Simon the magician

Lessons and applications from Simon Magus (Acts 8:9-24)

POST OVERVIEW. In the last post (#597, 12/7/2022), we had studied the passage about Simon the magician in Acts 8:9-24. From that study we will observe a couple of lessons and also make a couple of applications.

In the most recent post (#597, 12/7/2022), we had studied the passage in Acts 8 about the false faith of Simon the magician and his baptism by Philip the evangelist. We saw that, despite his claim of belief in Jesus, Simon never truly believed. We also determined that Philip’s baptism of Simon based on his profession of faith was the appropriate thing to do, even though Simon’s profession was false.

In this post, we will extend our study into lessons learned and applications made.

LESSONS FROM SIMON MAGUS

What do we learn from this situation with Simon the magician?

First, this passage makes it unambiguously clear that baptism does not save. The proof is irrefutable: Simon the magician was baptized and yet he was not saved. A review of this passage should serve to silence those who hold to baptism as the means of salvation rather than as a marking of those who have believed and are saved.

Second, we learn that it is possible for a sincere minister of the gospel to baptize an unbeliever unintentionally. The New Testament teaches that a person is baptized upon their profession of faith in Jesus. It is possible, however, that the person’s professed belief is not genuine. Our study passage shows that Philip, already identified as a “man of good reputation, full of the Spirit and of wisdom” (Acts 6:3, 5), a sincere minister of the gospel who is identified in Scripture as an evangelist (Acts 21:8), baptized Simon the magician based on his profession of belief. The pattern in Acts, and so the practice in the church age, is that a person’s profession of faith, of declaring Jesus as Lord (1 Cor. 12:3), is assumed to be sincere and a person is baptized upon profession of faith.

By the way, it is interesting to note that the apostle Peter does not rebuke or correct Philip for baptizing Simon Magus. If Philip had done something that was wrong, then it is certain that, at this infant stage of the church, the Holy Spirit would have prompted Peter to correct that error so that the error was not repeated throughout the life of the church. The fact that Peter does not correct Philip in any way indicates that Philip’s baptism of Simon based on his profession of faith was entirely appropriate. The fault and guilt lay entirely with Simon because he had essentially lied about his belief (see also Acts 5:3, 4).

APPLICATIONS

As we think about this episode with Simon the magician, we need to ask the question, “How does the church today avoid this situation of baptizing unbelievers?” Ultimately, the possibility of baptizing someone based on a false profession of faith cannot be removed. There are no apostles around today who have the gift to discern genuine faith from false. In the absence of this apostolic discernment, however, the church can take steps to try to ensure that a candidate for baptism is a genuine believer. For example, the person’s profession of faith can be examined carefully by wise elders to test the authenticity of their profession. Also, if the person has been a professing believer for some time, the persons interviewing the candidate for baptism can look for “the fruit of repentance” (Matt. 3:8; see also Luke 13:6-9; John 15:2) since their conversion. If after this investigation, the candidate’s profession of faith appears genuine, then baptism is done.

So, it is possible for even the most careful pastor to unintentionally baptize a person because the person made profession of a faith they did not possess. But this event is not a cause of undue concern, and that for two reasons.

THE CHURCH’S CLEANSING BY CHURCH DISCIPLINE

First, the church does have a remedy for this situation. It is difficult for the person who is an “unsheep” to remain undetected in the flock forever. This is because every baptized believer is to bear fruit as a disciple of Jesus. The Spirit-sealed disciple says no to sin and yes to righteousness. He worships, he witnesses, he grows in his faith. So if, over time, it is discovered that a professing believer is not exhibiting the fruit of repentance, but is instead evidencing the fruit of unrighteousness, the church will respond and confront this problem. If the sinning church member does not change and does not repent of his unrighteousness, eventually the church will exercise discipline and will remove this one from the flock (Matt. 18:15-18; 1 Cor. 5) because the person’s unrepentance is counted as evidence of unbelief.

THE LORD’S PERFECT CLEANSING AT THE AND OF THE AGE

But second, there is an even more compelling reason that the unintentional baptism of an unbeliever is not a problem. The one who makes sure that His true church is composed only of genuine believers is the Lord Himself. If there are “unsheep” in the earthly flock, they are known to the Lord and will be removed by the Lord. The following are Scriptures that attest to this truth.  

“The Lord knows those who are His” (2 Tim. 2:19). No matter how cleverly those who are not true believers disguise themselves, the Lord will find them out because He knows those who are His and those who are not.

“I am the good shepherd, and I know My own, and My own know Me” (John 10:14). Jesus plainly declares that He knows His sheep. Only His true sheep will be saved from the judgment. (Consider John 10:26 – “But you do not believe because you are not of My sheep.”)

In the parable of the wheat and the tares (Matt. 13:24-30, 36-43), Jesus teaches that there will be true believers (wheat) and unbelievers (tares) in His visible church until the end of the age. Then, at the end of the age, He will throw the unbelievers into the furnace of fire (13:42). Again we see that those who make false profession on earth do not deceive the Lord of heaven.

The parable of the dragnet is similar to the parable of the wheat and the tares. In this parable (Matt. 13:47-50), Jesus tells us that the dragnet of the gospel brings in both “good fish” (true believers) and “bad fish” (false), but at the end of the age, the Lord will take out the wicked from among the righteous and will throw them into the furnace of fire.

These Scriptures make clear that, even though man or the devil may sow those who are false in the field of the visible church (Matthew 13:38-39), the Lord is the One who reigns over His church and He will ensure that, at the last day, His bride has no wrinkle or spot.

Soli Deo gloria            rmb                 12/08/2022                 #598

The case of Simon the magician (Acts 8:9-24)

POST OVERVIEW. A study of Acts 8:9-24 and the episode involving Simon the magician. We consider the implications of Simon’s professed belief and subsequent baptism despite his unbelief.

In Acts 8:5-24, we read how Philip preaches “the good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ” (8:12) in Samaria and, as a result, some of the Samaritans believe and are baptized. This is exciting news, indeed, but this event also presents to us a couple of situations which can be misinterpreted and thus cause doctrinal confusion. The first situation involves Simon the magician and his professed belief and baptism and the second situation relates to the Samaritans receiving the Holy Spirit well after they had believed in Jesus and been saved. We will carefully examine these two situations in an attempt to remove this potential confusion.

GENERAL THOUGHTS ON INTERPRETING ACTS

Before we begin looking at Simon the magician, we should note that there are several considerations to keep in mind as we study the book of Acts. First, Acts portrays a time of great transition in redemptive history. At this time, the Jew-Gentile divide is firmly in place; there are still people who have believed in “the baptism of John;” the gospel is spreading first to the Jews, then to the Samaritans, and finally to the Gentiles; and the apostles are the authority in this new gospel movement. The fact that this is a time of transition constrains our interpretations of the individual episodes in Acts.

Second, because things are in transition, we must repeatedly ask the question, “Is this event merely descriptive or is it also prescriptive?” Luke is an excellent historian and includes many details of these events in Acts. His accounts are very descriptive of what occurred. The bigger question, however, is whether this description is also the way things should occur. That is, is this event a prescription for what should happen in all churches or with all believers throughout the church age till Jesus returns? In other words, is this episode in Acts describing for us what is normal in the church? Carefully answering these questions helps keep our interpretations on solid ground.

Third, in the early chapters of Acts as the gospel is spreading from Jerusalem to Samaria to the Gentiles (“remotest parts of the earth” in Acts 1:8), each new group of believers must be folded into the church in the same way. The pattern is established at Pentecost (Acts 2), where those who believe are baptized and, upon apostolic confirmation, they receive the Holy Spirit. What happened at Pentecost with the first fruits of the Jews happened again in Samaria (our current study in Acts 8) as the Samaritans, a mixed race of Jew and Gentile, are brought into the fold, and finally this happened (as we will see later on) when the first Gentiles come to saving faith in Christ (Cornelius in Acts 10). This process of apostolic confirmation and incorporation in the Body was unique in redemptive history, but its occurrence can cause confusion for readers of Acts.

With that as background, let’s begin our study of Simon the magician (Acts 8:9-24).

SIMON HIMSELF BELIEVED AND WAS BAPTIZED

The first situation we will address involves Simon the magician (“Simon Magus”). This Simon is a curious character. Before Philip came to Samaria preaching the gospel, Simon “was astonishing the people of Samaria” with his magical tricks (Acts 8:9). But when Philip performs miraculous signs and preaches the good news, the people give their attention to him, believe in the name of Jesus, and are baptized. The potential difficulty arises when the Scripture says, “Even Simon himself believed” and was baptized (8:13). To this point in Acts, when anyone believed and was baptized, it meant that they had been saved. Belief in the good news followed by baptism was the formula for salvation. But with Simon the magician, it becomes apparent that, despite his professed belief and his subsequent baptism, he is not a genuine believer but is still “in the bondage of iniquity” (8:23). How do we explain this?

PROFESSED BELIEF AND BAPTISM

To understand this situation, It is necessary to examine both professed belief and baptism to see what is happening here.

Our doctrine teaches us that water baptism does not save a person. We could say that “Baptism marks a person as saved, but it is not the means by which a person is saved.”

But we must go further. We can say “Baptism marks a person as saved” because their baptism is based on that person’s profession of faith (belief, trust) in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible teaches that faith and salvation precede baptism. “For by grace you have been saved through faith” (Eph. 2:8). In all examples of baptism in the New Testament, salvation by faith precedes baptism. Therefore, we can conclude that a person is baptized because they have professed Jesus Christ as Lord and are therefore assumed to be saved.

So then, as a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ, Philip appropriately baptized the Samaritans based on their profession of belief in the Lord Jesus. He assumed that their profession of faith was genuine, so he baptized them. In the same way, he also baptized Simon the magician based on Simon’s false profession of faith. But Philip was not an apostle, so he did not have the apostolic gift that allowed him to discern a false profession.

APOSTOLIC DISCERNMENT

In Acts and during the apostolic period, one of the gifts of the apostles was the ability to discern genuine faith. When the three thousand believed on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2), the apostle Peter was there to confirm the faith of those believers. But Peter was not there in Samaria when the gospel was proclaimed by Philip and so he could not confirm that these Samaritans had actually believed in Jesus and should now be included in the church. The Samaritans, including Simon the magician, had professed belief in Jesus, but without apostolic sanction, it was not certain that they possessed belief in Jesus.

Peter went down to Samaria for the purpose of putting his apostolic stamp on this move of the Spirit of God. In this instance, the apostle Peter was able to discern that Simon’s profession of belief was false. The Scripture makes clear that Simon had not truly believed in the Lord Jesus and was not saved, and so Peter exposed his unbelief and did not lay hands on him.

Having looked at Simon’s unbelief and his baptism and having determined what is happening in this passage, we also want to consider what lessons can learn and what applications we can draw from this study. The next post will take that next step.

Soli Deo gloria            rmb                 12/07/2022                 #597

Baptism of Simon the magician (Acts 8)

INTRODUCTION. A study of the fascinating character of Simon the magician from Acts 8:9-24. Simon is a false convert who “believes” and is baptized during the ministry of Philip in Samaria but is later revealed to be still in his sins. What can we learn from him and his false profession that will help us in our own ministry?

In this study in Acts 8:5-24, we read about the fruitful ministry in Samaria of Philip the evangelist as men and women hear Philip’s gospel message, believe the message, and are baptized, a pattern that is typical of the apostolic ministry of the book of Acts. We also meet Simon the magician, who is anything but typical. Simon clams to believe and, as a result, is baptized, but his claim of believing is proven false by his actions and his words.

The key verses are Acts 8:18-19:

18 Now when Simon saw that the Spirit was bestowed through the laying on of the apostles’ hands, he offered them money, 19 saying, “Give this authority to me as well, so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.”

What we see here is that our magical friend had a very distorted view of the Holy Spirit and of the gospel of salvation. In fact, I suggest that Simon the magician is seeing this entire gospel event through a dark, occult lens. Remember, Simon is a magician, a wizard who was called “the Great Power of God” for astonishing the people of Samaria with his magic arts. But when Philip comes into Samaria performing signs and great miracles (8:13; see also 8:6-7), Simon is forgotten, and his fame and income vanish. The Samaritans “believe Philip preaching the good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ” (8:12) and, when they believe the gospel, they forsake all their interest in the magic arts and thus give evidence of their true conversion.

By contrast, Simon claims to believe and yet he continues to pursue his magic arts. This is a first hint that his professed belief is suspect. Despite “believing” and falsely being baptized it seems Simon is still a magician. As a magician, Simon does not see Philip as an evangelist who is preaching the gospel of salvation, but he is a powerful fellow magician who can do amazing magic arts through the name of this Jesus Christ. And so Simon “continued on with Philip” (2:13) not so that he could hear more about Jesus, but so that he might learn how Philip was performing all these signs and miracles. Simon wanted to learn Philip’s magic, no to know Philip’s Christ.

In the same way Simon does not see Peter as an apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ but as another powerful spiritist who is able to bestow occult powers on people simply by laying his hands on them. Not believing that the Holy Spirit is the third Person of the Trinity, but is instead some spiritual force, Simon appeals to Peter as his fellow magician and offers him money so that he too may bestow this “Holy Spirit” on others by laying hands on them.

Taking a closer look at 8:18-19, we see Simon’s errors.

  • Simon believed that the Holy Spirit was bestowed mechanically when anyone with power laid hands on anyone else. But the Holy Spirit is the gift of God that is given to the believer when they place their faith in the Lord Jesus. Thus, it is bestowed spiritually as a result of faith.
  • The magician thought that he could buy the Holy Spirit with money. It is typical of unbelievers to believe that money can buy anything, but the Holy Spirit is God and cannot be purchased at any price.
  • Simon assumed that he could buy the Holy Spirit and then dispense it to whoever would pay him money to get it. (“So that everyone (or anyone) on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.”) He treated the Holy Spirit, the third Person of the Trinity, as a commodity that could be sold.

These were the thoughts of Simon the pretender. He pretended to be a genuine believer, but, as Peter pointed out, he was “in the gall of bitterness and in the bondage of iniquity” (8:23). Simon the magician is thus guilty of the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit (Matthew 12:24-32), for he views the divine Spirit as a demonic force to be dispensed to anyone willing to pay money. Simon treats the Holy Spirit of the living God as an occult spirit, a commodity sold by the magician as part of his dark trade.

Finally, Simon betrays his unregenerate state by refusing to obey the instructions of the Apostle Peter. In Acts 8:22, Peter commands Simon to repent of his wickedness and to pray to the Lord for forgiveness (both “repent” and “pray” are in the imperative in the Greek), but Simon ignores the call to repent and tells Peter to pray, instead (8:24). Simon is either unwilling or unable to pray, and so he asks Peter to pray for him. But a man must repent for himself, and a man must ask for forgiveness himself. No one can repent for someone else, and no one can ask the Lord for forgiveness for someone else. Simon hears the gospel but does not believe. Simon is commanded to repent but ignores the command. He is commanded to beg the Lord for forgiveness, but he refuses to act. Thus, in the end Simon perishes.

SDG                 rmb                 3/9/2022                     #501