Tuesday, July 7, 2015
Acts 8:35 Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus.
MISSIONARY PHILIP: INSTRUCTED BY GOD TO TELL THE GOOD NEWS
Acts 8 records an example of one whom Jesus used as His instrument to broadcast His Gospel good news. Philip, a member of the Christian church at Jerusalem, was instructed by the Lord to travel down a desert road of southwest Palestine. Here he met up with a man riding in a chariot who needed instruction in the Word. Philip took the opportunity the Lord provided to tell the man about the Savior. All about how Jesus, the Son of God, had offered His life as a ransom for sinners on the cross, went a lamb to the slaughter not opening His mouth, in order to provide atonement for the sins of all, as the prophet Isaiah foretold.
The story of Philip and the man of Ethiopia reminds us of what mission work is really all about at its core. It's telling the simple but indescribably wonderful news that God our Father loved this perishing-in-sin world so much that He did not hold back from giving us His one and only Son, so that all who trust in Him shall not perish in hell forever but live perpetually in heaven. This is the message every Christian person has been called to share. What a privilege God has given us!
If you cannot speak like angels, If you cannot preach like Paul,
You can tell the love of Jesus, You can say He died for all.
If you cannot rouse the wicked With the Judgement's dread alarms,
You can lead the little children To the Savior's waiting arms.
(The Lutheran Hymnal, 496:2)
