Treasure | Ep43

Transcript

In Acts the 8th chapter, Luke records an account of a man who found a treasure. That’s what I want us to study today.

When Jesus was on earth, he said, the kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid again. And from joy over it, he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.

This was a little parable about a treasure. He said, the kingdom of heaven is like a treasure. And he said, here’s a man who found a treasure, and then he went and buried it and then bought that field because he wanted that treasure that was there.

In Acts the 8th chapter, Luke records an event of a man who found a treasure. I want us to look at Acts 8, actually verses 27 through 40. But I’m not going to read it because it is a long reading, but I’m going to relate it and then look at it.

The idea is that Philip was preaching in the city of Samaria, and it says an angel of the Lord appeared to Philip saying, arise and go toward the south under the way they goeth down, from Jerusalem to Gaza, which is desert. And he arose and went, and when he got to that point, he saw a man, a eunuch from Ethiopia, riding along in a chariot. And the Spirit said to Philip, go near and join thyself under this chariot.

And he ran beside the chariot, and he heard the man reading, and he said, do you understand what you read? And the man said, how can I, unless somebody guides me? And he desired that Philip would come up and sit with him, and the place of the scripture that he read was Isaiah 53, and says there in verse 35, and Philip opened his mouth and began to preach Jesus. And as they went on their way, they came to a certain water, and the eunuch said, see, here’s water, why can’t I be baptized? And he commanded the chariot to stand still, and they went down into the water with Philip in the eunuch, and he baptized him. And the eunuch went on his way rejoicing, and Philip moved on over to begin preaching along the coast.

That, in essence, is the summary of that great event. I want us to think about the treasure. Jesus said the kingdom of heaven is a great treasure.

There’s lots of treasures related in the story or the account that I just related to you. It is interesting, of course, it says, first off, that this was an Ethiopian man, eunuch, who was from Ethiopia, who was the treasurer for Candace, queen of the Ethiopians. So here’s a man who is a treasurer.

He must have been a very responsible man. He is a man who is in charge of that nation’s treasury. And ironically, he is on his way to Giza, down a road that would take them from there, from Jerusalem, to his homeland of Ethiopia.

And interestingly, Giza, the city, means treasure. So here it is. A treasurer is traveling around toward a city with a treasure that means a treasure.

And then here comes Philip. He gets up into the chariot and preaches Jesus to this man. And that message about Jesus is the message of the kingdom of heaven, which is that treasure that Jesus spoke about.

So it is interesting that all the treasures that are related in this little passage, you have the kingdom of heaven, which is a treasure. You have the treasurer, the Ethiopian eunuch. We then have him traveling toward a place, that means treasure.

And then all of a sudden, Philip begins to preach to him Jesus, which is really the treasure of the kingdom of heaven. I want us to think about some things of important facts from this text. First off, this man was a religious man.

Whether he was a Jew or a proselyte, doesn’t matter. He had come to Jerusalem, it says, to worship. He had traveled a long ways.

This man is coming from Ethiopia to Jerusalem to worship. Now, the Ethiopian, the Ethiopia in the Bible, is not the same area of Africa that we call Ethiopia today. This is a different place, but it was about 1,000 to 1,500 miles from Jerusalem.

Can you imagine? Here’s a man who is so dedicated to God that he gets in a chariot and rides for 1,000 miles, or maybe 1,500 miles, to come to Jerusalem to worship. The distance they could travel in a chariot was about 30 miles a day. If you say it’s 25 miles a day, think about how long it’s going to take him to get there.

He’s going to be gone 40 to 60 days on this trip. He’s a man that is in a responsible position. He is in charge of the treasury of this country.

He is going to be gone from work 40 to 60 days, and yet he’s able to do that. He was a man in a position of great authority and responsibility. That speaks well of him.

He was a man of great wealth. He was riding in a chariot. And someone has said, that’s the Cadillac of that day.

You see, most people walk, but he’s riding in a chariot. What a great tribute to be able to travel that way. He was a wealthy man.

You know, it also says he was reading a copy of the book of Isaiah. The book of Isaiah did not belong to everybody. No one rare did anybody have a copy of it.

The only way you’d get a copy of the book of the Bible was to pay somebody to hand copy that book for you. Isaiah has 66 chapters. Some of those chapters are very long chapters.

How long would it take someone to copy that, pen by pen, letter by letter, word by word? That’s a long time. And you think about paying a man a day’s wage for every day he works on that copy. This man spent a lot of money getting a copy of the book of Isaiah.

So this man had a lot of wealth. He is also a man who was teachable. You know, he’s reading from this book of Isaiah and as Philip comes up beside him, he hears him, and he says, do you understand what you’re reading? And he said, how can I, unless somebody guides me? You know, somebody of that responsibility job, somebody with that much wealth, quite often could have the attitude, no, thank you, I don’t need any help.

But he was teachable. He said, how can I understand this unless somebody guides me? And they’re reading the passage of Isaiah 53, and the eunuch said, is this man talking about himself, or is he talking about somebody else? And Philip, it says in verse 35, opened his mouth, began the same scripture and preached unto him Jesus. And so he is a person who was teachable.

He was also willing to change his religion when he learned that what he had been doing was no longer acceptable to God. He was either a Jew or a Gentile, a proselyte, but he was so dedicated to God that he was willing to travel 1,000, 1,500 miles to go get to worship for a few hours at that place. And that was a religion that God had ordained that came through Moses on Mount Sinai as recorded in Exodus 19, 20, and so on, down through 25.

It was a religion that God established. But what this man doesn’t know is that that law and that religion had been removed and that the church had been established, that Jesus had been crucified, that no longer do they have animal sacrifices, but now they have the sacrifice of Jesus. But he doesn’t know that at this time, but he is very teachable and he is learning.

And it is interesting that when they come to some water, it’s not Philip who said, do you want to be baptized? It’s the eunuch that said, see, here’s water. Why can’t I be baptized? This tells us something about it. Philip, it says, taught him about Jesus.

And yet the man didn’t ask about Jesus. He asked about baptism. When we preach Jesus, we preach baptism, not because it’s a work of man, not because it is an ordinance of the church, but we preach it because it is tied to Jesus Christ Himself.

When one is baptized, he is baptized into Jesus Christ, Romans 6, 3, and 4. And so this man not only was teachable, he was also willing to be taught and to obey what he was taught. He was also a man who when he found this great treasure, was willing to obtain that treasure by being obedient. And then the text says in verse 39, and he went on his way rejoicing.

There is some great facts about this great man. I want us to think about the lessons that we can learn from this great text. First off, let’s begin with Philip.

Philip was preaching in the city of Samaria and doing a great work there, baptizing a lot of people. We found out in verse 12 of that chapter. But now then it says, and the angel of the Lord came to Philip and told him to go down to the Gazer, the road that goes from Jerusalem to Gazer.

And so this angel gives him that instruction. When he gets to that point, Philip is at the point, the angel didn’t tell him what he’s going to find, he just told him to go to that point. When he gets to that point, the Bible says, and the Spirit said to Philip, go near and join thyself under this chariot.

Two things that we look at right here. The angel and angel of God spoke to Philip. And then it says, the Spirit of God spoke to Philip.

You see, in biblical times, when God did speak to people, he did not speak to the sinner, he spoke to his prophets and apostles. Philip had become a prophet by having the apostles lay hands on him in Acts 6, verse 6. And now then here in Acts chapter 8, this prophet of God is spoken to by God to say, here’s what I want you to do. And so he sent him to a certain place.

He told him to go join the man in the chariot. The Spirit and the angel were speaking to God’s spokesman. God does not speak to us today in that way.

God speaks to us today through the Bible. It is also interesting that even in those times when God did speak to his people, he never spoke to the sinner. He always spoke to the apostle or prophet.

Philip, he spoke to, and Philip preached to the man. In Acts 10, the angel told Cornelius to send for Peter and have him come, and he said, he will speak words whereby you and your household can be saved. The angel did not speak to Cornelius the sinner.

The angel said Peter, an apostle, will speak words that you will obey. Folks, God does not communicate with us today by a verbal voice. God does not put a burden on our heart.

God does not give us experiences to let us know we’re saved or need to be saved. God works today through the word of God. Paul speaks of this in Ephesians 6 and verse 17.

And says, taking the word of God, which is the sword of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit still convicts us today as it was promised in John 16.8. But he convicts us today through the word that he gave. You see, the Holy Spirit was the one who gave these apostles and prophets the authority to write and guiding them as writing that message to us.

And God today will not speak to you directly. He’s only going to speak to you through the word of God. The written word of God is what God uses today.

Another great lesson that we need to see from this account is that we need to be teachable like this man was teachable. Sometimes we take the attitude, I already know. Well, we may know.

But when we hear something, we need to examine it. Maybe there’s a clarification of what I thought I knew that I’m mistaken about. Or maybe I understand it partially, but maybe I don’t understand it fully.

We need to be willing to be taught. We need to be able to listen to what is being taught compared with the Bible. And to see if we really are following what God said, we must be willing to make the changes that are necessary.

You see, this man was teachable. And when he found out that his religion was wrong, he was baptized into the church. And so he was willing to be taught and willing to be obedient.

You and I must be willing to make changes in our lives, even if it means giving up the religion we followed. As we study the Bible, we have to change. We ought to change our understanding about God and salvation.

We need to change the moral lives of our lives that we live. We need to change how we worship God. We need to change what we have believed about getting saved.

There’s all kinds of areas that we need to learn about. This man was willing to do that. He was teachable, and he obeyed what he learned.

We must be willing to make changes in our own lives. This man changed from a religion that God had established but had removed to become part of religion that Jesus had established. Saul, the same thing is true of him.

He grew up a leader in the Old Testament, a leader in that law of Moses, a leader in that synagogue worship, a leader that was built around the temple. But when Paul learned that he was wrong, he changed his religion. Even though his parents and grandparents had been a part of that religion, he changed it.

He changed and left it. That’s hard. And some of you, if you’re going to really be obedient to God, are going to have to leave the religion of your mother, your father, your grandparents.

It may be that they never had the opportunity that you have. Maybe you have learned something that they didn’t have the opportunity to learn. You need to leave the religion of man-made doctrine and follow the religion of Jesus Christ.

We must also realize that if we’re going to follow Jesus, we have to be baptized. Baptism is one of those subjects that most churches practice. There are only a couple that do not.

But many churches do not put much emphasis on baptism. Some will say, well, you don’t really have to be baptized. We’ll baptize you, but you don’t have to be.

That’s not what the Bible says about baptism. The Bible tells us that baptism is essential and that Jesus said, He that believes in His but pass will be saved. That makes baptism crucial and important.

Peter said in 1 Peter 3, 21, that baptism doth also now save you. Now, he’s not excluding faith or repentance or anything like that. But he does say baptism is the point at which we’re saved.

Romans 6, 3 and 4, says that baptism is what puts us into Christ. And in Christ is where salvation is found. Let me urge you to evaluate your religion, listen to what the Bible says.

If you’re wrong, make some changes. And then you can, when you obey, can be as the eunuch was and he went on his way rejoicing. Thanks for joining us this week and spending time in God’s Word.

Special thanks to Mac Graham, John Kachelman, and Lightway Media for recording, producing, and making this podcast possible. If you’re ever in the Littleton, New Hampshire area, we’d love to have you join us for worship and Bible study on Sunday afternoons at 4 at the Senior Center. You’re always welcome.

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“Meditating On The Word” is hosted by Wayne Burger, recorded by Mac Graham, and produced by John Kachelman III and LightWay Media. Follow us on social media to get updates and information when available.

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