GOOD NEWS FOR YOU: POWER

As we have moved through 2020 and the pandemic, our nation and society have struggled with power.  We have done a lot of things in order to decrease the impact of the COVID-19 infection.  We have watched as our society has debated and struggled over things such as social distancing and masks.  Most everyone, at some point during the past year, has felt “powerless” to control the events around them.  Power is the title of the sermon in the sermon series Good News for You.  This is the Good News for all of us: power is available!  God’s grace in Jesus Christ seeks to empower us to witness to God’s goodness and love.  This week, we turn to Acts 8:27-39.  Philip, one of Jesus’s disciples, follows the voice of the Spirit and walks up to the chariot of an Ethiopian eunuch.  As he comes closer to the chariot, Philip hears the Ethiopian reading from Isaiah 53.  This leads to an encounter that changes the life of this Ethiopian official.  The Holy Spirit is working today to transform our lives and this empowers us to impact the lives of others.  Philip’s encounter helps us to understand how God desires to bring the Good News of joy and hope into all of the world, especially to those who are powerless and are desperately wondering if God cares for them.  It is our prayer that you will sense the power of God as you read Acts 8:27-39: So he started out, and on his way he met an Ethiopian 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 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 baptized?” 37 [And Philip said, “If you believe with all your heart you may.” And he replied, “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.”]  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. (NIV)