Christ Is Preached

Christ Is Preached to an Ethiopian

26 Now an angel of the Lord spoke to Philip, saying, “Arise and go toward the south along the road which goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.” This is desert. 27 So he arose and went. And behold, a man of Ethiopia, a eunuch of great authority under Candace the queen of the Ethiopians, who had charge of all her treasury, and had come to Jerusalem to worship, 28 was returning. And sitting in his chariot, he was reading Isaiah the prophet. 29 Then the Spirit said to Philip, “Go near and overtake this chariot.” 30 So Philip ran to him, and heard him reading the prophet Isaiah, and said, “Do you understand what you are reading?” 31 And he said, “How can I, unless someone guides me?” And he asked Philip to come up and sit with him. 32 The place in the Scripture which he read was this:

“ He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; And as a lamb before its shearer is silent, So He opened not His mouth. 33 In His humiliation His justice was taken away, And who will declare His generation? For His life is taken from the earth.”

[b]34 So the eunuch answered Philip and said, “I ask you, of whom does the prophet say this, of himself or of some other man?” 35 Then Philip opened his mouth, and beginning at this Scripture, preached Jesus to him. 36 Now as they went down the road, they came to some water. And the eunuch said, “See, here is water. What hinders me from being baptized?” 37 Then Philip said, “If you believe with all your heart, you may.” And he answered and said, “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.”[c]38 So he commanded the chariot to stand still. And both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water, and he baptized him.

This portion of scripture is dear to my heart.

An angel tells Philip where to go. As Philip arrives there just happens to be a man reading from the prophet Isaiah while riding in his chariot, and what we know today as chapter 53 at that. The Holy Spirit tells Philip to join himself to this chariot. As he obediently does so he hears the man reading from Isaiah. The man could not understand who it was that Isaiah was writing about. Ah, but Philip knew. Philip knew that One Who was led like a sheep to the slaughter; he knew that One Who did not open His Mouth, Whose life was taken from the earth. Yes, Philip knew Him quite well.

You notice that from that very portion of scripture Philip was able to preach Christ to him. I imagine that conversation lasted a good while. It seems to me that Philip covered a lot of ground here. It is evident that Philip taught on discipleship, for you'll notice that the man WANTED to be baptized. I see here that Philip had the entirety of the Great Commission in view in his mind's eye as he presented the gospel message. The man was presented the Gospel message, he believed it with all his heart, was baptized, and went away a believer, a disciple of Christ.

More later.