Unit 6 Early Church--Lesson 8 NT6.8 Philip and the Ethiopian

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1 1 Unit 6 Early Church--Lesson 8 NT6.8 Philip and the Ethiopian Scripture: Acts 8: Lesson Goal: This lesson is about Philip, a deacon who preached about Jesus Christ to an Ethiopian man. Philip showed his love for Jesus by helping this man understand God's Word. Introduction: This is the eighth lesson in Unit 6: The Early Church. This unit covers Acts 1-12 and tells the story of the apostles spreading the gospel in Jerusalem and Samaria. In this lesson we are going to learn about Philip, a deacon who preached about Jesus Christ to an Ethiopian man. We will learn that we too are to tell everyone about Jesus. It is described by Luke in the book of Acts. Acts tells about the history of the church. Let's say the first five books of the New Testament. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Acts. Attention Getter: (Show pictures of children from around the world.) Do you know someone who has lived in another country? We are going to look at some pictures of school children from different countries in the world. These children are from Ethiopia, Afghanistan. Japan, and Mexico. No matter what country they are from God loves each and every child and he wants them to go to heaven to be with Him. Today we are going to hear about the way Philip helped a man who lived in another country. The man was visiting Philip s country. Philip lived in Israel and the man was from Ethiopia. Opening Prayer: Dear Jesus, thank you for loving us and providing for us a way to go to heaven. Please forgive us our sin and help us to serve you all our life. Help us to tell others everywhere about how You died on the cross for our salvation. Thank you for loving people everywhere. In Jesus' name, Amen. Memory Verse: Our verse for today is Romans 10:9 "If you confess with your mouth, Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved." Lesson Video: Philip was one of the men in the first church family who had been chosen to help make sure people s needs were taken care of. Philip s job had a special title: deacon. The word deacon means servant. And Philip did a fine job of serving people who need food. But helping to make sure people got enough food was not the only thing Philip did to obey God. Just before Jesus went back to heaven he told the disciples that they should Go into all the world and preach the good news about Jesus.. Jesus promised that after He left He would send the Holy Spirit to help the disciples tell others about Jesus. Ten days after Jesus left for heaven the Holy Spirit came like tongues of fire on the disciples. Miraculously the disciples had the ability to speak many different languages. All the people heard about Jesus in their own language! Many people believed in Jesus as their Savior. They were baptized. One day there was three thousand that believed. Another day there were five thousand people! The church grew and grew! The believers were to tell people in Jerusalem first, then in Samarian and the Judea, and finally to the whole world. Peter and John were the main preachers in Jerusalem. But soon the church was so big that the deacons were chosen to help them. Philip was one of the first deacons. Philip obeyed Jesus' command. He preached about Jesus and his death on the cross everywhere he went. Philip left Jerusalem and went to a city in Samaria just as Jesus had commanded the disciples to do. Audio: "What is going on over there? Why is that crowd of people around that man? Haven't you heard? That man is Philip. He has come to Samaria to preach about Jesus Christ. He is also healing people people who have never been able to stand up are now walking. I want to hear more about this. Let's go closer."

2 2 I am not healing this person in my own name, but in the name of Jesus Christ. Jesus, who was sent from God, came to earth to give Himself to save us from our sins. Listen and believe. (WALLA: Crowd sounds of "Yes, I believe. Tell us more of Jesus..." then fades out) God's Spirit gave Philip great power to healed many people. When people saw people being healed they knew that Philip was speaking God's message. Philip preached about how Jesus was the Son of God and about how He had come to give people the gift of salvation if they would only believe in Him. Many people were believing in Jesus and being baptized. Audio: One day an angel came to Philip and told him to go on a trip. "Philip, I am an angel from the Lord. I have a message for you." Philip answered, "I am listening. Please tell me. The Lord is telling you to go south to the desert road. It's the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza. I will go immediately." (Music transition and fade up on sounds of footsteps on gravel/dirt road) (reverb: whisper) "I'm not sure why I'm on this deserted road. I think I'll ask God what He wants me to do." "Father in heaven, you sent me to the country of Samaria to preach about your son Jesus. So many people were being healed by your power. Even more people accepted Jesus as their Savior. So many people wanted to know more about you. But then, you sent an angel to tell me to leave Samaria and walk down this deserted road. I have obeyed you, Father, but I am confused. Please show me your purpose in sending me here. In Jesus' name, I pray, Amen." (Footsteps continue) "I am the Holy Spirit of God. Look, ahead. Do you see that chariot? Go to that chariot. Stay near it. I see it. I'll run to it." (Sounds of footsteps running) There was only one chariot traveling on this lonely desert road, and in the chariot was an official from the country of Ethiopia. This man was very important in his country because he was in charge of all the wealth that belonged to Candace, the queen of Ethiopia. But, this man was also interested in God. "Excuse me, sir. I see that you are reading the Scriptures the book of Isaiah. Do you understand what you are reading?" said Philip. "How can I understand it? I've traveled all the way from my country of Ethiopia to the city of Jerusalem to learn more about God. I've read and read about God, but I still don't understand. Can you explain it to me?" said the Ethiopian. " Yes, I can," said Philip. "Please tell me what this means. I would be honored," replied the Ethiopian. (Sound of Philip climbing aboard, chariot moving).here is what I was reading. It says "He was led like a sheep to be killed. Just as lambs are silent while their wool is being cut off, He did not open his mouth. When He was treated badly, He was refused a fair trial. Who can say anything about His children? His life was cut off from earth." "Tell me, please. Who is the prophet Isaiah talking about? Himself or someone else?" asked the Ethiopian. "Have you heard of Jesus?" said Philip. "No, I haven't." replied the Ethiopian. Philip started at the beginning and told the Ethiopian official the good news about Jesus. Jesus is the person Isaiah was talking about here. Jesus is God's only Son who was sent to this earth to save us and to bring us back to the grace of our Father in heaven. If you believe in the love that Jesus gives to you, you will be given a new life. After the official listened carefully to Philip, he believed in Jesus and wanted to be baptized. "That is a wonderful idea." said Philip. (Sound of chariot stopping and then men entering water) "Dear friend, as a new believer in Jesus, I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit," said Philip. (Sound of water, baptism, and then men walking out of water). When the two men came up out of the

3 water, the Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away to another city. The Ethiopian official did not see him again but he was filled with joy because he now belonged to Jesus. 3 "I'm so happy. I finally understand what I have been searching for. I have found the love of Jesus. I must hurry home so that I may spread my joy to everyone else. There are so many people to tell," said the Ethiopian as he got in his chariot and headed back home. When God tells us to do something, he doesn't always tell us why right away. Because Philip obeyed God's command, the good news of Jesus was spread to the country of Ethiopia. Remember the command that Jesus gave as He was going back to heaven. He said, Go into all the world and preach the gospel. That is what was happening! The Ethiopian went back to his own country in Africa and there he told other people about Jesus. That is what we are supposed to do. We are to tell others about Jesus. When Philip went near to the chariot the man was reading from the book of Isaiah. Philip asked him, "Do you understand what you are reading?" The man said he needed someone to explain it to him and he invited Philip to join him and they continued on the journey. The scripture he was reading had been written more than 500 years before in a prophecy in the book of Isaiah about a man who was going to be unfairly treated, judged, but that man would not defend himself. The Ethiopian asked, "Is the prophet writing about himself or someone else? Philip started at that very scripture and told him the good news about Jesus and how he had come to earth, been killed and how that God had raised him from the dead. Evidently he also talked about baptism because when they came to a body of water, the Ethiopian said, "Look, here is water. Why shouldn't I be baptized? He ordered the chariot driver to stop." Philip said, "If you believe with all your heart, you may." The man said, "I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God." Both Philip and the Ethiopian went down into the water and Philip baptized him. The word baptized here means immersed. It was like a burial as if the person has died and then comes alive again, literally a new man. When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away. We don't know if he was suddenly transported to another place or he was just told to go to another place. Anyway the Ethiopian never saw Philip again. As for the man in the chariot he was happy. He went on his way rejoicing. He had a wonderful new relationship with Jesus and God, the Father. Have you asked Jesus to be your Savior? You can do that right now if you want. Do you want Him to take you to heaven when you die? Do you believe that Jesus is God's Son and that he came to die on the cross for your sins? Do you believe that Jesus rose again from the grave and lives in heaven? Then you can ask Jesus to be your Savior. Let's pray and you can say the words of the prayer I am praying. We are going to ask God to save you. Let's pray. "Dear Jesus, I love you and believe that you are the Son of God. I believe that you died on the cross to pay for the things I have done that are wrong. I ask you to forgive me and to give me the gift of eternal life. Thank you Jesus for saving me. Amen." If you prayed that prayer and really meant it in your heart then you need to tell me or your parents. They can help you understand more and answer any questions that you have. If you have already asked Jesus to be your Savior then our job is just like Philip and the Ethiopian. We are to go tell others about Jesus too! We started off our lesson by looking at pictures of children from over the world. As Christians we have a big job of telling everyone in all these places about Jesus. Jesus loves them just like he loves us. He died on the cross for them too. Jesus had told us to tell them about his salvation. Let's go tell the world about Jesus so they can go to heaven too!

4 Review Questions/ Game: Team Answers Divide students into two teams. Take turns having each team answer the following review questions. Encourage the team members to consult one another before answering. Give one point for each correct answer. Give the winning team a simple treat. 1. What did the Christians do when persecution began happening to the Christians in Jerusalem? (They escaped and moved to Samaria.) 2. Who told Philip to go to the desert road to Gaza? (An angel of the Lord) 3. Who did Philip meet on the road to Gaza? (a man from Ethiopia) 4. What was the Ethiopian Official riding in? (A chariot) 5. What was the man's official title in his country? (He was an eunuch who was in charge of all the wealth of the queen.) 6. How do we know that he was a religious person? (He was reading the prophets (Old Testament]) 7. From which book of prophecy was he reading? (Isaiah) 8. What was the Ethiopian official doing when Philip first saw him? {Reading a scroll of the book of Isaiah) 9. What did he ask Philip? (I need someone to explain this to me. "Is the prophet writing about himself or someone else?") 10. What was Philip's message to him? (Philip told him about Jesus the Messiah and how he had died on cross to pay for sins and was resurrected.) 11. What did the Ethiopian official want to do after Philip taught him about Jesus? (He wanted to be baptized.) 12. What did the Ethiopian believe about Jesus? (He believed that Jesus was the Son of God.) 13. What happened to Philip when they came up out of the water? (Philip was taken away by the Spirit of God.) 14. What happened to the Ethiopian? (He got back in his chariot and went home to Ethiopia rejoicing.) 15. Why was it important for Philip to immediately obey the Lord's instructions? (The Ethiopian man may not have heard the gospel and been saved.) 16. Where can a believer find God's instruction for living? (The Bible) 17. Who helps you learn about Jesus? (Parents, teacher, preacher, grandparents, etc.) 18. What are some ways that you can help bring the Word of God to people who do not know about Jesus? (Give money to support missionaries, pray for missionaries, collect items and send supplies to missionaries, etc.) Bible Memory Verse Activity: Memory Verse Puzzle Our verse for today is Romans 10:9 "If you confess with your mouth, Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved." This verse is a great promise that we will go to heaven someday if we ask Jesus to be our Savior. Believing in Jesus means that we know that Jesus was God and that He died on the cross to pay for what we have done that is wrong. It means that we love Him and want to serve Him all of our life. Look up the scripture in the Bible. Have a student read the verse. Repeat the verse together. 4 Say: "Until Philip explained the scripture to the Ethiopian, it was like a puzzle to him. He could not understand. Today we are going to "solve" the mystery of our verse in a puzzle." Divide your class into groups of four children each. Print the memory verse Romans 10:9 on sheets of different colored construction paper. Be sure to use a different color for each group. Cut the paper into puzzle pieces. Mix all the puzzle pieces together. Children must sort the puzzle pieces by color and then work together to assemble puzzles to discover the verse. Romans 10:9 "If you confess with your mouth, Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him Craft Activity: Scripture Scroll The Ethiopian man was reading the Old Testament from a scroll. Explain that before Bibles were printed into a book form that the only copy of Scripture was on scrolls. Today we will make a scroll of our memory verse. Students will make a scroll and print the verse Romans 10:9 on the scroll. To make the scroll give child a large brown paper bag or some brown paper wrapping paper. Each sheet needs to be about 15" X 20". Crumple the paper into a large ball. Then

5 unwrap the paper and smooth out with your hand. This gives the paper an "old" look. Teacher can then use a candle lighter to singe the edges of the paper to give it a parchment rough edge. Give each child two dowel rods and let the wrap the ends of the scroll onto the dowel rods. Glue or tape the ends of your scroll to the dowel rods. Have student use black marker to print the words of Romans 10:9 onto the center of the scroll. Roll up the scroll and tie with cord or twine to hold the wooden scroll handles together. Craft Activity: Friends Sharing Jesus Wreath Philip stopped on his trip to tell a man the good news about Jesus. Explain that we can share the good news about Jesus with our friends, too. Give each child a paper plate and a piece of construction paper. Have them trace a hand on the construction paper. Have them write their name on each hand print. Then instruct the students to cut out the hand print. They should continue tracing and cutting out hand prints until they have enough to go around a paper plate. In the center of the paper plate have them print the words, "I'll share the good news about Jesus." Have the children glue their hand prints around the paper plate to form a wreath. Allow the glue to dry and display the wreaths in the classroom. Allow the students to take home their wreath. Group Learning Activity: Cardboard Box Chariot Races Build two classroom chariots that the children in your class can "ride in. " Take a square cardboard box and cutting off one side of the box. Lay the box on it's side (so that the bottom of the box becomes the front and the side of the box is touching the floor) and paint the entire box silver or gray. Cut out large round circles (2) out of the panel you cut off of the box to make wheels and use a brass fastener to attach them to the front (bottom of the box) sides (sides of the box) to make the wheels. You can then take some thick cording or string, hole punch two holes in the front (bottom of the box) of the chariot, and thread it through to make the reins that would be attached to the horses. If you want to get really creative, you can draw two horses on cardboard with wide hooves, cut them out, and used a toilet paper roll in between them to make them stand up and three-dimensional, and tied them to the string to make it look like a real chariot. You could use a disposable camera to take pictures of the kids taking turns riding in the chariot. Divide your class into two teams. Make two of the cardboard chariots above so you can have a chariot race across the room. Let the individual members of each team sit in the box and scoot it across the floor to a mark and then back. Each team member must "ride" in the chariot. Let a member of the team pull their team mate in the race by pulling the cord attached to the box. Team that finishes the race first is the winner. Craft Activity: Cardstock Chariots Template Print off the template below onto cardstock. Each child will need one copy of the cardstock template (at least 4 inch by 5 1/2 inches of cardstock) Cut on the solid lines and fold on the dotted lines to make a chariot. Cut out the two small rectangles in each upper corner. Fold the small rectangle on top downward until the fold is even with the cut edges. This fold should be two inches deep. Fold the right and left sides inward two inches. Tape the edge from the top and the sides to make one end of the chariot. It should look like one side of a box. The other end should be open. Cut a 10-inch length of string. Tape the two ends to the middle and front of the chariot. Fold a piece of card stock in half. On one side, draw a large wheel and a slightly smaller wheel. Cut these out using both sides of the card stock to create four wheels Group Learning Activity: Wordless Salvation Book The wordless salvation book was first used by Charles Spurgeon in It is a popular tool used all over the world to present the gospel to children. This book of colored pages is not only extremely easy to use, it s also very effective in communicating the message of salvation through Jesus Christ. Give each child a piece of yellow, black, red, white and green construction paper rectangles approximately 5"X 8" (one half page). Explain that each rectangle is a page in their salvation book. Place the pages of the book in the following order. Punch holes in the left side and tie with yarn. Teach children the meaning of each color: Print a copy of the chart for the meaning and give to each child to practice using their wordless book. 5

6 1. Yellow or gold--reminds us of heaven. God wants us all to be with Him in heaven. Heaven is a wonderful place where there is no sickness, no sin, and no death. God loves us very much and wants us to be with Him. (John 3:16a) 2. Black--reminds us of sin. Because we have all sinned, we cannot enter heaven on our own. Sins are things that we do, think, or say that make God unhappy. The punishment for our sins is that we can't be with God. But God loves us so much that He made a way for us to be with Him. (Romans 3:23) 3. Red--reminds us of the blood of Jesus. God loved us so much that He sent His Son Jesus to earth to take the punishment of our sins by dying on the cross. Jesus died on the cross so that all the things we have done can be forgiven. (1 Corinthians 15:3-4) 4. White--reminds us that we can be made clean from sin by believing in Jesus as our Savior. To have our hearts made clean by Jesus we need to A--admit that we have sinned and ask for forgiveness; B--believe that Jesus died on the cross and took the punishment for our sins; C--confess our sins to God and invite Jesus to come into our lives to help us turn from sin. Invite the person to pray this prayer: "Dear Jesus, Thank you for loving me. I know that I have sinned. I have done things that are wrong. I believe that you died on the cross to pay the price for my sins. Please forgive all of my sins and make my heart clean. Please come into my life and help me turn away from doing wrong. Thank you that with a clean heart, I can have a relationship with you and will one day be with you in heaven. In Jesus' name. Amen." (John 1:12) 5. Green--reminds us of things that grow. It is important that we grow in our faith by reading the Bible, praying, obeying God, confessing our sins, going to church and telling others about Jesus. (1 John 1:9) Have students practice telling the meaning of each page so they can comfortably share the gospel with another child. (Kits for these books are often found at Christian book stores and can be purchased very reasonably.) Life Application Challenge: Write a Prayer The Ethiopian was reading his Bible. It was the Word of God that showed him his need of salvation. We need to read and study God's Word every day. If we are believers someone explained to the plan of salvation. Write a short prayer based on this lesson. Include in your prayer a time of giving thanks to God for giving you His gift of salvation and a request for salvation for someone close to you. 6

7 7 Romans 10:9 "If you confess with your mouth, Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved."

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