• Acts 6:5
• Samaritans: I should love my neighbor
  • Acts 1:8
  • Samaria was both a region and a city.
  • John 4:7-9; 8:48; Luke 9:51-56 – The great divide between Jews and Samaritans.
  • Acts 8:5-13 – Philip went to teach the Samaritans despite the hostility between them and Jews (of which Philip was one).
• Preaching: the power of the gospel
  • Acts 8:25-40
  • Many today teach that the Holy Spirit must directly act upon you before you can be saved. That is not what happened here!
  • Acts 8:4-5, 35-36 – Philip preaches Jesus and the result is baptism.
• Longevity: Growing (without growing bitter)
  • Acts 8:40; 21:8
  • Somewhere around 20 years passed between Acts 8 and 21.
  • Mark 4:16
  • Are we planting roots in God’s word so that as time passes, we will be able to stand?
  • Philip had good reason to grow bitter because of the prosecution of Saul. Then Saul (now Paul) comes to stay at his house!
  • Acts 1:10-14
  • Philip grew to be called “the evangelist” – not “the grumpy old man!” He endured lots of unfairness, but he did not let it make him bitter.

[Sorry, we lost the first part of this recording. -MRW]

• I Peter 5:1-14
• I Peter 5:5 – Peter beings to make a comparison between the role of the older men and younger men. The younger men are to be subject to the elders. See Matthew 23:28. We are all to serve each other.
• I Peter 5:6-7 – We must all humble ourselves before God. We must leave all our anxiety in God’s hands because He cares for us.
• I Peter 5:8 – One of the ways Satan seeks to tempt us is in pride. We all have a tendency to think higher of ourselves than we should. We must all realize that Satan is after us personally.
• I Peter 5:9 – Like Jesus, we can put the devil to flight by resisting him. We have more power in this regard than Satan! We’ll never have to give an account to Satan if we resist him, but we will certainly have to give an account to God if we resist Him!
  • See I Timothy 3:12. If we do have to suffer in some way for Christ, we should have the same reaction as the apostles in Acts 5 and rejoice that we are counted worthy to suffer for Christ.
• I Peter 5:12 – “our faithful brother” – this was quite the compliment!
• I Peter 5:13 – “She” here is apparently a woman who was a Christian known to the audience.
• I Peter 5:14 – This “holy kiss” is equivalent to our handshake today.

• Using your Bible: Psalms 51:5, continued:
  • Harmonize
    • Matthew 19:13
    • Romans 5:18-19; 6:4
    • II Corinthians 5:10
  • Figures of speech
    • Acts 2:8 – What does it mean to be born into a language? Any comparison to the manner of speaking in Psalms 51:5.
    • II Samuel 11 – Possible background to Psalm 51.
• Using your Bible: Mark 10:25
  • Read the text!
  • Read the context: Jesus’ discussion with the rich young ruler. Mark 10:17-31
  • Compare translations: Most are very consistent for this verse.
  • Greek
    • Rich - 4454 πλούσιος (plousios) – in abundance
    • Kingdom of God - 993 βασιλεία (basileia) – an area ruled by a king
  • Figure of speech – possibly hyperbole

• Ephesians 1:15-2:8
• Ephesians 1:16 – Paul left us a good example of making mention of other saints in our prayers.
• Ephesians 1:17 – Paul prayed that they would be blessed with wisdom and with a mind to receive revelation from God.
• Ephesians 1:20 – See Ephesians 6:12. The word “heavenly” in Ephesians is used to mean the highest of whatever class is being considered. Compare Ephesians 1:3.
• Ephesians 1:23 – The church is the body of Christ. Compare Ephesians 4:4.
• Ephesians 2:3 – They formerly walked in the lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.
  • I Corinthians 11:12-13 – One can be something “by nature” either because it is an innate quality or because it is something a person has learned to be. See also Romans 2:14.