Dennis Tuuri

# Acts 8:1-8

Please stand for the reading of God’s word. Acts 8:1-8.

And Saul was consenting unto his death. And at that time there was a great persecution against the church which was at Jerusalem. And they were all scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria except the apostles. And devout men carried Steven to his burial and made great lamentation over him. As for Saul, he made havoc of the church, entering into every house, and hailing men and women, committed them to prison.

Therefore, they that were scattered abroad went everywhere preaching the word. Then Philip went down to the city of Samaria, and preached Christ unto them. And the people with one accord, gave heed unto those things which Philip spake, hearing and seeing the miracles which he did. For unclean spirits crying with loud voice came out of many that were possessed with them and many taken with palsies and that were lame were healed and there was great joy in that city.

We thank God for his word and pray that he would illuminate to our hearts. Please be seated.

The text before us makes a definite correlation between what has just occurred—that of course being the death of Steven—and we want to consider this text, Acts 8:1-8, in the context of a series of contrasts that are drawn for us in this particular text. The contrast first begins between devout men versus the ravaging of Saul.

In verse one, we read that Saul was consenting unto his death—that death being of course Steven’s death, really his murder. And at that time there was a great persecution against the church which was at Jerusalem and they were all scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria except the apostles. Now when it says “at that time,” the specific words used there indicate that it was that very day. It wasn’t that general vicinity. It was the very day at which Steven was martyred that this great persecution occurred.

Persecution—that word occurs twice in the book of Acts. And here is the only place that is called a great persecution. So this is a great persecution. And we’ll be seeing at the end as we get to verse 8 that the end result of the great persecution is great joy. And so that’s the bookend, so to speak, of this particular text and why I’ve decided to break off at verse 8 and then look at verse 9 as the beginning of a new section.

Great persecution yields great victory and great joy in Samaria. As we’ve said, this is the third cycle of increasing persecution and it ends with a great persecution. That great persecution begins at the martyrdom of Steven. And then it continues with Saul going through the houses of the believers, the Christians at that time, calling them off to jail, to imprisonment. Some were probably martyred, etc.

So, we have here a great persecution against the church at Jerusalem. And they were all scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria except the apostles. It’s significant to notice here that things have changed, haven’t they? Remember originally in the account of the book of Acts some few verses back the people were favoring the church. Remember after the dealing with Ananias and Sapphira, the text tells us they had favor amongst the people.

And indeed originally the original persecutors appeared to have been the Sadducees. Well, by now the Pharisees have joined in full force as is evidenced by Saul who himself was a Pharisee of course, consenting unto the death of Steven, indicating that there were Pharisees who were involved in the murder of Steven as well as the Sadducees. The conservatives now have joined the liberals in opposing the true people of God.

By the way, we can expect that just because people are conservatives and may espouse morality, etc., as the Pharisees did in some sense, does not mean they’re motivated by the same spirit that we are. And indeed, if they’re not, then eventually they will turn against us as well. Well, in any event, the conservatives and liberals, the accommodationists, the moralists or legalists have both turned against the church.

Now, and also the people also—we didn’t point this out in the text dealing with Steven, but it talks about how the people also were of one accord with those who were persecuting and murdering Steven. We see this same correlation in the life of our Savior. He comes to Jerusalem and the crowds hail his coming as the great king and then within days he is rejected by those same people.

The mobs are fickle and here the people have turned against the church and so a great persecution occurs and everybody leaves Jerusalem. But the intent of the text is—we don’t know exactly who specifically, if it was just 12 men who stayed in Jerusalem, that’s unlikely. But the point of the text is that most of the church disperses then and is scattered throughout the regions. But it’s interesting to note that the apostles do not leave Jerusalem.

Much could be said about this. But I think the one thing I want to mention here is that one of the things this tells us is that it wasn’t because of fear ultimately that people left Jerusalem. You know, persecution can be under the hand of God’s providence a means of telling us the work should happen elsewhere. And we’ll see as this text develops, that’s just what’s happened. The church doesn’t look at this persecution as something outside of the control of God.

They see it as a signal then to go out into the land. And the fact that the apostles stay in Jerusalem is evidence that it wasn’t fear that drove them out. The apostles and all Christians are to be courageous men, men who don’t fear the slings and arrows of abuse and the persecution of those who had opposed the church. The apostles here are particularly mentioned as remaining in Jerusalem. I think is one among other things as examples of courage.

They stayed of course in a particular station that God had called them to minister unto. And you remember that the transition from the apostles to the seven—from the twelve to the seven—is a transition from Hebrew-speaking Jews who are converted to Christianity and then the Greek-speaking Jews and we talked about how that was a preparation for the taking of the gospel into Samaria in the uttermost parts of the earth.

So in a particular way another reason why the apostles stay in Jerusalem is their station, but it’s the station of the seven and the rest of the church to spread out now and to obey the Lord’s command to preach the gospel in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and the uttermost parts of the earth. So these first few verses tell us about that, but they tell us about it in a particular way.

We have a contrast in verse two drawn between two types of men. After this introductory statement here in verse one which is then fleshed out for us in verse three.

Going on from there we read that devout men carried Steven to his burial and made great lamentation over him. Now as for Saul, he made havoc of the church entering into every house and hailing men and women committed them to prison, calling them off—in other words, dragging them into prison.

Now we notice several things here. First of all we see the mourning of the saint’s death, Steven’s death. Mourning is seen throughout the scriptures as an indication of the reality of the horrific acts of murder and death amongst us. The death of our body is not a joyous thing in and of itself. It yields to joy, but it is itself something to be mourned.

We see throughout the scriptures men mourning for saints. In Numbers 20, we see the people of Israel mourning for Aaron at his death. Deuteronomy 34:8, the children of Israel wept for Moses. 1 Samuel 28:3, now Samuel was dead and all Israel had lamented him—the death of Samuel. 2 Samuel 3, David tells all of Israel to mourn before Abner, before his body that is. And so the death of Abner—there’s mourning on the part of the people of God. Hezekiah was shown honor, we are told in 2 Chronicles 32:33, by the children of Israel at his death, and that probably was—has as a reference to mourning.

And then finally in 2 Chronicles 35 we read that Jeremiah lamented for Josiah. So throughout the scriptures we see lamentation and mourning is not wrong. This is not some sort of gnostic denial of the body. It rather acknowledges the importance of the bodies that God has given to us. And so lamentation and mourning over illness and death is proper for Christians and actually is a sign of piety.

And so we have here this contrast between these devout men—we’re not identified more than that about who these men were—who actually in the context of this rush and this murder that has just happened in the beginning persecution of the church on that very day, they make great lamentation over the death of Steven, recognizing the horrendous sin that was done to him, recognizing the tremendous man of God that he was and lamenting their loss as well as his own particular manner of death.

But of course, he has gone on to joy with Jesus. At any event, the contrast then is drawn for us in verse three that as opposed to these devout men, we have Saul who makes a havoc of the church. The verbs used here in terms of referring to Saul are the same words that are used in other Greek literature that talks about a devouring animal. Brutal cruelty is described in Saul’s acts here toward the church.

The word is used, for instance, in literature at the time of a boar ravaging a vineyard into which he had broken and of a wild animal ravaging a body. And of course, that’s the picture that God wants us to come away from—this picture of Saul—with is a man who broken into the vineyard of God and a man who is breaking into households, the church of Jesus Christ and doing great damage and creating a real disturbance and ravaging the body of Jesus Christ.

And so later our Savior will say “Why do you persecute me?” This was Saul and his rejection of his humanity as all unregenerate men are and the rejection of their humanity—become wild animals. They become wild animals who tear apart the true people of God. Of course, ultimately, this points—we’ll speak of this more in future weeks—but ultimately this points to the fact that all of us prior to conversion are wild animals.

That there’s no distinction here. And so, this great contrast is drawn. But it’s an interesting contrast because you’ve got devout men on this side, pious, godly men who lament the death of the saints. And over on this side, you’ve got this wild animal of a man troubling the people of God and the body of Christ, mourning the body and troubling the body. But on this side as well, we’re given that contrast by of a man that we know—as the account goes on—becomes the great apostle to the Gentiles.

And so this is a very optimistic text set in a very frenetic and upset and disturbed circumstance. Nonetheless, it’s a very optimistic text before us. But as for now, we don’t want to lose sight of the fact that there is this great contrast drawn. What is really the contrast drawn between? It’s between two men and their approach to the people of God. Men who on one hand minister to the saints and a man who on the other hand is malignant against the saints of God.

And so this is by way of contrast for us as well an exhortation to us. Now we don’t have to put in the extreme phrases that the scriptures do here. But in some sense all of us at different times in our relationship to the body of Christ also are either ministering to the saints or we’re maligning the saints. We’re either acting like devout men or we’re acting like a wild beast ravaging the vineyard.

And so the church of Jesus Christ is portrayed here as a body—in the case of Steven, the body of believers at Jerusalem. And then men are contrasted in the way they react to or treat the body of Christ. It’s proper for you to think through how you treat the body of Christ. Do you mourn the death of the saints? Beyond that, do you participate in the death of the saints? Remember we said before the persecution begins here with ridicule, slander is involved, and then finally physical violence. And so in our tongues, do we minister to saints? Do we malign saints? Do we act like devout men? Do we act like wild beasts?

Now these things are particularly—we can say, “Oh yeah, we minister to the saints of God and we’re universal Christians,” you know, kind of like that “universal soldier” people used to sing about. We’re universal Christians in the army of God and yeah, we try to be nice to Christians whenever we come across them. But the particular reference of course is the body of Christ at Jerusalem, the church gathered.

And so in the context of this application to us, we want to think about how we minister to saints in the context of the body of Christ where he has placed us. For most of us here, in the body of Christ at Reformation Covenant Church. And so you have a positive responsibility here to see yourself as called to minister to the body of Christ at RCC, particularly those of course here at this particular household.

I would make further application that in our families do we minister to one another or do we malign one another? All of us raising children know that our children have a tremendous tendency in the flesh and in their fallen nature to pick at each other and to be that wild beast-like Saul was trying to hurt each other. Children, you should be admonished by this text to minister to the saints, those that are visibly in the visible covenant community of God.

That’s being spoken of here in the context of the Christian households in which you’ve been placed. You should every day—it would be a good thing this next week, every night when you go to bed—to think about the fact: children, did I minister to my brothers and sisters and my parents today or did I malign them with my tongue or with my deeds? So we have that contrast drawn and it makes immediate application to us and it pits us—of course really the contrast is in Psalm 1, you know, the way of the godly, the way of the ungodly, the righteous and those that reject God’s path.

Well, secondly there’s a contrast drawn between a fire extinguisher becoming a fire spreader. The context for verses 2 and 3 were the contrast between Saul and the devout men. But one other thing I should mention before I move on—the men that minister to the body of God, even the men that minister to the saints, they’re described as devout men, okay? Devoted to God. We cannot minister to people apart from a correct motivational attitude, that being love for the Savior and devotion to him.

So kids or adults, if all you try to do by force of your will to minister to people in the body of Christ at RCC, the extended body of Christ in your household, you’re going to fail by your will alone. You cannot do it. Only through the spirit of God can you be devout, devoted to the Lord Jesus Christ that provides the motivation to ministering to those who are called. You look at people different. When you look at your brothers or sisters, you don’t see your brother or sister.

You see somebody that God has placed his mark of ownership, consecration, that is baptism on. And you treat them in that way. And so the fact that they’re devout men provides us the motivation, the correct mindset, the relationship to God that ushers forth those deeds of ministration to the saint in our home, in the church, during times of persecution, whatever it is. So, I don’t want to pass over that.

Very important not to get the cart before the horse, not to put these acts of deeds that we do before the proper motivational attitude of devotion to the Lord Jesus Christ. Ultimately, of course, your devotion to Christ is being demonstrated through your ministering to those who are covenantally in Christ. You minister to the Lord Jesus Christ as you minister to your brothers and sisters. How many of you tomorrow would rush off someplace if you knew the Lord Jesus Christ was going to be there and you could minister to him some way.

That’d be a great thing, wouldn’t it? And you would not pause for a minute, I hope, to rush off and minister to Jesus Christ in some way—if he was thirsty, to give him water, etc. But God says God wants us to make that same correlation to the people of God. And he wants us to have that same motivation to minister to the saints that are called and covenantally in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so, we minister to that body.

Well, this second contrast then going on is between the fire extinguisher becomes the fire spreader. In verse 1, we see this great persecution goes against the church at Jerusalem. They were scattered abroad. Well, the story doesn’t end there because then at verse 4, after drawing this contrast between devout men and Saul—devouring men, devout and devouring men—verse 4: “Therefore they that were scattered abroad went everywhere preaching the word.”

We have this tremendous contrast drawn between the purposes of those who persecute the body of Christ and the purposes of God behind all those purposes turning this whole situation around. This persecution becomes the signal and the single event by which the gospel is spread into all the regions. Let me just read a couple of commentators here.

“God maintains his overruling power in a very striking way. The tiger spirit in people and rulers which had been restrained until that the new-born child might gather strength is permitted now to manifest itself and having tasted blood and Steven’s martyrdom rages against the followers of the Lord. The church of Jerusalem is scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria.”

The point of this commentator is that God restrains the wrath of men against the Lord Jesus Christ and his church for a season while that church grows and prospers and builds and matures to a point at which it then can withstand the persecution and do what God has called it to do. Otherwise, and I thank those of us who have been around since the days of the Grange where many of us will convocate this evening at the Reformation Party, we know all of us have testified to the fact that God has in a very marked way protected this church for years against many things that could have come upon us that would have caused us great trouble and distress.

In the same way, in terms of the life of this church, we were providentially protected until such a time as we can meet the difficulties that might come forth. And what is the purpose of those things? As we read another comment here:

“The New Testament church considered the dispersion of the church the divinely ordained means of providing a beachhead for the spread of the gospel in alien territory.”

What a contrast here. The dispersion of the church after the great persecution in Jerusalem compared to the dispersion of the Jews in the Old Testament where their dispersion was a result of their sin and judgment against them. But now we’re in the New Testament times of blessing. The Lord Jesus has come and has reorganized and re-empowered his church and their dispersion is no longer seen as curse or as judgment. Their dispersion is seen as victory as establishing beachheads throughout various areas of the world through which the gospel will be spread.

Another commentator said: “The persecution aimed to destroy the infant church and the providence of God to the very opposite. It started a great number of new congregations especially in all of Palestine. Each one a living center from which the gospel radiated out into the world.”

J. Alexander says: “Here we have a signal illustration of the providential law according to which what appears to be an irretrievable calamity is not only overruled but designed from the beginning to promote the very cause which it seems first of all to disturb and defeat.”

The providence of God is behind the great persecution we read of in this text. The thing that was to extinguish the fire—the reforming power of Christianity, that great blaze to all the world—that very event, the persecution, became the means by which the fire was spread. And so the providence of God is seen behind the persecution of the church. As many people have said throughout the centuries, the blood of the martyrs is indeed frequently the seed of the church.

And so we have it here. The blood of Steven, the blood ultimately of the Lord Jesus Christ, is the seed of the church by which it spreads. And so it does spread and so we have this great contrast drawn for us. This is really important for our lives. I think it’s very important to see in the scriptures repeatedly, verse after verse, chapter after chapter a sovereign God. God does not react to the persecution then change his plans and say well let’s use this persecution to spread the faith.

No, God ordains the persecution against his church to try it, to try them in the fiery trial of his tribulation so that they might then go forth into the earth as shining gold into all the world. God’s hand is behind the persecution of the church ultimately to cause the gospel to spread. As I said, the church did not run with fear. The church ran because the starting gun had been fired, so to speak, in the persecution.

And they knew the Lord Jesus said, “When that happens, it is time to take the gospel into Judea, Samaria, and all the world.” And so, the firing gun had shot them off in the direction of which they are to be headed. This is very important.

I was at a meeting yesterday where we had various ministers of the Reformed faith here in Oregon come together and it was an interesting thing to consider in light of this lesson—this contrast between the attempts of men to trouble the church and then the end result being the strengthening of the church. That’s what happens here. The growth of the church. To the lives of some of the men that I fellowshipped with yesterday there was a man there who was cast out of the synagogue, so to speak—cast out of a reformed denomination. And that denomination had sent an investigatory committee to a particular church here in Oregon.

And it reminded me of, you know, sending forth a Saul to go forth and trouble the people of God. And some of these men that come out from this particular denomination go out to trouble men who profess the Lord Jesus Christ. This man was deposed from the ministry. This man and his church were disfellowshipped. Disciplinary action was taken against them. And you know what some of the basis for this was?

One of the things that this pastor was accused of was of preaching the antithesis. Now the antithesis is an old Dutch phrase. It’s not simply Dutch. It’s a covenantal phrase, but the Dutch use it a lot to speak of the antithesis between the people of God and the people of the world that is drawn into the structure of God’s providence. We see the antithesis sharply declared for us here in Acts chapter 8 as we do throughout the scriptures.

And of course, the great tendency, the great humanism of our age wants to do away with all antithesis. Wants to say that we all can just be pluralists and everybody does their own thing. No, the scriptures say there is warfare that goes on throughout the course of humankind and we should be very—it would be good for us to consider the Dutch Reformed model of the antithesis particularly as it relates to the uprising of our children and to remind ourselves that our children should not be in contact and being influenced by those outside of the faith on the other side of the fence, so to speak, whose really their motivation is against the Lord Jesus Christ and against his church.

We must be very careful to guard the influences of our children and teach them the antithesis between the Christian and the non-Christian in the world. Well, in any event, this was one of the things he was deposed for. And he was talking about these events and the troubling things that went on in this particular church. But, you know, he said, you know, God is really behind this. And I said, well, you know, we know that intellectually. What do you mean by that specifically? And he said, well, you know, our people really got motivated. They understood the nature of the battle that we’re in here as followers of the Lord Jesus Christ. They were motivated. They got woken up, so to speak. A wake-up call from the persecution that came upon that church. And that church is much more committed to the faith of the Reformation now because of the persecution. And so God is doing these very things.

Fire extinguishers become fire spreaders in our day and age as well. The very reason why I was at this meeting was an interesting one. There was another minister there from another part of the state—a Reformed minister who we had a little bit of problem that I did not know of until about a month or so ago. And we don’t need to get into the details of it, but there was a situation that had developed. I’d never met this minister. He had never met me, but it caused him to have some concerns. And so, as a result of interaction with another minister, I contacted this fellow and we talked a couple of weeks ago and he invited me to this meeting.

And it looks now that we’re going to continue on in fellowship. This meeting yesterday may well be the beginning of some sort of Reformed ministerial association in Oregon, which would be a tremendous thing. There were men at this meeting from the CRC—churches that are still in the CRC, Christian Reformed Church—represented in the OPC, Orthodox Presbyterian Church, Independent Reformed Church in Salem was there as well, and myself. And Roy Dick and Garrett went with me to the meeting and there were other elders there as well.

In any event, the reason I bring this up is because again here, while we had a situation about that could have been contentious between our church and this other church and myself and this other minister, the end result of trying to work that through as Christians—to dialogue and reflect over it, talk about it and clear whatever matters need to be cleared up—the end result of that is increased fellowship. And the end result of that and other problems is what produced this meeting yesterday.

And as a result of that meeting, we may well, as we go into 1994, have a fellowship of conservative Reformed ministers who reject the ordination of women, who reject theistic evolution, who reject the liberalizing tendencies in many of the denominations, and that acknowledges the catholicity of reformed people that hold the doctrine of the Reformation in Oregon. That association now will probably develop and go on into 1994 and we have a greater sense of unity than before.

You see, Satan’s desires are evil in these things. He desires to use these tensions and problems within churches, within congregations, within denominations to destroy the work of Christ. But God is using those very things to grow the church of Christ both numerically and also in terms of the unity that’s produced.

You know, Stephen has just given us the account of Joseph and how his brothers moved with envy, sold him into Egypt. And of course, you remember that Stephen doesn’t quote this, but you remember the critical element of that story is later that Joseph tells them that they meant it for evil. The brothers meant it for evil, but God intended it, ordained it for good and for the development of his people and preserving of them and the spread of the gospel into Egypt and the conversion of Pharaoh, conversion of the whole world pictured back then.

And of course leading to the coming conversion of the world that we’re now in the process, in the book of Acts, of reading about and hopefully being excited about as that gospel spreads out from Israel and from Jerusalem into Samaria and then into the Gentile world. Same thing is being said here. The persecution—we said before the persecution in Jerusalem, Stephen draws a parallel to the persecution of Joseph. The greater Joseph, the Lord Jesus Christ leads his people into all the world. God intends it for good and God intends it for the salvation of the world.

This is very important in the life of the church as it develops in the book of Acts. It’s important for our life as an individual congregation. It’s important for Reformed denominations to see that this principle is continuing continually ongoing.

The motto of the Scottish Presbyterian Church was a burning bush. I have a book—a history of the Scottish Presbyterian Church. It’s called “The Burning Bush” and it’s called the burning bush because that was what they referred to themselves as frequently—stamped on some of the many of the correspondences of the people involved in the Scottish Presbyterian Church early on, etc. The burning bush is a symbol. The whole first chapter of this book is about why they call themselves the burning bush and what does this mean? But it seems that the most obvious understanding of why they referred to this bush—there was not a lot of explicit references as to why. But the burning bush is a bush that is afflicted and persecuted and yet not consumed.

And so the church, the Scottish Presbyterian church, grew with great persecution originally and throughout its lifetime. And yet it had persecution but it was not consumed. Indeed, not only is it not consumed, but the fires of God’s tribulation in the church produces more golden vessels to be used for his purposes. This is important because it also has application to your life. You will go through trials, tribulations, persecution perhaps in your lifetime.

This very week, you’ll probably have some degree of persecution, trial, tribulation—if not from your own flesh then from others. And you have to recognize that while these things are troubling, you must take them from God’s hand with thanksgiving because his intent in your life is to mature you and to conform you unto the image of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Say, you know, we don’t have, you know, some kind of arm wrestling thing going on here between God and Satan. No, the Lord Jesus Christ is in control. And whatever persecutions and troubles come forth from our hand, they come forth simply for the purpose of maturing us and causing us to have our dross burned out. Now, it’s hard for us sometimes. We’ll see that in the next contrast, but it’s very important for us to see that the tribulations that come into our life are opportunities.

I had a fellow I used to work with and he was a Catholic. I think this statement of his mostly had humanist origins. You probably heard other people say this: “There are no such thing as problems. There are only opportunities.” And you know that’s a kind of a funny phrase. It can be kind of a Pollyanna-ish thing. You know, well I don’t want to acknowledge there might be problems in the world. There are only opportunities for me.

But you know for the believer that is true. Ultimately all the problems and troubles that come upon us are opportunities for growth. And when this other pastor and myself looked at the situation that developed as an opportunity from God to build better understanding of each other, better relationships between the churches, that’s what it became. And when the church that was persecuted by this other denomination saw that persecution not as a way to go home and feel sorry for themselves, but rather as an opportunity by God to train their people in the true Reformed faith, as opposed to what these other persecutors were teaching them, etc., and to train them to wake up that the battle is now and for our lifetime as well as the early church, that became then an opportunity for growth and maturation.

And when you have problems happen this week to you, look at it as an opportunity. I had an immediate—I was thinking of this when we were at the meeting in Eugene, or actually it was down in Cottage Grove. This is going to sound silly but on the way back we ran into a terrible traffic jam—30 minutes stuck on the freeway basically for 30 minutes. And you know you can look at that as an irritation and I frequently do. I confess that as sin on my part. It irritates me and I get impatient but I can look at it as an opportunity.

Obviously a very little thing in your life—30 minutes in traffic. So what? But nonetheless an opportunity to build your sense of patience and acceptance of God’s providence. And so this week as trials and tribulations come into your life look at them as opportunities. Don’t look upon them as persecutions. I hate to even you know somehow mention in the context of the great persecution the martyrdom waiting in the traffic for 30 minutes. But that’s the kind of lives our that’s the way our lives are composed of small individual things. God draws the big lessons for us out. But those big lessons are the same lessons that we must learn and apply in the small things of our life.

And so we have this contrast between Satan’s purposes and the persecutor’s purposes and God’s purposes.

And then third, we have a contrast drawn between demonic pain and gloom and Christian joy. The text goes on in verses 5 and 6 to say that Philip went down to the city of Samaria and preached Christ unto them. The people with one accord gave heed unto those things which Philip spake, hearing and seeing the miracles which he did.

For unclean spirits, crying with loud voice, came out of many that were possessed with them. And many taken with palsies and that were lame were healed. And there was great joy in the city.

You see the contrast. We see the demonic world being invaded, so to speak, through the gospel—the proclamation of the word of Jesus Christ, not through physical force, not through arms, not through might, but from my word and my spirit. God tells us here that word and spirit goes forth and is seen not only in healing physical diseases, but in conquering demonic worlds as well. And so you have this contrast between the demons coming out with great crying and gloom and shrieking. And the opposition to that from verse 7 is verse 8. There was great joy in the city that had been cleansed and had been brought back into health and salvation through the ministration of God and through the ministration of Philip and the church as they went abroad to preach.

As Matthew Henry says: “Philip was sent to break the power of Satan and in token of this unclean spirits being charged in the name of the Lord Jesus to remove came out of them that were possessed with them.”

Verse 7: “As far as the gospel prevails, Satan is forced to quit his hold of men and his interest in them. And then those are returned to themselves and to their right mind again who while he kept possession were distracted.”

And so the power of the Lord Jesus Christ is seen as going out to demon-possessed people and giving them salvation and deliverance—those that are called and elect in the Lord Jesus Christ. Contrast it with the great joy that is felt by the people of God who understand what God has done for them in healing them in body and in soul and in spirit.

Matthew Henry says of this joy: “The bringing of the gospel to any place is just a matter of great joy to that place. Hence the spreading of the gospel in the world is often prophesied of in the Old Testament as the diffusing of joy among the nations. ‘Let the nations be glad and shout for joy’—it’s in the Psalter. The gospel of Christ does not make men melancholy but fills them with joy if it be received as it should be for it is glad tidings of great joy to all people.”

Indeed, you know, our Savior had been to Samaria. He had spent several days there teaching amongst the people. You remember the woman at the well, but then there were also other people that were saved as well. And in the context of this, it’s interesting. I’m going to read from the account in John chapter 4 of Jesus in Samaria.

We read this: in the meanwhile, his disciples prayed him. Let’s see, I should go back up in verse 29. The woman who was at the well, who was convicted of her sin by the Lord Jesus Christ. In verse 29, she says, “Come see a man which told me all things that ever I did. Is not this the Christ, the Messiah?” Then they went out of this city and came unto him. So this is the context for what follows now.

“In the meanwhile, that is while he is in Samaria, his disciples prayed him, saying, ‘Master, eat.’ But he said unto them, I have meat to eat that ye know not of. Therefore said the disciples one to another, ‘Have any man brought him ought to eat?’ Jesus saith unto them, ‘My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work. To do the will of him that sent me, then to finish his work.

Say not ye, there are yet four months, and then cometh harvest. Behold, I say unto you, lift up your eyes, and look to the fields, for they are white already to harvest. And he that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit into life eternal, that both he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together.’”

You see, our Savior in Samaria predicted, as it were, talked of the spread of the gospel into all the world. All the fields are white for harvest. Indeed, you know, the gospel will go forth. He wants to finish his Father’s work. What is that work? To disciple the nations. And he gave them by way of prefigurement, the conversion of some in Samaria. He gave them the conversion pictured of the Gentile world. And he told them that their will also should be to do the work of the Father and to finish his work, to disciple all the nations, to press toward that end.

We’d have a whole nation and a whole world indeed that would sing forth praises to God of great joy, both the sower and the reaper coming together in joy at the end of that harvest. And so our Savior pointed forward to the conversion of the world and the Gentile world, the conversion of the Samaritan nation. And he put that in the context of joy being the end result—that the sower and the reaper together might joy and rejoice before God.

And that’s what we see in this particular passage of scripture versus the demonic pain and gloom. We have great Christian joy in the city and in the people that are converted.

Matthew Henry said—excuse me, this is J. Alexander—”The joy here mentioned is to be restricted neither to the natural enjoyment of recovered health in one’s own person and that of others nor to the intellectual pleasure of acquiring knowledge and discovering truth or to the spiritual happiness arising from conversion and assurance of forgiveness but must be understood as comprehending all these elements and therefore justly called a great joy.”

As it was a great persecution, we have a great joy. And this great joy, as Alexander points out, is certainly the joy of physical deliverance. It’s certainly the joy of the knowledge of forgiveness of sins. It’s certainly the joy of the intellectual understanding of the truth of God. We all want knowledge. We all want health and life. And we all want glory from God. And those things are all to be rejoiced in.

And so, if we understand the way that salvation touches every aspect of our being, then our joy is not simply a singular joy, but it is a multiple joy, a great joy before God.

Now, notice in the context of this what were they rejoicing as the result of? We’ve got to go a few verses out of our text to see this. But it’s very important to see this in few verses later on in Acts chapter 8. Okay. Verse 12: “But when they believed Philip preaching the things concerning the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ they were baptized both men and women.”

We’re given more information about what the gospel that was preached was—it was the gospel, the doctrine of the kingdom of God and of the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, King of Kings and Lord of Lords, in addition to being Savior. And they were baptized into that name. It’s significant that baptism is mentioned here. Here we had Samaritans that were cut off from the worship of God at Jerusalem. People are cut off from worship of God through physical infirmities. They’re cut off from the uncleanness of spirits that plague them and they’re ushered back into the true worship of God here.

They were cleansed through the performance of baptism. But it’s important to notice that the joy that they had was the joy of the kingdom of God. Again, quoting from Matthew Henry: “Philip preaches the king, the things concerning the kingdom of God, the constitution of that kingdom, the laws and ordinances of it, the liberties and privileges of it, and the obligations we are all under to be loyal subjects of that kingdom. And he preached the name of Jesus Christ as king of that kingdom, his name which is above every other name.”

And so our joy also should be great as we understand the implications of the kingdom of God—that it does relate to our bodies. It relates to our spirits and our souls. It relates to our reconciliation with God and with his people and all that should produce a great joy in us as well.

You know, it’s interesting that our Savior predicted the contrast that we saw between the devout man lamenting over Steven and the ravaging, devouring man Saul as he persecuted the church. Our Savior said that while you weep and lament, those that persecute you will rejoice. He had predicted that in the gospels that while you weep and lament, those that persecute you will rejoice. But now we see that’s not the end of the story. Our Savior was preparing his people.

But then the end result of following through and obedience in the preaching of Christ’s gospel is that we see in the demon-possessed—the demons themselves—the weeping and lamenting of the demonic world as the gospel is preached forth in all its fullness and the rejoicing of the elect community of Jesus Christ. And so this third contrast should be heartening to us. It should remind us of the great blessings that we have in the Lord Jesus Christ.

You know, we are called every Lord’s day into this joy. We are called forth. We confess our sins before him. He assures us of our forgiveness. He feeds us then with his word. We consecrate ourselves and he commissions us then to go out into the world. The end result of worship is indeed the commissioning of the church of Jesus Christ to bring this joy into all the world.

And so we have to understand that is what our purpose is. You know, the service doesn’t really end until the benediction is said and then at the end of our communion service every week, we also then talk about the need to depart. And there is a relationship between this text here and the transfiguration of the Lord Jesus Christ on the mount of transfiguration. They went—the apostles went there with the two of them representing the apostles—under the mount of transfiguration. And they wanted to stay there. You remember I think it was Peter said, “Let us build a tabernacle here. Let’s live here. Let’s live in the context of the worship of God and his heavenly sphere.”

And God says, “Now, this is my son. Listen to him. And you must now go on off of this mountain after witnessing this thing. After coming into worship, so to speak, in the presence of God, they are then commanded to go out into the world.” And what happens is they get down to the bottom of that mountain. A demon-possessed people need to be healed. And so, at the end of our worship service, we go forth with a commissioning by God. Having come into his presence, having worshiped him, he feeds us.

As Jim Jordan says in his recent talks up in Seattle, he fuels us up for the work he’s going to give us to do. And then he commissions us to go out into all the world and to go to the demon-possessed people and turn the elect of Jesus Christ from suffering under that demonic oppression and instead turn them into having hearts of joy and rejoicing before him.

You know, there is a personal nature to this as well. This contrast—we come, as we said, into worship confessing our sins. And if we understand that palsy, spirit or being paralyzed, being lame, being demon-possessed, these are all pictures of uncleanness and impairment to us, then we should recognize there is certainly a correlation between the sin which does so easily beset us as the book of Hebrews tells us and these conditions which are debilitating to our physical bodies and to our mental health.

There’s a debilitation to our spiritual health which we suffer daily as a result of our own sin. And so we, when we come to worship, we confess that sin. We want to immediately, as we come before God, to worship him. If you think about what we’re doing here—that we’re coming into the presence of God to sing forth his praises. That’s what worship is all about. Then the first thing you want to do is say, “I cannot do this. I have sinned. I need to be assured by you, Father, that you forgive me of my sins. I need to be made whole. I need to have this lame condition that I have because of my sin forgiven to me.”

Now, of course, that happens in a special sense on Sunday, but that’s true of the rest of our week as well. And you know, frequently—and I know this is kind of a by way of illustration only, not by way of exegesis of the text, a way of illustration—there is pain that accompanies our getting rid of our uncleannesses as well before God. Our sins are not easily rooted out of us. God has to do deep surgery on us, frequently to get out long-standing habits of sin in our life.

And it is with much shrieking frequently that we end up dealing with our sin. And so there is a relationship here to us as well. We don’t get to the great joy until we get through, on a daily basis, the confession of our sin and subjecting ourselves to the great physician, the great surgeon who does surgery on us to remove the impediments of personal sin that we have entered into.

Now if you don’t know what I’m talking about here, think about it. Think about your life. Evaluate your life day by day, week by week, year by year. Are you growing in the Lord Jesus Christ? What sins easily beset you? And if you have not given up certain areas of your life, sinful things—with maybe not verbal shrieking, but internal shrieking and pain—then you know, pray that God would do that work in you because I’m guaranteeing you that sin is down there, needs to be rooted out, and it’s not an easy thing.

It is a difficult thing. It’s the thing that the spirit of God does to us and we subjecting our—if we pull back from the pain of involvement with people, of the witness of God’s people, to the end that our personal sin would be rooted out, then we may think we’re better off pulling back from the pain of the night, but we are never then to the place of greatly rejoicing as these people in Samaria were who had subjected themselves to the full healing power of the word of God as it was preached into their life.

And so let us then also subject ourselves to the healing power of God. And let us, as I said before, recognize that part of our worship service, an essential part, the culmination of it, so to speak, is the benediction of God, the commissioning to go forth into all the world to go to the demon-possessed people, the elect of God, who are out there bound by physical illness, spiritual illness, mental illness, etc., to go to them with the word of God that relieves them from that thing.

Now, you see, the great commission was given to who? Was it given to all the church in Matthew 28? No. It’s given to the apostles. The apostles were called forward and given the great commission. They’re the ones specifically in Matthew 28 that received that admonishment. But who do we see going out here? Is it the apostles? No. God deliberately, for whatever purpose, puts the apostles—don’t take this wrong—but on the shelf. He leaves them back in Jerusalem to man that station. And he sends forth the seven.

Yes, Philip here. This is not Philip the Apostle. This is Philip one of the seven. The Philip is preeminent. But the scriptures plainly tell us here that they went everywhere preaching the word and they—doesn’t mean just the seven. It means all the people of God have a responsibility to proclaim the word and to evangelize the world for Jesus Christ. Yes, in a preeminent sense, the officers of the church and those that have been given gifts for that purpose are to be helpful and useful. But ultimately, it is the job of all Christians to receive the commissioning from God as Peter and John did on the mount of transfiguration to go into all the world and to heal those demon-possessed people.