EVENING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR
6/29/2026 8:36 PM
My
Worship Time
Focus: PT-2“Philip”
Bible
Reading & Meditation Reference: Luke
6:14e
Message of the verse: “Philip”
I will now pick up where I left of in this morning’s
SD.
“An incident recorded in John 12
provides another example of Philip’s analytical and overly cautious
personality. Verse 20 introduces ‘some
Greeks among those who were going up to worship at the feast.’ Those were God-fearing Gentiles (cf. Acts
10:22; 17:4, 17), maybe even full-fledged converts to Judaism, who had come to
Jerusalem for Passover. In the aftermath
of the triumphal entry, they sought an audience with Jesus. Why they approached Philip (v. 21) is not
clear, but John’s note that Philip ‘was from Bethsaida of Galilee’ suggests
that may have been the reason. Bethsaida
was near the Gentile region known as the Decapolis (Matt. 4:25; Mark 5:20;
7:31), and they may have been from that region.
Further, since he was a Galilean Philip likely spoke Greek.
“Their simple request to Philip, ‘Sir,
we wish to see Jesus’ (v. 21) caught him completely off guard. He was a ‘by the book’ person, and there was
no precedent for introducing Gentiles to Jesus; it was not in the manual. In fact, two of Jesus’ previous statements argued
against it, at least in Philip’s mind.
When He sent the Twelve out to preach the gospel Jesus had instructed
them, ‘Do not go in the way of the Gentiles, and do not enter any city of the
Samaritans; but rather go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel’ (Matt.
10:5-6). And Philip had also heard the
Lord say to a Canaanite woman, ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house
of Israel” (Matt. 15:24). That was
enough to make him hesitate to bring these Gentiles to Jesus.
“But in his narrow focus of methods
and procedures, Philip missed the point.
The Lord’s statements were not intended to prohibit Gentiles from coming
to Him, but merely emphasized that the priority of His ministry was Israel (cf.
Rom. 1:16).” “16 ¶ For I am not ashamed
of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who
believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” “Philip forgot that Jesus had also said that ‘the
one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out’ (John 6:37) and, ‘I have
other sheep [Gentiles], which are not of this fold [Israel]; I must bring them
also, and they will hear My voice; and they will become one flock with one
shepherd’ (John 10:16). And He had
commended the ‘great faith’ of the Syrophoenician woman (Matt. 15:21-28).
“Uncertain about how to proceed, ‘Philip
came and told Andrew’ (v. 22). Unlike
Philip, Andrew had no doubt about how to handle the situation. If people wanted to come to Jesus, he was
going to bring them…Andrew’s reaction was swift and decisive; he ‘and Philip
came and told Jesus’ about the request (v. 22).
“The last glimpse of Philip in the
New Testament (the Philip in Acts is Philip the evangelist, not the apostle
Philip) comes in the upper room on the night of Christ’s betrayal and
arrest. The Lord had just made the
monumental statement, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes
to the Father but through Me’ (John 14:6).
He alone is the source of salvation (cf. Acts 4:12) and no one will go
to heaven who does not by faith alone embrace Him alone as the Savior. Jesus followed that statement with an
explicit declaration of His absolute deity and equality with the Father: ‘If
you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from no on you know Him,
and have seen Him’ (v. 7). To know Jesus
is to know the Father (cf. John 1:18), since the Persons of the Trinity are one
in their very essence.” (cf. John 1:18) “18 No one has ever seen God; the only God, who
is at the Father’s side, he has made him known.” “Having known Jesus through the years of His
earthly ministry, the disciples in effect already knew the Father as well.
“At this point Philip made one of
the most distressingly foolish and ignorant statements any of the apostles ever
made. He said to Jesus, ‘Lord, show us
the Father, and it is enough for us’ (v. 8).
Unbelievably Philip, who had so eagerly embraced Christ as the
beginning, missed the point. He failed
to grasp not only what Jesus had just said, but also all the teaching he had
and the miracles he had observed over the years of Christ’s ministry. His skepticism, lack of faith, and inability
to understand the significance of what he had seen and heard was heartbreaking.
“Jesus rebuked Philip for his disappointing
statement by demanding, ‘Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not
come to know Me, Philip?’ ‘ The Lord then reiterated plainly the truth that He
had taught the apostles in verse 7: ‘He who has seen Me has seen the Father;
how can you say, ‘Show us the Father?’
(v. 9). He then reprimanded
Philip for failing to grasp that reality, despite what he had seen and heard
(v. 10), and challenged him to believe; to take his faith in Jesus as the
Messiah to its logical conclusion (v. 11).
The evidence Philip had seen pointed conclusively to one inescapable
conclusion, Jesus was God incarnate, one in essence with the Father.
“There is little reliable
information about Philip’s later life and ministry. The early Christian writers had a tendency to
confuse him with Philip the evangelist (Acts 6:5; 8:26-40; 21:8). The fourth-century church historian Eusebius,
for example, wrote of a Philip who lived in the city of Hierapolis in Asia
Minor with his virgin daughters. But
whether this was the apostle Philip or Philip the evangelist is unclear. According to the apocryphal Acts of Philip,
the apostle Philip reached in Phrygia,
Greece, and Syria before being martyred in Hierapolis in Asia Minor. The Acts of Philip, however, is not
considered a reliable historical source.
“It is perhaps to be expected that
such a quiet, unassuming, behind the scenes person’s history would be so
obscure. That in no way, however, diminishes
Philip’s importance. This skeptical,
analytical, pessimistic man of limited ability, weak faith, and imperfect
understanding was nonetheless one of the twelve most important people in the
history of the world.”
6/29/2026
9:49 PM
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