Responding to the Good News
by Edwin Crozier
The Ethiopian Eunuch had traveled hundreds of miles to worship at the Jerusalem temple. However, he was not allowed to fully participate in the worship because the law said a eunuch could not enter the Lord’s assembly in Deuteronomy 23:1. I don’t know if he was aware of that law before he traveled, but did it anyway, or if he went the whole way expecting to participate fully and then found out when he arrived. Either way, not being able to fully participate had to have been very disappointing.
While traveling back to Ethiopia, he was reading Isaiah 53. As he did so, a man started running alongside his chariot. “Do you understand what you are reading?” the man asked. “How can I unless someone explains it to me?” the Ethiopian responded. The man offered to explain.
According to Acts 8:35, this man “opened his mouth, and beginning with this Scripture he told him the good news about Jesus” (ESV). The man was Philip, one of the deacons from Acts 6. Don’t forget: the last of these deacons who preached ended up getting stoned. Yet, Philip continued to preach and teach. Astounding!
Even more astounding is how the Ethiopian responded to Philip’s teaching. The text merely says Philip taught the good news about Jesus. Yet, as Philip spoke, the Eunuch saw water and broke in, “See, here is water! What prevents me from being baptized?” (Acts 8:37, ESV).
Stop and think about this for a minute. We are told Philip was simply preaching the good news. But the Eunuch responded by asking to be baptized. What does that tell us Philip included in preaching the good news about Jesus? Philip included baptism. Not only that, Philip must have said something about the necessity and the immediacy. Why would the Ethiopian make such a request if he hadn’t heard it was necessary?
This intrigues me. Today, it seems like so many want to be an exception to the Bible’s teaching on baptism. So many want to get out of it. To many, when you read what the Scripture really says about baptism, they start making objections. Like the Sadducees of Luke 20, they make up hypothetical stories about prisoners, car wreck victims, and men traveling in the desert, which they believe demonstrate God would never require baptism. But the Eunuch didn’t do any of this. He wasn’t trying to figure out how to get out of baptism or postpone it. He wanted in on it. He was afraid Philip wouldn’t let him get baptized. He wanted to get baptized, and he wanted to do it “right now!”
This tells us something about how we need to preach the gospel. We need to preach the gospel in a way that makes people think they need to be baptized. We need to preach it in a way that makes them ask to be baptized. If we aren’t preaching like that, we aren’t preaching like Philip. Or like Peter. Remember Acts 2:38?
This also tells us how to respond to the gospel of Jesus. If we want to participate in the good news of King Jesus, we need to be baptized in water in His name. Have you submitted to that? If not, can we help you?
