historic moment.

Now, this passage doesn't indicate judgement.

It indicates endorsement. So even the Samaritan can, the

Samaritans can be saved. I mean, they're going wow, God,

wow. OK.

But this and several other events that we're going to see

in the book of Acts coming up very quickly.

We're going to see these very unique moments in history and we

need to be very, very careful. Not to make them the normative

patterns for the rest of time. Let me explain this to you.

These Acts stories revealed the historic movement of God as he

saves different categories or different types of people on the

planet. OK, for the very first time.

So first you had Jewish people at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit

comes, now you have Samaritans, later you're going to have

Gentiles, and there's even going to be this weird little group of

John the Baptist followers later, because God's going to

make sure there's no exceptions. We're going to take care of

every kind of person, every type, every category of human

being can be saved. Doesn't mean everyone is, but

that type of person can. So God breaks these barriers to

salvation for the first time ever for each type or category

of person on the planet. And the Holy Spirit came in

special ways, just like He did at Pentecost for the Jews.

But these are very special, unique, historical,

one-of-a-kind moments. So these groups represent all of

us, including you. You're either Jewish or you're

Samaritan or you're Gentile, or maybe you're a weird little

follower of John the Baptist, OK.

And so you got to represent. This is representing everybody.

Now, why is this so important? This was absolutely crucial for

these Jewish believers to see. See, these Jewish believers that

the fact that the gospel movement was for all types of

people and not just for them, you remember they'd have an Old

Testament mindset which meant that God was theirs, Yahweh

belonged to them, and the fact that Yahweh would belong to

somebody else is a radical departure for them.

Even though Isaiah said we are supposed to be a light to the

Gentiles, the Hebrews did a really lousy job of that.

And so they had spent a lot of time condemning people who were

outside of their own people. So for the gospel to

breakthrough, that is quite dramatic.

Now, friends, unfortunately, I know churches who are this way.

I've worked with hundreds of them all across this country.

And, and churches that often condemn people who are outside

of us. I, I know churches that see the

lost people of their world as their enemies.

We have real enemies, folks. His name's Satan and he's going

to fry forever in a lake of fire.

Now His forces can report that to him.

His forces, his demonic forces, lostness, death, sin, those are

our enemies. Lost people around you are just

lost, and they need our love and they need our help to learn His

truth. So these Jewish believers needed

the special affirmation of the Holy Spirit placed upon the

salvation of these other categories in these very unique

ways in order to accept them. So it was huge for them, still

is for us. Without it, none of us could

have ever been saved. Because last time I checked, I'm

not Jewish. I needed God to go to other

kinds of people. All right, I'm not Jewish.

I'm not a Samaritan. I don't think granddaddy was a

little follower, John the Baptist.

I think I'm a Gentile and I needed the gospel.

So the gospels for all people, including you, your neighbor,

your colleague, your classmate, that person down the street

that's lost as a goose, that person that acts horribly, the

gospels for them. So this new strategy I'm going

to share today with leaders is going to help mobilize 100% of

us to spread His truth to them, along with a whole lot of other

things. What, what level of

precipitation, what level of participation am I looking for?

100% So run now. But later on in Scripture,

you'll see the more normal biblical pattern that emerges.

The Holy Spirit comes in and dwells and baptizes a person at

the moment of salvation. So there's no need for a second

experience. There's no need for a second

blessing or a second baptism of the Holy Spirit.

And what's really interesting about it is the guy who writes

about that more than anybody is Saul, who becomes Paul.

Look at verse 25. 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.

So not only did the apostles endorse the Samaritan mission,

they enthusiastically participated in it.

They share testimonies, they share the word of God.

And Samaritans, even Samaritans, can be saved.

But we also have another example and a more odd example, an

example of a power engagement. That could have been a great

distraction. It could have been a great

distortion of the truth. Go back to verse 9.

Let's cover this. But I always like that word.

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.

You think they paid attention to him?

See the redundancy? That's for emphasis and old

language. You see something more than

once. It means this is a big deal.

So to fulfil his mission through US, for us to move through the

difficulties to get to his mission, God going to have to

move us beyond our comfort. He's also going to have to move

us to spread his truth. Thirdly, he's going to have to

remind us of his power. Who's really in charge here?

Who's really in control? The sorcerer amazed them with

his power tricks. He even proclaimed himself to be

the great power. I mean, where's Gandalf in Lord

of the Rings music when you need it?

Simon was actually known in history.

He's actually documented in church history and other places.

There's evidence about him and even from the early church

fathers who talk about that, those who followed him and there

were those who modelled themselves after him and there

were even those who worshipped him as a God.

So this is a fairly celebrity type level person.

Look at verse 12. 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. So Simon believed something, but

there's going to be a question about his commitment or about

the completion of his belief. Look at verse 18.

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

gift of 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. It's nothing like pastoral care.

And Simon answered, Pray for me to the Lord, that nothing of

what you have said may come upon me.

So Simon was more amazed at the signs than he was at the

salvation. He, he made his money with his

magic in the past. And now he wanted to buy the

power of the Holy Spirit. He wanted to dispense the Holy

Spirit like a magic trick. In fact, the word simony or

simony actually comes from him and means the purchase of or the

sale of ecclesiastical pardon, or the sale of grace, or the

sale of a, of an ecclesiastical office, a church office.

And so he became known and for this, this idea of purchasing

God, sometimes I think I see that in church life.

I see people more impressed with the signs than the salvation.

I, I see people seeking A flashy show or shallow spiritual

emotionalism with no substance or, or, or to simply have their

personal perceived felt needs and once met their way that they

want the magic power without the sacrifice.

And, and it can be dangerous and, and Peter being Peter

didn't hold back. I, I like Peter, he harshly

condemned Simon's desire to manipulate God.

That's what he was trying because that's what magic is.

What magic is, is manipulating the powers to my benefit or to

your detriment. I can manipulate the powers,

right? And so instead of submitting to

the power of God, he wanted to manipulate the power of God for

his own good and for his own profit.

That's like the prosperity gospel, the prosperity gospel

movement of today where I can name it and I can control, I can

manipulate the power of God to claim it in my life.

We've got to be careful. That's magic.

That's not true spiritual maturity.

God the Holy Spirit is no person to be bought or controlled.

Simon had not fully or rightly responded to the gospel.

He responded to self. His heart was not right.

And, and, and if you are trying to control God, if you're trying

to manipulate him in some way, if you're just trying to get

pleased by the show, you better be careful.

If you're trying to control your own life, if you're even trying

to control the resources with what with which God has blessed

you, your heart's not right either.

Because Simon's motivation was inwardly focused and selfish,

it's amazing that we never find out if he repented or not.

We don't know he never appears again in Scripture.

So much for the great power. God's power cannot be bought.

God's power cannot be manipulated.

Salvation is a gift of grace that we cannot purchase, that we

cannot earn, but we must submit to it.

We must submit to this gift. We must submit to His mission.

We must submit to His power. This is the proper biblical

formula. He's going to move us beyond our

comfort. We got to spread His truth.

We've got to recognize His true power.

And then finally, God has to help us make disciples.

We can't do that by ourself either.

Look at verse 26. Now an age 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 Canada's Queen of The Ethiopians, who was in

charge of all her treasure. He had come to Jerusalem to

worship. Just note what Philip does.

Philip always goes exactly where God tells him to go when he

tells him to go. You know, there's a willingness

and obedience that are great descriptions of Philip.

I pray they become the greatest descriptions of Inglewood, that

we're willing to go. We're willing to go wherever and

whenever he commands. Now, in this case, this

Ethiopian was probably from the Kingdom of what was called Maro.

It doesn't exist anymore. In the Old Testament, it was

Cush. And this was considered kind of

the end of the earth for the Greeks and the Romans.

So we're already seeing Acts 18 moving forward.

And he's basically the Minister of Finance for the Kingdom.

And he was also likely a God fearing Gentile.

So he wasn't a full convert to Judaism, but he was one who

believed in Yahweh and would come to Jerusalem to observe and

to worship some verse 28 and was returning seated in his chariot

and he was reading the prophet Isaiah.

And the Spirit said to Philip, go over and join this chariot.

Again the Holy Spirit LED Philip goes, he obeys.

And I pray it may be so for Inglewood.

I'm begging you, Inglewood, listen to him and let's obey

him. Please pray He will lead us to

somebody seeking truth. Pray He'll lead you to somebody

who needs to understand the word of God.

Pray he leads you to somebody who needs to meet Jesus and

understand that. The Ethiopians reading from

Isaiah book about judgment, but it's also a book about hope and

a book about the future, but it's also the book that

describes the suffering servant of God, Israel's prophecy, or

excuse me, Isaiah's prophecies for Israel about Jesus.

Look at verse 30. So Philip ran to him and heard

him reading Isaiah the prophet and asked, do you understand

what you're reading? And he says, how can I unless

someone guides me? And he invited Philip to come up

and sit with him. So this Holy Spirit said go and

you couldn't stop Philip in his obedience, he sprints along with

the chariot and in obedience, I pray that's us Inglewood, that

we hop up to help people understand the Bible.

So he hops there, guiding somebody to understand God's

Word is an awesome privilege. And here we see this opportunity

to hop out of comfort zones and run to help others understand

God's truth. That sounds, I don't know,

Jordan, that sounds like a connect group to me.

Sounds like what we do on midweek services.

It sounds like what our family ministries are doing here with

her, our kids. That's why I harp so much in

being in them so much. Plus, you're going to hear some

great ways to become even stronger through them in our

training today. And I'm expecting what kind of

participation? I cannot wait for what is about

to be unveiled. So grab your unsaved, grab your

inactive, grab your uncommitted friends and get ready.

Get them to join you during these privileged moment because

that's what these are. These are privileges we got to

take advantage of the privileges we have to learn and to grow

because many don't have them. I was in Asheville, you know,

Asheville. I was in Nashville a few years

ago. I was ministering with a church,

consulting with a huge church out there.

And I was sitting at a little outdoor coffee shop on the

street there. And you can see the church

building from where I was sitting.

And a young man walks up to me, college age.

He wasn't in college. He was actually living out in

the woods. And he looked like he was living

out in the woods. I don't want to be mean, but you

know, he looked like he was living in the woods.

And he walked up to me and I just asked him, I said, you know

anything about that church over there.

And he goes, no man, I don't know anything about that church.

I said, would you like to learn something about it?

I said, sit down, I'll buy you some coffee.

Sits down with me. I buy him coffee.

And I said, and we talked for a while about who he was and what

what he was doing. And he was very natural looking.

I'll just leave it at that. And I said, I said, yeah, I'm

helping this church out a little bit.

I said, did you know that they're, they have groups up

there your age who made every single week to try to help each

other understand the Bible and to help each other live their

lives according to the Bible. He goes right up there.

And I said, yeah, right up there.

He goes, no way. I said Yahweh and I said,

listen, I said this gets better. I said, did you know they have

people your age in a group like that and that they would love

for you to join them tomorrow morning at 9:30?

No. Yeah, you, you, you don't know

that. Yeah, I do.

I'm sitting right here telling you this because you mean they

would let me the way I look, the way I smell and the way I'm

living. They'd welcome me up there to

come sit in their group and they'd teach me the Bible.

I said, my friend, I promise you they would.

And he goes, threw my coffee out the table.

He goes, I've been looking for this my whole life.

You mean somebody would actually help me?

I've been, I've been trying to read the Bible and I can't

understand it. You mean somebody up there my

age would accept me just the way I am and would help me

understand the Bible? I said, let me tell you, it gets

even better. I'll tell you what I'm going to

do. You see that door right there?

We could see a door right there. We're sitting there.

We can see the door. I said I'm going to stand at

that door tomorrow at 9:29. I'll be outside watching for

you. You come find me.

I'll walk you to this group. I'll introduce you to this

group. If you're not comfortable, if

you're not happy, I'll pull you right out with me, I promise.

And I'll take you, and I'll bring you back down here.

Buy another cup of coffee. I wasn't sure if he did 929, I

was late. He was standing there and I take

him in. Now, Friends, you got to

understand something before 929. Guess where I was?

I was in that small group with my finger pointed at him.

Here's what's finning to go down, folk, get your doughnuts

ready. And somebody needs a spare Bible

because he ain't going to have one.

I walk him over there, lovely people welcoming him, loving

him, taking. And he looks at me and goes,

John, I'm good. And I left him there.

We make so many assumptions. He actually said to me, you mean

I can show up without a ticket? I can show up just by myself.

I don't have to be invited by somebody who's already there.

I can just show up. I don't have to have a member

want me there. We make a lot of assembly.

We think they all know church. They don't know church.

I didn't know church. My first church was Fellowship

of Christian Athletes. I didn't know I could just go to

church. People don't know they can just

come. We got to walk alongside of

them, put our arms around him. We take so much for granted, we

take so many privileges as a choice.

I know so many who would give so much around the world, so many

people I know around the world to have comfortable rooms, to

have small groups to study the Bible.

In verse 32. 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.

Justin was not 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 asked you, does the prophet say this about himself

or about someone else? Then Philip opened his mouth,

and beginning with this scripture, he told them, told

him the good news about Jesus. Pointing to Christ from the book

of Isaiah is easy. In fact, one of the greatest

ways to share the gospel with somebody in Judaism is from the

book of Isaiah. Go to the suffering servant

passages. There's no question they know

that he'll be describing Jesus. The Old Testament prophecies

about Jesus needed a New Testament interpretation.

So Philip explains how how the fulfillment of these and many

other Old Testament passages were true and the host stories

about him from Genesis to Revelation.

The host stories about Jesus. Look at verse 36.

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? Now go to verse 38.

And he commanded the chariot to stop, and they both went down

into the water, Philip and the eunuch, and he baptized him.

Now some of you are looking at your Bibles and you're saying,

where's verse 37? Well, verse 37 doesn't actually

appear in some of the earlier manuscripts, but some English

translations will include it either in the text or as a

footnote. And this is all it says.

It says if you believe with all your hearts, you may.

Or another translation, if you believe with all your hearts,

you may. And the eunuch answered, I

believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.

So it certainly doesn't hurt theology to include verse 37

with its emphasis that Philip would not have baptized him had

he not believed God's Word, been saved, and knew he needed to

identify with Christ, just like Kaylee did this morning.

The word baptism is frustrating to me.

I've said this, I think Wednesday night, but it's

frustrating to me. Sometimes we transliterate Greek

words and make new English words out of them.

I wish we would just translate them because if we just

translated the word baptism every time it showed up in the

Bible, the word immersion would just be there.

Because that's what the word means.

It can't mean to sprinkle, it can't mean to pour.

John the Baptist did not sprinkle water on Jesus head.

That word would not have been used.

There are other words for sprinkling and pouring.

Greek is that specific. So this is immersion.

You are completely covered. You are submerged, you are

thoroughly covered. That's the whole idea.

Because it's a symbol of what Christ has already done for you

in salvation. You've been completely covered

by his blood, You've been completely cleansed by his

sacrifice. You have been put to death, the

old self, and now you're risen to a new life in him.

Roman says that's what Kaylee testified today.

So what prevents you from being baptized?

Also, see, here's water. And I promise you in a moment

you could come talk to a pastor and say I've never been

baptized, but I've been saved. I need to be baptized.

And I promise you, we'll make sure that there's water up

there. Jordan, was the water warm this

morning? It was warm this morning.

It did me warm water. What a luxury.

I baptized where the water wasn't warm.

You understand what I'm saying? Lost a guy in a river one day.

His hands were up in the air and he was shouting Hallelujah as he

drifted away. That's no joke.

No joke. I learned that day.

When you're baptized, put the head upriver to or you'll drown

somebody if you're going right down his nose.

But anyway, lost him. He went all the way around the

bend screaming Hallelujah. Let's finish this up, verse 39.

And when they come 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. A lot of joy in this passage.

But Philip found himself at Asitus, and as he passed

through, he preached the gospel to all the towns until he came

to Caesarea. Holy Spirit moves his people

according to his plan to fulfill his mission.

People were baptized, people rejoicing, servants were

preaching the gospel to all the towns.

Philip finds himself in the Old Testament, Ashdod, the old

capital, the old enemies of the Philistines.

He preaches along the coast and finds herself finally at

Caesarea. So the gospel spreads according

to Acts 18. Everything's coming true until

finally it reached some of you and it reached me.

See one of the things you got to understand is his mission always

moves forward with or without us.

Persecution in crisis couldn't stop it instead of pushed it

forward in new ways. My God takes difficulties and he

makes them into opportunities. Last time I checked he can even

command the storms. Listen to what the gospel says

in Mark four and he being Jesus awoke and rebuked the wind and

said to the sea, peace be still. And the wind ceased and there

was a great calm and he said to them, why are you so afraid?

Have you still no faith? And they were filled with great

fear and said to one another, who then is this, that even the

wind and the sea obey him. Well, let me tell you and answer

that question this morning, folks.

He is Jesus, the Christ God Incarnate, who came to be one of

us to show us how to live and to die for our sins is a perfect

sacrifice on the cross, because He's the only one perfect enough

to make that incredible payment. And then he destroyed death

through his resurrection so that we might have eternal life if we

believe by faith in grace, in the grace He offers us, to be

saved. That's who He is.

And He is absolutely the only one who can give you true peace

and save your eternal soul. And if I were you, I would

listen to him right now. I believe I'd ask Him to forgive

you. I'd ask Him to save you.

Allow Him to remove your fears, calm the storms.

It doesn't matter what's raging in your life right now.

Be still and allow Him to bring you peace.

He can rebuke those winds and waves for you.

Peace. Be still and respond.

Father, thank you. Thank you that we are not trying

to tackle the winds and waves of this life on our own.

It's too much. It's too much, Father.

It's too much. Thank you, Father, that you

don't leave us alone to do that. But Father, you are equipping

us, discipling us, making us, sanctifying us to be the people

who believe, to be the people who take your truth to a world

that's crumbling. Father, this morning, maybe

there's somebody here and they're they're at that first

step. They need to be saved.

They need to ask Christ to come into their heart as the Lord and

Savior to believe he died for them and rose again.

Well, Father, I just pray, Father, don't let him leave.

Don't let him sit. Don't let him.

Father, as soon as we begin to sing that they would come down

an aisle and take a pastor by the hand and say, I, I've got to

know what it means to be saved. Father, many believers here, the

Lord, sometimes we take you as a luxury.

We take Christianity as an option.

We take church as a choice. We take obedience.

That's just one other thing, Father, forgive us.

May people around the world forgive us, Father, who don't

have any opportunities. Father, I pray that we'll

recognize our responsibility, our stewardship.

Father, for some, that means they need to be baptized.

They need to publicly identify their salvation with the church.

Others need to join the church so they can serve and be held

accountable for that service. Others need to come and they're

called. They're called the ministry.

They're called the missions. Maybe some just need to come and

unload some of the storms in their life.

They just need to come and pray. Maybe they need to pray for

Oaxaca. Maybe they need to pray for

Rocky Mount. Maybe they need to pray for the

meeting getting ready to happen in just a couple of minutes.

Father, we ought to all be stirred to something.

Surely apathy is not an option. Surely same old, same old isn't

the right choice today. Surely not.

So let us listen and let us obey in Christ's name.

Hey man, stand with me. We're going to sing together.

There'll be some of us standing up here.

You don't have to even talk to one of us.

You can just come and pray if you want to do that.

But whatever God tells you to do, you do it, and do it now.