Acts 8 (Bible Study) (Philip)
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Philip in Samaria
4 Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went. 5 Philip went down to a city in Samaria and proclaimed the Messiah there. 6 When the crowds heard Philip and saw the signs he performed, they all paid close attention to what he said. 7 For with shrieks, impure spirits came out of many, and many who were paralyzed or lame were healed. 8 So there was great joy in that city.
Simon the Sorcerer
9 Now for some time a man named Simon had practiced sorcery in the city and amazed all the people of Samaria. He boasted that he was someone great, 10 and all the people, both high and low, gave him their attention and exclaimed, “This man is rightly called the Great Power of God.” 11 They followed him because he had amazed them for a long time with his sorcery. 12 But when they believed Philip as he proclaimed the good news of the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women. 13 Simon himself believed and was baptized. And he followed Philip everywhere, astonished by the great signs and miracles he saw.
14 When the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to Samaria. 15 When they arrived, they prayed for the new believers there that they might receive the Holy Spirit, 16 because the Holy Spirit had not yet come on any of them; they had simply been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. 17 Then Peter and John placed their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.
18 When Simon saw that the Spirit was given at the laying on of the apostles’ hands, he offered them money 19 and said, “Give me also this ability so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.”
20 Peter answered: “May your money perish with you, because you thought you could buy the gift of God with money! 21 You have no part or share in this ministry, because your heart is not right before God. 22 Repent of this wickedness and pray to the Lord in the hope that he may forgive you for having such a thought in your heart. 23 For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin.”
24 Then Simon answered, “Pray to the Lord for me so that nothing you have said may happen to me.”
25 After they had further proclaimed the word of the Lord and testified about Jesus, Peter and John returned to Jerusalem, preaching the gospel in many Samaritan villages.
Philip and the Ethiopian
26 Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, “Go south to the road—the desert road—that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.” 27 So he started out, and on his way he met an Ethiopian[a] eunuch, an important official in charge of all the treasury of the Kandake (which means “queen of the Ethiopians”). This man had gone to Jerusalem to worship, 28 and on his way home was sitting in his chariot reading the Book of Isaiah the prophet. 29 The Spirit told Philip, “Go to that chariot and stay near it.”
30 Then Philip ran up to the chariot and heard the man reading Isaiah the prophet. “Do you understand what you are reading?” Philip asked.
31 “How can I,” he said, “unless someone explains it to me?” So he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.
32 This is the passage of Scripture the eunuch was reading:
“He was led like a sheep to the slaughter,
and as a lamb before its shearer is silent,
so he did not open his mouth.
33 In his humiliation he was deprived of justice. Who can speak of his descendants? For his life was taken from the earth.”34 The eunuch asked Philip, “Tell me, please, who is the prophet talking about, himself or someone else?” 35 Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus.
36 As they travelled along the road, they came to some water and the eunuch said, “Look, here is water. What can stand in the way of my being baptized?” [37] [c] 38 And he gave orders to stop the chariot. Then both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water and Philip baptized him. 39 When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away, and the eunuch did not see him again, but went on his way rejoicing. 40 Philip, however, appeared at Azotus and travelled about, preaching the gospel in all the towns until he reached Caesarea.
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Acts of Jesus through the Apostles
Introduction to Philip
Stephen’s death, caused “a great persecution” (Acts 8:1)and “all except the apostles” to be “scattered.” Those who wanted to stamp out the church only served to spread it tremendously. Philip went to preach the gospel to a city in Samaria.
‘We have an advocate with the Father, one who speaks in our defence: Jesus Christ the Righteous One.’ 1 John 2:1
1. 8:1-4. What are the results of the execution of Stephen and the persecution that followed? Who is preaching? Give examples of God working through disaster?
There is a threefold “cause and effect” chain in these verses.1. “on that day”, Stephen’s death, caused “a great persecution” (v.1a). 2. the persecution caused “all except the apostles” to be “scattered” (v.1b) 3, the dispersion caused “those… scattered” to “preach the word wherever they went.” (v.4). Stephen’s death led to persecution. The persecution led to scattering which led to increased ministry. Those who wanted to stamp out the church only served to spread it tremendously.
The early Christians were spreading the gospel among their own people. Jesus told the disciples that the gospel was for every nation and people (1:8), and Pentecost miraculously proclaimed the Gospel in the languages of all the nations (Acts 2:4-11). Stephen was the first “martyr”, but now we see that the immediate result of his death accomplished his message! “All except the apostles were scattered … throughout Samaria…Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went” (8:1,4)
Amazingly, God had to use a persecution to get the early Christians to do what he had told them from the beginning that he wanted them to do. (Samaria and the ends of the earth) Stephen’s death was by no means in vain. In the history of the church - the expulsion of all missionaries from China after the Communist takeover in 1949 seemed to be a disaster. But the result was a) many of the expelled missionaries went to other parts of Asia, and so spread the faith in unreached places, and b) Chinese lay leaders took over the Chinese church and, since they were indigenous to the people, the church exploded in size and vitality over the last few decades. It is now 30 to 40 times larger than it was 40 years ago. Both the missionaries and the Chinese Christians had become complacent. But personal “disasters” are also ways for the gospel to spread in our lives. See Romans 8:28, and Hebrews 12:1-18. It seems, the worst thing for the spread of the gospel is success and a comfortable life!
2. Acts 8:1-4. Who is doing the preaching of the word in these verses and what is the significance of that?
One of the most significant little phrases in Acts is 8:4 “they who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went.” Not the apostles — they stayed in Jerusalem (v.1). “All were scattered except the apostles” (v.1) It was everyone else, the “laypeople”, not the clergy, who were scattered. And the Greek word rendered by the NIV translation as “preached the word” is the Greek word evangelizdomai, “evangelize”. This then is how Christianity in 300 years spread from this little handful of people into every nook and cranny of the Roman empire, until it even converted the leadership and made that old pagan culture into a Christian society. When the Christians were all together under the powerful and gifted leadership of the apostles, they had been fairly passive in their ministry. They brought their friends to hear the “great preaching” at the church in Jerusalem. But when they were scattered, they gathered up the courage to communicate themselves what they had learned.
The result was, though they were less eloquent than the apostles, they were more effective. Why? Because lay people (being more numerous than “professionals”) can reach more folk, and because a lay person’s testimony often has a more authentic ring to the listener than a well-polished speech.
This is one of the key practical differences between the other faiths and religions and Christianity. It was not the job of the clergy to do evangelism. They did it to model and encourage the people, who had the main task of “preaching the good news”.
3. Acts 8:5-25. What was surprising about Philip going to Samaria? Philip proclaimed in words (v4) and deeds (v7)? What were the results? Give an example for today.
In the New Testament we read that the Jews and the Samaritans hated one another. When Assyria conquered the northern tribes of Israel (Samaria was its capital) most of the people were deported.
The Assyrian government then repopulated Samaria with foreigners, who intermarried with the Jews who were left. The result was what the nation of Judah saw as a mixed race. The Samaritans built their own temple on Mt.Gerizim and repudiated most of the Old Testament Scripture, so the Jews saw them also as heretics. Thus the hostility between Jew and Samaritan was worse than relationships with the Greeks or Romans or any other pagans. Cf.John 4:9, where the writer simply observes that “Jews do not associate with Samaritans”.
But here we are told that Philip went to preach the gospel to a city in Samaria. He did urban ministry (“a city”) among the most despised people group that he as a Jew could know (“Samaria”). This tells us that the gospel had changed Philip’s whole way of looking at the world. He did not feel superior to the Samaritans. Before, Philip would have regarded the Samaritans as too hopeless and too evil for salvation. Now the gospel shows him that a) everyone is as hopeless apart from the gospel, b) everyone is evil and lost apart from the gospel and c) no one is more hopeless and evil than anyone else and so d) anyone can be saved and changed and incorporated into the family of God.
What were the elements in his ministry? Philip did two things, and then two things resulted.
First, Philip “proclaimed the Christ” in words (v.5) i.e. he did not come teaching morality and religion in general, but the gospel in particular. Christianity IS Jesus. It is making Jesus your Everything.
Second, Philip came with deeds. He healed sick people and cast out demons (v.7). Results?
Philip’s deeds made the crowd pay close attention to Philip’s words (v.6). Philip demonstrated the power of the gospel by changing lives, and as a result, the crowd listened to his words.
Then, the ultimate result was that “there was great joy in that city”. (v.8) The spiritual and physical healing lifted the whole city into a state of joy.
These statements are so simple that we may overlook the wisdom herein. The only way we will see a movement of God that lifts our whole city is if there is a combination of word and deed. We must not be too distracted by the fact that Philip’s “deed-ministry” was miraculous. We have several times discussed the fact that we should neither insist that all miracles have ceased, nor insist that the church exhibit the same kinds and number of miracles at every time and place. The fact was the Philip say physical misery around him and worked on it (“healed the sick”). Also he saw spiritual bondage and healed it (“cast our demons”). They the crowds flocked to and listened to the preaching. In the same way, the people of a city need to see a) Christians having compassion on the physically suffering (e.g. the poor, the dying, the orphans, etc.) and they need to see b) the changed lives of people who through Christ have been delivered from psychological and spiritual bondage. Then they will listen to the gospel en masse.
What would be the equivalent for us today, to do Philip’s kind of ministry? Well, for everyone it would be different. It depends on who you are. To do “Philip” ministry in a city, you must: a) combine word ministry with deed ministry, and b) combine persuasion with testimony of changed lives.
4. 8:9-25. Did Simon truly believe (compare v13 & v21-23)? What was Simon’s main problem? What is the warning for us?
Verse 13 says that “Simon believed and was baptized”, yet Peter says later that his heart is “not right with God” (v.21), which means that he is not a Christian. Some would say that Simon had been converted, but had fallen away from grace, had lost his salvation. But Peter’s words in verse 23, “For I see you are (lit.) in the gall of bitterness and captive to sin” has the sense of “now I perceive your true state”. The best way, then to read v.13, is that Simon intellectually believed the truth of Christ, but no new birth, no real change of heart,
Why? Verse 19 shows that his interest was “this ability”. He saw the power to heal people physically and spiritually, and he wanted that power for himself. He had been a magician, and the work of a magician is to have power. Now in the gospel he saw a greater power, and he just wanted this for himself, too. In other words, Simon’s fundamental and basic heart attitude had not changed at all. He got into Christianity because he wanted power and more glory. He was trying keep control of his life and promote himself.
This is subtle and a great warning to us. Some of us feel that we need approval in order to have happiness and value. So we may appear to “convert”, but we may be getting into Christianity just to get this nice group of people to love and approve of us. So our real “salvation” is not Christ, but the approval of other Christians. There has been no real heart change, no real abandoning of our good works for faith in Christ’s work for us. We are just doing the old self- salvation in a new way. Or, here’s another example, closer to Simon’s pattern. Some of us feel that we need power over others in order to have happiness and value. We may always feel that we need to be running things, be telling others what to do. So we may appear to “convert”, but we may be getting into Christianity just because we see a new place where we can run things and pontificate and tell people how they ought to live. So our real “salvation” is not Christ, but power over others. There has been no real heart change, no real abandoning of our good works for faith in Christ’s work for us. We are just doing the old self-salvation in a new way. So this mistake of Simon is much easier to do than you think! It is being done in the church all the time!
Did he repent? We cannot be sure, from his reply in v.24, but John Stott does not think his reply indicates that he did. “Simon’s response to Peter’s rebuke is not encouraging. He showed no sign of repentance… Instead of praying for forgiveness… What really concerned him was not that he might receive God’s pardon, but only that he might escape God’s judgment. Simon’s tears [may] have been tears of remorse or rage, but not of repentance.” Stott, The Message of Acts, p.151.
Simon seems concerned that he might be hurt, not that he has hurt God. That is not a good sign!
5. Acts 8:26-40. What do we learn about sharing our faith from the story of the Ethiopian’ conversion?
We need to know several things about the Ethiopian. First, “Ethiopia” in those days corresponded to the Upper Nile region from Aswan to Khartoum. The Ethiopian was a eunuch, a person castrated in his youth, so that he could work in the royal court with out distraction. (This was fairly common at the time among men who were going to be groomed for administrative leadership.) This man was a black African, and a high official. He “had gone to the temple to worship”, which means that he was a believer or at least a seeker after the God of the Bible. However, we can doubt that he got a warm reception there, for the Old Testament forbid eunuchs from going into the presence of God Deut.23:1).
Why was the Ethiopian reading the Isaiah scroll? (v.28) It is possible that he was doing so because in Isaiah 56:3-4 the prophet predicts a time in which eunuchs will be accepted by God into his courts and into his family. Philip finds him reading one of the Servant Songs of Isaiah about the Messiah to come, from Isaiah 53:7-8. He explains the gospel of Jesus on the basis of this passage. The Ethiopian responds in joy. Perhaps he now sees how eunuchs can be given “an everlasting name that will not be cut off” (Is.56:4). He sees that, through this Messiah, we can live on, even if we do not have children. He responds in joyful faith.
What do we learn about evangelism? First, God guides us into “divine appointments” (v.26). We need to look around us, for the people God brings into our paths are people we are to share our faith with. Second, we must not be put off from talking to someone who is extremely different from us.
Obviously, an African official was very different than a Jewish commoner! Yet God can use us in the lives of people who are utterly different. Third, we must not be prejudiced. Isn’t it amazing that one of the first conversion stories we have in Acts is the story of a Jew leading a black man to Christ? In Christ, these divisions dissolve. Philip did not let prejudice keep him from being a warm, respectful witness. Fourth, Philip started by asking a question. Instead of giving a “canned” presentation, he discovered what was on the eunuch’s mind and heart. Philip essentially asked him “what is your point of interest and need right now? What is your main question?” Philip did not answer questions that the eunuch was not asking! He made sure to present the gospel as an answer to the particular concerns of this man. Fifth, Philip evangelized through a small group Bible study! So often, this works well. It is natural, it gives the Christian the “backing” of the Bible’s authority, so it is clear that the gospel is not just something you have made up. Often this is one of the best ways to share your faith — to have both Christians and non-Christians discussing a passage of the Bible. Sixth, Philip did not just talk in general terms, but he helped the eunuch to the point of decision. The only reason the eunuch would have asked for baptism (v.36), is if Philip had been explaining it to him. We must encourage people to a point of decision.
Keep in mind that Philip was a public speaker (8:4), and not everyone can do that. But here we see Philip evangelizing in a way we all can do.
