Acts 8:26–28:

“Then an angel of the Lord said to Philip, ‘Get up and go south on the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.’ (This is a desert road.) So he got up and went. There he met an Ethiopian eunuch, a court official of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, who was in charge of all her treasury. He had come to Jerusalem to worship and was returning home, sitting in his chariot, reading the prophet Isaiah.”

Remember, this is part of my exploration of the value of small things, and I am going to dwell on this Acts 8 passage for a while. I am picking three verses at a time. So I am picking 26 to 28 now, and I want to see the value of small things here.

When you look at this short passage, who do we see there? We see an angel of the Lord. We see Philip. We see an Ethiopian eunuch. He had come to Jerusalem to worship and was returning home, sitting in his chariot, reading the prophet Isaiah.

Isaiah wrote something hundreds of years ago, probably with nobody called “the Ethiopian eunuch” in mind when he was writing it. But here we are, hundreds of years afterward: whatever little thing Isaiah did to write that text down is now going to have an impact. And it is still having an impact.

So whatever effort Isaiah exerted, line by line, to write that scroll, it is still bearing fruit for eternal life. Remember, I am talking about the value of small things.

And look at Philip—one man, Philip. Just one man. There was no group, no band, no organized event. Just one man listening to God. One man at God’s timing. One man taking the step God wanted him to take. One man leaving everything behind.

Look at what had just happened in Samaria: explosion. Miracles left and right. Souls being saved left and right. But God had something else for Philip to do, and it looks like a small thing, right? Almost like a small thing.

“What can be more important than staying with this crowd? What can be more important than the crowd, the church, everything?”

No. What is more important is what God wants. What is more important is what God values.

God values this Ethiopian eunuch. And that time was crucial, because at that exact moment, he was going to be reading a particular passage. Only God knows all this. He was going to be reading Isaiah. He was going to be on his way back to Africa.

There was no time for Philip to sit down and think or analyse or strategise. He had to obey. He obeyed God, and he met this Ethiopian eunuch—a court official of Candace. Do you think Philip had some valuation in mind of how prestigious this man was? No. This highly‑placed man, highly regarded by a whole nation—the value, before God, is the value of a soul. The value of a soul.

Remember, I am still talking about the value of small things.

There was nobody there. There was no camera, if you want to put it like that. There was nobody saying, “Let’s write this down and publish the testimony.” Be careful with that mindset.

Just a man doing what God wants, speaking to another man in the desert, where there are no witnesses, no ego to be massaged. This man is not a church member. Philip cannot say, “I have evangelised him; next Sunday he will be in my church.” There is no “church member.” The eunuch is going back to where he came from, far away. He is not coming to your gathering next week.

Yet you know what happened here. A powerful thing happened here. A divine thing. God’s thing. It may look small in people’s eyes. It may be just one person.

Just spending time with one person. That is what I am talking about: one person. Only God knows the value. Only God knows how highly placed the Ethiopian eunuch really is. Philip’s job is simply to obey—even in that little, seemingly small assignment.

God bless you. See you later.