Jesus is for Everybody
(Acts 8: 1-17)
Back in the Spring of 2008 when I found out I had been offered a position as a Deputy Prosecuting Attorney for Jefferson County I broke the news to the Sunday School Class at First Baptist, Tyler, that I had been teaching that Teresa and I would be moving, primarily to be closer to our brand-new grandson. I was flattered by their disappointment and I told them that I was just following Jesus’ command to his disciples given in Acts 1: 8, where he says: Rather, you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth. I told them it wasn’t exactly the end of the earth, but you could get there in three hours. One of the members quickly pointed out that I was going to the “None Zone” as in when asked what church a person went to they would reply: none. Better yet, I thought, a target rich environment with the challenge of telling anyone who would listen that Jesus is for everybody.
And it’s that going into the “none zone” and preaching the gospel that Luke is writing about in our scripture reading for this morning. As background, it is important to understand that up to this point the new church was still trying to get established in Jerusalem. It was tough going as there were so many people to minister to, those who wanted to be fed spiritually and those who needed to be fed physically. There were so many people in need who were coming daily to the church for help, it was getting in the way of preaching the Word so the church council appointed seven deacons to address this crisis of want and need. Philip, a Greek-speaking Jew, was one of them. It reminds me of that adage that it is hard to remember that your main objective was to drain the swamp when you’re up to your rear in alligators. Now with this logistical issue resolved the church began to take root and it began growing. Unfortunately, this growth did not go unnoticed. The Pharisees and Jewish religious hierarchy took note and saw this explosive growth as a threat to their status quo. Something needed to be done. Enter Saul, an up-and-coming Pharisee who received permission to go house to house rounding up these blasphemous believers and throwing them in prison. This hate-fueled rampage put great fear into many of the new believers who didn’t want to languish in a Jerusalem jail, so they fled the city scattering throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria.
At this point it would be a good idea to put this into context. Think of Israel as being shaped like California. Israel had been divided into three main regions with Galilee in the north, Samaria in the middle, and Judea in the south. Samaria had been conquered by Assyria in 722 B.C. with many of the survivors being taken captive and carried off to other countries leaving the poorest of the poor and resettling it with foreigners. These foreigners intermarried with the remaining Jews who were left, and the mixed race became known as Samaritans. The Samaritans were considered half-breeds by the “pure” Jews in the southern kingdom of Judah and the two groups hated each other. So, it was kind of like northern California which was pretty rural and sparsely populated, and you had Judea in the south much like Los Angeles, growing and thriving, and Samaria in the middle like San Francisco with kind of a mishmash of a population. Because of this, neither the northern region nor the southern region wanted anything to do with Samaria. They weren’t good enough to be true Jews.
So, Luke tells us that those who had been scattered moved on, preaching the good news along the way. Ironically, this was an unintended consequence of the persecution, the spreading of the gospel just as Jesus instructed in Acts 1: 8. He didn’t tell them how they would get to Judea or Samaria, but that when they did, they would be his witness. The persecution helped spread the gospel. So, we’re told that Philip went down to a city in Samaria and began to preach Christ to them and the receptive crowds were united by what they heard being preached and the signs they saw him perform, and they gave him their undivided attention. After they came to believe, Philip who preached the good news about God’s kingdom and the name of Jesus Christ, both men and women were baptized. When word got back to the church in Jerusalem about the success Philip was having Peter and John were sent to Samaria to find out whether or not the Samaritans were truly becoming believers. Luke tells us that in spite of Philip’s evangelism, the Samaritans who believed and were baptized did not experience any outpouring of the Holy Spirit. The Jewish Christians, even the apostles, were still unsure whether Gentiles and half-Jews could even receive the Holy Spirit. This was a crucial moment for the spread of the gospel and for the growth of the church. Peter and John had to go to Samaria to help keep this group of new believers from becoming separated from other believers. When they saw the Lord working in these people, they were assured that the Holy Spirit worked through all believers; Gentiles and mixed races, as well as pure Jews, so Peter and John laid their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.
By preaching to the Samaritans Philip had crossed a barrier of Jewish prejudice and discrimination even as Jesus did in his own ministry. I mean you would think that Peter and John understood this as they were physically present when Jesus confronted the Samaritan woman at the well and then spent time with her family, friends, and fellow villagers. What God accomplished or kicked off through the ministry of Philip and the apostles is that facet of Israel’s restoration that involved the reunification of the divided kingdom under one Davidic king, Jesus Christ.
As believers, it’s all about getting out of our comfort zone and taking chances, risking failure and planting the seeds. Just as the persecution forced the believers out of their homes in Jerusalem, sometimes we have to become uncomfortable before we’ll move, before we’ll sell our house and move out of the Bible Belt into the None Zone. We may not want to experience it, but discomfort may be best for us because God may be working through our struggles. So, when we are tempted to complain about uncomfortable or painful circumstances, how tough we think we have it, especially when it comes to doing God’s will, we must stop and ask if God might be preparing us for a special task because, after all, Jesus is for everybody.
Let us pray.
Why should we feel discouraged? Why should the shadows come? Why should our hearts be lonely and long for heaven and home? They shouldn’t because Jesus is our portion, and our constant friend is he. Through his amazing grace he chose us, he made us his own just as was planned from the day of creation. Through his grace he set no limits, no conditions, no qualifiers. He accepts us just as we are. But it’s not just us that he has chosen, that he has accepted as his children, he is accepting of everyone and anyone who comes in his name. Because of his grace our hearts shall not be troubled, and we can rest upon his goodness, losing our doubts and fears as we follow the path he has set for us. And we sing because we’re happy. We sing because we’re free. We sing because we know he watches us. In Jesus’ name, we pray, Amen.
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Jesus is for Everybody
We may not want to experience it, but discomfort may be best for us because God may be working through our struggles.