Be Near
Acts 8:29
The Spirit told Philip, "Go to that chariot and stay near it."
It is impossible to catch fish from far off. You can’t do it from the car, or from your easy chair at home. You can’t stand out in your yard and call the fish to come to you. Usually, fishing involves taking a trip, sometimes a long trip, to even get in their vicinity. Once you arrive at the body of water, you then need to find where they are hiding. In order to catch them, you must get close – the closer the better. Evangelism is the same way. In order to share the Gospel you must be close to the non-believer – the closer the better.
This passage from the book of Acts, about Philip and the Ethiopian, is a great example of this idea – God connecting with the lost through the saved who are “near”. It begins with Philip being told by the Spirit of God to go and be near the Ethiopian.
I find it significant that God did not instruct Philip to stand far off and proclaim the Gospel, hoping the Ethiopian would hear and be attracted to it. God did not tell Philip to hold a worship service where he was, using rites and ceremonies unfamiliar to the Ethiopian, in the hope that the unbeliever would come and willingly join in. And God did not tell Philip to go and sit next to the Ethiopian in his chariot, explaining the Gospel to the seeker in the most complicated and technical language Philip could use.
Instead, the Spirit told Philip to simply go and be near the Ethiopian. Once he was nearby, Philip heard what the Ethiopian was reading aloud and merely asked a question, “Do you understand what you are reading?” Then, once he was invited to by the Ethiopian, Philip shared the meaning of what the man was reading – the Gospel of Jesus Christ!
What a great model for us today! For us to share the Gospel with the lost, we must first be near them. We must be among the lost, close enough to know what they are doing and accessible enough to hear and know the questions they are asking. Then, when we are asked, we can share the good news about Jesus in a meaningful way, using language they will understand.
Later in this same chapter of Acts, we see that Philip stayed with the Ethiopian until he was baptized - another example of the “nearness” principle at work. Philip stayed “near” the Ethiopian until his salvation was complete.
To be a great fisherman – fisher of men – you must be “near”.
Tight lines!