The noun “apostle” means “sent one(s)”; the verb “apostello” means “to send.” Jesus never intended the Church to be a Calgon commercial. Remember those? “Calgon, Calgon take me away!” In John 17:15-16, *18 Jesus prays, “I am not praying that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. . . As you sent me into the world, I also have sent them into the world.” It was never Jesus’ design to evacuate his church from the world, with all its complexities and brokenness.
So many Christians say, “Lord, take me away.” Whenever I hear this, a part of me protests. Isn’t there so much unfinished work to be done? How do we recover a sense of “sent-ness?” How do we reclaim our apostolic roots, our missional identity? In John 17, Jesus prays. Maybe that’s the best place to start?
Next week we’re going to talk about the Apostle Peter’s paradigm shift. Peter was as blind in his own prejudices and bigotries as Saul was in his zeal. God makes Peter and Cornelius realize that when it comes to the Kingdom of God, no human being is too unclean, too impure, too unworthy to be saved. The gospel is truly for everyone, everywhere. Not just the ethnic Jew, but the Samaritan… the Greeks, the Gentiles, every tribe, every tongue every ethnicity and every nation!
But tucked away in the shadow of Saul’s great conversion, and Peter’s epiphany, is a snapshot of Philip, the Evangelist. As a severe persecution breaks out, led by Saul, Philip emerges in the Acts narrative! Philip was a peer of Stephen. Philip was of good reputation. He was full of the Holy Spirit, grace, wisdom, faith, and power. Acts 8:4-8 says, “4 So those who were scattered went on their way preaching the word. *5 Philip went down to a city in Samaria and proclaimed the Messiah to them. 6 The crowds were all paying attention to what Philip said, as they listened and saw the signs he was performing. 7 For unclean spirits, crying out with a loud voice, came out of many who were possessed, and many who were paralyzed and lame were healed. 8 So there was great joy in that city.”
There are echoes of John 4 in Acts 8. In John 4 Jesus speaks to a Samaritan woman about eternal life, the gift of the Spirit, and the kind of worshippers God desires. Jesus even introduces himself as the Messiah. The Samaritan woman believes, races back to her village, and tells everyone about Jesus. In John 4 and Acts 8, there is great joy in both cities. Even Samaritans… those so-called dogs… were coming to the faith. By the way, I love that story in the gospel where Jesus interacts with a Canaanite woman. The woman insightfully tells Jesus, “even a dog eats crumbs that fall from the table.”
We don’t know a lot about Philip, but his evangelism style mimics the teachings of Jesus. Do you remember the parable Jesus told where many guests are invited to a banquet, but they all decline? So, the Master of the banquet tells his servants in *Luke 14:23-24, “‘Go out into the highways and hedges and make them come in, so that my house may be filled. For I tell you, not one of those people who were invited will enjoy my banquet.’” Go preach to those Samaritans on the other side of the tracks! This is the ethos of apostleship, of Philip, of “sent-ness.”
In Acts 8, Philip has two evangelistic encounters of interest. *In Acts 8:9-13, “A man named Simon had previously practiced sorcery in that city and amazed the Samaritan people, while claiming to be somebody great. 10 They all paid attention to him, from the least of them to the greatest, and they said, “This man is called the Great Power of God.” 11 They were attentive to him because he had amazed them with his sorceries for a long time.” 12 But when they believed Philip, as he proclaimed the good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, both men and women were baptized. 13 Even Simon himself believed. And after he was baptized, he followed Philip everywhere and was amazed as he observed the signs and great miracles that were being performed.”
Here we have a man being baptized, but instead of being fixated on Christ he is fixated on his own power and self-glory. He’s used to being someone great, used to attention, used to impressing people, used to being called great. He’s tangled in sorcery and the occult. He’s all about Jesus for all the wrong reasons!
Acts 8:14-24, “When the apostles who were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them. 15 After they went down there, they prayed for them so that the Samaritans might receive the Holy Spirit because he had not yet come down on any of them. 16 (They had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.) 17 Then Peter and John laid their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit. *18 When Simon saw that the Spirit was given through the laying on of the apostles’ hands, he offered them money, 19 saying, “Give me this power also so that anyone I lay hands on may receive the Holy Spirit.”
*20 But Peter told him, “May your silver be destroyed with you, because you thought you could obtain the gift of God with money! *21 You have no part or share in this matter, because your heart is not right before God. *22 Therefore repent of this wickedness of yours, and pray to the Lord that, if possible, your heart’s intent may be forgiven. *23 For I see you are poisoned by bitterness and bound by wickedness.”
*24 “Pray to the Lord for me,” Simon replied, “so that nothing you have said may happen to me.”
What does the Bible say? Man judges by appearances, but God judges the heart? Simon is a caricature of men like Peter and John, Philip and Stephen. He’s facing the same jeopardy as Ananias and Sapphira, and he knows it! Simon your heart is not right before God. You’re poisoned by bitterness; bound by wickedness. Repent.
And now we come to a second evangelistic encounter. Acts 8:26-40, “*26 An angel of the Lord spoke to Philip: “Get up and go south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.” (This is the desert road.) 27 So he got up and went. There was an Ethiopian man, a eunuch and high official of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, who was in charge of her entire treasury. He had come to worship in Jerusalem 28 and was sitting in his chariot on his way home, reading the prophet Isaiah aloud. *29 The Spirit told Philip, “Go and join that chariot.”
I wonder how many of you like Philip have ever been sent on an adventure by the Spirit of God? Has the Spirit ever shown you someone and said, “yes, him” or “her”? In Acts, the Holy Spirit directs the mission beyond Jerusalem, into Judea, Samaria, now to an Ethiopian official! But there is more than an ethnic barrier being crossed in Acts 8. As I read Acts 8, how many of you first noted the “Ethiopian” ethnicity of the official? How many of you first noticed not the Ethiopian’s ethnicity but his sexuality? In modern, politically correct vernacular his pronoun wouldn't have been “he”, or “she”, but “they /them”!
In Acts 8, Philip is sharing Jesus with a Eunuch! Do you realize that for the modern church, Acts 8 is infinitely more scandalous than what happens later in Acts 10, when God sends kosher Peter to Cornelius’ unkosher household! “Surely not Lord! Surely the gospel isn’t even for the unkosher… for the eunuch? I know you said everyone, but. . .” In Acts 8, Philip shares Jesus with two men. We know the name of the first man. Simon's body is right, but his heart isn’t; We don't know the name of the Ethiopian eunuch. His body is alphabet soup, yet his heart is right!
In *Matthew 19:11-12 Jesus spoke of such eunuchs: “Not everyone can accept this saying, but only those to whom it has been given. For there are eunuchs [1] who were born that way from their mother’s womb, [2] there are eunuchs who were made by men, and [3] there are eunuchs who have made themselves that way because of the kingdom of heaven. The one who is able to accept it should accept it.”
There are three categories of eunuchs. First, there are some who in the words of Jesus are “born that way," with particular “ambiguities” or even “abnormalities” in their sexuality, through no fault of their own! People are born with millions of conditions that can impact most any part of the body. Of course, the fall affects body. . . Botched circumcisions could render people unwhole.
Second, there were people “who were made” eunuchs, not of their own will but of another. Perhaps in the theatre of war, they got injured. Perhaps victimized through violence. Perhaps taken captive, exiled like Daniel. Perhaps victimized by the barbarism of ancient medicine. Perhaps made eunuchs because they fell into the hand of ancient Roman sex trade at a young age, an industry fond of turning boys into androgynous toys. Today, youth are maimed through the ill-counsel of well-intended but ideologically blind counselors who think it better a child be made different than their otherwise biologically assigned gender!
Third, there are those who “made themselves” Eunuchs. That is, of their own accord, for reasons arising out of their social or psychological irreality. When Jesus told people it was “better” to gouge out their eye, or cut off their hand than not enter the kingdom there were those who didn’t stop with their hand! Such eunuchs were sincere, but sincerely misguided. Some mutilate their own body out of some misguided theology, even out of misguided devotion to God’s Kingdom!
“To those who can accept it…” the kingdom can be for such as these! Phillip was a man who could accept unflinchingly that yes, the Kingdom of God is for eunuch!
How many of you noticed not just the official’s ethnicity… yes the matter of his gender or sexuality, but the book of the Bible eunuch was reading? *Acts 8:30-35, “30 When Philip ran up to it, he heard him reading the prophet Isaiah, and said, “Do you understand what you’re reading?” 31 “How can I,” he said, “unless someone guides me?” So he invited Philip to come up and sit with him. 32 Now the Scripture passage he was reading was this: He was led like a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb is silent before its shearer, so he does not open his mouth. 33 In his humiliation justice was denied him. Who will describe his generation? For his life is taken from the earth. 34 The eunuch said to Philip, “I ask you, who is the prophet saying this about—himself or someone else?” 35 Philip proceeded to tell him the good news about Jesus, beginning with that Scripture.
Do you know Isaiah is considered the first gospel? It’s virtually impossible not to see Jesus the Messiah in Isaiah. If someone is already reading Isaiah, their conversion is a virtual slam-dunk-baptism away. But how many of you have ever read Isaiah? Have you ever considered why, an Ethiopian eunuch and foreigner might be particularly interested in Isaiah, of all the other books of the Hebrew collection? In *Isaiah 56:3-8 we find this ancient promise of God: “No foreigner who has joined himself to the Lord should say, “The Lord will exclude me from his people,” and the eunuch should not say, “Look, I am a dried-up tree.” 4 For the Lord says this: “For the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, and choose what pleases me, and hold firmly to my covenant, 5 I will give them, in my house and within my walls, a memorial and a name better than sons and daughters. I will give each of them an everlasting name that will never be cut off.”
It is the pride of every cisgender person to announce the many names of their blossoming offspring, the many fruitful branches of sons, daughters, then grandsons-granddaughters. Regardless of the circumstances of your eunuch-hood, it was to your shame to live in a world where you find yourself “a dried-up tree.” Where you’ve been “cut-off” literally, spiritually, socially, sexually. Isaiah is announcing a Kingdom reality can exist where no worldly or bodily hope never did!
Isaiah 56:6-8, “As for the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, and to become his servants—all who keep the Sabbath without desecrating it and who hold firmly to my covenant— 7 I will bring them to my holy mountain and let them rejoice in my house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and sacrifices will be acceptable on my altar, for my house will be called a house of prayer for all nations.” 8 This is the declaration of the Lord God, who gathers the dispersed of Israel: “I will gather to them still others besides those already gathered.”
A eunuch may never be able to get their body right, this side of glory… but the one thing a eunuch can get right is their worship, their heart before God. The eunuch, after all, had come to Jerusalem to worship the God of Isaiah! The same grace extended to the murderous and blasphemous Saul… extended to an ego-centric Simon… extended across ethnic lines to even Samaritans… to unkosher Cornelius & household… the same grace afforded the blindly prejudiced and bigoted Peter… Phillip extends to the Ethiopian eunuch! I didn’t write the gospel… I just declare it!
*Acts 8:36-40, “36 As they were traveling down the road, they came to some water. The eunuch said, “Look, there’s water. What would keep me from being baptized?” 38 So he ordered the chariot to stop, and both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water, and he baptized him. 39 When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord carried Philip away, and the eunuch did not see him any longer but went on his way rejoicing. 40 Philip appeared in Azotus, and he was traveling and preaching the gospel in all the towns until he came to Caesarea.”
When was the last time a Christian was good news to a eunuch? Oh that we might wrestle not just with the Spirit’s apostolic call that we be “sent”… but sent to people and places outside our comfort zone. What would happen today if an Ethiopian eunuch came to faith and wanted to be baptized? If he/they stuck around? Would he be welcomed, assimilated, or driven out? The Church figured out the Acts 10-Jew-unkosher Gentile dilemma… what might it look like for the church to wrestle with Isaiah 56, Acts 8? What might it look like for Isaiah 56 to become a reality, not just a forgotten promise? May the Spirit guide his Church in these divided times!