Transcript

John 4, would you turn there? John 4. I know we have a lot of folks out of pocket on this Labor Day weekend, but the best thing I like about it is they come back. Sometimes it’s good to take a break, but not too long.

Jesus told the woman at the well that if you drink this water, you’ll be so satisfied you’ll never even thirst again. We just sang that. I’m satisfied in Him alone. We’re not going back to works or ritual or sacraments or ethical renewal or moral renovation of our lives to somehow gain a standing before God. We have been purchased and made right in Christ.

Now, I’m going to pretty much cover most of the chapter. But for our beginning this morning, let’s look at John 4:30-35. As I’m in between books of the Bible and I keep stumbling upon texts that make me think of Friend Day and encouraging us and challenging us to be faithful in that task. Ethan, if you would, cut me down a little bit up here, okay? We just got these speakers in, and they’re bright and clear and just a tad loud.

John 4:30, “they went out of the city and were coming to me.” Meanwhile, the disciples were urging him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.” They’d gone away, and he’d been up there at the well, a meeting with that woman at the well, woman of Sychar. The disciples come back and say, well, you need to eat. John 4:32 “he said, I have food to eat that you do not know about.” So the disciples were saying to one another, “well, no one brought him anything to eat, did he?” And Jesus said to them, “my food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.” Let me pause there. There’s a kingdom on earth to build for God’s glory. That’s why Jesus came. That’s why his father sent him to the earth. And so he’s saying to his disciples, not really a rebuke, he’s trying to sharpen them that you’re talking about physical food. We have to have that, but I’m about something bigger than that. The physical food is to the end of building the kingdom.

Do you remember the alignment prayer? Do you remember it? Not the Lord’s prayer, it’s okay to call it that. Not the model prayer, it’s okay to call it that. But really it’s the alignment prayer, to realign yourself with God’s purpose and priorities. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. We will glorify your name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. We want to be about that work. We want to be on mission with God on the earth of building his kingdom, i.e., his local churches, building them up for its glory in the earth. And Jesus said, that’s why I’m here to get that job done. That’s my food.

John 4:35 “Do you not say there are yet four months and then comes the harvest?” He’s referring to the actual physical harvest. Now he does the parallel to the spiritual harvest. “Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields that they are white for harvest.” Now these men, these disciples that Jesus is having this verbal intercourse with were on board with Jesus. They had signed up to be about his work with him, to be co-laborers with him, to be on mission with God, if you will, which is what we’re supposed to do. They were committed to build his kingdom.

Now you remember there was in the gospels, there’s a lot of times when they didn’t quite grasp what that was and what that was supposed to look like. And Jesus would have to sharpen them and rebuke them and correct them as to just really what his kingdom was. One time he even had to look at Peter and say, “get behind me, Satan. You’re setting your mind on man’s interest. You’re thinking the way a man thinks instead of the way God thinks about building his kingdom”. So these guys are on board. They signed up to build the kingdom, but they really don’t grasp what it looks like now. And Jesus, in effect, is saying to build my kingdom, “we’ve got to win the lost sheep.”

And look around you, they’re all around you. “The fields are white into the harvest. They’re all around you guys. This isn’t hard”. And they might ask the question, well, just how do we do it? Just how do we win them? And that’s where we get our text today. Jesus gives a perfect illustration for us. An example to emulate, that is emulated for us, of winning the lost.

I simply call this the Soul Winner. Now let’s state very clearly up front, there are glorious truths in this narrative, and we could preach many sermons, particularly on the wonders and the glories of who Christ says he is. But there’s also a powerful illustration from Christ’s life of how we ourselves can be soul winners. Be about the task of winning souls. I’m not saying it’s an absolute exhaustive example, but it’s a solid and good example.

Notice first of all, commitment. Roman number one (I), commitment. We see this in John 4:4-5. If you’re going to be a soul winner, you start with a commitment to be one. I didn’t say you feel like being one. I didn’t even say you have a burden for the lost and to be a soul winner. I just say there ought to be a commitment. In John 4:4-5, here the Lord is, the Bible says, and he, John 4:4, “he had to pass through Samaria.” He had to pass through. Jewish people did not go through Samaria. Samaria was the country, if you will, of the city of the half-breeds, half-Jews, half-Gentile.

I didn’t see this in any scholarly journal or manual on the text, so I hope I’m not wrong, but basically, a committed Jew would view a Samaritan as an unclean thing. We just don’t go around them. So it’s a radical thing, and Jesus was constantly doing things that freaked his disciples out, really messed up their thinking. Why would our Lord, why would our Savior, why would this Jesus, the promised Messiah, have to go through Samaria? We avoid Samaria at all cost. No self-respecting godly Jew would go into Samaria, but Jesus said he had to go. He’s committed to it. He’s committed to it. So he came to the city of Samaria, John 4:5, the city called Sychar, near the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son, Joseph.

You know, Jesus is God incarnate. He is omniscient. He knows everything. He knows all, and he knows a woman from Sychar is going to be there by well that day, and that woman was in dire need of a savior. Now, a thought here on following the example of Jesus, just to bring this out in a balancing way, there are a lot of ways Jesus is not an example for us to emulate or follow, at least specifically and meticulously. I mean, he’s God incarnate. He’s God in human flesh. There are things he said and things he did that we cannot even try to do and should not try to do. He’s God’s Son, the Son of God who came to fulfill the office of Messiah or Savior. That’s only a one-time thing and he’s the only one in the universe who could possibly fulfill that office and we’re not to follow him in that. That’s done, only he qualifies to do that. So there are a number of things that Jesus does and says that we’re not supposed to follow. You can’t go to the cross and die for the world, only he’s qualified to do that.

So there’s so many things that are outside of the realm of even possibility for us, yet that being true, there’s many ways in which he is the supreme example that we should emulate, that we should follow. And one foundational example that we should all purpose to follow is Jesus’ example of reaching the lost sheep. Jesus’ commitment to reaching the lost with the saving gospel. And that’s what he does here. In Luke 19:10, Jesus said, “for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.” 1 John 2:6 reminds us, “whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.” Whatever else we follow or learn from Jesus is that we should follow him and learn from him about reaching the lost, having a commitment to it.

Specifically, commitment to his purpose of building his kingdom, building his church. And the foundational issue in getting the church built, the kingdom built, is reaching the lost and filling the kingdom up. So we must join our Lord in his quest to find the sheep that’s lost and, in effect, be on mission with God. God’s going to build his kingdom. He’s charged us to be committed to get in on it. 2 Peter 3:9 says that God is not willing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance. The heart of God.

You might say, Pastor, as far as this commitment to reach the lost, to be honest, I just don’t have a burden for the lost. I just don’t have a burden about it. You don’t have to. You don’t need a burden. You just need to be obedient. You just need to be obedient. In Matthew 28:18-20, Jesus has risen from the dead. He gathers about 500 of his disciples around him. There’s leadership there, there’s regular folks there. And he does not say, now as you have a burden, go and make disciples of all the nations. No, he says, go! It’s an imperative, go! Sometimes the scholars say the idea is as you’re going, make sure you’re always keeping the priority in your life of making disciples, bringing people to faith in Christ. That’s a commitment we should all have.

Now, I wanna give you two insights, sort of applications here about reaching the lost and having this commitment to reach the lost. A, and this doesn’t come out of our text, it comes from the balance of scripture, but just the two practical insights here. The source that drives this commitment is love. Where does this desire to, whether or not I have a burden or not, or whether or not I’m excited about it, but this thing in me that says, yes, I want to be committed to co-labor with my Lord and Savior and be a part of reaching the lost for Christ. Well, we just learn more of his love and it is the source of having that kind of commitment.

We use Jesus as an example again here, though, where Jesus’ commitment to do his Father’s will flowed out of his love for his Father. In John 14:31, Jesus says, “but so that the world may know that I love the Father, I do exactly as the Father commended me. I do exactly what my Father’s will is, and that’s how I show I love him.” His will for us is that we all, as a team effort, no one does it the same way, and no one has the exact same job maybe as someone else, and certain personalities and comfort levels, you would say, changes the way you might approach someone or speak to someone, but all of us should have a commitment to be a part of the task of being a soul winner, be a part of the team effort of reaching the lost for Christ. Why wouldn’t we do that? That’s the commitment we should have, and it flows from this love we have for God.

But now, first, first, Jesus, the Son of God, was enthralled that God the Father had such love for him. Did you hear that? Jesus, the Son of God, was enthralled, treasured, overjoyed in the love his heavenly Father had for him. In John 17, numerous places in that high priestly prayer, Jesus is going to the cross and he mentions several times, Father, I know you love me. Show the love that you have for me. It’s that love relationship, that love element. And then for us, We know God loves us. We know Jesus loves us. We know Jesus in love died for us. We know Jesus in love keeps us, though we are radically unworthy and unattractive to him, and all of our pollution and sin and depravity, and yet he loves us. He loves us, and that’s the source of your commitment to want to obey him. And in whatever else we obey Him in, we ought to be obeying Him and being on the mission with Him to be soul winners and reach the lost.

Now, B, the second insight or application I would like to bring out here is the stirring that revives the commitment. What is this? Where are we going to get stirred up afresh to renew and revive a commitment to be about obeying our Lord and be about the task of building His kingdom, i.e., reaching souls with the gospel? Well, a primary way that happens is through pastoral admonition. That’s the job of the pastor. And you might say that the more mature members of the body would share in that job too. Peter makes this very clear. 2 Peter 1:12. Peter functioning as the overseer and pastor of these flocks, now he wasn’t there directly, he was an apostle, but slowly the churches were handed over to elders. But in a pastoral spirit, he says to these churches, 2 Peter 1:12, “therefore, I will always be ready to remind you of these things, even though you already know them and have been established in the truth which is present in you.” So Peter says, “I will always be ready to remind you afresh of what we have in Christ,” I think that would include, and our service and our commitment to obey Christ. That little phrase in there, “I will always be ready,” men, I was always ready in the past to remind you, “I’m always gonna be ready in the present to remind you,” and “I’m gonna be ready in the future to remind you.” Peter wasn’t saying that these people were backslidden, or some kind of woeful wickedness, he just said, as Christians, you need a steady and regular dose of stirring up. Stir it afresh. Stir it up again.

This morning, as you’re listening to your pastor preach, may something in your heart say, yes, Lord, in the ability you’ve given me, I want to recommit myself to help the whole team effort to reach more lost with the gospel. How could that be wrong? Stir us up afresh. It’s just human nature that we shrink back on the things that matter the most. In the context of 2 Peter, he’s saying you’ve been firmly established, you’re complete, you lack nothing in Christ. Now continue on in that joy and that security and serve him faithfully. 2 Peter 1:13, “but I consider it right as long as I’m in this earthly dwelling to stir you up by way of reminder.” Peter knew his time and his ministry was coming close to an end. He was older and probably quite feeble, but he said, “it’s my right, even my duty, my responsibility to keep stirring you up to your commitment to Christ and his work.” 2 Peter 1:15, he goes on to say, “and I will also be diligent that at any time after my departure, you will be able to call these things to mind.” He says, “I was always faithful in the past to stir you up in the present to stir you up. I’ll be faithful as long as I’m alive in the future to stir you up. And then when I’m dead and gone, I pray you’ll lay in bed at night and I’ll stir you up again as you think on what I preached.”

I sometimes wonder how many of you leave church and don’t think a thing about what I preached. Just don’t think a thing about it. Well, you know, that makes my job really hard because then I think I’ve got to preach longer and harder next Sunday.

So, Peter says, “We need this regular stirring up,” and I wanna do some of that this morning. I wanna charge you afresh. This is not arm twisting. This is not brow beating. Go out and grab people by the neck down at the, well, I was gonna say the mall, but the mall’s almost not there anymore, but wherever you go, grab them by the neck, say, you listen, I got to witness to you. My pastor said to get with it. No, no, no, no, no. But there ought to be a commitment that as I go and where I am and what influence I have, God, give me grace to be a soul winner. I want to help be a part of the team to bring more people to Jesus Christ.

II, as Jesus gives us something of a powerful example, he said, “I must go through Samaria.” I must go through Samaria. A commitment he had to meet this lady. He knew she was coming. John 4:6-9, “and Jacob’s well was there. So Jesus being wearied from his journey was sitting thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour and there came a woman of Samaria to draw water and Jesus said to her, ‘give me a drink.’ But the disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. Therefore the Samaritan woman said to him, ‘how is it that you being a Jew ask me, [i.e., a Samaritan woman] ask me for a drink, since I’m a Samaritan woman, and for Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.'”

So here Jesus very intentionally makes a connection to this woman, which is shocking to her. I mean, here is a condescension beyond comprehension. God incarnate, putting himself on level ground with this woman. What humility, what commonality he’s exhibited here as if I’m one of you, I’m like you. And there’s a way, certainly a way in which even though he was God incarnate, he was fully human. It says he went to the well and he was weary, he was thirsty like any other human would be after they’d been traveling as much as he’d been traveling. He connects with her though.

Now water was scarce in these days. You had to find a decent well and often the wells were somewhat polluted. So it was a precious commodity to have a good well nearby. So everybody came to the well and the Bible says it was the sixth hour when the woman came to the well and that’s probably because she wanted to avoid any crowds. She was shameful of her lifestyle and her reputation. The Bible says Jesus is weary. The word weary can be translated to toil exceedingly. He was slap worn out, very thirsty. He may let that be known to this woman. The Bible says he’s sitting by the well. There’s a ledge around those old wells and he’s sitting there and he’s really exhausted and the Samaritan woman walks up and he says, “give me something to drink.”

So Jesus actually models the great commission commandment he gives in Matthew 28:18-20 when he said, “go into all the world or as you’re going, try to make disciples.” So here, Jesus is just going, he’s weary, he just stops for a drink and here’s a woman that comes to the well and he’s going to reach out to her. He is reaching out to her. He makes a connection with her in a very humble way. He models for us. So can I charge you that as you’re going, young people, to school, As you’re going to the ballgame, as you’re going to work, as you’re going to some social setting, as you’re fellowshipping in the neighborhood, just be aware. Have a renewed commitment. God, how can I help build the kingdom? Can I make a connection with somebody whereby I might help reach out to them and help them come to faith in Christ? So Jesus starts reaching out to this woman, connecting to her as a fellow sojourner on this earth. And Jesus does it with great love and with great humility. We’ll say that again and again, perhaps that is such a key as you’re connecting with people. Connection requires your humility.

You can’t come across as a know-it-all. You can’t come off as coarse and harsh and demeaning. There’s got to be a willingness to put yourself in their shoes and connect where they are because you’re trying to gain a hearing. In one sense, Jesus does not reach up to her and Jesus does not reach down to her. He just reaches out to her. I’m weary. You’re weary. I need water. You need water. We’re in this together. We’re a lot alike. Because if the people in your circle of influence, your oikos, translated household in the New Testament, if people in your circle of influence know you very well, they know you’re dedicated, they know you’re trying to go to church, they know you’re trying to live for God, and they immediately assume you think you’re better than they are. And what you need to tell them, as proper opportunity allows, is that no, I’m not better than you, in reality, I’m worse than you. But I do have a savior.

Paul called himself the chief of sinners. The closer you get to Jesus, the more you see your own unworthiness. This humbling, this reaching out on a horizontal plane, and he does this in that simple phrase, “give me a drink.” As if Jesus is saying, dear woman, I am thirsty. We are alike. I’m connecting with you here. He’s befriending her. Oh, what a humble and kind-hearted gesture. And how far, how far a humble and kind-hearted gesture will go toward winning a hearing to another lost soul.

So he asked her for a drink. She knew that kinda meant, “you’re kind of saying we’re equal?” She knew that meant, “you’re accepting of me?” Powerful, it’s amazing. John 4:9, “the Samaritan woman said to him, ‘how is it, how is it that you being a Jew ask me for a drink, since I’m a Samaritan woman, and for Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.'” This is amazing on several levels. First of all, she’s a woman and no teacher, no rabbi ever spoke to a woman in public. Secondly, she’s a Samaritan, an unclean one. I guess to Jew of this day, they call Gentiles, Gentile dogs. If you’re a half breed, half Jew, half Gentile, you’re worse than a Gentile dog. A woman and a Samaritan and above all things, a Samaritan woman, and of all things, a woman who is notorious for her sexual immoralities. and yet Jesus reaches to her with love and acceptance as if we’re on equal ground. Of course, he’s infinitely holy and true and never sinned, but in his humanity, he reaches out and makes a connection.

Who are you right now purposing to be humble and caring and loving and kind toward hoping that you’ll make a connection and get a word or an open door for the gospel? You see, Jesus’ love knows no bounds. Oh, that’s a simple little quick statement, but you need to think about it. Jesus’ love knows no bounds. There is no depth of sinfulness where Jesus cannot reach you and lift you and embrace you. So through this selfless, humble, loving gesture, Jesus makes a vital connection. He wins this woman’s interest. He wins a hearing from her. And yet he does it all without ever committing sin.

III, in this example of a personal soul winner, we’re drawing principles here that are applicable for us. Notice the correction. You will never share the truth of the gospel with anyone when it doesn’t have a corrective element to it. It is true. The gospel is offensive to the natural man. To the unhumbled man, the gospel is offensive. Now, that doesn’t mean we have to try to make it offensive. And let me say this as we’re going through this. There is a radical and significant difference between the way I talk to a person if I’m personally witnessing to them and the way I talk to people when I’m preaching to them. There’s a difference. You preach what the text says. If that’s offensive, it’s offensive. But on a one-on-one level, that’s a good place where you need to be seeker-sensitive. You need to be somewhat aware of where they are without lying, of course, without twisting the truth, of course, but the way you bring it across.

So here Jesus in John 4:10-26 starts knocking down, correcting one false caricature about God and about salvation after another. First of all, hey, let’s say that one thing he knocks down, and this is something that we have to keep in a gracious way knocking down as we talk to people, and that is salvation is a person, not a process. Salvation is a person, not a process, because everyone you talk to comes into this earth with a fallen sin nature, and in that fallen nature, they presume that gaining God’s welcome, gaining God’s forgiveness, gaining heaven means I have to do this certain process. I have to go to a church, I have to take the sacraments, I have to perform the rituals, I have to meet with the priest, and he performs his priestcraft, I have to be baptized, something, and then I have to morally clean up my life, on and on and on. There’s a process to it, but Jesus says here, no, there’s no process, it’s a person.

John 4:15, “the woman said to him, ‘sir, give me this water so that I will not be thirsty nor come all the way here to draw again.'” So here’s Jesus talked to her about he’s the living water. She needs to drink of that water. She’s still thinking, well, how do I do that? How do I do that? It’s not anything you do. It’s someone you trust. It’s someone you trust. You have to be mindful, brothers and sisters, that as you’re trying to share something, the things of Christ with a friend or relative or somebody in the neighborhood, that you’re depending, no, you’re wholly depending on the Holy Spirit to apply these things to their heart. There’s no way this woman could understand what Jesus is saying unless the Spirit of God opened her heart to it. The Bible tells us about Lydia, remember down by the stream there close to Philippi. The Bible says the Lord opened her heart.

Now secondly, not only it’s a person, not a place, but it’s a person, I’m sorry, not a person, not a process, it’s a person, not a place. The people in this day were very focused on, they had been taught thoroughly, there’s certain places where you find and know God, and if you do things right there and go through the right rituals and sacraments or whatever they would call it, ordinances, then you somehow you gain God. Jesus has pointedly, we’re gonna go back to it in a moment, but pointedly in John 4:16-19, pointed out her individual sins and immoralities. Again, we’ll get to those in a moment. But what Jesus is generally saying, John 4:21, “Jesus said to her, ‘woman, believe me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father.'”

“You worship what you do not know,” In other words, she’s a Samaritan, they worship on Mount Gerizim. And they thought that’s the way you worship God, not in Jerusalem, Gerizim. And Jesus said, “you worship what you don’t even know.” That was just kind of made up somewhere. There’s no divine revelation that was given to you to tell you to go worship God in Gerizim. That’s just something you guys made up. So he’s correcting these things. “You worship what you do not know. We, the Jews, worship what we know for salvation is from the Jews.” He said it’s a historical fact according to revelatory truth. God gave this truth to the fathers that the Jews should center themselves around Jerusalem and that’s where the temple will be and that’s where you will find and worship God. He said that’s true. Kind of interesting that in his pointing out that none of these things really matter anymore, he does correct the Samaritan’s view that salvation came from someone other than the lineage of Abraham. God had a special work and purpose in and through the Jews.

Then he says in John 4:23-24, “Jesus speaking to her, ‘but an hour is coming and now is when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth for such people the Father seeks to be his worshipers.'” Spirit and in truth. This reminds me a whole lot of Nicodemus. That’s just a page or two back. Where Nicodemus comes and said, “what am I going to do? It’s a process, isn’t it?” And also implying with his Jewish heritage, Nicodemus saying, “what shall I do to obtain eternal life? And where’s the place I do it at? How’s all this work, Jesus?” And Jesus said, well, Nicodemus, “you’ve got to be born of the Spirit.” That’s what he said on this one. There’s got to be a work of the Spirit. Now, I don’t know why God uses the means that he uses, but he uses the means of you sharing, you sharing your testimony, you sharing what you understand of the things of the gospel, the preacher preaching the word and preaching the gospel, but the spirit has to take it and apply it to the heart. But we all can get in on it.

So here, these corrections are coming across. John 4:24 again, “God is spirit and those who worship him,” The idea of worship here is come to know him truly and become a true worshiper of him, be a truly saved one, be a true member of his kingdom. They must come in spirit and in truth.

So there are three things in verses 21 through 24. that Jesus was basically correcting. Number one, he says, first of all, you Samaritans are wrong. It’s not Gerizim, it’s Jerusalem. That’s where God purposed for the Jews, his people, that is, to worship. Secondly, the geographic place is now a moot point. The physical geographic place to find God is now over. It’s now Hebrew word, book of Hebrews, New American Standard Translation — It’s now obsolete. Finding a place, going through the motions is no longer required of God in any way, shape, or fashion. So first of all, the Samaritans, you were wrong. God meant for you to worship in Jerusalem, but that’s all made obsolete now. And thirdly, God is spirit and all true worshipers, the true children, saved children of God, will worship him in and by the spirit. There’s a new dispensation, Jesus says, that’s being established. It’s a new economy, spiritual economy being established. Time does not matter. The place does not matter. Going to a special person, a certain priest does not matter.

These are all now obsolete. And it seems like she’s receiving some of this, because John 4:25, “And the woman said to him, ‘well, I know that Messiah is coming.'” That’s pretty good right there. She’s maybe connecting good dots. “Okay. It’s not the place. It is not the process. It’s not the ritual. It’s a person. I know there’s a person coming. I know there’s this Messiah, this promised Messiah who’s coming, who is called the Christ. And when that one comes, he will declare all things to us.”

Very few statements in scripture are more powerful than John 4:26. “Jesus said to her, ‘I who speak to you am.'” “Am he,” but the “he’s” not in the original Greek. “I, the one right in front of you, I’m him.” Oh my goodness. It’s, I don’t know, I wish I had a good illustration. It’s like everything that you’ve ever, ever desired, you’ve worked and worked and labored and sacrificed and done without and worked and labored, and it’s like someone says to you, “you can never, ever have it, it’s never gonna happen, that’s not gonna be yours”, and then you turn around and somebody says, “but I’ve got it all for you right here, it’s a gift”. That’s kind of the way this was, it was like, My goodness, are you kidding me? The whole purpose and salvation of God is right here in a human package in front of me. This is God incarnate who had to go to Samaria to a woman of the night, in love, to say, I’m your savior right here. Aren’t you glad he comes to us? We would never have the sense to come to him.

But now here’s the real key to her turning point, the conviction. That’s number four, the conviction. Now we go back to John 4:16-19. Pretty powerful stuff. Let me go up to 11 and get the flow of this context. Let me go up to 10 to get the flow of this context. John 4:10, “Jesus answered and said to her, ‘if you knew the gift of God and who it is who says to you, ‘give me a drink,’ you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.'” That was a big deal in those days because running water was typically pure because they got their water through old wells and cisterns and it was often very polluted and difficult water made them sick often. But living water was a special thing. John 4:11, “She said to him, ‘Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do you get that living water?'” John 4:12, “‘You’re not greater than our father Jacob, are you, who gave us the well and drank of it himself and his sons and his cattle?'” John 4:13, “Jesus said to her, ‘Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again. But whoever drinks of the water that I personally, a person, me, I myself, will give him shall never thirst. But the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.'”

John 4:15, “The woman said to him, ‘Sir, give me this water.'” Notice it’s not yet Lord, Sir. He’s not quite there yet. “Sir, give me this water so I will not be thirsty nor come all the way here to draw.” John 4:16, “and he said to her, ‘well, go call your husband and come here.'” “The woman asked him and said, ‘I have no husband.'” John 4:18, “Jesus said to her, ‘well, you have correctly said, I have no husband. You’ve had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. This you have said truly.'” And it’s almost humorous. John 4:19, “the woman said to him, ‘sir, I perceive you’re a prophet. How do you know these things?'” Anyone that comes to Christ, the Spirit of God will unveil to them the sinfulness of their sin. Correction. Correction. Now it comes to the conviction.

This was the most loving thing Jesus could have done for her. Are you one of those people that will never surround yourself with someone who disagrees with you or corrects you or shows you where you come short? The Bible calls that kind of person a fool. Jesus loves too much to not correct that which is going to destroy you. If we love others, we’re honest about their sin. But I want to say this again, make sure with humility and love there’s been a connection before there is a correction, before there can be conviction. That’s a personal level of witnessing. So this is not like the public preaching of the word. Even Jesus himself, he’s straightforward at this point about her personal sin, but he was very careful to make sure she sensed his commonality is connecting to her.

Lastly, Roman five, let’s notice the conversion. John 4:28-29. “So the woman left her water pot and went into the city.” Well, she came all that way to get the water, but now she don’t even care about the water. And the reason she don’t care about the water, I’m convinced, is because now she didn’t need the well water because she had the living water, the water springing up to eternal life. So she said, “this stale water in this old well can wait.” John 4:29, “come see a man,” she says to the men. Now that’s interesting, the last part of John 4:28, “she said to the men,” because the women of the community had nothing to do with her. That’s most likely why it’s worded that way. “Come see a man who told me all the things that I have done. This is not the Christ, is it?” I think that’s a way she was respectfully urging the men. I think she believed he was the Christ, but she’s saying, “don’t you think you need to check this out? He’s the Christ. Do you think he could be the Christ?”

John 4:39, “From that city, many of the Samaritans believed in him because of the word of the woman who testified, ‘quote, he told me all things that I have done, end of quote.'” You know what she did? She initiated the first Friend Day. She initiated the first Friend Day. She didn’t know how to say it, but she thought, I can get them to this man who can make it clear. So she goes to her oikos, her circle of influence, the people she hung with and ran with, probably all a very immoral, ungodly, corrupt group. And she said, “just come with me and see. Just come with me and listen.” And I don’t believe in bait and switch kind of nonsense. I don’t believe in giving away bicycles to get a crowd here, whatever it might be. Just very humbly and honestly say, I want you to come and hear the preaching of Christ with me on Friend Day. Be my friend and come. So she’s saying to all of her friends, “come and listen, come and see this man.”

Well, revival begins to break out. John 4:40, “So when the Samaritans came to Jesus, not a process, not a place, actually to a well, I guess, if he’s still there. Anywhere, somewhere in that city, they came to Jesus, and they were asking him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days.” So not only did he pass through Samaria, he stayed there and started a church. John 4:41, “and many more believed because of his word.” “And they were saying to the woman, ‘it’s no longer because of what you said that we believe, We have heard for ourselves. Isn’t that what we want our friends to do on Friend Day? It’s not because I respect you. I’ve heard the word of God. And now that’s spoken to me. And that’s why I want to come to your Christ and embrace him and believe it.'” “It’s no longer because of what you said that we believe, but we have heard for ourselves and know that this one is indeed the savior of the world.” The results of the first Friend Day.

The light has come and all of these guys were exposed as to their bankrupt, external, shallow, going through the motions, religion stuff they did. That was exposed and the light came on and all of their willful, gross immoralities were exposed. But Jesus forgave them all. And they’re full of joy about it. You see, salvation is not a place. Salvation is not through some ritual, some going through the motions. It’s not through some confirmation process. That might be okay in a way, but that’s not salvation. Salvation is not the human priest that administers the sacrament to you. It’s all and only in the one and truly only high priest, and that is Jesus. That is Jesus. And you can find God anywhere and anytime if you come in spirit and in truth.

You remember Butch Tuggle? A lot of you remember Butch Tuggle. Butch had grown up, I don’t remember exactly, but it was in a context of a denomination that strongly taught work salvation. You gotta do this, you gotta do this, you gotta do this, you gotta live right or you could lose your salvation. And by best understanding, Butch hadn’t really been to church at all since he was a child, but his wife went to church here, and I’d visited their home a time or two, and I’d share some things of Christ, and I think we did make something of a connection. I don’t have any problem telling people, you don’t talk about specific sins, but telling people about what a sinner we are, and how much we needed a Savior.

Butch started coming to church. And one Sunday morning I preached a rather weighty theological treatise on the doctrine of justification by faith. Really not thinking about people being converted, I was thinking more about the saints of God joying in their Christ and in their salvation. I preached this rather weighty theological treatise on justification by faith and Butch leaves the service and he goes out and gets in his old pickup truck. And it was an old pickup truck. And he couldn’t drive it. He just told me later, he said, “I just sat there. And I came to know Christ as my Lord and Savior”. And we baptized him. Now he’s in heaven. He learned that it wasn’t a person, it wasn’t a place or a process, it was a person. He found that person.

So can I charge you afresh this morning? Can I charge you to the commitment of being a soul winner? If you can bring a person to hear of Christ, that’s good. That’s a part of being a soul winner. Friend Day’s a great and easy way to do that. Make a connection with humility and love for them. Make sure they know we’re on equal ground. We’re not better than them in any way. After the connection, if they’re open and want to talk about it, there’s going to be some correcting, and you’re not going to call it correcting. You’re just going to tell them the truth as you understand them, which will begin to correct their false assumptions, the false caricatures in their thinking. And then praise God by the work of the Spirit. Get them under the preaching of the Word if they will come. Enroll them in your small group. Let me remind you again what your small group is. Among other things, your small group is the Gentile court. At the temple, there was the court of the Gentiles. They couldn’t go into the main part of the temple, but they could go to the court of the Gentiles to learn about Jehovah until they were generally converted and could go in. And small groups is a place where we can help associate and help bring them to an understanding of this Christ and his salvation, what it’s all about. And then we can maybe see conviction and then conversion. And we will be about the work Christ left us here to do. Build up his church, i.e. build up his kingdom.

So. I hope, I have been, I hope we’re all stirred fresh to that commitment. Every single person could get at least one person to be their friend on Friend Day. Everybody can do that and be a faithful part of the team of building the kingdom of God.