टीका वर्तमान में केवल अंग्रेज़ी में उपलब्ध है। हिन्दी अनुवाद प्रगति पर है।
Acts 8 — How Can I, Except Some Man Should Guide Me?
A great persecution scatters the church except the apostles; the scattered preach the word everywhere. Philip preaches Christ in Samaria; many believe. Simon the sorcerer believes, is baptized, then tries to buy the Spirit's gift and is sharply rebuked. An angel sends Philip to a desert road; the Ethiopian eunuch sits reading Isaiah 53. Philip joins the chariot, begins at that Scripture, and preaches Jesus. The eunuch believes and is baptized. The Spirit catches Philip away; the eunuch goes on his way rejoicing.
“And he said, How can I, except some man should guide me? And he desired Philip that he would come up and sit with him.”
— Acts 8:31
- v.1-4 Persecution scatters; gospel spreads
- v.5-25 Samaria; Simon the sorcerer
- v.26-40 The Ethiopian eunuch
The gift of God may not be purchased. Simon's instinct — to buy spiritual power as a commodity — is the perennial corruption of religion. Every age has Simons.
Peter's rebuke is severe because the sin is severe. To treat the Spirit as a transaction is to misunderstand the gospel at the root. Grace cannot be bought; therefore it cannot be sold. The word "simony" comes from this scene and points at every modern echo.
A humble question. The Ethiopian was reading Scripture and knew he needed help. Many would have preferred a private guess; he preferred a true answer. The teachable heart finds the truth.
Philip was sent to the desert for this one conversation. God arranges meetings the planner could never engineer. The angel's instruction (v.26) had no apparent strategic logic — until Philip met the chariot.
Began at the same scripture. Philip met the eunuch where he was — in Isaiah 53. He did not start a separate course; he opened the passage already open.
Preached unto him Jesus. The Old Testament passage was about Jesus; the sermon was Jesus. Christian preaching, when it is faithful, traces every text back to Him. The eunuch had been reading Christ without seeing Him until a preacher helped him.
Philip was useful because he was movable — sent to a desert without explanation, he went. When the Spirit prompts you toward a conversation, a person, a place that has no apparent payoff, go. The Ethiopian was on the other end of an obedience that looked like a wasted trip. Your unexplained nudge today may be a chariot in the desert tomorrow.
Christ is named explicitly in verse 35 — preached unto him Jesus. The whole chapter's evangelism, from Samaria to a chariot in the desert, has the same content: Jesus, the One Isaiah 53 was about all along. The eunuch went home rejoicing because he had been given a Person, not a system. He is the founding believer of an African church that has continued to this day.
The persecution that meant to silence the church spread it instead. Every scattered believer became a missionary. Satan's strategy backfired — the very dispersion was God's evangelism program.
A pattern that recurs in church history. When the church cannot be uprooted, it is scattered; when it is scattered, the gospel travels with the people. What looks like loss to the eye is often expansion in God's plan.