Baptismal Service For Deb, Abigail & James
Deb Mansell Testimony
Abigail Hemingway Testimony
James Pollard Testimony
'As they traveled 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 baptised?”' Acts 8:36
Main Readings: Acts 8:26-40
In the days when this bible passage was written there were people who God had showed himself to. And then there were all the rest to whom he hadn’t.
If you were Jewish, you belonged in the camp that had received God’s revelation. And if you weren’t a Jew, you hadn’t.
And that’s the reason why this Ethiopian eunuch, when he picked up part of the bible to read it, didn’t understand what it was saying.
It was foreign to him.
It says that he was an Ethiopian. So he wasn’t from Israel, like the Jews. He was from a distant land.
But he had made a lot of effort to go out of his way and come to Jerusalem to worship the God of Israel.
And now, he was on his way home. In his chariot. Reading from the Scriptures God had given Israel.
The passage he was reading was one of the most remarkable passages in the whole Old Testament.
But he had a problem. He could read the words, but he couldn't understand who they were talking about.
And that raises a question which is still important today. What do we need to understand if we are to going to know God?
If you have had little or no contact with Christianity, then you will know exactly how this man felt with this scroll in his hand.
He didn’t know what it meant when it said: ‘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. In his humiliation he was deprived of justice. Who can speak of his descendants? For his life was taken from the earth’.
It was not plain to him who the Old Testament prophet Isaiah was speaking of with these words.
‘Is it himself’, the eunuch asks Philip, ‘or is it someone else?’
And I guess what we have to note about this man, is that his interest is peaked. He is, at least, grappling with these strange writings from the God of this foreign land.
And you have to give it to him! So many people dismiss God before they’ve even given him a chance to say something!
That’s not this man! And it needn’t be you either. You can give God your attention. You can ask yourself, ‘what might God be saying to me also?’
And it’s in this posture of inquiry that Philip asks the man if he understands what he is reading.
And his response isn’t ‘get out of here’. It isn’t ‘who are you anyway?’ or ‘where did you appear from?’ It’s, ‘how can I understand it unlesssomeone explains it to me?’.
That’s an admission on the part of the eunuch.
Would you be too embarrassed to admit you didn’t understand something that you had never encountered before?
This man had every reason to be proud – he was an important officialin charge of the treasury of the queen of Ethiopia.
‘Get lost, Philip, I would rather continue in ignorance than admit I need help from someone like you’.
That would have been a natural response.
It wasn’t his response.
So often pride gets in the way of finding out about God.
If that’s you don’t be afraid – be like this man and invite someone into your chariot who can explain God to you!
It’ll take some vulnerability. But this story is going to show us that, in Christianity, ‘humility’ is on the path to true and lasting joy.
This man made that humble step.
And up came Philip into the chariot and sat with him to explain what he had been reading.
So, what did he say?
Well, it doesn’t tell us, except to say that, ‘starting with that very passage of scripture, Philip told the man the good news about Jesus’.
Now, we know that the verses about the sheep and the lamb were not talking about Isaiah the prophet; they were talking about Jesus.
So, let me tell you how that is so.
Let’s replace the word ‘he’ in Isaiah with what we now know about who that is – namely Jesus.
It then reads like this: ‘Jesus was led like a sheep to the slaughter’.
Jesus was a Jew obviously. And we know that he was crucified on a cruel cross until he was dead.
Isaiah says that when he went to the cross – like a sheep going to slaughter – he was actually like a lamb because he didn’t open his mouth. He didn’t protest.
Even though the execution he was led to was totally unjust. Even though he had done nothing wrong. Even though he did not deserveto die. Even though he was hounded onto the cross by jealous and spiteful people who hated him. Yet he did not lash out. He went quietly and willingly to the cross.
So why didn’t he protest? I think I would have.
In fact, we all would. There’s nothing so worthy of protest than injustice! We all feel that.
Isaiah says, ‘he didn’t even have any descendants because his life was taken from the earth’. So why no protest?
Well, the answer is that the cross was his goal. When he came into the world, it was the cross that he was aiming for.
In another place in the Old Testament it says, ‘cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree’. The cross was made from a tree.
When Jesus hung on the cross, he became accursed. Yet he had done nothing wrong. But, you see, it was his aim to become accursed.
Why?
Well, very simply, it was for the eunuch; and for people like the eunuch.
And maybe you say to yourself, ‘well that’s ridiculous, the eunuch didn’t know Jesus’.
‘And besides what use would it be to the eunuch that Jesus was accursed for him?’
Well, there are some strange things at work here in this passage – are there not?
There is an angel who tells Philip where to go, before Philip has even set eyes on the eunuch! That’s one thing.
Then there is the Holy Spirit of God who tells Philip to go to the verychariot the eunuch is in and to stay near it. That’s the second thing.
And then there is the fact that the eunuch is reading a passage of scripture, written 700 years before Jesus, that Philip tells him is about Jesus. That’s yet another strange thing.
Angel of God; Spirit of God; testimony of God. That’s what we have in these three oddities.
So, what’s the point? Well Jesus is evidently no ordinary person. God seems intent on communicating to the eunuch who this Jesus is.
And the reason for that is that he wants the eunuch to know that Jesus actually came into the world to die on the cross for him.
And, that the purpose of Jesus’ death for the eunuch was so that the eunuch’s sins could be purged away.
Jesus who had no sin; who committed no sin, came to bear the sins of others, like the eunuch, in himself.
When Jesus hung on the cross, God’s anger against the eunuch’s sin - reserved for a day when the eunuch would meet God face to face - was poured out on Jesus, so that it wouldn’t have to be poured out on the eunuch.
The eunuch was a human being who had rebelled against God his whole life – just like we all have. And those sins stood against him and accused him.
And the penalty was going to be very severe!
God is infinitely holy and good. And this man had rejected him, and gone his own way his whole life, and turned his back on God. And God was rightly, furious about that!
There aren’t any human penalties that can satisfy the amount of the offence caused to God when a person rejects him – like he had.
And that put the eunuch in a whole heap of trouble. It puts all of us in a whole heap of trouble, because we’re just like him.
In exactly the passage the eunuch was reading it says this, which sums it up for us:
We all [no exceptions], like sheep, have gone astray [that means we wandered away from God], each of us has turned to our own way;and the Lord has laid on him [that is on Jesus] the iniquity [the sin; the guilt; the offence] of us all.
That’s amazing, isn’t it?!
It’s as though, this man, who Jesus never met, could have his sin cancelled out; could have the offence he had caused God erased.
In the Old Testament, to show the costly offence of sinning against God, God called for a lamb to be slaughtered – for its blood to poured out – so that the sins of people could be atoned for.
And so, Jesus came in that vein. He came as a sacrificial lamb to take away the sins of the world.
He bled on the cross for sinners, to actually deal with their sin.
And this plan worked because of one thing! Jesus committed no sin. And Jesus is divine.
His sinlessness qualified him to die for sinners.
And if Jesus had been a human being like any human being, his death would be no more effective than any other death.
But Jesus did not remain in the grave. Having borne the sins of others, he was raised from the dead.
His resurrection demonstrates that death has been defeated and that his saving work has succeeded.
Jesus is the Saviour of sinners because he is alive.
And everyone who belongs to him has a sure hope beyond death.
So, when Jesus was hanging on the cross, he was hanging there for the eunuch – and bearing the eunuch’s punishment in his own body.
In exchange for the sin Jesus bore for the eunuch, Jesus gave the eunuch his own perfect, spotless acceptance with God.
And that means, God will never count the sins of the eunuch against him. Never!
It means Jesus has satisfied the anger of God, in himself, on behalf ofthe eunuch.
It means the eunuch really has peace with God.
This is what the prophet Isaiah was writing about. This is what Philip explained to the eunuch in the carriage.
And, what he explained to the eunuch applies to every single one of us.
We all find ourselves as desperately needy as the eunuch.
And, if we can drop our pride and open our ears, we will hear the sweetest message anybody can hope to hear in this world! The message of salvation through Jesus Christ.
So, the question is: what did the eunuch do with that message – and by extension, the question is what should we do with it?
Well, as they travelled along the road they came to some water – a lake, I guess.
And it says, ‘the eunuch said to Philip, “Here is water. What can stand in the way of my being baptised?”’
We’re gathered here to rejoice with these three people who want to do the very thing the eunuch wanted to do. So, what does it mean?
It means that the message Philip told the eunuch about Jesus - from Isaiah - the eunuch, in that moment, believed with all his heart.
It means, he believed he was a sinner and in desperate need of saving.
It means, he believed his sins were horrid and offensive, and costly, and he didn’t deny them – he owned them. He owned them and he was sorry for them.
He didn’t blame them on his upbringing; or on background in Ethopia; or his struggles in life. He blamed them on himself.
And he believed what Philip had told him about Jesus.
He believed Jesus came to die for him personally on the cross.
He believed Jesus alone could take away his offence against God.
He believed Jesus was more to be desired than all the treasures of the queen of Ethiopia.
He believed that Jesus alone was worthy of his worship, for the rest of his life.
That’s why he wanted to be baptised.
Before Jesus had ascended into heaven, he had told his disciples to go and spread this good news of ‘sins forgiven’ far and wide.
And, when people believed their message, he told them to baptise them, and to tell them to do all that he – Jesus - had commanded them to do.
The eunuch was very happy that day, and very eager, to do what Jesus had told the disciples. To be baptised.
What is baptism for?
It’s to tell the world: ‘I’ve been saved by Jesus’.
The going down shows that Jesus died for me.
Going under shows, I identify with Jesus – my old self that rejected God has died with him.
Coming up shows that I believe, one day, I will rise from the dead because Jesus, my saviour, has risen from the dead.
Deb, Abigail and James, who are here this afternoon, want to do what the eunuch wanted to do. They want to tell it out loud, that their hopeis in Jesus – now and forever more!
And I think they want ask you: is your hope in Jesus too? If it’s not, it needs to be.
They would all say, ‘come to Jesus if you haven’t already’. Don’t let pride prevent you from coming.
Be like the eunuch.
Go away from here,even this morning, rejoicing becauseyouhave found Jesus.
