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Living Waters of Grace 10.09.25 · Living Waters of Grace / Calvary Chapel of Westmoreland Sunday Services

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  This is Living Waters of Grace, the teaching ministry of Clark
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  Wofford, senior pastor of Calvary Chapel of Westmoreland,
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  County of Greensburg, PA. Now here's Pastor Clark as he
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  continues teaching through God's Word.
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  How exciting this is for Phillip and how exciting it is for you
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  and me when you have a chance to tell someone about what the Lord
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  has done for you. And how much more exciting it
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  is. Whenever they start responding
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  and their eyes start lighting up and they're getting questions
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  and they want to know and maybe they get to the point.
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  Well, how can I know this? Jesus, there's nothing more
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  exhilarating in life to have the opportunity to see God bring
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  someone into salvation because you were faithful to tell them
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  about Jesus. Amen.
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  Sometimes you won't be received well when you go out telling
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  people about Jesus. Eventually you'll find someone
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  receptive to the message and you'll be able to lead them to
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  Christ. The love and salvation of the
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  Lord can reach more people through you.
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  Pastor Clark will explain in today's message that that's what
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  a healthy relationship with Christ looks like, growing in
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  him every day and telling others about what he did for them.
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  It's good news that's meant to be shared with everyone around
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  you. Now here's Pastor Clark in the
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  book of Acts Chapter 8 with today's edition of Living Waters
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  of Grace. If you have your Bibles there,
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  turn in your Bibles to Acts chapter 8.
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  What was it like to be in the Roman Empire at the time that
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  Christianity first began? I think at times for us in this
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  country, we we feel like the way we are working right now as a
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  nation is, is not real good obviously.
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  But we have to understand that this is not uncommon in world
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  systems. And I wanted to just review a
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  few things regarding the terrible sexual morality that
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  was going on in the time of the Roman Empire when the apostles
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  were first starting out with the Gospel Society at that time was
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  deliberately throwing off any kind of vision that Christians
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  would have for sexual ethics. Things that were once considered
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  unthinkable at that time were now being deemed natural and
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  good. And this time that we're living
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  in isn't the first time that Christians have had to live in
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  times of of sexual immorality. The New Testament church was
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  birthed in a time where the world was utterly opposed to
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  Christian morality. Just not today.
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  Not just the day we're living in, but the days that our
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  brothers and sisters first were brought into the Kingdom of God
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  in the book of the Acts. Most of the New Testament texts
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  that Paul had wrote, we're dealing with sexual immorality
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  within the world and within even the community of the church
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  predominantly at that time in Roman cities.
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  And so there's these three ugly features of Roman sexuality.
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  And I'm not going to get too graphic.
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  It's, it's pretty gross. But it was socially acceptable
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  at this time for a strong Roman man to have intercourse with men
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  and women alike. Does it sound anything different
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  than what we're experiencing today?
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  A real man would be having sex with his slaves, whether they
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  were male or female. He would visit prostitutes, and
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  he would have homosexual encounters even while being
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  married. The sexual relationship between
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  an adult man and an adolescent boy was unfortunately, all too
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  common. Pedophilia was understood to be
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  good and acceptable at the time. The culture was full of extreme
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  promiscuity and inequality. Yet the system is evil as it
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  looks to in our eyes, was accepted and even celebrated by
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  Rome. Isn't it fascinating how our own
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  country is celebrating this stuff now?
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  It was foundational to Roman culture, least not to protest
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  against it. To be loyal to the Empire, you
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  had to be loyal to the morality of the Roman Empire.
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  To the Romans. A biblical view would have been
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  very disruptive to the social fabric and demeaning of Roman
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  ideal of masculinity. Christianity at that time
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  condemned the Roman system in every part.
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  The Christian sexual ethic limited intercourse to married
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  man and wife that protected children and gave them dignity.
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  Christianity did not simply represent an alternative system
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  of morality, but one that condemned the existing system,
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  the system that was foundational to Roman identity and stability.
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  Christians were considered outsiders.
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  Christians were traitors. Christians were dangerous.
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  Their brand or morality threatened to destabilize all of
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  society. No wonder then they were scorned
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  and even persecuted. Right now, as I read this
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  article, I can't seem to grasp this fact that we're living in
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  times that are so similar to what this empire had lived and
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  experienced. Our early Christian brothers and
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  sisters had to understand the difficulty at the time that this
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  unconfession of biblical chastity in a safe culture was
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  what they wanted and what obviously we want today as well.
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  The morality that was being taught and practice stood out is
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  unnatural to the Roman world. My pastor in Philadelphia says
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  Whatever happened to this normal, good old fashioned sin,
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  Right. Sin is so warped now and weird.
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  I mean, it used to be like adultery, That's bad enough, but
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  pedophilia? And how much deeper and darker
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  can the culture and the society go into in regard to immorality?
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  Christian sexual ethics that limited intercourse to a
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  marriage between a man and a woman, a woman, was not merely
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  different from the Roman ethics, but yet they utterly brought
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  down their own institution of what they thought was normal in
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  the beginning. And it just became more and more
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  perverse as the days went on. This is why the Christians faced
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  so much hostility at the time. And this is a very same thing
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  that's happening today in the halls of our government.
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  We are having people who are legislating immorality.
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  It's a minority group that's wanting you and me to slowly
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  embrace same sex marriage or eventually this pedophilia idea.
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  It's it's like the frog in the firing pan that the heat keeps
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  being turned up. The media keeps talking about
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  the pros and cons or whatever. And after a while you get tired
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  of hearing it. And your response might be,
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  well, it doesn't really affect me.
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  I'm not going that way. What does affect you?
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  It affects me. It affects everyone.
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  It affects your kids. What's being taught nowadays in
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  public school systems is just beyond our dreams.
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  I mean, when I was a kid in school, we had the Pledge of
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  Allegiance and we said the Lord's Prayer and we had the 10
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  commandments. None of that's there now.
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  This is how far we've fallen as a society and a culture.
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  Now, the good news is, is that in the 1st century, the
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  Christians were men and women of great courage.
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  They confess their values and their morality in a spirit of
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  bravery. They confess and practice
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  Christian morality. And today we need to be brave as
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  well and have the willingness to obey God rather than men, even
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  in the face of persecution. So when you think about Philip
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  and all these guys in the early book of the Acts, sometimes
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  we're reading this sort of like in a vacuum.
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  We have to really think about what were they living in at the
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  time? What was the culture like?
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  It was worse than what we're dealing with right now.
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  So take heart, take courage. The majority of the people in
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  our country are pro-life. The majority of the people in
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  our country are pro marriage between a man and a woman.
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  The majority of the people in our country are against
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  pedophilia. So don't let the media think
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  that it's the other way around, OK?
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  They're making millions of dollars to twist our minds and
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  to water down our convictions. That's why it's critical to vote
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  a lot of some when Christians, I don't vote.
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  It's not worth it. It's definitely worth voting.
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  You need to vote. Every vote counts.
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  And if you don't vote, you're basically living apathetically
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  and complacently in a world that you still have the ability to
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  have a voice. The good news is, is that we are
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  to be salt and light in the world.
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  And we have the ability, by the power of the Holy Spirit and the
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  Word of God, to stand our ground and not to compromise and not to
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  neutralize and not to be apathetic or complacent, but to
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  be bold and be loving and be gentle.
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  Because people that embrace these convictions of immorality
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  are lost. They don't know Jesus, OK?
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  Many of us were embracing those values at one time before the
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  Lord saved us, right? It's important to understand
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  that. So when we study the book of the
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  Acts here today, Philip is called the evangelist.
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  He's the only man in the New Testament called literally the
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  evangelist. We're called in the Bible, all
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  of us as Christians to do the work of an evangelist.
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  And that means simply being open to sharing your faith with
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  someone that doesn't know anything about Jesus, OK.
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  And so we pick it up here in verse 26.
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  And this is the the whole issue here.
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  Previously, Philip was down there preaching the gospel in
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  Samaria. Big revival happened.
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  A lot of people got saved. Now the Lord is working in his
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  life to work with one person. So one person to God isn't more
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  important than 1000, right? God is not looking at numbers or
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  population. He's looking at one heart, one
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  person at a time. And so Philip is sensitive here.
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  An Angel of the Lord in verse 26 of Acts 8 spoke to Philip saying
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  arise and go toward the South along the road which goes down
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  from Jerusalem to Gaza. It's interesting in a Bible you
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  can read these things and read them quickly and not sort of
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  reflect on the fact that this is a big deal that an Angel spoke
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  to him. Now was he more important than
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  you or me? I've never had an Angel speak to
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  me yet I, I, I welcome that if that's what the Lord's will is
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  for me. But then how do I discern if
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  it's a an Angel of darkness or an Angel of light?
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  They, they both can sort of float in the same atmosphere
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  and, and work in the same way. But the interesting thing about
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  the word of God is, and we're taught throughout the Scriptures
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  that God's main focus and main way of speaking to your heart
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  and mind is through the word of God, the written word of God by
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  the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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  I don't need an Angel to know what the Lord wants me to do.
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  And you don't either. I got Genesis through Revelation
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  and there's more information than I actually need to have
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  that I need to follow and, and and accept and and live live in,
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  you know, but this Ethiopian eunuch is, is a man in a
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  chariot, this worshipping in the Jewish sense driving down the
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  road and we're going to read what what happens here.
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  So Phillip is getting this sense of of God wanting to do
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  something arise and go toward the South along the road which
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  goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.
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  There's two roads that go down that way.
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  This one was more of the difficult Rd.
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  This is the desert. And so he arose and he went, and
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  behold, a man of Ethiopia, a eunuch of great authority under
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  Candace, the queen of The Ethiopians, who had charge of
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  all her treasury and had come to Jerusalem to worship, was
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  returning. Now, when you read this, I don't
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  know about you, but like, I like to look things up when I read
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  something. I'm like, what's the eunuch?
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  Does anybody ever look at that definition?
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  Sex change operations were happening back in the 1st
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  century. The church That it's a
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  castration of a male, they have no ability to have sexual
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  relations. That people who were in empires
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  and cruel and controlling wanted to make sure that those who
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  served them weren't having sexual union with their
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  concubines or trying to overthrow a government by
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  developing another group of people.
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  And for some reason this was accepted back in those days.
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  I I don't hear much about it now.
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  I'm glad that this is isn't a requirement for people, but
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  strange, isn't it? And so this person is a eunuch
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  and he's basically not able to ever have a family or have
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  children, but he's committed to this woman, Candace, the queen
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  of The Ethiopians. Now, Ethiopia at that time was a
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  large area that covered just not Ethiopia, but down into Sudan
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  and those various regions. He was a man of great authority,
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  it says. And he handled the treasury of
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  this whole land of Ethiopia. It's a very, very prominent
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  person. He had come as a seeker to
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  Jerusalem to find out about Jehovah God.
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  And as he's there, he's still thinking about things and he's
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  sitting in his chariot and he's reading Isaiah the prophet.
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  Now to have a, a scroll back in those days, the, the Bible
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  wasn't complete like it is here now that we have what a blessing
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  what we have. You had to buy it in scrolls and
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  specific books. And it was it was quite
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  expensive. And so he's up there with this
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  big scroll reading the writings of the prophet Isaiah and the
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  Spirit. The Holy Spirit in verse 29 said
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  to Philip, go near and overtake this chariot.
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  So he had to run. It says in verse 30.
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  So Philip ran to him and heard him reading the prophet Isaiah
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  and said, Do you understand what you are reading now in your
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  life? In my life, the Holy Spirit is
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  speaking to us all the time about all kinds of different
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  things that the Lord wants us to do.
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  I would trust you hear His voices.
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  I desire to hear His voice too. What is the will of God for your
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  life and mine? What is it that the Holy Spirit
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  is wanting you and me to do on a daily basis?
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  God sets up divine appointments all over the face of the earth
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  for one-on-one connections with people to talk to them about
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  their struggles or their problems.
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  I got a phone call this morning, the wrong wrong time to answer
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  the phone. I was in the radio room and just
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  felt compelled to answer the phone and the person on the
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  phone was saying that they needed some help.
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  And usually they start with church, starting with A and they
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  work the way all the way down to the end of the alphabet to try
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  to get money with this person had a girlfriend that needed
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  help and she didn't have any place to stay.
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  And this guy couldn't help her because his father wouldn't help
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  him or something. All these excuses.
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  I said, well, why don't you come to church today and we can meet
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  you and we can talk and maybe, you know, think about what might
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  be the next step for you and her and he.
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  And he said, well, where's the church at?
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  And I told him, he said, well, I don't know if I can get there.
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  I said, well, we're here every Sunday at 10:30, right?
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  They like you to send them a check or put them in a hotel and
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  you never meet them and you don't have any ability to have
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  any kind of opportunity. But I said you really need to
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  get connected with a community of believers.
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  You can have a family and you can get help and you can find
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  out about the Lord and the ways of God and that kind of stuff.
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  But he wasn't interested in that, you know.
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  And so, but I think about everything being being a divine
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  appointment. You show up somewhere, someone
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  tells you something and you have a chance and to tell them about
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  your relationship with the Lord, that's a divine appointment.
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  The appointment is really divine.
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  Whenever the person starts asking questions and they're
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  interested in what it is you have to tell them, like in this
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  instance here with this Ethiopian eunuch and Philip.
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  And so the, the response to this question, he says, well, how can
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  I unless someone guides me? And he asked Philip to come up
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  and sit with him. So no question in Philip's mind
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  was, wow, God's up to something here.
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  This guy's already prepared to hear about Jesus, and I just get
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  a chance to tell him about him and explain things to him.
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  How exciting this is for Philip and how exciting it is for you
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  and me. When you have a chance to tell
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  someone about what the Lord has done for you and how much more
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  exciting it is whenever they start responding and their eyes
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  start lighting up and they're getting questions and they want
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  to know and maybe they get to the point, Well, how can I know
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  this Jesus? There's nothing more
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  exhilarating in life to have the opportunity to see God bring
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  someone into salvation because you were faithful to tell them
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  about Jesus. Amen.
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  My wife is talking about this over and over.
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  We were praying the other night. We had a profound discussion
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  about life and aging and kids and grandkids and family and
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  older moms and just everybody that's in our life and how we
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  want to be used by the Lord together as a couple and not be
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  thinking about ourselves or our opinions or our feelings.
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  But how can we more be more giving to others and less
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  focused on this ourselves? And she told me, and I mentioned
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  this briefly, but I want to bring it up again.
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  She happened to be in a neighborhood where her mom lives
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  in a older development. And she had a chance to visit a
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  neighbor about some unrelated matter.
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  And she went in and the woman was crying and her daughter was
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  there. And Cindy said, what's wrong?
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  She's why going to break up my home.
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  My husband's died. I got to leave this place.
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  I can't handle it myself. They're going to put me in a
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  personal care home now and just seems like my life is this
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  ending and I got all this stuff. I don't know what to do with it.
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  And and she was just overwhelmed and distraught, this woman and
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  Cindy began to tell her about the Lord and she finally got to
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  the point of asking the lady if she could pray for her.
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  And she says, oh, I would, I would love that.
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  And so Cindy got to pray for her and got to impact this woman for
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  Christ. And she said, Clark, that's all
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  I want to have a chance to do in life, to have those kind of
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  opportunities, those kind of divine appointments, because she
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  said there's nothing that makes you feel any better than that
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  kind of opportunity and experience, right?
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  And you guys know you've been there, you've done it.
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  And and so this is the opportunity that we're learning
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  about today in the book of the act.
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  This is Philip's encounter and God personalized it.
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  So you and I can sort of think as we study this together, how
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  can I be like Philip and be open to the Holy Spirit and be ready
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  to tell someone that they need Jesus?
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  And so Philip runs over and he is going to begin to speak to
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  him. In verse 31, this man says, I
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  can't understand any of this unless someone guides me.
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  And he asked Philip to come up and sit with him.
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  The place in the Scriptures which he read was this.
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  He was led as a sheep to the slaughter.
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  This is from Isaiah chapter 53, verses 7 and 8.
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  Doesn't matter where you go in the Bible, you can always take
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  wherever it is in the Bible and lead people to the truth of who
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  Jesus is. And as a slam before its shears
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  is silent, so he opened not his mouth and his humiliation, his
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  justice was taken away and who would declare his generation for
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  his life is taken from the earth.
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  Now you and I being believers right away, we know, hey, that's
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  Jesus, that's prophetical, that's been fulfilled in the
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  death, the burial, resurrection of Jesus Christ.
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  But the eunuch is hearing and reading this for the first time.
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  So the eunuch answers Philip and says, I ask of you, of whom does
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  this prophet say this? Of himself or of some other man?
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  And that's sort of the view of the Jewish people when they read
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  Isaiah 53. If you ask a Jewish person, who
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  do you think that's about? They'll say, well, that's a
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  prophet or that's about the Messiah.
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  Or they might just be honest and say we have no idea when we read
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  that what that's talking about. South Philip opens his mouth
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  and, beginning at this Scripture, preaches Jesus to
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  him. So not only did he cover this
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  section of Scripture in Isaiah of this being fulfilled when
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  Jesus came to earth, but he would go into the teachings of
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  the Gospels and the experience that they've had already in the
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  book of the Acts with the preaching of the gospel and how
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  thousands of people are becoming believers because they're
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  hearing about Jesus saves for the first time.
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  Jesus saves from sin, Jesus forgives sin, Jesus cleanses us
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  from sin. And so when Philip is preaching
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  to Jesus, to him, and they're going down the road, it says now
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  as they went down the road, they came to some water, interesting
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  water. And the eunuch said, see, here
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  is water. What hinders me from being
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  baptized back in those days, they had public baptism.
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  It wasn't done in the backyard of someone's home or in the YMCA
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  or in some church facility. They love going out into the
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  community in the streams and lakes and rivers and get a big
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  crowd of people around and have people publicly baptized.
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  Because when that happened, the culture all the sudden said,
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  something's going on here with these Christians.
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  Every time I turn around, they're, they're, they're being
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  dunked underwater and they're, they're following Jesus.
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  What's going on here? And it convicts them.
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  And maybe they're thinking I'm missing out on something or I
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  should be baptized or I should follow Jesus.
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  I mean, all kind of thoughts happen when people see other
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  people baptized, as this man recognized right away the
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  significance of water, and water represents purification and
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  cleansing. He would have been taught that
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  in the school of Judaism. But that water can't cleanse us
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  from our sin. It's a purification, right?
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  Temporal. But it can't wash away sin, only
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  the blood of Jesus Christ. What can wash away my sin?
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  Nothing but the blood of Jesus, right?
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  We sang about that this morning, The blood of Jesus.
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  That's without the shedding of blood.
• 22:13
  There is no remission of sin. If we walk in the light as
• 22:18
  Christians, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one
• 22:21
  with another. We have this communion, we have
• 22:23
  this oneness, we have this unity, and the blood of Jesus
• 22:26
  Christ, God's Son, cleanses us from all sin.
• 22:30
  Amen. If we confess our sin, he is
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  faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us from
• 22:37
  all unrighteousness. It takes the blood of Jesus to
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  do that, the only sacrifice that could take away our sin.
• 22:44
  And so Philip says to him, if you believe with all your heart,
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  you may. Now when you think about when
• 22:51
  you first became a believer and the Lord brought you to the
• 22:57
  knowledge of your need of salvation, and you began to
• 23:02
  think about, you know, this, this power of the of the cross
• 23:07
  and what it can do for you. You realize that first of all,
• 23:12
  when you believe, you were maybe in front of someone that
• 23:15
  understood you were believing, or maybe you were by yourself
• 23:18
  when you believed like I was, but you knew that now you
• 23:21
  believed. You once didn't believe and now
• 23:23
  you believe a young man that used to come to this church.
• 23:26
  I'll never forget the story. Wonderful young man and friends
• 23:29
  of some good family here. And he had come from a Catholic
• 23:33
  background and he never really heard, he said, the Gospel.
• 23:36
  He just felt that he was hearing about religion every Sunday.
• 23:39
  And so I got to know him after a while.
• 23:41
  And I said, well, by the way, you know, how did you come here?
• 23:44
  And he told me and and then I said, were you a Christian?
• 23:48
  And he said, yeah. I said, well, how did that
• 23:49
  happen? He said one Sunday.
• 23:51
  I'm just sitting here and all of a sudden I believed.
• 23:54
  Isn't that awesome? Thanks for joining us on this
• 23:58
  journey through Acts. On today's edition of Living
• 24:01
  Waters of Grace, Pastor Clark shares that one of the most
• 24:04
  remarkable things about the book of Acts is how it shows the
• 24:08
  disciples transformation. The followers of Jesus we meet
• 24:12
  here are very different from the often confused and fearful
• 24:17
  disciples in the Gospels. After Jesus's death and
• 24:21
  resurrection, and especially through the power of the Holy
• 24:24
  Spirit, the apostles experienced a profound change in their
• 24:29
  hearts and boldness. Their faith became unwavering,
• 24:33
  and they moved forward with courage to spread the gospel
• 24:36
  despite opposition and hardship. Acts reminds us that the same
• 24:41
  Spirit who empowered them is at work in US today, shaping our
• 24:46
  hearts and giving us strength to live boldly for Christ.
• 24:50
  Living Waters of Grace is a ministry of Calvary Chapel
• 24:53
  Westmoreland. If you're in the Greensburg, PA
• 24:56
  area, we invite you to join us this Sunday at 10:30 AM at 400 E
• 25:02
  Pittsburgh St. Unit 6B.
• 25:04
  Visit calvarychapelonline.com For more information, where you
• 25:09
  can also join our e-mail list. Submit prayer requests, give
• 25:13
  online and download our mobile app.
• 25:17
  If you are in the Greensburg area, you can listen to Grace FM
• 25:20
  on the new 91.7 frequency. Pray about helping support the
• 25:25
  new station that will reach thousands more listeners.
• 25:28
  Send gifts to Grace FMPO Box 716, Greensburg, PA 15601.
• 25:36
  If you can join us in person, you can subscribe to the Calvary
• 25:38
  Chapel Westmoreland YouTube channel so you'll be alerted
• 25:42
  when new material becomes available.
• 25:45
  We're so grateful that you joined us today in Axe TuneIn
• 25:48
  again soon for another edition of Living Waters of Grace.