The Disciples See Righteousness In The Samaritans

The Samaritans were despised by the Jews as a mixed-race, mixed-religion people. The very word "Samaritan" conjured up in the Jewish mind everything they considered to be abhorrent to God; unlike themselves, whom they (rightly) considered to be God's treasured people. However, they saw themselves as righteous and the Samaritans as unrighteous, just by virtue of birth.

However, measured against God’s standard of righteousness, every person ever conceived stands condemned. Nobody can have genuine, authentic, righteousness without having God’s nature, for he alone is sinless.

But God understands our failure and has provided His own true righteousness, His perfect righteousness, in place of the righteousness you and I do not have. It is given to us freely, without contribution on our part, as we have faith in Jesus Christ. This is called justification, which means that we are now “made right” or “just” before God on the basis of Jesus’ achievements.

Once righteousness has been received into your inward being through the indwelling Holy Spirit, then your character traits and outward behavior can’t help but change to reflect the profound spiritual change you’ve undergone.

Righteousness does also refer to “upright moral conduct,” in keeping with God’s standard set down in His law. Certainly your and my testimony to the reality of God’s goodness and righteousness to the people around us would have little effectiveness if our conduct and our character were not also morally upright.

But to live morally is not just about outward moral behavior. Our confession that Jesus is Lord, and that God raised Him from the dead is going to be more than what we say. To live morally, according to God’s way, is to actively enrich the lives of the people around you.
According to this standard, the Samaritan woman was the most righteous person there, and her townspeople were also learning true righteousness at Jesus' feet.

* A righteous person lives in humility, submitting her life to God, inviting the Holy Spirit to control her thoughts, her feelings and thereby her words and actions.

* A righteous person, in submission to God, understands her complete and utter dependence on Him for the course of her life, the course of her day-to-day living, and sees the hand of God in all the events and people in her life.

* A righteous person’s words naturally glorify God and build up the people who listen. Her words come out of the overflow of her heart, filled with God’s righteousness.

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The Disiciples Learn Righteousness

The disciples were doing good. They were doing what they could to serve their rabbi and take care of His needs.
+ They made sure He had a place to rest
+ They did the work of finding food
+ And when they came back they tried to get Him to eat as they watched all these people begin to stream out of Sychar towards them.

Their whole focus was on the physical plane, thinking about Jesus’ physical needs, not on the spiritual plane, realizing the amazing spiritual birth that had taken place in the Samaratian woman, and the immediate spiritual fruit all these people coming towards them meant.

Jesus was training His disciples to recognize a different kind of being good than simply serving Him by taking care of His physical needs. This kind of work, providing for your family, is good work. But there is an even more important work that transcends the needs of earthly life, and that is meeting the need for eternal life.

The Lord was opening His disciples’ eyes to the deep satisfaction of true righteousness, believing in Him and doing God’s will. This kind of righteousness wasn’t unknown to Jewish thinking. The Jewish concept of wisdom was what a person needed to know in their heart and mind to live a life of righteousness.

Wisdom and a life of righteousness are, in other words, inseparable.

Every person, regardless of their cultural and religious background, understands God’s Moral Law. And because we understand it, deep down, that can fool us into thinking we’re good people. The temptation is to reassure ourselves of our own righteousness by comparing ourselves with someone who seems less mature, less righteous.

But the standard for righteousness is perfection, it is God’s standard, not people’s standards.

Righteousness means just what it sounds like: “Right - ness.” The human definition of righteousness is more about character traits and outward conduct, while God’s righteousness is an expression of His divinity, His holiness.

-->Since righteousness and goodness flow out from the character of God Himself as a part of His attributes, as part of His nature, righteousness is actually a matter of your inner essence.<-- Righteousness refers to a right standing with God, free from guilt and sin.

[More on Righteousness tomorrow]
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The Samaritans Need To Know Jesus Personally

Many people from the Samaritan woman's village of Sychar believed in Jesus because of what the woman had told them about Him. They immediately recognized something powerful about Jesus because of the woman's testimony that Jesus had seen into her past, and into her heart.

So the Samaritans invited Jesus to stay with them. It was a sacrifice of time for these Samaritans, as they put aside their work and other daily tasks and responsibilities in order to have this two-day retreat with the Lord. And Jesus did stay with them and taught them. John recorded no miracles, or even requests for signs.

What a remarkable difference to the time Jesus spent in Jerusalem during the Passover. People were amazed at the miracles Jesus performed there, and John wrote that people did believe Jesus, but we know it was an insincere and shallow belief that did not honor the Lord, because John also wrote that Jesus did not entrust Himself to the people in Jerusalem....like He entrusted Himself to these people in Sychar.

The Samaritans' faith became grounded, not in supernatural experiences of signs and wonders, but rather in the good strong teaching of Jesus' words,

And many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, "It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world." (John 4:41-42)

That's the strongest faith, and the most spiritually mature confession recorded thus far in Jesus' ministry. They had met Jesus themselves, and as they spent time with Him, their relationship became firsthand.

How often do you spend time personally with Jesus? It's easy to let our faith hang on someone else's testimony -- books, pastors, spiritual friends. That's why a very important part of your life is going to be spending time reading the Bible and asking God to personally instruct you.

You and I need to have our faith grounded in the good strong teaching of God's word being taught directly to us by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, through His Spirit.

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The Samaritan Village Comes To Jesus

Jesus showed the disciples all the people coming towards them and explained that their satisfaction would come from doing the work God was presenting to them, reaping the harvest in front of them,

"Do you not say, 'There are yet four months, then comes the harvest'?" (John 4:34b)

All around them were fields with young crops, four months away from harvest, but

"Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for harvest." (John 4:35)

I think Jesus nodded His head towards the people coming down the road. "Look guys, that 'field' walking toward us is ready! Now's the time!"

When the opportunity presents itself, regardless of what your personal agenda might have been, that's the time to take that opportunity and do the most with it. We never know how much time we truly have.

"Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, 'One sows and another reaps.'" (John 4:36-37)

The disciples had just been in Sychar buying food. They had had plenty of opportunity to let the townspeople know that the Lord Jesus, Messiah, Who had been performing many signs and miracles in Jerusalem, was just right outside of town by Jacob's well, come and see.

But they didn't.

John's gospel tells us it was the woman who testified about Jesus, and the whole town was her harvest, not the disciples'. Now Jesus was going to rejoice with this woman as her entire town came out to meet Him.

Jesus explained this to His disciples,

"I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor." (John 4:38)

Archeologists have located Aenon near Salim, where John the Baptist had been baptizing at the end of his ministry. It was near Shechem, which was close to Sychar and Jacob's well. John the Baptist had prepared the 'soil' of this town, and planted the 'seed,' and Jesus had come with His disciples to reap the harvest. His disciples were now going to enter into the harvest even though they really hadn't done anything but go buy food.

The disciples had food for Jesus, but Jesus had food for the Samaritans, and He was teaching His disciples to reach beyond their little group to the world around them, recognizing and feeding those who were so hungry spiritually.

True satisfaction is found in doing God's will

Jesus has sent you and me into the harvest as well. God gives every Christian chances to plant His word in others' hearts, and to cultivate that seed with our love and prayers. In due time that seed will bear fruit to the glory of God.

There are times when you and I will only sow and others will be the ones who get to reap the fruit of the harvest.

Sometimes it is us who will get to reap.

Either way, doing the will of God is the important thing

* In what ways are you accomplishing the mission God has set for you?

* Where are the fields white for harvest around you?

* The disciples needed to broaden their view, get out of their little group. In what ways might you need to look beyond your family or friends?

* All the disciples had to do was reorient their thoughts as they looked at those Samaritans headed towards them. Who do you need to reorient your thoughts about?

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Knowing God's Will

Doing God's will is not just about doing general good works, and applying His word to your life in practical, every day ways. God also has good works in mind for you to personally do, as the Apostle Paul explained in his letter to the Ephesians,

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. (Ephesians 2:8-10)

People often ask me: How can we know what those things particular things are?

There are several approaches to this knotty issue, which I talk about here and here

Some food for thought, for today:

1) Believe that God knows what He wants for you, and for your family, to do. Breakthroughs happen for people who believe God.

2) Sometimes God will first speak to you directly from His word, words that seem to leap right up off the page for you in your Bible as you are studying. God guides people through His word in Scripture.

3) The Bible teaches that we should also seek godly advice from those who are wise and to be trusted. Be humble and teachable as you listen to what they have to say.

4) God will also cause circumstances to reveal His will -- such as an invitation that you didn't first cause to happen, to serve God in some way; or maybe a job offer, or the chance to do something, or move somewhere, or be with a certain person, or an opportunity arises.

5) If God invites you with circumstances, He will give you confirmation through Scripture, His published word. If God invites you through His word, then He will provide the opportunity as well, through your circumstances.

6) Be in prayer throughout this process to sense the Spirit's message to your inner being. Ask God for this inner guidance. Throughout Scripture God promises to guide you, so believe that and pray for God's direction, trusting that He knows how to speak to you in a way that you will recognize is from Him. God will guide through the inward witness of the Holy Spirit.

The "peace of God" in a decision is that sense of knowing within you that this is right -- a contented peace, or a conviction that it is the right thing to do, or a compelling desire -- it is difficult to describe, but easy to identify.

When these things are present, you can be sure that God has called you into doing whatever it is you have asked Him about. Right after there will often come some testing, either doubts or opposition of some kind, that will rattle you. Then you must go back to the process and the circumstances that proved the settling of God's will for you in order not to be moved away from the direction God has shown you.

It helps if you write it all down, as you go through the process, to remind you in times of need what the Lord has been revealing to you.

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The Disciples Learn True Satisfaction In Samaria

The disciples had come back from the town of Sychar with some food. When they got to Jacob's well they saw Jesus talking with this Samaritan woman, and they were surprised. That word in Greek means they were astonished, utterly amazed. But they didn't ask Jesus why He was talking with her, nor what He was talking with her about. I think they must have just hung back, politely, and waited for the woman to leave.

A half mile from town, without her water jar, it probably took her no more than fifteen minutes, maybe, to get back, tell everybody about Jesus and have everyone drop whatever they were doing to follow her back to the well. Think quick turnaround!

In the meantime, the disciples had started digging into their meal and trying to get Jesus to eat, too. But I think Jesus was watching the road coming out of town. He had bigger things on His mind. Sure enough, He began to see some people walking back towards Him, as He sat on the lip of Jacob's well.

Imagine Jesus watching those people walking towards Him, while the disciples kept urging Jesus to eat something,

Jesus said to them, "I have food to eat that you do not know about." (John 4:32)

Why would Jesus phrase it in that way rather than just flat out teach them about true heart satisfaction?

He captured their attention by bringing in what their minds were occupied with. And they were all about the food. When did Jesus get food? they asked. How did He get the food? Who brought Him food? they asked as they looked meangingfully at each other.

Jesus had only a few minutes to explain to the disciples that something really big was happening,

Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work. (John 4:34)

God the Son had come to accomplish God's work, salvation.

Jesus explained that doing the Father's will -- in this case, leading the Samaritan woman to salvation, and preparing to speak to her whole town -- was true nourishment to His soul. This truth, for Jesus, had been tested in the wilderness when He was tempted (right after He was baptized).

During that time of temptation Satan knew Jesus had been fasting for forty days, and that He was weak with starving. So Satan told Jesus to use His super powers to turn a stone into a loaf of bread. After all, the devil insinuated, if He died of hunger, His whole mission would be a failure.

Jesus' answer was to quote from scripture. A person did not live by bread alone, but by the word of God. Eternal life, and God's will, that is even more important than earthly life.

Now the disciples needed to know where true satisfaction in life comes from:
* Food satisfies physical hunger. In the same way, the food of God gives us meaning in life, satisfying our spiritual hunger.

* Food strengthens the body. In the same way, the food of God strengthens us spiritually. Doing God's will strengthens us for doing the greater things God has for us to do.

* Food supplies enjoyment, and doing God's will brings spiritual enjoyment.

* Food nourishes, keeps us healthy, and protects us from getting sick. In the same way, the food of God keeps us spiritually healthy.

* Food is necessary to live, we eat every day. So it is with God's will. Doing God's will is necessary when you have been born again, for God dwells within you, and every day you and I need to be in His will to receive nourishment, strength, enjoyment and health.

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The Samaritan Woman's "Fruit of Faith"

Can you imagine Jesus’ joy and delight in this woman? How much more joy did she bring Him than Nicodemus, who had all his advantages, but left Jesus that night without putting his faith in Him.

The epilogue to this one woman’s willingness to run back and tell her village about Jesus is found in Acts 8:4-25. The seeds planted on this day became a great harvest of believers when the apostle Philip went back to Samaria three years later to tell them about the Lord Jesus’ resurrection.

What you’re full of is always going to come out

That’s right! Whatever it is.

What are you full of? Have you been born again?

Is God’s eternal life welling up within you like a spring of living water? You don’t have to think about it, you don’t have to work at it, it just comes out naturally because it’s your nature, whether your old nature, or the new nature God has given you. The Samaritan woman had found love and significance in Jesus and she had to tell everyone she kne

An effective witness will have to leave some things behind. Maybe you have been damping down God’s Holy Spirit within you because there are some things you haven’t left at Jesus feet –

* Maybe you are a shy person.
* Maybe you feel like you don’t know enough to talk about the gospel.
* Maybe you’re afraid people will ask you questions you can’t answer, or they will argue with you, or not like you any more.
* Maybe you’re carrying unforgiveness, or prejudice.

If you recognize that this is where you are, I hope you will ask God to make it possible for you to be intentional and proactive about addressing in practical ways what is holding you back.

Think what joy you bring the Lord Jesus when you are filled to overflowing with His love and joy, and you are willing to bring others to Him.

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The Samaritan Woman's Confession of Faith is Followed by Action

Have you ever heard the phrase “Leave it at the feet of Jesus”? Well this is what the Samaritan woman literally did with her water jug, the symbol of her old life, having to walk a half mile each way every day just to get water.

Leaving her jug was a symbol of repentance, putting down her old life and taking up the new eternal life that Jesus offered her.

– She would not longer seek satisfaction through one romance after another. Her thirst for love and acceptance, for a sense of significance would come from her knowledge of God’s love, and His life, welling up within her.

What do you need to symbolically leave at Jesus’ feet? What have you been trying to find satisfaction in that you now realize is actually standing in the way of you finding true satisfaction in Jesus?

– She could trust Jesus with the things of her life. After all, He had proven that He knew everything about her, but instead of condemning her, He loved her and entrusted His revelation of Himself to her.

What do you need to let go of, and trust Jesus with, so that you will be able to receive more from Him?

– She knew she was coming back, and that Jesus would be there, taking care of her water jug for her. He is trustworthy with the things of our lives.

What do you need Jesus to take care of for you, so that you will be free to tell others about Him?

She was born again, and we immediately see the power of God working through her

1) Her values changed, she was no longer burdened about her old life
2) She ran towards the very people she had been trying to avoid before. 3) She was concerned for other people, not protecting herself
4) The most important thing to her was bringing them to the Lord

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The Samaritan Woman's Response of Faith

The woman was tracking right along with Jesus, but it hardly seemed possible that Jesus could be the one everyone had been waiting for, for centuries

"The woman said to him, 'I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.'

"Jesus said to her, 'I who speak to you am he.'" (John 4:25-26)

The Samaritans called the Messiah “Tahav,” the Revealer. Someday the Messiah would come, and He would bring about this radical change in worship, but Jesus certainly can’t mean that time had come now
...could He?

The words that John records Jesus having said at this point are, literally, in the Greek: “I that speak to you – I AM” Jesus spoke out loud the holiest of names, the “I AM” of God, Yahweh. It is the boldest claim yet in John’s gospel, and it was to one of the lowliest people you could think of.

You would have thought Jesus would have saved this incredible revelation for someone who could really appreciate it, like Nicodemus, or at least His disciples, or at the very least a Jew, and a man. The rabbis of that day had a saying, “It is better that the words of the law be burned that to be delivered to a woman.” Women weren’t considered to be worthy of receiving revelation from God in that day.

But here the Lord gave this Samaritan, and a woman at that, the revelation the whole world had been waiting to hear.

Why?

* She had so little spiritual truth.
* She hadn’t been raised up in the scriptures, or God’s Law.
* She was considered a lowly sinner even by Samaritan standards.

But what she had was humility. She was teachable. She wanted what Jesus had to give. She was willing to receive whatever He had for her.

You don’t need to be a Nicodemus to receive understanding from God. You just need to be humble, teachable, and want to learn.

God desires people to worship Him in spirit and in truth

How often do you really worship God? Even on Sunday mornings, when our minds and hearts are not in it, singing songs and reciting words are not really worship.

When you feel like your joy has gone away, then worship is one of the places you can find your joy back. If prayer has come to feel like a burden, then temporarily put aside all those petitions and spend your time praising and worshiping for a while. Sing songs of praise. Pray scripture that worships God. This is how you drink from the spring of living water, God’s life within you.

When you feel weak, or down, or joyless
1) Think about God’s attributes
2) Find verses that talk about God’s great power, His love and goodness and meditate on them
3) Remember before God all those times that He showed His power in your life
4) Tell the Lord how you know He will meet you powerfully in your current situation

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The Samaritan Woman's Question: Are You The Messiah?

The Samaritan women didn’t try to defend herself or get away from Jesus. Instead of retreating, she came in closer to Jesus. She was, in effect, admitting the Lord was right about her.

She said “You must be a prophet, you really see me, you know everything about me, you know what’s in my heart.” She was finally stepping into the spiritual plane with Jesus, and this was Jesus other purpose for her – to discover Who He really is.

Remember that the Samaritans only believed in the first five books of the Bible, the Pentateuch. So they didn’t believe in any of the Bible prophets. The only prophet they had ever believed in was Moses.

As far as they were concerned there would only be one more prophet, the prophet Moses had prophesied about, the Messiah. But here Jesus was, obviously a prophet! So she asked Jesus about her religion –

1) What about our holy mountain?
2) Have we been wrong after all?
3) Are the Jews right after all?

Jesus made three remarkable statements in answer to her question:

1) "Jesus said to her, 'Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father.'" (John 4:21)

The question of whose mountain was right was soon going to be irrelevant. The Jewish form of worship, with all the sacrifices, would no longer be necessary because Jesus was going to fulfill all that symbolism by dying on the cross.

Jesus’ death and resurrection would make every believer’s body God’s temple. Wherever believers are gathered together, that’s a holy place, that’s where God is worshiped.

2) "'You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews.'" (John 4:22)

The Samaritans had some truth, but it was mixed with error.

The Jews alone had the scriptures, the revelation of God, and the right symbolic worship, and through the Jews would come Jesus Himself, the fulfillment of all the scriptures.

3) "'But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit.'" (John 4:23-24)

Man-made religion is not acceptable to God.
* True worship is done in the human spirit.
* True worship comes from the heart. It’s not something you do while your mind is somewhere else.

God is spirit, and so are you and I, in our innermost being. Worship is the human spirit meeting God’s Spirit, a communion which is intimate union.

That can only happen when you are born again. Truth is transparency with God, and it is also meeting God through Jesus Christ Who is the truth.

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The Definition of Repentance

In scripture, repentance means to "undergo a change of one's mind" which results in a change of the entire direction of a person's life.

Biblical repentance is a radical turning away from sin and towards Christ. It is a key element of saving faith

According to the Bible, repentance and faith go together. There can be no genuine turning to Christ in faith without an accompanying repudiation of sin.

The Bible explains that in the past you and I were spiritually dead, unfeeling towards God. We followed the ways of this world and, even though we didn't realize it, we obeyed Satan, who rules the world. Satan has power over everyone who is dead to God. Before you and I were born again, we were also ruled by the selfish desires of our human natures. Because of this, we were already under God's wrath.

But look at how Jesus was with this Samaritan woman. That is the picture of God's real mercy! We were dead because of our sins, but God loved us so much that He made you and I who received Him alive with Messiah Jesus. It is God's wonderful kindness which saves you and me, which woos us to repentance, and flows into our lives when we repent.

As a person hears the gospel, understands it and accepts it, God's regeneration of that person from being dead in their sins to being spiritually alive, and that person's repentance and calling on God all seem to happen together.

True repentance involves three important steps:
1) Conviction: Becoming convinced, through the work of the Holy Spirit, that what you have done – or not done – constitutes sin, it was wrong and you now hate it as God hates it.

You and I know when we do things that are wrong – yelling at our kids, being rude to someone, breaking a promise we don’t want to keep. Then we try to protect ourselves from feeling bad about it by trying to justify it, trying to make it seem less than it really is. But scripture teaches that confessing our sins honestly and completely, without trying to gloss over it, or make excuses, is really the only way to spiritual health, and that brings us to the next step.

2) Contrition: Along with your confession of sin, with no attempt to excuse it or justify it, you also experience the sorrow that you have offended God and broken fellowship with Him.

3) Conversion: Resolving, deeply, to turn away from sin and turn towards Christ, coupled with a willingness to make restitution whenever possible.

Repentance is a prerequisite, a necessary condition for salvation. But even after a you and I are saved, we continue to sin. The Bible calls us to repent again and again as we are convicted of our sin by the Holy Spirit.

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Jesus Confronted the Samaritan Woman's Sinful Lifestyle

Jesus knew what was standing in the way of this woman moving from temporary satisfaction to true heart satisfaction. She was trying to find heart satisfaction and that sense of significance we all need, in relationships with men. So He gently drew out what had been keeping her back

"Jesus said to her, 'Go, call your husband, and come here.'"

At first she tried to make her situation look better than it really was by trying to create the impression that she lived alone, that she was single.

Yes, Jesus agreed, that’s technically true. But you’ve already been through five marriages, and you’re actually living with a guy right now who isn’t your husband.

When Jesus brought up her lifestyle choice, she was amazed, but not offended. Jesus had shown Himself to be completely in the know about her sin, but also tender, compassionate, loving and personally interested in her.

* He didn’t condemn her, or try to shame her or ridicule her.
* He didn’t go into a long speech about how immoral that was.
* He didn't go on about how low her standards were, what’s wrong with her, going from man to man.

Instead, without holding back the truth, but with all gentleness, Jesus helped her to see the loneliness and emptiness in her heart.

--> When you and I are in situations like this, talking about spiritual things with people, we also can pray and ask God for this kind of insight, to help people see the truth about themselves, and the truth about God.

Her thirst to be loved, and to find significance had never been satisfied. She knew what falling in love was like, she knew what a hot romance was all about, but she had never yet found true love.

She had found out, again and again, that falling in love only lasts so long – and then something deeper and more real has to take its place, or the relationship will die away. Every time she got married she was looking for a secure and binding kind for love, love that would last a life time. but with each failed marriage her hope dwindled so that finally she had reached a point where she’d given up on the commitment of marriage.

Jesus understood her loneliness, and her fear of being left old and alone. He knew that her search for acceptance and self-worth and love had led her to look for the wrong kinds of love, and now she was a moral outcast. Jesus had two purposes for her at this point.

1) The first was for her to recognize how empty her lifestyle was so she could repent.

[More on repentance tomorrow]

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Only Jesus' Living Water Truly Satisfies

The woman asked the Lord if He thought He was smarter and better than the famous patriarch Jacob who had dug the very well He was sitting on? Where was there a stream? Was He going to dig deeper than the 150 feet of this well? And what was He going to get the water with?

The woman kept speaking on the earthly plane, about running water, but Jesus persevered in talking on the spiritual plane, understanding her cynicism and her soul hunger. He explained that the water He was talking about wasn’t just regular water

Jesus said to her, "Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." (John 4:13-14)

Jesus was talking about God’s Holy Spirit, God’s very life being put into her inner being through faith in Him. The spring of living water would be inside her, and she would have a fresh source of life-giving water day and night.

That sounded fantastic to her

The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water."(John 4:15)

It’s hard to tell if she understood what Jesus was talking about, or if she was still thinking about regular, earthly water. But either way, she believed Jesus, and she was interested in what He had to offer her. She didn’t have a lot of knowledge, but she was teachable and open to the truth.

--> How teachable and open minded are you and I? How much do you and I miss because we’re not willing to entertain a new idea that’s different than what we always thought?

Only Jesus’ living water truly satisfies

The Samaritan woman had to walk a half mile every day to Jacob’s well to get water. Every day that jug would empty out eventually, as she used the water, and back she would have to go to get more.

Think of all the things in life that promise to satisfy --
* A good job, a good relationship, a good family, good children, good possessions, good source of money.

* If only we had a bigger house, or a maid, or new car.

* If only we could get into that club, or buy at that store, or be included with those people.

That’s earthly water. None of that lasts. Jobs change; people grow old and die, or move on; material things are subject to decay, theft, fires, floods. What earthly thing have you been counting on to satisfy your soul hunger?

Only what God offers lasts. The spring of living water is God’s life which not only lasts, but it stays the same quality forever, rich, refreshing, profoundly meaningful, infinitely exciting life. Eternal life is saturated with God’s own love, joy and peace springing up within you like a spring of living water.

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Jesus speaks to the Samaritan woman

I wonder if it made the Samaritan woman feel uncomfortable at first to see this lone Jewish man sitting on the well she would have to use to draw water. She may have hoped that he would move away, but he didn’t, so she had no choice but to go up to the well to get her water.

Have you ever been in one of those uncomfortable situations? You want to keep yourself to yourself. But the Lord loves people, all people. There’s no ranking system with God, that some people are better, He loved this mixed-race, mixed-religion woman and He respected and honored her.

What opportunity has God opened up for you, no matter how lowly, to talk about the Gospel? What kinds of people have you already decided you won’t be talking about Jesus with because they’re just too coarse, or they’re not too smart, or they’re too worldly?

Maybe you’ve told yourself they have their own religion already, leave well enough alone, or they have science, or they’re just not your kind of people. When do prejudices stand in your way and mine, in these uncomfortable situations?

If you’re the kind of person who lives an outwardly blameless life, how do you act around a person who doesn’t? Do you make them feel comfortable around you, or do they sense your disapproval?

Notice how Jesus reached out to her in such a simple and vulnerable way. He asked her for a drink of water. Though He is God, He is also a man, and He knew what it was to be hot and tired and thirsty, to have physical needs.

She was of course surprised that a Jewish person would talk to her, and here Jesus was also a man, that made it even more uncomfortable. I’d like to think she still poured Him a drink as she asked Him how He could possible by willing to drink from her unclean jug. Jesus had an even bigger surprise for her

Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, 'Give me a drink,' you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water." (John 4:10)

That really took her aback!

What was Jesus talking about? Living water in ancient times meant fresh running water which remained healthy and pure, like a stream. Often water stored in cisterns would grow stagnant, so a source of fresh water was especially valued in the desert. But even wells could go bad or run dry, so a stream was the most valuable of all since it meant that there was a continuing source of water no matter how hot and dry the rest of the area got.

The prophet Jeremiah compared God to living water, and rejecting God for earthly sources of satisfaction as being like drinking stagnant water from broken cisterns.

declares the LORD, for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water. (Jeremiah 2:12-12)

There are other Old Testament references to this idea of God being the source of fresh, pure living water, but since none of them are in the first five books of the Bible, the Samaritan woman would not have been familiar with this concept. Still, she might have remembered God's dealings with His people in the exodus, providing them with water whenever they needed it.

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Background on Samaria

Ordinarily, most Jews of Jesus’ day, if they wanted to get to Galilee, took the long way around, six days on foot instead of two, so they wouldn’t have to go through Samaria.

A thousand years and more before Jesus’ time, the ten northern tribes of Israel had rebelled and started their own government, leaving only the two southern tribes of Judah and Benjamin as the "real Israel" under King David’s dynasty. The northern tribes rejected the Jerusalem temple worship and set up golden calves at their own shrines, in "holy cities" of their own making.

Three hundred years later the Assyrians came in and wiped out the northern kingdom, took the people captive, and sent in their own people to repopulate the devastated area. You can read the whole story in 2 Kings 17. Hundreds of years after that, when the Jews came back to Judah to rebuild the temple, they would not let the Samaritans help them and forbade intermarriage with the Samaritans.

For the next 450 years the Jews and the Samaritans hated each other. The Samaritan built their own temple on their own mountain, Mt. Gerizim, in the historic area of Shechem where Jacob had originally pitched his tent and dug a well. They only accepted the first five books of the Bible as scripture, and they also worshiped five other deities besides Yahweh. They were a mixed-race people, part Hebrew and part Assyrian, and they had a mixed religion, like New Age today.

When Jesus and His disciples got to Jacob’s famous well, they decided to take a break. Jesus sat down to rest, and the disciples went into the nearest town to go buy some food. They probably passed by the woman with her water jug as they walked into the town of Sychar. Archeologists show there was another well in town, but she was walking the extra half mile every day out of town to go to Jacob’s well, probably because of her low reputation amongst the other town members.

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