A SOUL WINNING EXPERIENCE
Acts 8:26-40

Text: Acts 8:35

What a wonderful story of a soul-winning experience! This is a classic conversion, with three characters involved. The three characters are three men in the passage.

I. THE SEEKER - (a man of Ethiopia), (Acts 8:25-27)

    1. He was a responsible man "an eunuch of great authority"

       A. He obviously had people driving him, for he later commanded the

            chariot to be still.

    2. He was a religious man

       A. "had come to Jerusalem for to worship"

       B. Religious, but confused.

          1. He was reading the Bible while riding down the road but not           understanding what he was reading

       C. He was religious, but unsaved

    3. He was a receptive man

       A. He was willing to receive the word of God

      B. The problem is with the WILL. If a sinner is WILLING, God will show Him the truth. (Jh.5:40) (Jh. 8:32)

II. THE SAINT - (Philip) (Acts 8:28-31)

God almost ALWAYS uses a tool, a man, to get the gospel to as lost man.

What kind of man does God use to win souls?

    1. Philip was submissive to the Lord

    2. Philip was studied in the word of God

    3. Philip was a "second-mile" believer (Matt.5:41)

      A. He was not only willing to go to the desert to witness to an African Gentile, but

he also was willing to RUN to do it!

III. THE SUBSTITUTE - (Jesus) (Acts 8:32-38)

    1. This man was the SAVIOR (Isa.53:6) (Jh.1:29)

    2. This man was sinless (1 Pet.2:22) (2 Cort.5:21)

    3. This man shed His blood (Heb.9:22)

    4. This man stepped out of the grave after three days and nights!

The seeker was religious but lost. Once he saw the way of salvation, he took it, was saved, and was immediately willing to be identified as a believer in water baptism, showing his identification with his new Lord's sacrificial death, burial, and resurrection.

Are you saved? Or are you just religious

An artist, seeking to depict on canvas the meaning of evangelism, painted a storm at sea. Black clouds filled the sky. Illuminated by a flash of lightning, a little boat could be seen disintegrating under the pounding of the ocean. Men were struggling in the swirling waters, their anguished faces crying out for help. The only glimmer of hope appeared in the foreground of the painting, where a large rock protruded out of the water. There, clutching desperately with both hands, was one lone seaman.

It was a moving scene. Looking at the painting, one could see in the tempest a symbol of mankind's hopeless condition. And, true to the Gospel, the only hope of salvation was "the Rock of Ages", a shelter in the time of storm.

But as the artist reflected upon his work, he realized that the painting did not accurately portray his subject. So he discarded the canvas, and painted another. It was very similar to the first: the black clouds, the flashing lightning, the angry waters, the little boat crushed by the pounding waves, and the crew vainly struggling in the water. In the foreground the seaman was clutching the large rock for salvation. But the artist made one change: the survivor was holding on with only one hand, and with the other hand he was reaching down to pull up a drowning friend.

That is the New Testament picture of evangelism -- that hand reaching down to rescue the perishing. Until that hand is extended, there is no Gospel -- and there is no hope for the world.