Please turn with me to the word
of God, to Exodus chapter 11. Exodus chapter 11. I was thinking as I look here
among us, and I thought, you know, people of this area, they don't
think anything of us. We're just nobodies. But I want
you to see, these people were nobody. They were slaves. But
what God says about these people. Verse 3, 11-3. And the Lord gave
the people favor in the sight of the Egyptians. Moreover, the
man Moses was very great in the land of Egypt, in the sight of
feral servants and in the sight of the people. And Moses said,
thus saith the Lord. That's why we're here. We wanna
hear what the Lord's gonna say. That's it. I don't care about
my opinions. Thus saith the Lord. Thus saith the Lord about midnight,
while I go out into the midst of Egypt, and all the firstborn
in the land of Egypt shall die. From the firstborn of Pharaoh
that sits upon his throne, even unto the firstborn of the maidservant
that is behind the mill, and all the firstborn of the beasts.
And there shall be a great cry throughout all the land of Egypt,
such as there was none like it, nor shall be like it any more.
The Lord's telling them, and this is what these nobodies,
what I'm gonna do. But against any of the children
of Israel shall not a dog move his tongue, against man or beast,
that you may know how that the Lord doth put a difference."
Not make a difference, he puts a difference between the Egyptians
and Israel. I was looking up that word different
differences in the Bible over 20 times. And every time the
Lord talks about different difference, talks about the clean from the
unclean. That's what this is, this is
God's people. And you know in Corinthians there,
Paul tells the Corinthians, who, not what, who make thee to differ? What do you have that you have
not received? And if you received it, why are
you boasting about it? God has put the difference, that
difference is the Lord Jesus Christ. We don't look any different,
we don't act much different, but God has put a difference
between His people. Between law and grace, works
and grace, saved and unsaved, gospel and religion. And oh, how blessed we are. how
blessed we are, I pray we don't ever take it for granted. Let
us go to the Lord in prayer, please. Lord, we've gathered today and
we take great comfort in knowing that you have said where two
or more gathered, you will be, that you are present in this
very room with us this day. And we confess to you, Lord,
We believe and you give us that faith to believe that you alone
have all power, we have none. And we ask, Lord, that you would
give us the power this morning to hear, to believe, to worship
you, to exalt you. We ask your hand upon your prophets
whom you brought out for the preaching of your gospel. Lord,
that you may put into their mouths and hearts what you once said,
and that you enable them by your spirit to declare Christ and
him crucified, and to do it simply, truthfully, and boldly, not holding
anything back. And as your people, Lord, give
us the faith this day to believe it, not only to hear it, but
to love it. and the wisdom to defend it. We thank you, Lord, that you
are a God of mercy and goodness, and that your mercy and goodness
never ceases to your people, that we are undeserving sinners,
and that we, Lord, are completely dependent on you for all, all
things. We especially rejoice today that
we have the great blessing of witnessing your saving hand upon
those who were in unbelief, and you've come to them, made them
willing, and give them the faith to come to Christ. Give us that
faith also, Lord, to believe on and in you, and that all glory
would go to you. Let's all stand together again,
and we'll sing hymn number 58 in your hardbacked hymnal, 58. ? Jesus, the very thought of thee
? With sweetness fills my breast, But sweeter for thy face to see,
And in thy presence rest. Nor voice can sing, nor heart
can frame, Nor can the memory find A sweeter sound than thy
blessed name. O Savior of our kind! O hope of every contrite heart! O joy of all the meek! To those who fall, how kind thou
art! How good to those who see. ? But what to those who find
of this ? ? Nor tongue nor pen can show ? ? The love of Jesus
what it is ? ? None but his loved ones know ? Please be seated. Let's open our Bibles together
to Acts chapter 8. Acts chapter 8. Today is a very
special day in our family and for our church family. in that Ryan and Lord Grace have
both asked me to baptize them and they will be professing faith
in Christ at the conclusion of this service of which we're all
very, very thankful. And I guess I've sort of prepared
this message for them But you're welcome to listen in. You know, the events that take
place in Acts chapter 8 is when Philip is sent of God to meet
the Ethiopian eunuch in Gaza. And the question that the eunuch
asks Philip, after having heard the gospel, is the question for
us this morning. What doth hinder me to be baptized? And I've titled this message,
All Hindrances Removed. Because the truth is, there's
only one hindrance. And Philip answered that question
when he answered the Ethiopian with a question. You remember
what Philip said? If thou believest, of all thine
heart thou mayest. And what'd that Ethiopian say?
I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. You see, unbelief
is the only hindrance to confessing Christ in baptism. Only one. One. No other. Men will put lots of other barriers
in the way and in our own minds and in our own imaginations we
will build up things that hinder us that hinder us. I hope this morning that the
Lord will remove those hindrances, that we will not forbid him. You remember when the Lord, when
the Lord, there was some small children around the Lord and
the disciples pushing them out of the way. And what did the
Lord say to the disciples? Forbid them not to come unto
me. That word forbid is the same
word translated in our text in Acts 8, where the Ethiopian said,
what doth hinder me? What forbids me? What keeps me
from Christ? When our Lord rebuked the Pharisees,
the scripture says, and the lawyers were rebuked because they hindered
men from coming to Christ. The lawyers were presenting the
law as a necessary means in order for someone to come. And so they
hindered men from coming by presenting themselves as the gatekeepers
of the law and the examples of righteousness and the Lord rebuked
them because they hindered men from coming to Christ. What does
hinder me? In Acts chapter 10 when Peter
was sent of God to Caesarea to preach the gospel to Cornelius,
the first Gentile convert. And after he preached the gospel
to them and there was a demonstration of the spirit of God poured out
upon them, Peter looked out around and he said, can any man forbid
or hinder these from being baptized? And the answer was no. No, we
can't forbid it. No, we can't hinder it. I want to preach the gospel in
such a way all the time so that the only thing that would hinder
someone from being saved is their own unbelief. I pray that the Lord would enable
us to be like those who prepared the way for the King. John referred
to that, John the Baptist, in John chapter one, when he said,
well, he quoted, turn with me to Isaiah 40, because that's
where he's quoting from. John the Baptist, as the forerunner
of Christ, as the forerunner of Christ, quotes, Isaiah 40
as the prophecy that he was to fulfill. And so in Isaiah chapter
40, beginning at verse three, and the voice of him that crieth
in the wilderness, that's what John said, I'm the voice. I'm
but a voice that crieth in the wilderness. Prepare ye the way
of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our
God, every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall
be made low, and the crooked places made straight, and the
rough places plain. And the glory of the Lord shall
be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth
of the Lord hath spoken it. Now here's the analogy, the king
is coming, and so men were to go out, and remove all the obstacles
that were in the way for the entourage of the king. If there were stones in the road,
trees falling over, crooked places that needed to be made straight,
holes that needed to be filled up, all of that was to be done
so that there would not be any hindrance for the coming of the
king. And John said, that's my call
from God. to remove the hindrances. We know that the cities of refuge
where the manslayer was to was to run to, to protect himself
from the avenger of blood. The cities of refuge, there were
signs out pointing to the cities of refuge and the people that
lived in those areas were to make sure that the roads were
clear, that anyone who had the law chasing them could get clearly
and plainly without obstacles to the city of refuge and find
safety. That's how we ought to preach
and that's how we ought to think or remove the obstacles. The Ethiopian unit saying to
Philip, if I've heard you correctly then Even though I'm an Ethiopian,
I'm not an Israelite, I'm not a Jew, what does hinder me from
professing Christ? The sick, the lame, the poor,
and the needy cannot be hindered. Matter of fact, Those things
are not a hindrance. They are the qualifications for
being baptized. To see that you are nothing in
your salvation and that he is everything. That you made no
contribution to your salvation, that he made it all and he made
it all by himself. Lord, if you're, if one of the
If one of the requirements for me to profess faith in Christ
in baptism is that I have to do something, have I done it
right? Have I done it often enough? Did I do enough of it? What doth
hinder me to be baptized, if thou believest? Now notice in
our story in Acts chapter 8, In verse 26, the angel of the
Lord spake unto Philip saying, arise and go toward the south
unto the way that goeth down from Jerusalem unto Gaza. Yes, the same place that we see
in the news today, that strip of desert land south of Jerusalem,
always been called Gaza. And Gaza, by interpretation,
means a fortified stronghold. A fortified stronghold. What are the obstacles that men
put in the way? What are the hindrances that
men suggest that have to be accomplished in order for one to profess faith
in Christ? They add to the simplicity of
faith by saying, well, you know, you need to clean up your life.
You need to break the bondage of sin. You live in the fortified
stronghold of Gaza. And until you find a way to change
the bondage of your sin, you can't be saved. What a hindrance that is. Truth is, when the Spirit of
God causes you to see that you're a sinner, you come to the conclusion
that everything about you is sinful. And that you're not capable of
producing anything that's without sin. You need a Savior who himself
is holy and harmless and separate from sinners and higher than
the heavens. One who can present himself and
his righteousness on your behalf. The Lord sent Philip down to
Gaza. So here's the question. Do you
live in Gaza? A fortified stronghold of sin
and unbelief? I cannot change my nature. I
need a new nature. I need a sinless nature. The Lord Jesus Christ came to
preach Deliverance to the captives. There was no way this Ethiopian
eunuch could have been delivered apart from having the Lord Jesus
Christ to stand in his stead before God and present his righteousness
on his behalf. You see, you and I live in Gaza. That's where sinners are. He came to set the prisoner free. You see, sin is like leprosy,
it's in the blood and it affects every part of us. The woman with
the issue of blood said, oh, if I could just touch the hem
of his garment, I could be made whole. It wasn't her hand that
made her whole, it was his garment that made her whole. And so it
is with faith. It's not our faith that makes
us whole, it's the object of that faith that cleanses us and
puts away all our sin before God, gives us a righteousness
outside of ourselves that we could never have. And notice in our text that the
Lord told Philip to go down to Jerusalem, unto Gaza, which is
desert, desert. That's where we live. We live
in a desert, a dry and thirsty land, a place where there is
no life. We've been living in a land without
water and without bread. You remember in 2 Samuel chapter
9 when When David, after now Saul has died and David has established
his kingdom and David calls in his servant Ziba and says to
Ziba, he says, is there anyone left from the household of Saul
that I might show him kindness for Jonathan's sake? David loved
Jonathan. He wanted to demonstrate the
kindness of the king toward a descendant of Jonathan. And Ziba said, yes,
there is a young man. His name is Mephibosheth. He's
crippled in both his feet, can't walk. And he lives in matre. And matre translated means sold. He's been sold into sin by his
father. And he lives, and that city of
nature is in the country of Lodabar. And Lodabar translated means
not a pasture, it's this little city down in the desert. That's
where Mephibosheth is. And David said, fetch him, go
get him, bring him to me. Here's what. the Lord is telling
Philip to do. Go down into Gaza, that fortified
stronghold. You know, I was thinking we see
in the Gaza of our own hearts what we are observing in the
news today. There is a web of tunnels that
hold evil in our hearts, that we can't eradicate, we can't
fix the problem. We need a savior. You see, sin is not an obstacle
for professing faith in Christ. It is the very qualification.
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. If you're not
a sinner, if you don't have the darkened tunnels of evil in your
heart and you don't live in Gaza and you're not left in a desert
land to yourself, that's where the Lord sends his preachers
with the gospel. that has no hindrance, has no
hindrance. And notice in verse 27, and he
arose and went and behold a man of Ethiopia, Ethiopia, symbolizing
the spiritual darkness of this man. He lived in a land where
there was no light. And the scripture tells us that
in him, in the Lord Jesus Christ was life. And the life was the
light of men. And light has come into the world,
but men love darkness rather than light because their deeds
are evil. They will not come to the light that they might
have life. Lord, I'm an Ethiopian by nature.
I live in a dark, pagan land. Left to myself, there'd be no
bread and no water. I'd be in complete bondage to
my sin. This Ethiopian had been brought
by God in prevenient grace. Now, prevenient grace is the
work of God in the hearts and lives of his elect before he
calls them out of darkness into his marvelous light. It is the
providential circumstances of God that causes them to be put
in the place to where the Lord will now save them. And in God's
prevenient grace, this Ethiopian chosen of God had come to this
conclusion. All the religions of Ethiopia
will not do me. I have a need that they can't
meet. Ethiopia was a very, very well
populated country. with lots of folks that were
engaged in the religions of Ethiopia and completely satisfied with
the hope that those religions gave them. But not this eunuch,
not this eunuch. God began working in his heart.
And he had heard about a God, a God by the name of Jehovah,
a God of the Jews. And so he had traveled with his
entourage all the way from Ethiopia to Jerusalem to worship the God
of Jerusalem. And now he's left Jerusalem and
headed back to Ethiopia and he still hasn't worshiped God. The
religion of the Jews had not helped him anymore than the religions of Ethiopia.
Why? Because there were hindrances
in those religions that he could not meet. There were qualifications
in that religion that he could not satisfy. And so now, after
hearing the gospel, he says to Philip, what doth hinder me to
be baptized? If I've heard you correctly,
the Lord Jesus Christ himself, who you are declaring as the
Messiah, has put away all those hindrances that men say are required
in order for me to be saved. Is there anything now that hinders
me? That's all I've met with all my life is hindrances. And God has spared me and he's
prevented me from finding hope and comfort in man-made free
will works religions, religions that require something of me.
Any message of salvation, any message of salvation that requires
you to do anything in order for God to be able to save you is
a works religion and it's a hindrance. And if
the Lord in his mercy and grace has given you any light, any
hope, any understanding, you know that you can't satisfy the
demands of those religions. That's why man-made religion
is so hypocritical, isn't it? Everybody trying to prove to
one another that they've made the grade. They've met the standard. And notice he's a eunuch, an emasculated man, unable to
have children, unable to produce life, impotent, without power
in himself. Here's the question for you and
for me. God find us in Gaza, a fortified
stronghold of sin that we cannot break, that we cannot deliver
ourselves from, a desert where there's no bread and no water. From the land of Ethiopia, spiritual
darkness and no hope. Notice also that this Ethiopian, verse 27, and he arose and went
and behold a man of Ethiopia and a eunuch of great authority
under Candace, queen of Ethiopia. Now Candace is a dynasty, not
an individual person. So Candace is representative
of the ruler of Ethiopia. Kind of like Pharaoh was not
a person, it was a dynasty. So this Ethiopian eunuch now,
he has authority over the treasury, not of an individual person but
of the nation, of the kingdom of Ethiopia. I can only imagine what his chariot
would look like. You only imagine the entourage
that he had and the clothes that he was wearing as compared to
this Bedouin by the name of Philip. This isn't even Philip the disciple,
this is Philip the deacon. One of the seven that was chosen
in Acts chapter seven to distribute the food among the disciples
in Jerusalem. So you can see the contrast between
these two individuals. And here comes Philip up to this
great man of Ethiopia. And not only did the religions
of Ethiopia not meet his need, not only did the works religion
of Judaism not meet his need, but he had no lack of wealth.
And all the possessions of this world did not satisfy the need
of his soul. You see, if a man can be content
with what this world has to offer, then God's not doing the work
of grace in the heart. I don't know any other way to
put that. If a man can be content with all the wealth and riches
and provisions and comforts of this world, and not find a need
in his soul for something more. All the religions of this world,
not find a need. God's not doing a work of grace
for him. But if all these things leave
you wanting, leave you lacking, and all the hindrances that men
put in the way in order for you to be saved, You find that you
can't meet them. There's hope. There's hope. He left Jerusalem with a copy
of the scriptures. I love that. That's all he had. His power, his possessions, his
religions of his own country, and the works religion of Judaism,
none of it met the need that God was putting in his heart. Now the scripture says, no man
seeketh after God at any time. Was he seeking God? Is that why
God is now rewarding him? No. No, God's seeking him. God, Michael, you read it. God
had made him to differ. God had caused him so that he
could not find satisfaction in these things. And he would not
be satisfied until God revealed himself to him. So God's seeking
him. And all he's got is a copy of
God's Word. Oh, he found no comfort in the ceremonies of Judaism,
but he left with a copy of God's word. So precious and so valuable. You know, prior to the printing
press, is that 14 something? A Bible would cost you an entire
year's wages to have. And now we let them collect dust
and sit around. We've got God's word. He had
God's word. Tell him what he paid for that
back then. And we don't know how much of it he had, but we
know he had the book of Isaiah. And he's reading from the book
of Isaiah. All you and I have, all we need
is a word from God. That's all we need. Opinions, thoughts, confessions,
creeds, the words of men, Oh, they will all fall short in removing
the hindrances. No, those things will become
a hindrance. We rely upon the opinions of
men and the works of men and the words of men. Those things
will become a hindrance to us. Paul asked this question twice.
He asked it once in Galatians and once in the book of Romans.
He said the very simple question, what saith the scriptures, settles
all controversy. For those who've been brought
to believe, those who know that God of his own will begats us
with the word of truth, with the word of truth. What's God
say? That's all I wanna know. Faith, saving faith, comes by hearing. And hearing
comes by the Word of God, doesn't it? God promises to bless His
Word. If God's going to speak to our
hearts, it will be by His Word. Psalm 19, verse 7, the law of
the Lord is perfect, converting the soul. The testimony of the
Lord is sure, making wise the simple. Thy word, David said,
is a lamp unto my feet. Thy word is a light unto my path. In the breaking of bread, the
disciples' eyes were opened and they beheld Christ. Oh, we open
God's word to reveal the glorious person of the Lord Jesus Christ. You know, another hindrance that
the Lord removed from this Ethiopian He put him in Gaza, raised him
up in Ethiopia, gave him a position of power and wealth, let him
go to Jerusalem, gave him a copy of scripture but he can't understand
the scriptures. All he can do is read them. Philip comes along beside his
chariot and says to him, understand this what thou readest. And God gave that Ethiopian eunuch
the humility to say, no, I don't. How can I except a man should
guide me? Oh, most men in his power, in
his position, seeing this man who is nowhere near the status
of him, would have raised their eyebrows and their nose to the
air and said, who do you think you are? They would have said
like the Jews said in John chapter nine, when that Lord healed that
blind man that was born blind. And the blind man rebukes the
Pharisees. He says to them, no man could
do this unless God was with him. And the Pharisees in indignation,
incensed with this blind man. They said, you were born, are
you coming to teach us? Oh, isn't it wonderful how the
Lord takes just a sinner, uses him. The Lord said, to the disciples,
he said, go into all the world and teach all nations, baptizing
them in the name of the Father and Son, the Holy Spirit, teaching
them to observe all things whatsoever I've commanded you. God raises
up men. Generally speaking, they have
less ability and less intellect than the average person. And yet, what's the Lord doing?
He's humbling his people to be taught by another. How can I
accept God? David, strong David, had to have
Nathan come to him and teach him. Naaman, oh, the commander-in-chief
of the army of of the strongest nation in the
world comes down to Dothan and meets Elijah. And he's got to
be taught of Elijah, the prophet. God sends Andrew to fetch Simon
and sends Philip to fetch Nathaniel and sends Paul to fetch Saul
and Lydia and Peter to fetch Cornelius. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shalt be saved. How shall they believe on him
in whom they've not heard? And how shall they hear without
a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they be sent? God gives a teachable spirit
to his children when he calls them so that they're able to
say with this Ethiopian, tell me what God says, I need to know. The Lord's called you to spend
your time studying God's word, tell me what it says and just
tell me what God says, that's all I wanna know. Don't give
me your opinion. Don't tell me fun, entertaining
stories. Tell me about Christ. I'm teachable. God's made me so. And we're not
that way by nature. We're not that way by nature. We're not teachable. When I ask
questions, I'm proud, self-righteous and independent. The Lord removed the hindrance
of being left to himself and he removed the hindrance of pride
by making him humble and teachable. What a blessing it is. God gives
a teachable spirit. Even when we are rebuked. David has now had his throne
taken from him by his very own son and he's fleeing from Jerusalem,
Absalom. And there's a man by the name
of Shimei and Shimei is throwing stones at David and cursing David. And David's, remember if it was
Abner, no I think it was one of his other commanders, said
to David, Who is this dog that speaks this way to the King?
Let me go and take his head off. And what did David say? David
said, leave him alone. The Lord sent him. The Lord sent
him to curse me. The Lord sent him to correct
me. The Lord sent him to rebuke me. What a blessing it is. God enables us. to be corrected and rebuked and
taught. This is where this Ethiopian
is. How can I accept a man should
guide me? Come up here. Tell me what this
is. And then he asked him, he says,
he's reading from Isaiah 53. And the Ethiopian, let's go back
to our text. In verse 29, then the Spirit
said unto Philip, go near and join thyself to this chariot.
And Philip ran thither to him and heard him read the prophet
Isaiah and said, understandest thou what thou readest? And he
said, how can I except some man should come, should guide me? And he desired, he pleaded with
Philip. He didn't say, yeah, I'll give
you permission to get in my chariot with me. He begged him to come
up there. Would you, do you understand
anything of the scriptures? Could you come up here and tell
me what this means? In the place of the scripture,
which he's read, verse 32, he was led as a sheep to the slaughter
and as a lamb done before his shears. So he opened not his
mouth and in his humiliation and in his judgment, his judgment
was taken away. And who shall declare his generation? For his life is taken from the
earth. And the eunuch answered Philip. Now the word answered
there, it's an old English way. He was asking, he wasn't answering
anything. He was asking him. And he asked
him, he said, I pray thee. I plead with thee, I beg thee,
do you have any idea who this prophet's talking about? Is he
talking about himself? Or is he talking about another? And Philip, beginning at that
very text, preached unto him Jesus. And I could just imagine
Philip beginning his message from this text by saying, well,
you just left Jerusalem, Only been a short while since Christ
was crucified. You were with the rabbis and
with the religious leaders of the city. Did they tell you anything
about, did you hear any talk about Jesus of Nazareth that
was crucified by the Romans just a little while ago? Oh yeah,
I did hear them talking about him. But they, but they excused
it as if he was No one special. He was nothing but a rabble rouser.
He was a blasphemer. He said that he was God. I can hear Philip. You just asked me who Isaiah
is talking about. That's who he's talking about.
Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus of Nazareth, he's the one.
He's the one who in his humiliation, his judgment was taken from him.
In other words, he's the one who bore all the sins of God's
people. The one who himself was without
sin. who himself was judged holy and
righteous before God. But as our sin bearer, as our
sin bearer, his judgment was taken away in his humiliation. And God judged him guilty. That's the same Isaiah 53, same
passage of scripture. It pleased God to bruise him. It wasn't the Romans. I can hear
Philip now. You heard about Jesus of Nazareth
that the Romans crucified? It wasn't the Romans who crucified
him. It wasn't the Jews that crucified him. It was God Almighty
that crucified him. It was God the Father that purposed
the death of his own son. It was God Almighty that took
the sword of his own justice and sheathed it into the heart
of his own son. When he saw the sins of his people,
on him, he put him to death. And it was the Lord Jesus Christ
who opened not his mouth, who went as a lamb to the slaughter.
Why didn't he open his mouth? Because he owned the sins of
his people as his own. He said, my sins have gone over
me. They are more numerous than the
numbers of the hairs of my head. He cried in Psalm 38, he said,
I will be sorry for my sins. And so the Lord Jesus Christ
opens not his mouth in rejection or in defense of himself because
he willingly bore the sins of his people and suffered the wrath
of God's justice in order to put those sins away once and
for all, all by himself. And he accomplished the work
of redemption. He opened not his mouth and went
as a lamb to the slaughter because he was guilty. He was guilty of our sins. He
bore the shame and the guilt, the sorrow for sin. He opened not his mouth because
he laid down his life for his sheep. No man took it from him. He willingly laid it down in
order to meet the requirements of God's justice. That all the
hindrances that religion, the Ethiopian religion and the Judaism
religion would put in the way of a of a eunuch, a eunuch, a
person who has no ability in and of themselves to produce
any life could be saved, would be saved. So that the eunuch said, what doth hinder me to be baptized? Is there anything? You just preached
to me the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace and the accomplished
work of the Lord Jesus Christ. What else is there that needs
to be done? Is there anything else? Philip said, Nope, it's all done. You believe? You believe? Now don't make it work out of
faith. Every time we talk about believing on the Lord Jesus Christ,
I feel a need to say this, because in the religious world, faith
is your contribution. It was Philip saying to this
Ethiopian, if you bring your faith, then that'll be the thing
that'll tip the scales. That'll be the thing that God
requires you to do. Faith by its very nature is the
absence of all work. It's the absence of all ability.
It's the absence of all, Lord, I don't have anything, I don't
have anything to contribute. I believe that Jesus is the Christ,
the son of the living God. Is that not what the Ethiopian
said? I believe that Jesus, you just preached to me from Isaiah
53, is the only hope that I have of being saved. I believe that
God is satisfied with him. I believe that God raised him
from the dead as the proof that God was satisfied with him. We know that Philip must have
taught him about baptism. How would he have known anything
about baptism? And here they are in a desert land And in God's
providence, they come up on this little oasis. I can just see
it. A few palm trees, a little pond
of water, maybe some camels. And the Ethiopian says, there's
water. What doth hinder me to be baptized?
Can I follow Christ? Can I profess Christ? Philip said, if thou believest. If you believe that Christ is
all, if you believe on him and in him as all of your salvation,
that you've got nothing to add to what he has already done, that's the only hindrance. That's
the only hindrance to being baptized on belief. I mean, yeah, to being
baptized, to professing Christ, the only hindrance. What doth
hinder me if thou believest? If you are resting all of your
hope on the Lord Jesus Christ for all of your salvation, you
will know that it was God that brought you to that place. Just
like God in his prevenient grace took this man all the way from
Ethiopia, gave him all the privileges that he had in his life, made
him a eunuch, brought a gospel preacher to him in Gaza, in the
bondage and stronghold of his own sin, in a desert place, was
God that made him to differ. Lord, I've got no place else
to go. That's what this Ethiopian was saying. What you just preached to me
has shut me up to Christ. I can't add anything to what
he's done. I believe with all my heart that
Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the anointed one, the one sent
of God to accomplish the salvation of God's people, and all my hope
is in him. All my hope is in him. Philip said, stop the chariot. All the hindrances have been
done away. This man wants to profess faith in Christ. Baptism is such a simple, simple
message, as is the gospel. Ryan and Lord Grace in a few
minutes are going to be plunged under the water, buried with Christ. Christ's death is my death. What Christ did on Calvary's
cross, the only hope I have that my sins have been put away, that
they've been separated from me as far as the east is from the
west, I can't do anything about them. When Christ raised from the dead,
I raised from the dead. Christ is my life. He's my life. He's my righteousness. He's my
justification. He's all my salvation. Very simple. Christ is everything. I'm nothing. He gets all the glory, amen? All the glory. Our heavenly father. Thank you for your word. Thank you. For your spirit. Thank you for. The faith that
you give. By your word. And by your spirit. To rest all our hope in Christ. or it's in his name we pray,
amen. Number 29 in the spiral hymn,
now let's stand together. I was lost and did not know it,
rushing madly to my end. But my God, who's rich in mercy,
would not let me die in sin. Hallelujah, God has saved me,
Saved me by His sovereign grace. Jesus died, the Spirit called
me, I am saved by sovereign grace. Chosen by my Heavenly Father
and redeemed by Jesus' blood, I am justified, forgiven, and
accepted by my God. Hallelujah, God has saved me,
Saved me by His sovereign grace. Jesus died, the Spirit called
me, I am saved by sovereign grace. ? God the Spirit came in power
? Gave me life and set me free ? He revealed my blessed Savior
? And created faith in me ? Hallelujah, God has saved me ? Saved me by
his sovereign grace Jesus died, the Spirit called me, I am saved
by sovereign grace. ? God has saved me and will keep
me ? By the power of his grace ? He will guide, guard and protect
me ? Till I see my savior's face ? Hallelujah, God has saved me
Save me by His sovereign grace. Jesus died, the Spirit called
me. I am saved by sovereign grace. Please be seated. Let's sing hymn number 190 now. We usually sing this for baptism.
It's a good hymn. Number 190 from the hardback
hymnal. ? We bless the name of ? That's
a different hymn, Troy. 190 in the hardback? ? We bless
the name of Christ the Lord ? We bless him for his, we'll just
sing it a cappella, okay? Let's see if we can get the first
note right. We bless the name of Christ the
Lord. We bless him for his holy word. Who loved to do his father's
will and all