Acts 8:9-24
Last week we looked at Saul and his zeal to serve God by crushing His church. Through his example we learned that there are some absolute truths and one of those is that the path to heaven can only be through Jesus. This week we will shift our focus to Philip, and his efforts to evangelize an unreached people group.
The Philip in this section of scripture is most likely the Deacon named in Acts 6:5. The Apostle Philip most likely stayed in Jerusalem with the others. (Acts 8:1) This means he was appointed by the church to serve the widows, and yet our first exposure to him is that he is out preaching the Gospel (8:5) to an unreached people group. This illustrates the principle that everyone is to share the Gospel when they have an opening regardless of their training or position.
Philip was apparently very successful and because of this drew a crowd. He also is one of a very small group of people that is recording as working miracles in Acts. Only the Apostles, Barnabas, Steven, and Philip are recorded as having this gift. This gift from God was for a specific purpose and that was to validate the New Testament scriptures, which at this time were still mostly unwritten. This was one of several special transitional times in history, and during these transitional periods we see a large increase in direct and overt miracles. It would be dangerous to think of this time in Acts as normative. This is not to say modern day healings and other miracles do not occur, just that this was an extreme time for them.
These miracles that Philip was gifted to do drew the attention of an interesting character by the name of Simon. Simon was apparently a popular fellow because of his ability to work magic. Out text says that he “practicing magic in the city and astonishing the people of Samaria, claiming to be someone great,” and they “all, from smallest to greatest, were giving attention to him, saying, ‘This man is what is called the Great Power of God.’” (Acts 8:9-10) We cannot be sure what Simon was doing; other then it was labeled magic. It could have been the typical mix of drugs, psychology, and some science that easily amazed an uneducated crowd, or it might have been real power that was backed by demons. It is even possible that Simon was not deliberately deceiving the crowds into thinking he had real power, he might have believed it also.
When Simon saw the attention being given to Philip, and likely saw many of his fans heading over to follow Philip he must have been worried that he was losing power and influence. To combat this he goes to join Philip’s team, likely hoping to learn how Philip was doing the great works so that he can match them. In those days magicians would sell each other their secrets as a secondary way to raise money, so its possible that was Simon’s plan all along. It certainly was part of his culture.
Our text says that Simon believed and was baptized. (Acts 8:13) This must have indirectly helped Philip and perhaps even gave his ministry a boost. Many probably came to Philip only because they had heard that Simon the great sorcerer had joined him, someone whom they already knew and respected. It is easy to imagine a person thinking, “Wow if Simon joined them, I need to find out more!”
Eventually word gets back to the Apostles in Jerusalem about the great success Philip is having and they send Peter and John down. This was intended to handle a few things. First there was the practical problem that Philip probably simply needed more hands to help handle the crowds he was dealing with. Also they would have gone to give an official sanction to the events. Most importantly they needed to go so that the Holy Spirit would come.
This is a bit of a problematic part of scripture for many. In this section we have a great preacher preaching and many coming to be baptized because of it, yet none of them have received the Holy Spirit. To understand why this worked out this way we need to remind ourselves of a few things are unique to this time in the life of the church.
We also need to remember who the Samaritans were. They were half-breed Jews that were hated by the full-blooded Jews that lived in Israel. The two groups despised each other and did not mix. The Samaritans had their own flavor of the Jewish religion and did serve the same God, but that only severed to fuel the fires between the groups. This makes them the first non-Jewish people group to enter the Church. Because of this there was a danger that they might have started their own branch of the church, just as they had their own branch of Judaism.
God’s delaying of sending the Holy Spirit until Peter and John arrived served to connect them back to the church in Jerusalem and helped to bridge that great divide that racial prejudice has created over the centuries. We will see this same kind of bridging where Peter has to personally bring the group in to the church two more times. After that all people groups will have been let in to the church and we will see the falling off of the massive miracle movement that categorized the time of Christ until now in our text.
Simon watched all this and apparently continued to be baffled by the power he saw. He likely guessed that Peter and John were greater then Philip and he wanted their power. So he offers Peter money for a lesson in how to perform what he saw them do. This would be a normal thing to do in Simon’s world. Magicians bought and sold each other’s tricks all the time. Peter however did not see this as a good thing.
Peter gets very upset, and uses some very strong language to tell Simon no. In order to see the strength of Peter’s words we could paraphrase his response, as “you and your money will burn in Hell!” Peter as he normally did, no matter how angry he got, offered Simon a way out of this curse. He tells Simon to repent and receive forgiveness that will heal his heart and bring him salvation. Simon’s response is to ask Peter to pray for him, which indicates that Simon’s heart was not reached yet. After this, based on early church writings, Simon would go on to be the founder of the Christian form of Gnostics. He clearly was not reached for Christ.
This gets to a sad truth about people in the church today. Many will come forward and profess faith in Christ, become baptized and join the church. They may even serve as Deacons, Elders or in other leadership positions with out ever truly being saved. If their heart is not broken, and they are not repenting of their sins then no matter what it might appear on the outside they are not Christians, and are destined for Hell. Many in today’s churches are in this exact position.
This in my opinion is why the church looks so much like the world, and is not a light on the hill for Christ. Many, perhaps even most of the people in the church and even in church leadership are not Christians, but merely worldly people playing a part. They either do not understand the difference between joining the Church and salvation through a personal relationship with Christ, or they do not care. I personally believe that it is a lack of understanding and not some malicious intent for the vast majority of them.
This is why I see the Church itself as the greatest mission field of our day. I hope one day that God puts me in a position and empowers me to reach the Church for Christ. I personally believe that is what it will take to win this country and the whole world for Christ.
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