Just One More

Hey, I want you to imagine someone handed you a package and said, don't keep it, deliver it.

For 2,000 years, that is exactly what has happened with the gospel.

It has never belonged to the people holding it.

It has only been entrusted to them.

The book of Acts is really a story of a package that keeps moving that began in God.

Jerusalem.

I would like to take just a moment this morning and welcome our campuses at the Department of Corrections, at Pendleton High School, our online family.

Well, I'll say hello to everybody today.

We love each and every one of you.

I am going to walk you through a timeline.

So the gospel, how did it get to Pendleton?

How did it get to the Department of Corrections?

How did it get to Walla Walla?

From a place called Jerusalem.

Pay attention, history lesson, really quick.

Here we go.

In the book of Acts, it begins in Jerusalem.

It goes to Antioch.

It goes to all kinds of places.

And when it ends, in chapter 28, Paul arrives in a place called Rome.

And the gospel begins by...

The end of Acts.

Oh, I need some help.

Come here, babe.

Somebody get me... Oh, there we go.

Here we go.

You can stand up here.

You can be like my male... Whatever her name is on that show.

Here we go.

Here we go.

Here you go.

This is your job.

Figure out which sticker goes where.

All right.

Paul arrives in Rome.

So, boom.

The gospel makes it to Rome.

All right.

Then by 8100, Christian communities exist in North Africa...

and Egypt and Syria.

Got it?

There we go.

You can cover here too.

You can do that.

Yeah, you just keep covering them.

You're so good.

We didn't practice this.

It's all right.

And also Syria and Asia Minor and Greece and Italy and likely India.

Good luck.

Oh, there you go.

All right.

Look at this.

Okay.

By the second century, A.D., 150 to 200, Christianity reaches Gaul or modern France.

and North Africa, including Carthage.

And then by 8301, Armenia becomes the first nation to officially adopt Christianity.

The package keeps moving.

Good job.

By 8328, Christianity becomes firmly established in Ethiopia.

By 8432, anybody here a St.

Patrick?

St.

Patrick begins missionary work in Ireland.

By AD 597, Augustine of Canterbury is sent to England, leading to many conversions.

And by AD 635, Christian missionaries of the Church of the East arrive in

in China during the Tang Dynasty.

And then by the 9th century, by the 8800s, Christianity spreads throughout Scandinavia, including Norway.

Package keeps moving.

By 8874 and 1000...

You're doing so great.

Christianity reaches Iceland, which officially adopts Christianity around A.D.

1000.

By A.D.

1200, portions of the Bible have been translated in many languages throughout Europe.

Tell Caleb, Pastor Caleb, he's doing a good job.

By the late 1400, missionaries established churches in the kingdom of Congo.

By 1493, on his second voyage, Christopher Columbus brings Catholic priests to the Americas.

In 1531, Franciscan missionaries expand their work throughout Mexico following the Spanish conquest.

It keeps going.

By 1556, John Calvin supports sending Protestant missionaries to Brazil.

Okay, he's not so Calvinistic that he didn't believe in evangelism.

Anyway, just a little theological joke there.

Okay.

By the 1600s, Jesuit missionaries established churches throughout the Caribbean, Central America, and South America.

All right.

By the 1730s and 40s, the first great awakening sweeps through the American colonies as leaders like George Whitefield and Jonathan Edwards preach revival.

Oh yeah, we should be thankful for that.

By 1792, William Carey launches the modern Protestant missionary movement, inspiring Christians around the world to take the gospel to every nation.

The early 1800s, churches spread westward across the United States as settlers move into new territories.

By 1836, Marcus and Narcissa Whitman arrive in the Oregon country, which includes present-day Washington.

Good job.

By the 1850s and 1880s, Washington Territory grows.

Churches of many denominations are planted in towns and communities across the region, including Walla Walla, Seattle, Spokane, and Tacoma.

By 1997, the last weekend of April in 1997, a little group of people decide to plant a church that is now known as Life Church in Walla Walla, Washington.

Started in Jerusalem.

That's all for now.

Thank you very much.

And then that church planted a campus in January of 2024 in Pendleton, Oregon.

Go nuts for Pendleton.

Ha!

Ha!

And then the Department of Corrections and so much more that God has in store.

Welcome to the series, There Is More.

As we journey through the book of Acts, as the gospel gets carried from Jerusalem to the uttermost parts of the earth.

Today, we are in Acts chapter 8.

We are continuing in Acts chapter 8, and we're going to look at a guy by the name of Philip.

We just finished talking about Philip a little bit, and right before him we talked about a guy by the name of Stephen in chapter seven.

Both of these men are guys that were chosen to be the first deacons in the church to oversee what we would call storehouse ministry to help the needy of those in the community.

Philip is called an evangelist later in the book of Acts, but he is seen as an evangelist in this chapter.

Follow along, I'm gonna read about 14 verses.

As for Philip, an angel of the Lord said to him, go south down the desert road that runs from Jerusalem to Gaza.

So he started out and he met the treasurer of Ethiopia, a eunuch of great authority under the candake, the queen of Ethiopia.

The eunuch had gone to Jerusalem to worship and was now returning.

Seated in his carriage, he was reading aloud from the book of the prophet Isaiah.

The Holy Spirit said to Philip,

go over and walk along beside the carriage.

Philip ran over and heard the man reading from the prophet Isaiah.

Philip asked,

Do you understand what you're reading?

The man replied, how can I unless someone instructs me?

And he urged Philip to come up into the carriage and sit with him.

The passage of scripture he had been reading was this.

He was led like a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb is silent before the shearers, he did not open his mouth.

He was humiliated and received no justice.

Who can this?

Who can speak of his descendants?

For his life was taken from the earth.

The eunuch asked Philip, tell me, was the prophet talking about himself or someone else?

If there has ever been a time someone teed it up for a great hit right down the middle of the fairway for the gospel, this was the time.

So beginning with this same scripture, Philip told him the gospel, the good news about Jesus.

As they rode along, they came to some water and the eunuch said, look, there's some water.

Why can't I be baptized next Sunday at Life.Church?

He ordered the carriage to stop, and they went down into the water, and Philip baptized him.

Now listen, I don't want to get too star-tracky on you, but this pretty much is this.

This is what I love about the book of Acts.

It's got some crazy stories in it.

When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away.

I'm telling you, this book is fun.

The eunuch never saw him again, but went on his way rejoicing.

I'll talk about why in just a minute.

Meanwhile, Philip found himself farther north at the town of Azotus.

This is, depending on how far they had been traveling in the carriage down the road, is anywhere from 20 to 30 miles away.

The Spirit of the Lord snatched him and dropped him somewhere else.

That's just cool.

That's all I gotta say.

He preached the good news there and in every town along the way until he came to Caesarea.

Today, out of this passage of Scripture, I want to talk on this subject just one more.

Just one more.

The church is only a few years old.

Thousands of people have come to faith.

The Holy Spirit has been poured out.

Miracles are happening.

People are gathering in homes.

Jerusalem is being transformed.

Samaria is experiencing revival.

If there was ever a time to stay where God was moving, this was it.

But God had more.

Not another crowd.

Not another revival meeting.

Not another city.

Just one more person.

Acts 8, 26.

He is told by the Spirit of the Lord, or by the Lord, go south and

down the desert road.

How strange, just lean in, how strange this assignment must have felt to Philip in the middle of preaching revival.

Thousands of people are coming to faith.

The lame are walking.

Paralyzed people are healed.

And now God sends him to a lonely road.

Sometimes we assume bigger crowds means greater impact.

God often measures impact differently.

Philip leaves revival for one more conversation.

Because heaven celebrates people, not just crowds.

So how do we ensure, my friends, that the gospel keeps moving?

How do we ensure that it doesn't stop with us?

Let's learn from Philip in Acts chapter 8 what he did.

Listen to this.

He listened to the Holy Spirit.

Here's what it says.

As for Philip, I want you to notice a couple of things.

An angel of the Lord said to him, go south.

Now, I don't know what the difference is between angels talking to us and the Holy Spirit talking to us.

But in the book of Acts, this is New Testament, this is available for you.

Angels talk to people.

and direct them.

But I want you to notice, an angel of the Lord said to him, where to go?

Go south down that desert road.

But look at this.

But the Holy Spirit said to Philip, go over and walk along beside him.

The angel got Philip moving.

The Holy Spirit got Philip close.

God rarely tells us every detail.

He simply says, go over there.

Talk to that person.

Sit beside them.

Call them.

Text them.

Invite them.

Philip had learned something.

Every disciple of Jesus should learn.

If we will ask God, who is on your heart?

God will often put someone on ours.

What occupies your mind and your attention every day?

Work, schedules, kids, sports, bills, vacation, work.

I don't know what might occupy your mind every day, but I do know what occupies God's mind every moment of every day.

Lost people.

Jesus said, I came to seek and to save that which was lost.

If his mission becomes our mission, we will begin noticing people we used to just walk right past.

I think one of the biggest mistakes that Christians make today is forgetting why we are here.

We just get caught up in life.

But Jesus said this.

He said, let me tell you why you are here.

You're here to be salt.

You're here to be salt seasoning that brings out the God flavors of this earth.

You know, if my wife and I drove over to the Tri-Cities and she just said, hey, I'm going to drop you off.

I'm going to leave you at the mall.

If she just with no other instructions just said, I'm leaving you at the mall.

You know what I'd probably do?

I'd probably wander around for a while.

I'd probably find something I wanted.

I might buy something that I don't need.

I would simply make the best of being left there.

But if she said, hey, I'm gonna go over here, but I'm gonna drop you off here.

Can you go into this specific store, buy this specific item?

I would have a different mindset when I went into the mall because I wasn't just left there.

I was sent.

Now I might browse a little and still buy something I don't need.

But the huge difference, there's a huge difference from being left and being sent somewhere.

Most Christians live as though God has just left them here.

Like he has just sort of got lost about where your address is or why you're here.

But the Bible teaches us something different.

The Bible teaches us that we're not just here on the little league baseball team to play baseball.

But we're sent and assigned by God.

We are sent to that team.

That you're not just sent to the local high school or the elementary school to teach math.

You are sent there.

You're not just left there.

You are sent there.

You're not just managing a business.

You're not just raising kids in that neighborhood.

You have been sent.

We forget.

that we have been sent and when we forget that we've been sent we end up being spent on things that just don't really matter.

Philip listened and the gospel package kept moving.

It kept going from Jerusalem to Judea to Samaria and to the uttermost parts of the earth.

What did the Holy Spirit do?

He spoke

And Philip listened.

And look at this.

Philip ran over and he listened again.

So not only did he listen to God, he listened to the man reading.

He listened closer to people.

When God puts his heart into you,

for what his heart burns for and is burdened with every single day, you will hear the voice of God and you will hear the cries of people.

You will hear God and you will hear others.

And Philip simply asked one question.

Do you understand what you're reading?

He didn't begin with a sermon.

He just began with curiosity because questions open up doors.

That's right.

to people's hearts.

People love talking to people who genuinely care about them.

Some of the best evangelists that I've ever known are not those who preach great sermons, but those, not just those who are great speakers, but those who are great listeners.

Maybe the most spiritual thing that we could all do this week is just ask another question.

How you really doing?

What worries you the most right now?

Can I pray for you?

What do you think happens after this life?

People are often much more ready than we realize.

And the Holy Spirit sent Philip to someone who was ready.

And I want to tell you why.

This Ethiopian was called a eunuch, which means he is a castrated male.

most likely he was forced castration, most likely as a young man.

And this Ethiopian, it says, had traveled hundreds of miles to worship God.

But because he was a foreigner and he was a eunuch, he almost certainly never entered the temple.

Deuteronomy chapter 23, it excluded eunuchs from worshiping in the temple.

And the temple itself excluded Gentiles.

Archaeologists have actually recovered the exact warning stones that hung along the temple that was the barricade, that was the entryway into Jerusalem.

the temple courts.

And this is what one of those stones looked like, actually was one of the stones that have been undug.

And this is what it says in Greek and in Latin to make sure no foreigner ever entered in.

No foreigner is to enter in.

And he says, whoever is caught will himself be responsible for his consequent death.

How about that on the outside of every church?

His entire life, the Ethiopian eunuch, his entire life had communicated, you don't belong.

God sends Philip to somebody.

Who has most likely been rejected his entire life to tell him about Jesus.

And this man believes.

He is then water baptized.

Can you imagine why the Bible says he rode away rejoicing?

Here's why.

Because he was reading in Isaiah chapter 53.

Now back then...

It was on a scroll, a scroll that just packed words on the page.

He was reading in Isaiah chapter 53 out loud.

Philip hears him.

He urges Philip, come sit with me.

Explain to me who he's talking about.

He explains the gospel to him.

He's water baptized.

Philip is star-tracked away.

And he rides away rejoicing.

I want you to understand something.

He had come hundreds of miles to worship.

To feel accepted by God.

Only to see on the walls, no foreigner.

To know in Deuteronomy 23, no eunuch is allowed in the temple.

On that same scroll, he reads down just a little bit farther.

Three chapters later.

And this is what he reads.

Do not let the son of the foreigner who has joined himself to the Lord speak, saying, the Lord has utterly separated me from his people.

Nor let the eunuch say, here I am, a dry tree.

For thus says the Lord.

To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths and choose what pleases me and hold fast my covenant, even to them I will give in my house and within my walls.

In my house and within my walls that you just saw stone that said you're not allowed in.

I will give you a place and a name better than that of sons and daughters.

I will give you an everlasting name that shall never be cut off.

Now you see why he goes away rejoicing.

It's just a few moments later.

He reads what he just experienced.

God receives people religion rejects.

The man replied, how can I?

He urged Philip.

Urged him, come up into the carriage, sit with me.

When is the last time we portrayed ourselves in such a way that someone felt compelled to urge you to sit with them?

When is the last time you looked like you had time to sit with someone?

I love that Philip didn't have to barge his way into the guy's life.

He just got close.

He just got within proximity.

And as they rode along, they came to some water.

And the eunuch said, look, there's some water.

Why can't I be baptized?

And again, this kind of goes back to what he was feeling about rejected his whole life.

Is there any reason I can't be baptized?

Because I just want to worship God, and I wasn't allowed to.

Is there other reasons why I couldn't be baptized?

No.

Stop this carriage right now.

Cancel your vacation and get dunked next Sunday.

And they went down into the water, and Philip baptizes him.

So what does Philip do?

Again, it's very simple.

Philip just listened to God.

Didn't have to preach a sermon.

He answered questions.

He asked questions and he answered questions.

He listened to God and then God led him to get close to somebody.

And when he got close, he could hear them.

Are we hearing people?

You might hear someone go, they're just so cranky.

Why don't you actually hear them?

Maybe you'll start hearing they're hurting.

They're afraid.

They're lonely.

And you hear them so that you can do what Philip did and you can ask a question.

Not, why are you so cranky?

Not that question.

But you can ask questions.

How can I pray for you?

And that's all Philip did.

And then he urged him out of Philip's care and concern for him, will you sit with me?

Please, will you sit?

Will you come and have coffee with me?

And then in that conversation, he asked more questions and Philip answered and told him all about Jesus, told him the good news.

But then what?

What did he do?

He led him to his next step.

Everybody has a next step in their spiritual journey.

And it might be just an invitation, just like I would love you to come to church with me or whatever that invitation might be.

But for this man, the Ethiopian eunuch, it was, he kept leading them from one step to another until it was, I think you should get water baptized.

And the Ethiopian eunuch asked for it.

And Philip led him to it.

And that's what our job is too.

Just lead people.

We don't save people.

How many of you know that?

We don't save people.

We simply help people take their next step.

Sometimes he's explaining the gospel, but everyone has a next step.

For 2,000 years, this package has been passed from one person, from one believer to another.

It started in Jerusalem in Acts chapter 2.

And then it went from there.

It found its home in the heart of a man by the name of Philip.

Philip.

who went to Samaria and then went to a desert road and found one man, an Ethiopian eunuch.

Paul, he delivered it to one city after another city.

Missionaries carried it across continents.

Someone carried it to Washington State.

Someone carried it

to Walla Walla.

Someone carried it to you.

Someone carried it to Pendleton.

Someone carried it into the Department of Corrections.

The package address label was never meant to stop with us.

It was entrusted to us.

God isn't asking any of us to save the world

He's just asking us to deliver this package to just one more.

Just one more.

I don't want the package to stop in my heart.

I don't want the package to stop right here.

I want it to continue to go from one generation to another.

And I want to pray for us today that we will hear the Holy Spirit.

that we will hear the cries of people and we will lead people to their next step.

Y'all ready?

Let's pray.

God, I believe that if we will ask you who is on your heart, that you will place someone on ours.

This package was never meant to stop with me.

It was never meant to stop with us.

So today, Lord, we put another label on the package by allowing you to fill in the blank in our hearts.

Speak to us today.

Speak to us this week.

Help us to hear you.

Get in that grocery line.

Go to that store.

Slow down.

Hear them.

Ask a question.

Help us to hear you.

Help us to receive your burden and your love for others.

Help us to get in proximity of everybody that's on your heart.

We don't believe we're left here.

We believe we're sent here.

We're on assignment this week.

We're on assignment every day.

So Holy Spirit, lead us.

Angels do whatever they do.

God, you use your angels in our lives as well.

Lead us and help us to lead someone one step closer in their walk with you.

Holy Spirit, we invite you.

Like the book of Acts, we invite this kind of move upon our life.

where we will leave the comfortable and we will go to the uncomfortable to reach just one more.

With every head bowed and every eye closed, you could be in the sound of my voice today, in Pendleton, in the Department of Corrections, online, right in this room right now.

And you could say, I might be that one more.

I'm just not sure I'm right with God.

I'm pretty sure I'm not right with him, but I would love to get right with him today.

If that's you, and you wanna get right with God, like this Ethiopian eunuch did, then I'm gonna give you a chance to say one sincere prayer, because that's all you are away from getting right with God.

And if you're in Pendleton, our campus pastor's on his way up on the platform, and I just want to recognize between you and me and Jesus,

that you're going to pray this prayer.

And if that's you, would you just look up at me right now?

Would you look up and wave your hand and catch eyes with me and say, yes, thank you so much.

Who else is here?

Just leave it up.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, guys.

Thank you so much.

Every section over here.

Thank you.

Every place.

All right.

I trust this in every room.

The people are responding to you, Lord.

So here's what I'd like to do.

I'd like everybody to stand up together with me right now.

Come on, let's all stand up together.

And we are going to all, as a church family, we're going to pray this prayer.

It's not the exact words.

It's just sincerity of our heart.

But everybody just pray this prayer after me.

Will you pray this?

Here we go.

Dear Lord Jesus, I come to you today in need of forgiveness.

Forgive me of all my sins.

Come into my heart.

I want to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

and born again.

Lead me from this day forward to just one more.

I pray this right now in Jesus' name.

Everybody shout amen.

Amen.

We love you, Lord.