Our scripture today is going to be in Acts, chapter 8, verses 25 through 40. We'll be there in a few minutes. I want to share a story with you just a little bit. That part of it has to do with things that we, my family, experienced this week. But I want to tell you about a man named John.

It was a guy that, for a lot of years, he and his wife Jen were a big part of our family and still are. They attended church service with us in Michigan, where I grew up and where my family lived. And we stayed in touch with them over the years. My parents, especially John and Jen, they adopted three boys from Russia back when Russia was still doing that. Shortly after the third one was adopted was when, if you remember in the news, there was a lady that had a Russian son and she couldn't take care of him, so she put him on a plane with a note around his neck, essentially saying, take this one back.

And Russia said, you can't have any of our orphans anymore. So that was kind of the end of that. But they had adopted these three boys, two at once, and then later an older one. And we went to Michigan this week for the funeral of one of the two of the younger boys who had died unexpectedly. And it was one of those situations where, you know, it's not just coming into town, you know, to the next town over or something.

Like we're, you know, it's 1200 miles away. But I said to my wife, I said, there's. I absolutely feel like this is somewhere that I need to be. And so she and Emma decided to come along. My parents were going up there and my sister was going up.

My sister used to babysit the boys when they were little and all these things. Our families were intertwined. I. I worked with John for a while. He had a business. He was a stonemason and he made granite countertops.

He was a craftsman. And I worked with him back when I was 18 or 19. And I got really strong during that time. Like we were lifting heavy rocks and my job was to put them all up on the scaffold. You know, his job was to chisel them out and put one at a time.

And my job is to keep these other guys supplied. They call it a tender. You tend the needs of the craftsman. And so I had mixed mortar and, you know, you're putting into these five gallon buckets and at first I'm like struggling to get one up on the scaffold. And then after a couple months of doing it, I'm just like, boom.

Boom, you know, And I'm just strong, doing all this dumb stuff, setting up scaffold 40ft high at a peak on this fancy house. And it's like we're up here pretty high. You know, we're doing all this stuff is quite the experience. John was a craftsman. He was very good at that.

John's I don't know, 13 years older than me or something like that, you know, quite a bit older than me, 15 years older maybe. So he's kind of in between my parents age and my age. And somewhere a few years ago, God kind of got ahold of John and started moving in his life and saying, leading him towards the path of pastoral ministry. I got to sit down with John and speak with him. I hadn't really had a conversation with him the whole time that he's been a pastor and he's been a couple years at a church in Michigan that he's been leading.

And he's led them very well so far. And he was just sharing with me the celebration of what's going on with the congregation that he's leading and just how well it's going and some of the good issues that they're dealing with. Having to knock down walls in the space that they're in to expand their sanctuary. And it's like, praise God that they have a building where they can just make it bigger to have more people in. So it's just exciting.

And I got to thinking about that and how it intersects the scripture that we're reading today. And I'm going to read that scripture with you from Acts chapter eight. And you might not see the conclusion, but I'll try to bring it back around a little bit. I want to read this with you. It should be up on the screen or there's a Bible in the rack in front of you.

Most likely Acts, chapter eight. So Peter and John had solemnly testified and spoken the word of the Lord. When they had done that, they started back to Jerusalem, proclaiming the good news to many Samaritan villages as they went. Then an angel of the Lord said to Philip, get up and go south on the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza. This is a desert road.

So he got up and went there. He met an Ethiopian eunuch, a court official of Candace, Queen of the Ethiopians, who is in charge of all her treasury. He had come to Jerusalem to worship verse 28. And he was returning home, sitting in his chariot, reading the prophet Isaiah. Then the Spirit said to Philip, go over and join this chariot.

So Philip ran up to it and heard the man reading Isaiah, the prophet. He asked him, do you understand what you're reading? The man replied, how in the world can I unless someone will guide me? So he invited Philip to come up and sit with him. Now, the passage of scripture the man was reading was, he was led like a sheep to slaughter.

And like a lamb before its shearer is silent, so he did not open his mouth. In humiliation, justice was taken from him. And who can describe his posterity or his offspring or his generations, for his life was taken from the earth. Then this eunuch said to Philip, please tell me, who is the prophet saying this about himself or someone else? So Philip started speaking and beginning with the scripture, proclaimed the good news about Jesus to him.

Now, as they were going along the road, they came to some water. And the eunuch said, look, there is water. What is to stop me from being baptized? So he ordered the chariot to stop. Both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water, and Philip baptized him.

Now, when they came up out of the water, the spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away. And the eunuch did not see him anymore, but he went on his way, rejoicing. Philip, however, found himself at Azotus. And as he passed through the area, he proclaimed the good news to. To all the towns until he came to Caesarea.

Something just hit me as I was reading that. Where did you say the road was going from Jerusalem to Gaza? And then there's a little parenthetical statement that said this was a desert, desert road. Where did they find water to baptize him? You know, like, I remember the cartoons, you know, somebody sees a mirage, you know, and they see, like, this oasis in the desert, and you get there and there's nothing there.

You know, it's just your brain plays those tricks on you. This was no mirage, folks. This was not like, a thing where the eunuch just had this imaginary conversation with this guy named Philip. And then the guy disappears. He's like, okay, well, this is great.

This was real. And somehow God provided a body of water in the desert enough for this man to be baptized. That just came to me. So that's. I don't know how to apply that.

That's just a little freebie to tell you God knows what you're going through, he knows what you need, and he knows the importance of the moment that you're in. And he's going to provide a way for you when there seems to be no. All right, now, the thing that I wanted to start with was this. In your Bible, in the New Testament, how many guys are there named Philip? Two.

Who says? Two who says? One who says? I have no idea. Okay, the rest of you got it.

Alright, you're gonna have to help me out a little.

I've gone all through this. I've read the Bible, I've studied it, I've read all the things that I can pick up in books and on the Internet and. And everybody tells you there's two guys named Philip. One is the guy that was the apostle of Jesus Christ, the apostle named Philip, the one that was from the same town as like Peter and James and John. And he's influential in bringing some of the disciples to Jesus.

This guy named Philip that Jesus calls Philip of Bethsaida, that he's the apostle named Philip. And then they say there's this other guy named Philip who, who shows up in Acts where they have these deacons that they assign to make sure that the widows that are from the Greek background, that those widows have the daily food distribution that they need, and that he's part of this council of seven deacons. And it's that guy that later becomes Philip the evangelist and goes and shares the gospel. First, the part that I hadn't read in Acts, chapter eight at the beginning of the chapter where he goes to some towns in Samaria and proclaims the gospel and they say it's two different guys. Now I'll tell you this, the scripture never introduces him as a new character.

People assume that because they read it and they say, well, if he was Philip the Apostle, why would he serve as one of the deacons that was serving tables? Why wouldn't he? First of all, that's smart leadership. The way I like to set up things. If we set up a committee in the church, what I like to do.

And by the way, we don't really have standing committees that just run forever and just meet every month just to feel busy and important. Churches have done that for so long and it's like, oh, no, thank you. We will set up ad hoc committees. Like when there's an issue, we'll set up a committee to take care of that. They investigate it, they give their time to it, and then they bring a recommendation maybe to the church board who can act on it.

And one of the things I like to do is take one of the members, if it's not the pastor directly, and take one of the members of the board, one of the members of that committee, maybe even chairing that committee. But that way there's kind of this liaison to the central group that'll make the decision. And they're the ones that can kind of, kind of field the information and forward that recommendation to the church board. And I think it works very smoothly. And I think that's what was going on in the book of Acts.

I think there's one guy named Philip. And I'll tell you this, there's nothing, as far as I can tell, I could be wrong. There's nothing, as far as I can tell in the scripture that demands there's two different guys named Philip. I think it's the same guy. I think this guy named Philip, Jesus finds him.

He calls him to be a disciple. He goes with Jesus throughout his ministry. And then when some people show up and they say, hey, guess what? There's some women being overlooked. We don't want them going hungry.

We don't want them in need. We want to take care of them. And so they say, well, why don't you guys pick for yourselves seven men, good men, honorable men, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, and you place them in charge of this operation. For me, if I was one of the complainants that was bringing that to the church council, I would say, you know what? I got a great plan.

Let's get one of the apostles on board. Let's get one of the apostles on board. And here's why I think that they chose Philip. See, there's this time when I believe it's Acts chapter. I mean, John chapter 12.

I believe where Jesus, like, he's gone through the triumphal entry. He's hitting the big time. It looks like all of his disciples are thinking, we got with the right guy, like, he's the real deal. And then there's some Greek, Jewish, like, converts to Judaism that are Greek men that come and they show up to the festival there at the temple and they find Philip and they say, sir, we would like to see Jesus. Now.

Somehow Philip had this natural, like, proclivity to go outside of his Jewish nation and to reach others for Jesus Christ. He had, like, this missionary spirit within him that said, I'm going to go out and make sure that the gospel is for everyone. And so I believe that there was something about Philip where these Greek men in John chapter 12 thought, we can approach him to approach Christ. So Philip goes and gets another disciple. They go tell Jesus about it.

And then I don't know what happened because Jesus doesn't have an audience with them. He's like, yeah, I got some other stuff I'm working on right now. And he ignores Him. At first we're like, Jesus. Why would you do that?

Well, Jesus was of a singular focus. He was headed to the cross and he knew where he was headed. It's not that he didn't care about them or have time for them. They were going to have their day where they would come to know Christ as Messiah. But that day wasn't that moment.

He brought them on his time. And so I believe that that man Philip, that apostle was also tagged. He was brought into the group of the original seven deacons. And guess what? It wasn't a lifetime appointment.

If God called you off of that committee to do, to serve somewhere else, then they would just put somebody else on it because one of them was named Stephen. And he immediately gets killed. They don't like Stephen, right? Like we talked about him a few weeks ago, Stephen, he's. He's boldly proclaiming the word of God.

So much so that his Jewish brothers that didn't believe in Christ said he's got to go. And so you've got all these people that can kind of come on and off the committee. And I think that Philip the Apostle is Philip the deacon and later becomes Philip the evangelist. And here's where I see that in life. Because like I talked about my friend John, who son's funeral.

We were just at. John at one point that I knew him was working as a stonemason. He was a craftsman. He was serving in the local church. I remember working with him and some other guys.

Our pastor too, at the time. We were building a new building for our sanctuary. It was a big gymnasium building. And we're up there like on this scissor lift, hanging drywall, like on this ceiling. 14 foot sheets of 5, 8 drywall, if you know what I'm talking about.

That's not easy work, you know, like heavy stuff. And we, we're out there doing all this stuff that was John. He's a solid Christian. He's a worker, he's a craftsman. Now he has a congregation that just knows him as John the pastor, you know.

And I heard him speak at his son's memorial and I'm like, I want to preach like that. Like, the way he was declaring the word of God was amazing. I'm like, he's doing this at his own son's funeral. Praise God for that strength and power that is within him. And so I believe Philip was similar to that, that he had started in one way, but Christ had called him along with the other apostles to fulfill the Great Commission, to share the Word.

Of God in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria and the ends of the earth, the rest of the world. So I could be wrong. It could be two different guys. It could be, there's Philip the apostle, and then he just kind of fades from view in the scriptures. And then there's Philip number two, Philip the deacon, evangelist.

And if that's the case, then so be it. But how would you like to be known your whole life? As what? You were in your 20s or 30s. Some of you guys are that age.

You're like, eh, I'm good with that. And later on you're like, oh, man, there's some stuff I'd like to put behind me, you know, like, can I not be known by that anymore? Am I right, Tom? No. Yeah.

Okay. All right, all right. This is just a guess. Just a guess.

So, okay, all that nerdy argument stuff out of the way, like, that was just for, like, probably five of you that are, like, really into it. You're like, no, pastor, it's two. The Bible, whatever. Agree to disagree on any of that. If that was not interesting to you at all.

Push that all aside. Here's where the fun part hits. Philip, whichever Philip it is, one or two or the same guy, this guy named Philip is here in the scripture, he gets this idea that God has told him, Like Jesus has said, I want you guys to go and spread the news of the gospel all over the place. You're going to start here in Jerusalem. When did that happen?

Pentecost. The day of Pentecost. The Holy Spirit shows up. They preach. Thousands of people are saved and baptized.

Then from there, those people all go back home. A lot of them have traveled. So they all go to the whole world, and they actually start sharing the gospel with all their neighbors. So immediately the gospel is proclaimed all over the world. But in the meantime, the commissioning of the apostles and the believers is Jerusalem.

And then Judea, which is kind of the surrounding region, and then Samaria. Last week I touched on the parable of the good Samaritan is just kind of tucked within the sermon. And the Samaritans were not people that Jews liked. They did not like. They lived next door to him.

They lived. It kind of surrounded them. Actually. The Samaritans were just kind of like an island within Israel. They didn't like them.

I don't know if there's any situation in the world like that now where Israel surrounds a part of the land that they don't really like. Those people, Palestine, never mind. Anyway, I guess geography and geopolitics isn't your thing, so not mine either. But you know, it's just kind of like, oh, I get it. There's always been some group that are like, we can't stand them, you know, but they're right here.

And what do we do with that? Well, they just tolerated the Samaritans. They would go around Samaria and take like a multi day journey to avoid these people. Have you ever spent days avoiding someone? Like, I don't mean like you don't talk to them for days.

I mean like you'll go out of your way by a few days just to not see somebody crazy.

Thank you for your honesty. So one of you. Yeah, so like, you know, there's there, there might be a time where you're like, oh man, I really, you know, I really want to go here, but I've got that one relative and if they hear that I was in town and didn't see them, you know, or I've got this old friend and they really just drain me and I don't want to go see them. But they're going to hear, you know what, I'm not going to post on Facebook that I went on vacation to their town, you know, like that's what I'm going to do.

I may have done this once or twice anyway and may, I mean asterisks certainly have done this. So Philip goes right into the place that most of his brothers avoided. He goes into the place because he had listened to his Lord and Savior. He listened to Jesus Christ saying he actually saw Jesus model this. Jesus actually stayed there.

There was a verse where it says Jesus had to go through Samaria. He was going from his hometown, like up in Galilee, up near Nazareth and Capernaum, and he was going down to Jerusalem and it said he had to go through Samaria. I gotta tell you, he didn't have to because all of Jesus fellow countrymen would go around it, but he didn't have to. There were alternate routes. But for Jesus, he had to because of who he was.

He had to go through there because of his mission, he had to go there. And Philip witnessed that, I believe. And Philip said, I've got to go there too. Jesus told us we would go there. He told us we must go there.

I have to go there. So Philip goes up to Jerusalem. Nobody sent him there. I mean to Samaria. Nobody sent him.

Like the apostles didn't send him. Nobody sent him there. He just went on his own. Of course, I believe by the leading of the Holy Spirit. But I Mean, there was no.

There was no sending group of people that put him on his way. He went to Samaria. He declared the gospel. There was a magician there named Simon. In church, like, lore and history, Catholic church stuff, he's known as Simon Magus.

Simon the Magician. You might have heard of him, Simon Magus. That's literally this guy. He was a Samaritan magician. He believes then there's so many people that become believers in Jesus Christ and get baptized that now all of a sudden, Peter and John are like, well, I guess we've got to go see what's going on.

They get up there, they recognize that these people have received well, that they've received Christ, so they lay hands on them to receive the Holy Spirit. For Peter and John, this is a test if these people are truly believers, because the Holy Spirit knows your heart. He knows where he is invited and welcomed. And these people were open and willing to the Holy Spirit leading and guiding them. So as Peter and John lay hands on them and these folks received the Holy Spirit, something changes in their lives.

Something changes in their lives. And it's evident that the presence of the Spirit of God is with them. And now this Simon the Magician, he sees this and he's like, that is real power. Like, I've done some magic tricks. I've done some sleight of hand.

He's probably gotten into it more than that. He's probably actually messed around with demonic spirits and evil forces, and he has channeled them and he has utilized them or they've utilized him. That's not. You know, you think you're in control of them, but really they're controlling you. Don't mess around with that, folks.

But he messed around with these evil spirits, and he was able to produce magical outcomes. And he was thinking, like, you know, I've had a pretty good following, but if I had the power to give them this Holy Spirit, man, that would be great. I would be awesome in this community if I could do that. So he's like, guys, hey, how much do I have to pay you for you to give me that ability? Like, train me to be able to give people the Holy Spirit?

How much do I have to pay you for that? And Peter's like, jesus told us we would live and die broke. You can't buy me, son. And he's like, may your money perish with you. I mean, that's literally.

He said, may your money perish with you. But he's like, obviously, money doesn't matter to me. I'm a pastor I mean, I'm a apostle. Sorry. And so he's like, you're gonna die in darkness.

And so this fear comes over the magician, and he repents of it. Then he's like, pray to God that none of these bad things happen to me. So there was true conversion happening here. There was the presence and power of the Holy Spirit happening here. Do we need that in our community, people?

Do we need that in our land?

So Peter and John, as they're leaving that area, they headed him back to Jerusalem, and. And they start preaching in Samaritan towns and villages along the way and celebrating what God is doing. Philip is content to stay there, except I picture him laying down. I don't know if it's, you know, from a night's sleep or if he's taking a nap. At this point in my life, a nap sounds fantastic.

Love you guys. I'm tired, though. We had quite the journey home. I was looking at the flights that were on Friday as I was planning our little impromptu trip, and I was like, I don't like the way any of those look. And I looked at the Saturday flights, and they were so much better.

And so I picked one of those. I said, we'll just stay up in Michigan an extra day. We'll go through Detroit and see what's going on there and all this stuff and get a hotel and just relax for a day and then come home. And then there was a problem with our connecting flight at the town where that was supposed to be. The power went out of their air traffic control tower, so it messed up all the flights into and out of there.

So everybody's trying to go somewhere through Nashville as a connector was messed up. And so they. They just rescheduled our flight. And now it was, like, gonna leave, like, six hours later from that, which was already a delay. So we spent, like, eight hours in the Detroit airport.

I don't recommend it. The airport was fine. I just don't recommend spending eight hours in any airport. Not fun. I can't really complain.

And I'm not trying to complain. I'm just saying, like, that was not my plan. And we get home, last night is late. We woke up this morning, and I'm like. I literally said to Amy, my first words were, what is today?

Because I had this fear that there was something I had to do and that I had to wake up. Like, I had to get out of bed right then, and my body was saying, no, you don't want to get out of bed yet. And I was like, oh, it's a big thing. I've got to be at that. They're expecting me there.

Philip, Somewhere, he's laying down. It doesn't say he was asleep, but I imagine he was asleep. And all of a sudden, an angel is sent to him. An angel is a Bible word for a messenger from God. And this angel says to him, get up now.

This isn't like when you wake your kid up in the morning, like, hey, time to get up now. This is like, flip over the mattress, you know, kick you out of bed. Literally. Like, this is. Get up.

This is serious. So Philip's like, okay, what now? He's like, go down to this desert road. He's like, that sounds terrible. The desert's hot and dry.

And no, you know, I was comfortable. But he does it. He's obedient. He doesn't ask questions like, lord, why or, why me? Or what am I supposed to do?

You know, how many times has God told you to do something and you're like, okay, Lord, show me the roadmap. Like, give me the plan. I want to see the whole thing first to know what I'm signing up for. Can you imagine, think of Moses, like, going way back. You think of Moses, he's living in the wilderness.

He got married. His dad's like a priest, you know, he's trying to live up to everything that's expected of him. He's tending sheep. Doesn't sound very like he was. For 40 years, he was the prince of Egypt, you know, like the Disney movie.

I mean, he literally was the prince of Egypt. He was actually going to possibly be the pharaoh one day, like, leading Egypt. And then he kills a guy and goes on the run for 40 years. And he's in the wilderness for 40 years tending sheep. And you think, this isn't going anywhere.

And then God gets ahold of him. Burning bush experience thing, you know, and he says, okay, I want you to go do such and such. I want you to go and go to Pharaoh and tell him to let my people go. They were slaves in Egypt. The Israelites were.

And he says, I want you to tell Pharaoh that, hey, can you just maybe release everybody right now? Pharaoh's like, no. You know, just, no. But Moses, as God is telling him this, he's like, this is what I want you to do. He says to God, I don't think I'm the guy for this job.

Who's been there before? Who's been there before? Or gal. Like, this is, you know, gender neutral here. I'm not the person for the job.

Lord, finally, Moses, when he. I don't even know if he agreed to do it, he just kind of gave up arguing. If you've been married, you know what that's like. You're like, I'm not going to win this one, but okay, you know, I still don't think you're right, but whatever.

If God had showed moses the next 40 years of his life and what that would look like, I have a strong feeling that Moses would have said, the sheep are really nice this time of year. I think I'll stay here. So many times, we want to know the full plan of God. When he calls you out onto a journey where he sends you into a mission, where he says, this is what I want you to do. We're like, okay, but can you tell me everything so that I can kind of prepare for it?

Like. Like, can you tell me what I'm going to need so that I can, like, build up what I need? Can you tell me how much it's going to cost so I can start saving money now? Because really, I don't trust you to provide along the way? Like, these are the things that I believe that if we knew in advance everything God had in store for us, we wouldn't do it.

There's only one example in the Bible of somebody that I believe knew what was going to happen and did it anyway, and that's the APostle Paul. For three days, as he was blinded, he wasn't eating or drinking anything. And God told a man named Ananias, he says, I want you to go find Saul. That was his first name. He later changes it to Paul.

I want you to go find Saul. I'm going to tell you right where he's at, and I want you to go there and lay hands on him and proclaim his sight to return to him. And I want you to go there because this man is praying, and I have been showing him all the things he must suffer for my name's sake. That was the only time in scripture that I know of where God told somebody just how terrible his life was going to be in the service of God. Now, I'm not telling you that whatever thing God's calling you to do is going to mean that you.

Your life will be terrible. I'm not saying that I don't believe that for most of us, but Paul was actually ordained or called to a position of suffering for Christ. He was the apostle that was ordained to suffer for Jesus, and he did it well. And so I believe that so many of Us, we want the whole story. We want the whole roadmap.

And we think God's just withholding it because he's cruel or vindictive in some way. And he's like, no, I'm not going to let you know how it's going to be. You're going to have to find out a page at a time. And. And we think that's how God's acting.

But really, God knows your heart and he knows that. He just wants you to follow him in faithfulness and obedience. And that's what happens with Philip. The angel tells him, like, get up and go. Go down to this road.

Okay? So he heads down there and he's standing. I picture him standing at a street corner, like, okay, Lord, you sent me here. What's going on? Why am I here right now?

This is. Think of a desert road, like a deserted road, too. This is a road that not many people travel. This was a road that was kind of an optional route. And most people would pick another one either to the east or to the west of there because it was more preferable because of the landscape, geography, water sources, all these things.

But Philip is there on this road, and I believe he had to travel a day or two to get there. By the way, like, where it was. And if he was still up in Samaria, he had to travel a couple days to get down to this road. His faithfulness in God, like, he spent multiple days journeying just to get to the place where God was able to use him. And some of you, I believe God is calling you to do something.

I don't know what that thing is, but he's calling you to do something right now. And it might be a little bit of a journey to get even to the starting place of. Of where he's going to use you.

Now, while all this is going on, it's all in God's timing. See, there was this man. We don't get his name, we don't get a lot of details straight from scripture about him, except that he was a eunuch. If I've got to describe that to you, you're not going to like it.

But they cut off part of his. His manhood that would produce testosterone. They probably do this before he has hit puberty. And at this point, his body doesn't go through puberty.

This would be done, by the way. A lot of cultures did this because they were creating somebody that was not a temptation for the ladies. You know, like, he's not. He doesn't have the drive for that. So he's not going to be.

He can serve around other women and things and not be and not have an issue with adultery and things like that. And so he would, because of the lack of testosterone and other hormones that wouldn't have been created in his body. His arms and legs would have grown abnormally long before stopping. His belly would be a little bit swollen. He probably wouldn't have developed much of his growth of his different hair on his body and would have a higher pitched voice because he never would have hit puberty and gone through the deepening of the voice.

He's a very odd looking and sounding guy, but he was an important guy. He is serving in the courts of a queen. Now. Our scripture translations usually say Candace. Like we think that's her name.

It was actually the Meroe Kingdom. M E R O E. The Meroe kingdom is in like modern day Ethiopian area of the world. And they, they had a line of queens, they were ruled by queens and that was called the kandake. So Candace is like a transliteration of that. So we don't actually know her name.

I did find some research that showed like a line of them. And so we think we might have an idea who she is, you know, that was serving at that time. We don't know this eunuch's name, but he was important because he was her kingdom's treasurer. He's in charge of all of the money for this queendom. I don't know.

Anyway, it's a queen and.

Okay, I haven't had enough sleep, so the humor's not there. Sorry. It was funny in my mind. So he's serving the queendom as the treasurer, but he makes a trip to Jerusalem 1200 miles away. Just ironic to me.

It's like I made a 1200 mile trip this, this week. That was by airplane. And except for yesterday's, like is relatively quick compared to traveling by chariots. And I'm sure it wasn't just him alone. He would have had an entourage with him.

He's an important guy. You don't need this guy getting abducted or killed or robbed. So he probably had guards with him. And this man has gone up to Jerusalem because he wants to worship Yahweh, the one true God. He believes that Yahweh is the, the ruler, the king of the universe.

And he wants to go to Yahweh's temple and worship him. He makes his journey up there probably with leave and permission from the queen, of course. He goes up there and he gets to the temple and there was a bit of stuff that a simple Google search might have helped him with, except he didn't have Google yet or ChatGPT or whatever we all use now. And there was a law in the Old Testament that said that no eunuchs would be allowed in the house of the Lord. God made that rule.

God made that law. This man shows up to the temple only to find the list of rules. And in that list of rules it says that he is not allowed in the temple of God. Now, he wasn't deterred by that. He didn't leave God in a huff and anger and say, oh, well, this man, with maybe his high pitched voice, his abnormally long arms and legs, but with a position of power, buys himself a copy of the scroll of Isaiah.

You know, at the temple gift shop we were watching. My sister rented an Airbnb and we were there in Michigan together and we. My daughter wanted to watch a movie and she found National Treasure. She loves that movie. It's a good movie too.

I love it. And there's a scene where Nicolas Cage, in the movie, he stole the Declaration of Independence. Spoiler, sorry. Like, if you haven't seen it, it's only a 20 year old movie. But he stole the Declaration of Independence.

And then kind of like somebody, like he's in the gift shop hiding out from security or something, and this lady thinks he's stealing one of their, like replica copies, so he has to pay for it and everything. So it's just this funny thing, you know, the gift shop in the hall there, and this eunuch finds a gift shop somewhere in the temple, a bookstore if you will, and he buys a copy of the scroll of Isaiah. Now I've got to say, it wasn't cheap to own a Bible back then. Like poor people didn't have the word of God in their hands. We give Bibles away in this land.

Like you can get them for free or cheap or very expensive. Sometimes if you want to buy a study Bible, you're like, why is it $60? You know, like, because a lot of people wrote the words under the Bible, like the scripture notes and everything, and they got to get their cut, I guess. But anyway, you're like, okay. And so this man buys a scroll.

He buys a scroll of Isaiah. He didn't get like all of them, I guess, or maybe he just decided that was the one to read. But he reads this passage and it's from Isaiah, chapter 53. And as he reads it, he's looking at this scripture and it resonates with him. Because in the particular passage he's reading, it says about this man who was disfigured beyond what a human being would normally look like.

And the eunuch says, I'm a weird looking guy too. Everybody sees me and they go away, they hide from me. And then he reads the part where it says that you can't see his generations after him because he was cut off from this earth. I think there's a pun in there. But anyway, he literally could not have any children.

And he's like, I resonate with this guy. And at that very moment where he had this need to understand the scriptures, God has already spoken to Philip. He's already told him to get on his way and stand at that street corner and just wait for further instructions. And as he's there, the spirit speaks to him and says, now go up to that chariot. Now this is a bit intimidating because it's clearly a foreign dignitary of some kind.

There's guards around him, there's all this stuff. Chariots are usually an instrument of war. And he's saying, it'd be like going up to a military tank. That was their high tech thing of the day. Go up to that Abrams tank, you know, and talk to the guy in it, huh?

No, I don't think so. They have multiple ways of killing me. You know, like, I don't think this is a good plan. But he does it. And Philip, when he goes up, that's the last instruction that God has to give him is go stand by that chariot.

And he goes there. And I think the chariot's just kind of at a walking pace. And he's just walking alongside of him now. Like, are they going to notice me? You know, like, are they going to tell me to leave?

What's going to happen? And he hears what's being said. He hears and he recognizes it. He's like, he's reading our scriptures and he's at this part that's talking about Jesus. If you've read Isaiah at the end of chapter 52, and all of chapter 53 is called the suffering servant passage, and it's talking about the Messiah that would suffer for not only the people of Israel, but for all the people of the world.

And this is the passage by the providence of God that this man is reading at the very moment that Philip stands next to his chariot and he says to him, he says, do you know what you're reading? Have you ever been reading the scripture? And you're like, I have no idea what I just read. I got nothing Lord, help me figure this out. It's a beautiful thing when you pray that prayer, when you confess that lack of understanding at the moment, you're like, lord, help me to understand this.

Because he may help you understand it right then and there, just in your own space with the scripture. And he may send somebody to you, or he may say, please dump the pastor. Call him up and see what he thinks. You know, like, I don't know. But, you know, you talk to a friend, you talk to a believer.

Like, by the way, I'm not the only one. Like, there's other believers that know the word of God. And you can ask them. Like, you can dig in and be like, you, hey, listen, like, do you have a few. Can I take you to coffee?

I got some questions about the Bible. And you may not have all the answers, but can you at least help guide me to finding them? I love doing that. I think there's some of you that love doing that. Some of you come to me with your questions, but it's like there's somebody else that has their questions.

They need to come to you because you have that knowledge. You've already been down that part of the journey. And so Philip, he shares with this man. He's like, let me enlighten you about this. The prophet that wrote this, Isaiah, he was definitely speaking about someone else.

And he begins to declare the gospel of Jesus Christ to this man. And as he shares the gospel of Jesus Christ to him, the guy's like, I'm in. I'm sold on this. I'm ready for the way of following Jesus Christ to be my way of life. Now, I believe those seeds had been planted a long time before.

Because the question that maybe you didn't have in your mind and maybe you did, was how did this guy even know to go to Israel to worship God?

Fast forward or rewind about 1200 or 1000 years before that, I forget the exact number. About 900 years before, I think there's a king named Solomon, son of David. He's the third king of Israel. Solomon was known as the wisest king, the wealthiest king, the most powerful king that Israel ever had. And there was a queen that came up from a place we know as Sheba, the general region where this man was from.

And that Solomon had a long standing relationship with her. Some legends say that they were actually married for a time and produced a son or two. But the belief that I have is that Solomon shared knowledge of God with her, that he gave her an understanding of who Yahweh God is. And that probably for hundreds and hundreds of years, that that knowledge of God was preserved maybe alongside of some idolatry and some worship of other gods. But somewhere along the way, God had spoken to these people that they had held the knowledge of God, the story of who God is, and that all the way down to the time where this eunuch was probably reading and studying something, and he came across this, and he said, I believe that.

That God is the one true God, and I want to go find out more about him. And he showed up to the house of God and finds a sign that says he's not allowed in there. So he buys a copy of the Word of God and he leaves thinking that that's it. But one man was faithful. One man refused to conform to the example that all of his brothers were doing.

All of his fellow apostles that were staying around Jerusalem, and they'd leave for a while and preach and come back. He says, no, I'm going wherever God sends me. I'm not just stuck being one thing. I'm going to follow the plan of God for my life. And he woke up as God kicks him out of bed and says, get up and go now.

Go down to that road now. Go stand by that chariot. All this stuff that sounds crazy to anybody that doesn't have the spirit of God living in them, but if you have the spirit of God living in you, you're like, this totally makes sense. I'm gonna do whatever God calls me to do. And so he shares the message with him and fulfills the great commission of Jesus Christ, as God has called him to do.

He baptizes the man, and then God plucks him out of there, and he's gone. This. If you're the eunuch, you're like, what just happened? Where'd the guy go? I promise you, he was right here.

Did you guys see him? You guys saw him, right? Like, where's he at now? It's his job. That eunuch is his job now.

He doesn't get to keep Philip with him. Like, okay, you're my own personal prophetic preacher guy. You got to come with me and share the gospel to all these people that I'm going home to. No, he doesn't have that. He's the guy now.

He's the one that has to share the faith. He's the one that has to go back and share witness to the queen and to all the other people and be like, yeah, here's what happened to me. If it seems like I'm different Now it's because I am. If it seems like some of my old ways and the hopelessness in which I live is gone, it's because it is gone. Because now I have a relationship with the Creator, God who made me, the one true God, Jesus Christ, who died for me.

He died for you, too. I got a feeling some of you in this room have a calling from God on your life. It might change how you live from here on out. Some of you in this room, in this building, somebody that listens online later, whatever it might be. There's something that God is either already speaking to you about or is going to in the near future.

I'm not like. I'm not like a prophet that's saying, like, I know these things. No, I'm just saying I believe that because I believe the Word of God shares that with us. I believe that because I've seen it in my life. I believe it because I saw it in John's life.

I believe it because I see it in Philip's life. I believe it because I know that there's something more that God has for you. And that it might not mean that you change your job, change your vocation, or change your city. It might be that he just changes the focus of how you orient your time, the way you spend your time, the way you look towards others. And it might be that he's calling you to be that light in a dark world, in the place that you already live.

And it might mean that he calls you out of that place and calls you to somewhere else. I don't know. What I do know is this. The Gospel of Jesus Christ demands that we go. It demands that we share our faith with others.

It demands that we live our lives in such a way that the Holy Spirit of God can speak to us and call us to go somewhere, and we respond in faithful obedience to that. God's calling you today to follow him, to live for him, to give your life to Christ, like this eunuch who was baptized to say, this is my way of life. I want to live this way. Then be obedient to Christ and start walking with him today. Let him renew you and restore you and give you new birth and new life.

But if he's calling you to serve him in such a way that you haven't before, then don't just kind of push that aside and say, no, you must have been talking to someone else. If he's talking to you and calling you to a life of serving him, then respond to that today.