Why Do I Still Feel Like I Don’t Belong? | Acts 8:26-40 | Kevin Queen

Y'all come ready to praise Him today. Come on, y'all. Come on. Higher than the mountains that we face. He's stronger than the power of the grave. Stronger than the power of the grave. He's constant. And constant in the trial and the change. One thing remains. One thing remains. Remains one thing. Your love never fails and never gives up and never goes out on me. Your love never fails and never gives up and never runs out on me. You sing. Your love never fails and never runs. Your love. Is that good news, Jones? Come on. On and on. On and on and on and on it goes. It overwhelms and satisfies my soul. Oh, I never have to be afraid. I never ever have to be afraid. One thing remains. One thing remains. Remains one thing. Remains one thing, your love. Your love never fails and never gives up

and never runs out on me. Your love never fails and never gives up and never runs out on me. Your love never fails and never gives up and never runs out on me. Your love. Come on, y'all. In death, in life, I'm confident and covered by the power of your grace. Oh, my daddy's name. My daddy's name. There's nothing that can separate my heart from your great love. Now, y'all read it. Cause your love never fails and never gives up and never. Come on, y'all. He's worthy. Your love never fails and never runs out on me. Come on, he's worthy. Your love never fails and never gives up. This is good news, church. Your love. Come on, y'all. On and on and on and on it goes. When overwhelmed and tired, it slides my soul. And I'll never have to be afraid. Never ever have to be afraid. Oh, for this one thing remains. For this one thing remains. Oh, one thing remains.

Oh, it's your love. Remains. Cause your love never fails and never gives up and never runs out on me. Your love. Your love never fails and never gives up and never runs out on me. Your love. Your love never fails and never gives up and never runs out on me. Your love. Your love. Your love. Your love. Your love. Intense in life, I'm confident and covered by the power of your great love. And my daddy's paid. My daddy's paid. There's nothing that can separate my heart from your great love. Come on, y'all. Lift him up. He is worthy to be praised. Amen. With the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. Let's sing. Your eyes to fulfill the law and prophets to a virgin came the world from a throne of endless glory to the cradle in the dirt We sing praise the father come on you sing praise the father

Is We praise forever to the king of kings The lost For even in your suffering you saw to the other side Knowing this was our salvation Jesus for our sake you died The father To the king Is And the devil rose from their tombs And the church of christ was born For the love of jesus christ Oh We praise Of kings, oh we praise forever to the king of kings So So So Well, it is uh, it is a good day to be together to worship together as a church and uh And this this week was significant. It was uh, it was back to back to school week for our family We uh re and I we took uh took durham back to back to auburn for his second year Then we uh, then we moved in camden for her fourth year at samford. That's sam not stan Uh samford and uh in birmingham and uh, and then uh, bolton started his uh His senior year in high school and uh in raleigh is now working a job back in uh at a church bethlehem church in Georgia, which means she's off the payroll, hallelujah. And so we're in that back-to-school mode and back-to-college mode. One of the reasons that we started our college ministry here at Crosspoint is because,

I don't know if you realize it, but there are 100,000 college students in the Nashville metro area, 100,000 college students. And our heart is to see a move of God among this next generation. And so we are excited that Crosspoint College starts up this week, Tuesday night at 7 p.m. at our Nashville campus. And so I wanna extend an invitation to you. If you were in college, that you'd come and be a part of that. If you know somebody who's in college, extend an invitation for them to join us. Or if you have a burden, maybe you're like me or Reed, we both of us, our lives were changed through a college ministry. And so we've got a heart for college students. Maybe that's the same for you. And if you wanna be a part of that, Pastor Nate and his team are doing a phenomenal job. And they'd love to talk with you about next steps and jumping in and serving as well. So we love what God is doing in the next generation. And we wanna bless our college students. In fact, one of my favorite leadership principles is do for one what you wish you could do for everyone. And so we realize in college, there are a lot of heavy existential questions that are asked. And one of them is, what's for dinner?

And so we have a bag of groceries. And so I think we've got somebody on the team. Yes, with a bag of groceries. If you're a college student and you would like the pantry being, help being set, you don't even have a pantry, your dorm room, you'd like to have some food. So if you're a college student, any college students, just raise your hand. We wanna bless you, give you something right there on the front row, ready to go. So yeah, so you can go ahead and hand him, that's it. And that's a great day. That was a great day for you. I'm pretty sure that there's some ramen in there. And that was just, I mean, you know, you've graduated from college when you get the good ramen. You know what I'm saying? Like none of this 12 for $1 stuff, but you get that $4 ramen. You know about that $4 ramen? You get the $4, you're eating it's like steak. You'd be like, I've arrived. But while you're in college, you learn how to elevate ramen. Put a little boiled egg on it. It'll be all right. So, all right. So we are, we are, we are all in this together. So, all right.

So we are, we are, we are also celebrating today because it is baptism Sunday and baptism Sunday is one of our favorite days throughout the year where we get to, we get to celebrate life change. And, and when people are baptized, one of the things you'll notice is that we don't take a group of people and cram them in the tub. We don't, for efficiency sake, we don't, we don't baptize multiple people at the same time. That's not the reason, that's not the reason we baptize people. We baptize people one at a time because that's how Jesus makes disciples. Disciples are handmade, not mass produced. And so Jesus forms a life, one person, he forms a spiritual life, one person at a time. And so today we get to celebrate baptism Sunday. We get to celebrate life change. We get to celebrate the one at a time. And Jesus tells this story, it's one of his most famous parables. He tells a story about a shepherd, a shepherd who was, who was counting a sheep at the end of the day. And he's like, one, two, three, four, five, six, and he's looking out and he didn't, then he realizes that there are 99. He realizes that one of those sheep are missing. And so the shepherd looks at his friends and he, he leaves the 99 with his friends.

And he goes on this search to go find the one because, because he was in, in his heart, his heart was broken over the one sheep that was lost. And so, so the shepherd leaves all the other 99 and he goes after the one and he searches high and low and he looks all over until he finds that one sheep. And he says that when he found that sheep, he picked the sheep up, he put it on his shoulders and he rejoiced, like he was celebrating that he found the one. And he goes back and he tells all his friends, I found the one that was lost. And then Jesus tells us in that parable, he says, I tell you then in the same way, there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons who do not need to repent. So Jesus, here's what he wants us to know in this is that Jesus notices when people have lost their way and that his response is compassion. His response is to search. His response is to look. That Jesus is not indifferent over those who have lost their way. And he tells us that all of heaven celebrates when one, that heaven joins in on the party when even one person repents. To repent means to come home. So there's a party in heaven over every one. And then Jesus also tells us that,

he mentions that there are 99 who need not repent. Now what's interesting about this is that the audience who would have heard this, they would have been familiar with the passage in Isaiah 53 that says, we all like sheep have gone astray. Each of us has turned to our own way and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. So they would have known, wait a second, there's not anyone who doesn't need to repent. I know that was a lot of negatives in there, double negative, but just hang with me. Everyone, everyone needs to repent that everyone gets lost sometimes, that everyone loses their way in life, that everyone is lost and everyone needs to be found. And so he says that there's this rejoicing. So the only way to maybe experience the worst kind of lostness is not realize that you're lost. But there are some who just who don't realize it, but the spirit of God begins to move in hearts and we realize I long for this connection with the living God. But even beyond our longing is if we experience that is because the living God is already seeking us. That God is already pursuing us. And so what I want you to know today is that Jesus came for the one. It's what we're gonna see in the text. If you've got a Bible, you can turn to Acts 8, verse 26.

Acts 8, verse 26, we're gonna pick up where we left off last week. And if you're just jumping in, it's a year long study in the book of Acts. When people call it the book of Acts, A-C-T-S oftentimes we're talking about and what they've called it is the Acts of the Apostles. But really it's the acts or the actions of the Holy Spirit through the church. So it's the actions of Jesus in Luke, the same person who wrote Acts. The first, the book of Luke, he said, this is what I began to write about. He writes about all that Jesus began to teach and preach and do. And then Acts is the continuation. So when we're reading Acts, we're reading the continuation of what Jesus continued to do and what Jesus continued to teach through the Holy Spirit, through the local church, through the church. And so that's where we're picking up in Acts chapter eight, which if you go back and just to remind you, Acts chapter 1.8 is a roadmap. It lets us know Jesus is saying, this is what I want you to do. He said, you will wait in Jerusalem and you will receive power. And when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem,

Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth. He says, this is like a, it's like this progression that takes place. There's this roadmap throughout the book of Acts that it begins with Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit receiving power. And then we go from Jerusalem to Judea because of persecution. We talked about that two weeks ago. And then from Judea to Samaria. And Samaria, we talked about that last week. Samaria, there was all this hostility. And so it crossed, the gospel crossed ethnic barriers. So now they've gone to Samaria. And then this week we catch a glimpse of when the early, if you would've been reading this in the ancient world, you would realize, oh, this is about the ends of the earth. We see how this plays out. But in Samaria, there was a move of God that was taking place. And then we see in verse 26, what's next. And so most of the time, what happens is I'll read the entire passage and then we'll pray and then we'll work through it. Today, what I want to do is I want to pray. And then we're going to walk through this passage verse by verse, because this is how Philip would have experienced it. God didn't give him all, he didn't give him all the information.

He didn't give him the whole plan at the beginning. He just gave him the next step. And that's how it is in many of our lives. Some of us in our lives, even right now, God is giving the next step of faith that we'll take by faith. But what we're going to see today is that when God gives you that next step, really, he knows, he knows his purposes. He knows what he's working out, but we need the faith to take that next step. So let's pray together. Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you that your word reveals your heart and your word is life and your word is truth. And so God, I pray that through your word, you would reveal in our own hearts and our own lives where you are calling us to more. I pray that we wouldn't just be hearers of the word, but we would be doers of the word today, that you would give us the faith and the courage to take the next step that you're calling us to. And so we invite you, Holy Spirit, Holy Spirit, that you would meet us in our desperate need to hear from you and that you'd reveal the Father's heart. And I pray that each of us would know that we are the one today that Jesus, you are pursuing. And it's in Christ's name I pray, amen, amen. Well, last week we left off in Samaria.

There's this move of God, salvations, baptisms, miracles, signs, and wonders. It's all taking place in Samaria. And then in verse 26, it says, So some of you might be listening to that. You're like, wait, an angel? Like an angel spoke to Philip. And maybe you're not a believer. So maybe when you hear that, you're like, well, that's where you lost me, with an angel talking to Philip. But what I want you to know is Luke's writing this. He's writing this from a worldview, from a perspective that God is real and that God is actively working in the world and that the spiritual realm, the spiritual realm of God is the spiritual realm of God's work and His work is the spiritual realm that the spiritual world is real. And so he's writing from that place. And so you don't have to believe all of that yet. You don't have to believe all that to even realize what Luke's telling us. He's saying that this whole thing didn't start with Philip. That this, what we're about to see, it started with him. God initiated what we're about to see. It didn't start with Philip, with his plan, it started with heaven. And think about it, all that Philip knows is I want you to go, I want you to go in that direction,

I want you to go to this road, to this desert road. And so God gives him instruction and he gives him this one thing. I want you to think about all the other things that Philip doesn't know. I mean, he's just heard go south to the road, the desert road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza. There's a lot of things he doesn't know. He doesn't know who he's going to see when he gets there. He doesn't know what he's going to say. He doesn't know what he's going to do. He has no idea, even the why, he just knows that God said, go. Once you see this is faith. Let me give you a definition of faith. Faith is not having all the answers and then doing something. Faith is not having all the answers and then doing something. It's trusting God enough to take the next step. It's trusting God enough to just take that next step. The next step of worship, the next step of obedience, the next step of loving God, the next step of serving others, the next step of living generously with our lives, the next step toward forgiveness, the next step toward reconciliation, the next step toward counseling, the next step toward recovery,

the next step that God leads you on. Faith, it's having enough faith toward confession, faith toward obedience, faith toward baptism, faith toward salvation. It's just knowing enough to take the next step. And so, Philip leaves the crowd, he leaves a successful ministry in Samaria, and he has the faith to take the next step and to go. In the world, it tends to move from, tends to move toward the crowd. We tend to think about, well, how do I leave obscurity and go toward the crowd? Here we see God calling Philip to leave the crowd, to leave the 99 and pursue the one. Verse 27 says, so he started out, and on his way, he met an Ethiopian eunuch, an important official in charge of all the treasury of Kendike, which means queen of the Ethiopians. This man had gone to Jerusalem to worship, and on his way home was sitting in the chariot, reading the book of Isaiah the prophet. So there's a lot going on right here. But what do we know about this man? Well, we know he's a VIP. He's a very important, influential figure. He's a royal official. He's like the CFO for a country. He is a wealthy, he's a wealthy man, important man. He's from Ethiopia, which would have been modern-day Sudan.

He's powerful. He's sitting in a chariot, in a Bugatti chariot. I mean, he's got all kind of money. He's got a copy of the scroll of Isaiah, and back in that day, scrolls would have been hand-copied. So it's, I mean, he is not hurting financially. He's educated, which means he knows how to read, and he's far from home, which in Luke's day, the audience would have read this, and they would have thought the ends of the earth. And so here's this man who has traveled all the way to the temple. He's traveled all the way to Jerusalem to have an encounter with God. Well, there's a detail that maybe we might have read over. It says that he's an Ethiopian eunuch. What's a eunuch? You just ask the person next to, I'm just kidding. A eunuch is someone who is castrated, and in that day, the way oftentimes people who were castrated would serve in positions of unusual trust for a king's cabinet, because they're not gonna be promiscuous, and there's also, they're not gonna create a rival throne to the dynasty. And so there's oftentimes, really, the sad part of this is this was something that happened to him when he was young. And so it was something that he didn't choose, but something that happened to him,

which he had all of the marks of outward success, and yet there is a great sadness in his life. And so he's asking the question, where do I belong? Do I matter? Does God see me? Yes, God sees him. Is there a place for me? Man, you're gonna see. God pursued the one. Verse 29, then the spirit told Philip, go to that chariot and stay near it. And so first God speaks through an angel, next God speaks through his spirit, and he gives just his still small voice, and I have never heard the audible voice of God, but I've heard a voice in here that's louder than any audible voice. It's the whisper. And in order to hear God's whisper, you have to be quiet. In order to hear the still small voice, you have to turn down all the other voices and distraction in order to attend to. the voice of God. And what does God sound like when he speaks? Well, he sounds like his word. God never contradicts himself. And so if you're like, how do I learn the voice of God? Read his word. And as you read his word, you begin to,

oh, that's God's tone. That's God's heart. That's how God sounds. That's how God speaks. Well, God steers Philip. And he says, I want you to go to that chariot and stay near it. And look what Philip does. Verse 30, it says, then Philip ran. Philip what? He ran, he laced up. He's like, this is what I came here for. And he ran. There is a sense of urgency to do the thing that God has called him to do. Why? Because he's already got movement in his life. Here's what I want you to see. That oftentimes we're like, God speak, God show me what to do. It was from doing the thing that he already knew to do that God gave him greater clarity on the assignment that he had for him. See, it's easier to steer a car that's moving than one that's parked. And so sometimes we're like, God, what do you want me to do? Just do the last thing that he asked you to do. And then in our obedience, God continues to revive his revelation of what he has for us.

And so he gives him this lead. He leads him. He says, go to that chariot. And Philip ran to the chariot and he heard the man reading Isaiah the prophet. Now it wasn't uncommon in that day for people to read aloud. And so he's reading out loud. So Philip gets close enough to hear what he's reading. And he's like, what? That man's reading. He's reading Isaiah. And Philip's like, I know Isaiah. I've read Isaiah. I know. And so in that moment, he leans in, but here's what I want you to see. Philip didn't run up to the chariot and just start preaching at the man. He got close enough to him to hear what was going on in his heart. Look, this is good evangelism. He draws close enough to the man to hear the questions that he was already asking, the things that was going on in his heart. He listens before he speaks. He hears where this man is at. And he begins the conversation. He says, do you understand what you're reading? Philip asked.

He said, how can I? He said, unless someone explains it to me. So he invited Philip to come up and sit with him. Philip's like, don't mind if I do. And so Philip just sits down. He's like, this is the moment. There's a sense of like, this is the assignment. This is what God had for me. This is why God led me to this moment. And he sits with him in the chariot. And so this is wonderful evangelism. Now, what is evangelism? Evangelism means to share the good news. And what we notice about Philip is he's not an apostle. He's not one of the 12 disciples. This is just, he's an ordinary believer. He's an ordinary believer, follower of Jesus. And he finds himself in a place to have a conversation about Christ. And this is evangelism. Listen, let me give you a definition of evangelism. Evangelism is not starting a conversation about God. It's picking up on the conversation that God is already having with people. Jesus told us that God is always working and that God is always speaking. The question is, are we listening? But that there are those who God is, God's having a conversation with them. And so Philip, he gets close enough to realize,

oh, this is the conversation that God is having. God's already at work in his life. God is already working. Philip listens and he asks questions. And man, this guy just sets it up on a T. Says, this is the passage of scripture the eunuch was reading. He was led like a sheep to the slaughter and as a lamb before its shearer is silent. So he did not open his mouth. And as humiliation, he was deprived of justice. Who can speak of his descendants? For his life was taken from the earth. And the eunuch asked Philip, tell me please, who is the prophet talking about, himself or someone else? And then Philip began with that very passage of scripture and told him the good news about Jesus. And so this man is reading Isaiah 53, which is the remarkable part of this. It's one of the most powerful messianic prophecies in the Old Testament. So in all of the Old Testament, out of all the passages he could have been reading, Philip's like, this is Isaiah 53. And it says he showed him Jesus. And interesting enough, this is the passage we talked about earlier with the verse that we all like sheep have gone astray, each of us have gone our own way. And so he's using this passage

talking about the suffering servant to say, Jesus is the one. The man's like, who is this? Is this the prophet or somebody else? He's like, it's Jesus. And so what Peter does, oh, Philip, Peter is great too, but Philip, what Philip does is he reveals, he reveals Jesus through the text. He makes a beeline to Jesus and shows him that this is Christ. And he's saying, he wants him to know God did all of this for you. Like, just think about this, that here's this man with a seeking heart who longs to know, and you need to know there are people in our lives who are far from God who were seeking. who are interested in the things of God. Their God is working in their lives, God is drawing them. And so this man travels 1,000 miles from Ethiopia all the way to Jerusalem. He gets to Jerusalem, goes to the temple, and when he gets there, he finds that he's a Gentile, he's a foreigner, so there is a barrier that he can't get any closer because of his status, because of his ethnicity. Even with all that he had, he couldn't get any closer to God. And because of this barrier, he's wondering,

is there a place for me? And then somewhere, I'm sure, that he heard or he understood, maybe this scripture that's found in the Old Testament, in the law of Deuteronomy 23.1 that says, "'No one who has been emasculated by crushing or cutting "'may enter the assembly of the Lord.'" Can you imagine what he felt when he heard that, that because of what happened to me, because of what happened in my past, because of what I can't have, because of the brokenness of my body, that I can't get closer to God, that God doesn't care about me, that I'm cut off from the assembly of God, that I have to be outside of the assembly because of what somebody else did to me? You just, the desperation, you can feel it in his heart. And God sees him. "'The eyes of the Lord search to and fro "'throughout the earth for those who would seek God, "'that God would pursue them.'" And so God works all of this for him. Through an angel moves Philip. Through a spirit moves Philip. To a chariot on the side of the road, broke down on 65. Runs up to him. He's got Isaiah in his hands. And Philip begins to lead him to Jesus, but he doesn't stop there.

I believe that there's more that God has. I wanna show you this. You know that emoji with just the mind just, you know what I'm talking about? You know the emoji? If there were emojis in your Bible, it would be that, this is mind-blowing. Isaiah 53 is what he was reading. Isaiah 56, he's like, Isaiah 53, I'm gonna show you Jesus. Isaiah 56, I'm gonna show you you. Check this out. Verse three, Isaiah 56. "'Let no foreigner who is bound to the Lord say, "'the Lord will surely exclude me from his people.'" This is a neighboring passage. He's like, if you're a foreigner and you think you've been excluded, God's saying no. Keep going. "'Let no eunuch say.'" Let no what? Eunuch? Some of us are looking like, who put that in my Bible? Who just put, maybe you've never seen that before. In Isaiah 56, God says, "'Let no eunuch say, I am only a dry tree, "'that I can't have descendants, "'that I can't have children. "'For this is what the Lord said, "'To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths,

"'who choose what pleases me, "'and who hold fast to my covenant, "'to them I will give within my temple and its walls "'a memorial and a name better than sons and daughters. "'I will give them an everlasting name "'that will endure forever. "'And foreigners who bind themselves to the Lord, "'to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, "'and to be his servants, "'all who keep the Sabbath without desecrating it, "'and all who hold fast to my covenant, "'these I will bring to my holy mountain, "'and give them joy in my house of prayer. "'The burnt offerings and sacrifices "'will be accepted on my altar, "'for my house will be called a house of prayer "'for all nations. "'The sovereign Lord declares, "'He who gathers the exiles of Israel, "'I will gather still others to them "'besides those already gathered.'" What God is saying is, I'm not done. I am gathering my people. I'm gathering them together. And he says, he says to this eunuch, the word for him is that you will have descendants. You will have spiritual descendants. And I will give your name. And this man who's wondering is like, God, do you have a plan for me?

Does God see me? Does God love me? Does God know me? Does God know my address? Does God know where I'm at? I've been cut off from having descendants. And God is saying, I see you, and there are descendants for you. And I'm gonna give a name that's gonna be passed down, an eternal name, a name that's connected with my house and with my people. There is a place in my family for you. And God goes out of his way to make this happen. This man traveled 1,000 miles thinking he was seeking God, only to discover that the God of the universe was seeking him. That God was pursuing him. And God did all of this for the one. And he would do all of this for you. I don't think you're here by accident today. I think you are here on purpose. And I believe all of us find ourselves in one of two places in this story. Either we are like that Ethiopian eunuch, or we are the one that God is seeking, or we are like Philip, and that we are joining God in seeking those who have lost their way. There's only, in normal Christianity, there's only two. You are either on mission, or you are the mission.

You're either on mission with God, with Jesus, seeking the one, or you are, who are the mission that Jesus has come for, for rescue for you. And the moment that we put our faith in Christ, we join Jesus on his mission. The great commission is for us, it's for all of us. And so this man hears the gospel and it just begs a response, verse 36. It says, as they traveled along the road, they came to some water and the eunuch said, look, here is water. What can stand in the way of my being baptized? He's like, well, there's some water. What keeps me from being baptized? Is it my ethnicity? Is it my background? Is it what's happened to me? Is my past? I'm a broken man with a broken body and broken dreams. What keeps me from being baptized? And I see Philip just looking at him and say, nothing. Jesus, he's made a way for you. In verse 38, and he gave orders to stop the chariot. Then both Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch went down into the water and Philip baptized him. That man's like, well, stop the chariot. Put the brake, like parking brake up. He's like, stop the chariot.

I'm getting down. I'm gonna be baptized right now. I want you to think about being Philip. Think about this moment, Philip, baptizing this man in the moment, getting into the water. He's like, what is happening right now? Just a little while ago, I was sitting on the couch. Like, what is happening right now? Think about being this man, this VIP, this influential man with all the wealth and all the money, but it couldn't buy this relationship with God. And God seeks him. And in that moment, he says, I'm in. I'm following Jesus. My primary identity is in Christ. My primary identity is not my ethnicity. It's not my nationality. It's not my sexuality. It's not my career. It's not my economic status. It's not my marital status. It's not my social status. I belong to Jesus. I belong to him. I'm following Jesus now. No turning back. No turning back. And when they came up out of the water, the spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away

and the eunuch did not see him again, but went on his way rejoicing. And Philip, however, appeared as a Zostos. I guess that's how you say that. And traveled about preaching the gospel in all the towns until he reached Caesarea. And Luke says, suddenly, Philip is gone. Now, Luke doesn't give us a lot of detail about that, but that sounds awesome. That sounds amazing. But what Luke wants us to see is that Philip just went on the next assignment. He just goes to the next assignment telling other people about Jesus. But what about the Ethiopian? What happens to him? We don't see any more of him on the pages of scripture, but this is where we go to church history. When we go to church history and we read the early church fathers, they talk about that it goes beyond of him just going on his way rejoicing. He told other people about Jesus. In fact, the first missionary to go back to Africa was this man. Then he goes back and they attribute to the first church being planted there to this man bringing the gospel there. And Philip was just running an errand for what God told him to do.

But they were reaching, what we found is he was a part of God reaching the ends of the earth. God's heart is for the nations. God's heart is for the nations. So I want you to bring in those who are foreign born. I want you to bring in those who don't yet know Christ. I want you to bring them to me. I want them to know that I've made a way for them. God's heart is for the nations. So God sends us to the nations. But Nashville, God is sending the nations to us. I don't know if you've driven down Nolensville Pike lately. Just made a list of some of the communities off Nolensville Pike. Kurdish, Latinos, Somali, Sudanese, Southeast Asian, African, Middle Eastern communities right here in our backyard. And so before God sent Philip to this Ethiopian eunuch, he said, can I trust you with your Samaria? Can I trust you to go with Samaria? So God bent his heart toward those who needed the gospel. And Philip took that step, and I want you to know, he wasn't an apostle. He wasn't in church leadership. He was just faithful to do the next thing that God called him to do. So there are two categories. Either we are like Philip and we're being sent,

or we're like the Ethiopian, where you know that God is pursuing you. And today on Baptism Sunday, we get to celebrate those who say yes to Jesus. And maybe, maybe you're like that Ethiopian. We're like, there's some water. What keeps me from being baptized? Look, there's some water. What keeps me from making that decision? What keeps me from being baptized today? I made a list. The truth is there are a lot of things that can. stand in the way of being baptized. Pride, fear, what other people think, guilt, shame, insecurity. The question is not, am I ready enough? The question is, has Jesus become the Lord of my life? Because you don't get your life cleaned up and then come to Jesus. You come to Jesus and he changes your life. I was driving in to church today and I passed Nissan Stadium. I don't know if you've seen it, but recently they've put the sign up, Nissan Stadium, over the stadium. And now I've realized, oh, it hasn't been finished yet. It hasn't been completed, but yet the name is put up. When you are baptized into the name of Jesus, what God has done, he's doing a work in your life. Your life is under construction,

but you need to know he claims you. He says yes to you. It is a covenant that you belong to him. And he puts his name over something that's still in process. But you don't earn your salvation. That work has already been done on the cross. And baptism is to receive the name and say, I belong to Jesus. I am his. And so today we get to celebrate our first baptism of the day. And it is a beautiful story. It is Kathy's story. It's a story that I've been able to watch progress over this past year, and to be able to see how God has worked through community, through a small group, and through his Holy Spirit. And so today we celebrate Kathy's story. All right. I love this story, Ashley. Hey, I want us, even across campuses, just to take a moment just to celebrate Kathy in this step of faith. Can we just, can we celebrate this moment? I'm gonna grab the microphone, Kathy. I just wanna say thank you for taking the courage, having the courage to go first and share your story with us today. Thank you.

I'm as shocked as anybody that I'm here and doing this so publicly. So I appreciate all of you. I grew up in a Catholic church and started exploring other denominations in college. And I don't remember a specific time where I believed or a time where I didn't believe in God. But even after I was confirmed Catholic, I still had that lingering fear that I wasn't enough, hadn't done enough. And the strong personal connection didn't come until my late 20s, when I had a really tough loss, cried out for the first time and felt an instant comfort. And I thought at that point, I was good. I was secure. And what's happened now to leave me here is the last few years, I felt disconnected, embarrassed because I'm not married with kids the way that I thought I would be. And it really surprised me of how much of a struggle it was to inch my way back in. And started off listening online and then sitting in the parking lot, shaking my head at what's going on. And the first time I walked into the auditorium, it was in the back by the earplugs hiding still. And the message was, we're meant to be in community, not in a cul-de-sac. So joined this wonderful small group and it's been gradual this time.

It wasn't that instant comfort. I felt an intention to work for that connection. And after a number of months of talking about my fears with these lovely women and the pastors, this time it's much deeper and more personal, a connection with Jesus. So now I am really surprised at the courage to do this with all of you and a growing sense of joy and peace. And I've let go of the expectations I was putting on God of where's my husband, where are my kids? And just being open to whatever my life is meant to be with him. And at the church service where they asked us to all write a goal and put it on an index card, I asked for courage to be more public with my faith. And here we are. And I really appreciate everybody about understanding the significance of what we're doing today with adult baptism. And then I don't have to have everything figured out. So today I'm doing this to fully submit and give my full heart to God without those conditions that I had. And I'm committing also to stay connected with all of you and stay in our faith community. Praise God, Kathy. Can we just celebrate that story? Thank you. It's awesome. What I get so excited about with your story is how God wrote that, and then that God would

have it where you wouldn't come out here by yourself, but you'd come out with an army of a small group here to celebrate you. And it's a picture that God puts the lonely and families, that there was a place for you, and I think God's going to use that story in a powerful, powerful way. Thank you for sharing. I want to ask you two questions, if I can. Kathy, do you believe in Jesus for the forgiveness of your sin? Yes. Praise God. And do you commit to follow Jesus with the rest of your life? Yes. Yeah. Well, then it is an honor for me. It's an honor for us to celebrate with you, and it's an honor to baptize you today in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. You can plug your nose, all right? Here we go. That's why we're here. Help people find and follow Jesus. That's why we have groups as a church, to open up our hearts, open up our homes, open up our lives, that we get to be a part of the most important and exciting thing happening on planet Earth, is people finding Jesus. And today we get to celebrate that through baptism. We get to join with the celebration of heaven over each one who finds him. And so today, I want to lead you in a prayer for those first who say, man, maybe I've lost a little mission in life, or maybe a lot of mission, or lost my way. There's two ways to be lost. We can lose the plot, and today can be a day of returning, like Phyllis, I want to return to living on mission. God, would you give me the next step?

The other would be those who would say, today I need to be found. I want to begin a relationship with Christ, and maybe we got some water. Take that step of baptism. I'd love to pray with you for that. So let's pray together, and we'll celebrate. Father, thank you for this word, and thank you for stories of people finding themselves in the book. God, today, by the power of your spirit, would you help us find our place in the book? We see, Jesus, who you are. And so for those who need to return to a life on mission, just surrender. Would it be surrender, just saying, Holy Spirit, fill me. Give me your heart for the lost, and give me courage to take the next step. Maybe you can pray something like that. And for those who haven't yet trusted you, I want to lead you in a prayer, and you can pray something like this. Jesus, thank you for loving me. Thank you for going to the cross for me. Thank you that I am the one that you gave your life for, and so today, I want to be found. I repent. I turn from my sin, and I return to you. Jesus, thank you that you are faithful to finish what you start, and so in this moment, as there are some who have received you, God, would you give them courage to take the next step, to tell somebody today to take a step of baptism, and to go public with that faith in you. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.