When Jesus Christ told his disciples to “Go… and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,” he was giving them what the Duke of Wellington once described as the Church’s “marching orders.” They were to tell others about Him. They were to carry the Gospel everywhere.
In yesterday’s study we concluded by asking if you keep aloof from unbelievers, or do you take the Gospel to those who need it? Another way of asking the same thing is to ask whether or not you have contact with non-Christians socially. Do you go to their homes, sit in their kitchens, ask hem their interests?
Yesterday, we listed the second principle, which is that Jesus began his conversation with a question. We pointed out that one consequence of this was that the woman’s interest in talking with Jesus was aroused.
Fourth, stress the Good News. Show that the Gospel of Jesus Christ offers comfort. I am sure you realize that this does not mean we are totally to overlook sin. Jesus did not do that. He brought the woman to the point of recognizing her sin by His reference to the issue of her husbands. Nevertheless, even as He gently uncovered the sin, he offered comfort; for He coupled His inquiry into her marital status with the invitation to come again to Him.
In England, in the early part of the nineteenth century, there was a woman who had heard the Gospel but had never been able to respond to it personally. She had come from a Christian home. She understood the faith. But, she could not come. She considered herself unworthy. One day she wandered into a very small church and sat down in the back. She was almost in despair and hardly heard the words of the elderly man who was speaking. Suddenly right in the middle of his address, the preacher stopped and, pointing his finger at her, said, “You, Miss, sitting there at the back, you can be saved now. You don’t need to do anything.” His words struck like thunder in her heart. She believed at once, and with her belief there came an unimaginable sense of peace and real joy.
Now Philip is on the scene, and he is another great man. He well earned the title of evangelist, because when the church was scattered, he made his way north to Samaria where he preached Jesus. Acts 8 contains two stories about him: 1) the impact of his preaching on Simon, the magician, which we looked at in last week’s study; and 2) his witness to the Ethiopian eunuch, who had been to Jerusalem to worship and was on his way home when God sent Philip to him.
Yesterday we looked at how God called Philip to evangelize to the Ethiopian, and how Philip responded in obedience to God. That is because Philip knew something that we need to know and which will be very helpful in our lives if we know it: God’s ways are not our ways, his thoughts are not our thoughts. How do we know this? We know it because God tells us (Isa. 55:8).
On the road to Gaza Philip came upon an Ethiopian eunuch. Ethiopia is a name which in ancient times was given to a large area of Africa south of Egypt. Today that land is more limited: it is a smaller country to the southeast of Egypt. But in that day it referred to the whole region of the upper Nile, approximately from Aswan to Khartoum. I press this because it is the area from which the Queen of Sheba came in the days of King Solomon. In other words, there had already been a link between that area of the world and Judaism.
We are not given the whole conversation between the Ethiopian and Philip. But I imagine that Philip gave a friendly greeting, and the man in the chariot gave a greeting back. Philip had already heard him reading from Isaiah—in those days people generally read everything out loud—so he asked, “Do you understand what you are reading?” (v. 30). It was a good question—inoffensive, yet a subtle but gracious offer to explain the passage if the Ethiopian official was interested in receiving one.
So there in the desert, in the presence of the treasurer’s entourage, this high-ranking official of the Court of Candace, the queen of the Ethiopians, was baptized, coming to God not as the treasurer of the Ethiopians, not as an important man, but as a sinner availing himself of the blood of Jesus Christ, who had died in his place.
In one way or another this story is told twice and perhaps even three times. First, the Lord gives Peter a vision meant to show him that the Gospel is not to be restricted to Jews but is for Gentiles too—Gentiles who may come to Christ not as Jews first, but as Gentiles. Second, Peter repeats the lesson he had received to Cornelius, perhaps even telling the vision of the sheet, though Luke does not include that specifically. Finally in chapter 11, when Peter arrived back in Jerusalem, he explained what had happened to that audience (vv. 4-17). Obviously, Luke is saying that this event is pivotal.
What an interesting man Cornelius is. He is a Gentile, first of all. This is the matter of chief importance, because this is an account of the opening of the door of the Gospel to the Gentiles. He is also a centurion. A centurion was a Roman military officer who had command of one hundred men. Cornelius’ group was called “the Italian Regiment.” It is interesting to note that this is not the only place in the New Testament where we are introduced to a centurion.
In verses 9-16, we are told of the preparation of Peter for his task. Did Cornelius need preparation? Yes, and God prepared him. Did Peter need preparation? Yes, Peter needed preparation, too.
While he was puzzling over the vision (v. 17), the men Cornelius had sent arrived in Joppa. Joppa was to the south. Caesarea was to the north. It was a three-day journey between them, and the men had arrived in the south hunting for the house of Simon the tanner and for Simon Peter, who was staying there. God told Peter to go down and welcome the three men.
Whenever you see yourself, not as the clean animal but the unclean animal, not as the attractive beast but as the creeping thing—the thing that is despised—that has no hope whatsoever as one who by the grace of God got into that sheet and is pronounced clean by the sheer grace of God in Jesus Christ, then you are ready to open your heart and arms to other people. And it does not make any difference who they are. God does not show favorites. If you got in, the Gospel must be for everybody.
The tenth chapter of Acts is one of the most important chapters in Acts—perhaps also one of the most important chapters in the Bible—because it tells how a Gospel which was originally thought of in exclusively Jewish terms came by the intervention and revelation of God to be practically as well as theoretically a Gospel for the whole world.
When Gentiles arrived at Peter’s door, he understood rightly that God was about to do something new. Then, when he arrived at the house of Cornelius and found the centurion and his household waiting eagerly to hear God’s message for them, Peter said, “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism.”
In today’s study we continue our look at Peter’s sermon to the Gentiles, which contains the basic Gospel message.
The central item in this list of essentials is the crucifixion of Jesus. Peter mentions it only briefly, perhaps because it was so well-known: “They killed him by hanging him on a tree” (v. 39). We may rightly suppose, however, that as questions were asked, this is the chief thing Peter would have spoken about.
When Peter got to the end of this sermon he gave what I would call an application or invitation, though he does so cautiously and even indirectly. Peter said, “All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name” (v. 43).
Paul’s late missionary efforts centered on the cities of his world. At the beginning, when he first set out with Barnabas, he passed through Cyprus from one end to the other, and we are told almost nothing about any specific ministry in towns. But after he went to Asia Minor, which we call Turkey, he worked in some cities there, small ones at first, then larger cities. At last, when he came to Europe, his ministry was focused almost entirely on the great cities: Philippi, Thessalonica, Berea, and now, in this chapter on Athens, the greatest city of them all.
In yesterday’s study we read about one type of philosophy Paul encountered in Athens, which was Epicureanism. In today’s lesson we encounter a second type.
Paul’s address begins in verse 22. It is a classic. When you write a formal address or sermon, you generally begin with an introduction, have three or four main points and then a good conclusion. This is exactly what Paul does here. He has a short but brilliant introduction, followed by four clear points. His first point is that God is the Creator of all things. His second point is that God is the sustainer of all things. His third point is that God is the ordainer of all things. His fourth point is that we should seek Him. Then there is a conclusion, which says that we should repent since we have not sought God as we should. To this he appends three sharp inducements.
Third, Paul says that God not only sustains the universe but that he also guides the affairs of men. Verse 26: “From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live.”
Paul ended his sermon on Mars Hill with a few inducements to repentance.
Canadian Committee of The Bible Study Hour
PO Box 24087, RPO Josephine
North Bay, ON, P1B 0C7