Seven Sayings By the Well - A look into the power and effectiveness of God’s Word, exemplified in the brief conversation between our Lord and a woman of Samaria. Presented by Grace Attendee, Darren Smith.

[0:00] Many, many years ago, I visited this church and this doesn't seem to want to stay. How does that do?

[0:16] I don't know if I just lean up there. Oh, would you twist this right here? Okay.

[0:30] Thank you, Keith. Now, many, many years ago, I visited here and I met Dave and Marie Weinbrenner.

[0:41] And in the subsequent years, they taught me a whole lot about the mystery and about understanding the Bible. And I've come to this church quite often and learned a lot from this pulpit.

[0:54] So, it is definitely a humbling honor to be standing up here. So, our subject today...

[1:06] Well, let's have a word of prayer before we get started. Lord God, we thank you for this time.

[1:17] We thank you for your word. We thank you for the power of it, for the effectiveness of it. As we look into your word today and some of the things that you've communicated to us, help us to grasp what's available to us in your word and to take hold of that in our own lives.

[1:38] In the Lord Jesus' name we pray. Amen. This study is a study I like to do. It's a short kind of one-session study.

[1:51] The overall topic of this study is really the word of God. It's effect, it's power, how it can work in our lives. And you'll see that the title I've got up here is The Seven Sayings by the Well.

[2:09] We're going to examine a little bit about the power of the word of God. And then we're going to look at a conversation that the Lord had with a woman of Samaria. And sometimes as you read through your Bible, you look at this, you might even skip over it or just kind of glide past that as a casual conversation that the Lord had.

[2:29] But I think that what we'll see is that in this passage, in this story, in this conversation that he had with this woman, you will see an example of how the word of God works and what it can really do in our lives.

[2:46] So our scripture reference that Gary read for us this morning, I want to read it one more time. I really want you to focus on the ideas that's presented here because we're really going to carry this over to this story, this conversation with the woman at the well.

[3:06] It says in Hebrews 4.12, The word of God is quick. It is powerful. It is sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing of center of the soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

[3:25] Neither is there any creature that is not manifested in his sight, but all things are naked and opened under the eyes of him with whom we have to do. One of the concepts I don't really think that we think about too much is that you realize that everything that you see in this world, everything that exists in this world, exists because God spoke.

[3:48] At the very beginning of creation in Genesis 1.1, it's laid out very clearly. God said, Let there be light.

[4:00] And there was light. God said, Let the waters bring forth all the fish and all the mammals. God said, Let the earth be filled with animals and let the air be filled with the fowl.

[4:17] But it was through his word. He spoke and things happened. And the reference that we've got here delves into it even a little deeper.

[4:28] It says it not only has inherent power in it, but it can really cut inside of us into places we don't even think can be split apart. It can get into us like nothing else can get into us.

[4:44] And that's what our story is going to be about today. We're going to be spending most of our time in John chapter 4. So I'd encourage you to follow along there.

[4:56] We're going to read through the whole conversation at first. Just kind of get the whole thing in our mind. Then we're going to go back through a little bit more detail, piece by piece.

[5:12] But John chapter 4, we'll start there in verse 3. It says he, and it's talking about the Lord Jesus, he left Judea and departed again into Galilee.

[5:30] And he must needs go through Samaria. Then he cometh to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph.

[5:42] Now, Jacob's well was there. Jesus, therefore, being wearied with his journey, he sat thus on the well, and it was about the sixth hour. There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water.

[5:56] Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink. For his disciples were gone away into the city to buy meat. Then saith the woman of Samaria unto him, How is it that thou, being a Jew, ask a drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria?

[6:14] For the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans. Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink, thou would have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.

[6:33] The woman saith unto him, Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. From whence hast thou this living water? Art thou greater than our father Jacob, which gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his children, and his cattle?

[6:52] Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again. But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst. But the water that I give him shall give him be a well of water springing up into everlasting life.

[7:12] The woman says unto him, Sir, give me this water that I thirst not, neither come hither to draw. Jesus saith unto her, Go, call your husband, and come hither.

[7:27] The woman answered and said, I have no husband. Jesus said unto her, Thou hast well said, I have no husband. For thou hast had five husbands, and he whom thou now hast is not thy husband.

[7:40] And that saidest thou truly. The woman saith unto him, Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet. Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and ye say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship.

[7:54] Jesus says unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh when ye shall neither in this mountain nor at Jerusalem worship the Father. Ye worship, ye know not what.

[8:05] We know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshiper shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth. For the Father seeketh such to worship him.

[8:18] God is the spirit, and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. The woman saith unto him, I know that Messiah cometh, which is called Christ.

[8:29] When he comes, he will tell us all things. Jesus says unto her, I that speak unto thee am he. Sometimes when you're reading through the book of John, maybe the first couple times you're reading through the book of John, you're reading through the first part of this, and you really get to John 3.

[8:51] And isn't John 3 like a real kicker because you've got the Lord talking to Nicodemus there, and you get to the peak, the pinnacle verse that we all quote, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

[9:07] And then he kind of does this thing where he's done talking to Nicodemus, and he has to go through Samaria, and he kind of has this conversation with this woman at the well. He's kind of passing through the city, says he must need to go through Samaria.

[9:19] He's thirsty, sits by this well, this lady of Samaria comes out, and he has this conversation with her. Seems like a pretty casual conversation. He starts out the conversation, and says, you know, I want you to give me something to drink.

[9:31] And then the Lord kind of takes the conversation, and you can tell he's kind of trying to twist it a little bit to say, let's talk about spiritual things, because I'm going to talk to you about living water.

[9:44] And you know, she didn't really get it at first. And then, did it bother you the first time you read that story how he seems to totally come from out of left field, and they're talking about the water, and they're talking about who's thirsty, and how to get the drink and stuff.

[10:01] And then out of nowhere almost, he says, go call your husband. And your first reaction when you read that is, well, where did that come from? It's like right in the middle of the conversation, they're talking about this water, and he doesn't really explain to her what the living water is or anything like that.

[10:19] He just says, go call your husband. And then, when she says, I don't have any husband, then he starts spilling the beans on her. Yeah, I know about you.

[10:31] You've not only had, you know, one husband, you've had five husbands, and the guy you're shacking up with right now, he's not your husband either. So, you start to think along, you know, your first time through, you might start to think, well, is this the way to evangelize?

[10:47] You know, you find out what the thing that they've done wrong, and you kind of get them to talk about spiritual things, and then you really hit them with it. You say, hey, I know you met Mrs. Five Husbands, and now you're working on number six.

[11:05] Is that the way that we're supposed to try to convict people? You know, what's he trying to do? When you first read to it, you might think along those lines. And then he ends up, when the conversation progresses a little further, he talks about the idea of where to worship.

[11:24] He talks about how to worship. God seeks such to worship him that will worship him in spirit and in truth. Because remember, she had brought up the concept, well, do we worship on this mountain or do we worship in Jerusalem?

[11:37] So, he raises the question about, you know, you got to think about how to worship. What is proper worship? worship. It's kind of an odd story when you first read through it.

[11:51] Several years back, I read a little study on it that really got me started to thinking about this conversation. And the title of this article was The Seven Sayings by the Well.

[12:07] Because when you really get into it and analyze it, you're going to see a lot more than what you see when you really just kind of read through it on the surface.

[12:19] What happens here in this conversation is that the Lord opens his mouth seven times. And seven in the scriptures always uses a number of perfection.

[12:31] And seven different times he opens his mouth and he addresses this lady. And as we'll see, the Gospel of John depicts the Lord Jesus as God.

[12:47] And his word is just as powerful as the God of the universe that created everything through what he said. He said, let there be light.

[12:57] And there was light. And the words that he uses to communicate with this woman have the same effect on her that the true word of God would.

[13:11] Let's look at this a little bit deeper. As I said, the Gospel accounts. When you look at the Gospel records, you've got four different books, four different Gospel accounts of the Lord's earthly ministry.

[13:24] And most of us are familiar with the concept that all four Gospels have a different purpose. The Gospel of Matthew gives us a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ as King.

[13:36] Behold your King. Most of the details that are brought out there in the Gospel of Matthew are to show that he is the promised Messiah, the promised Son of David, the King that was promised to Israel from way back when.

[13:50] And that's why the genealogy is given to show that he comes from this line, that he is the Son of Abraham, he is the Son of David, he is the rightful heir to the throne. The Gospel of Mark is given to show that the Lord is the ideal servant.

[14:05] He's the ideal servant. And when you're a servant, you don't need to know where the servant came from because a servant is not really as important, right? So you don't have any genealogy in the Gospel of Mark.

[14:16] You've got just the fact that this servant has come up and he's trying to serve God as best he can. And the events that are related to the Gospel of Mark show him as the ideal servant. The Gospel of Luke shows him as the ideal man.

[14:30] He serves his God exactly as a man should serve God. And the Gospel of John, as I said, it depicts him as God. And the elements and the ideas that are presented in the Gospel of John show how the Lord Jesus Christ was truly God in human flesh.

[14:53] So you don't have a genealogy because you don't have a start. And the Gospel of John starts out with the Word was God. The Word was with God in the beginning.

[15:05] So there's no start to Him. He's existed forever and now He was made flesh. He was manifested in flesh. And the things that He does throughout the Gospel of John shows that there is no way that this man could not be God.

[15:22] He knows things and He sees things in the Gospel of John that just no man could know. He goes up to Nathaniel. Nathaniel's out there on the road and He says to Nathaniel, Nathaniel, I saw who you were.

[15:33] You were still sitting under that tree. And I'm sure Nathaniel was like, well, how did he know that? How did he know that? And we'll see here in this story, obviously the woman, how does he know that she's had five husbands?

[15:47] They've never met. She comes up and meets Him and all he's knows is her whole life history. How could he know that unless he was God?

[15:59] So that's one of the things that we need to think about as we go through this story. That it is presented in the Gospel of John. The overall purpose of this Gospel is to show His deity.

[16:10] To show that He is truly God in the flesh. At the end of the Gospel of John, you notice how it sums up what the purpose of this book was. It says, many other signs did Jesus do in the presence of His disciples which are not written in this book.

[16:24] But these are written. These things that are included in this Gospel are written that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. And believing in Him, you might have life through His name.

[16:38] So John shows Him as God. All the events that are depicted there show Him as God. The other component of this is the fact that many other signs is how it points it out here.

[16:52] In the Gospel of John, now we're not going to break down the whole Gospel of John. We're only going to try to focus on the one section of Scripture that we want to understand. But we want to kind of put this in its place in its proper context.

[17:04] In the Gospel of John, it's broken up by there's eight signs that are shown in the Gospel of John. Eight examples that are given to show why this man is truly God in human flesh.

[17:19] And these eight signs are broken up at different parts of the Gospel of John. It starts in chapter 2, verse 11, where after the Lord did the miracle where He turned the water into wine, it says that this was the beginning of...

[17:33] Now, it says miracles if you're reading your King James, but it's really this is the beginning of the signs. This is the beginning of the signs that showed, that demonstrated that He is who He says He is.

[17:46] That He is God in human flesh. Now, the second sign that happens is in 454, where it says this is the second sign that Jesus did.

[17:58] So, now, the only reason I bring that out is not to do an analysis of all the different signs that come in the Gospel of John, but to show where our story fits into our structure here.

[18:11] You see, you've got the first sign and you've got the second sign. Now, in between those two things, there are two different conversations that He has. You see, after the first sign, He cleanses the temple and there's the part later on where John the Baptist is shown as decreasing and Christ is increasing.

[18:31] But there's two conversations that are related in this section of Scripture. One is the conversation that He has with Nicodemus, which we are all usually a lot more familiar with because of the oft-quoted verses in that passage.

[18:45] And then there's the conversation that we just read with the Samaritan woman. Now, to do a little refresh on that conversation that He had with Nicodemus, it starts in John 3, verse 1.

[19:00] It says, There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, He was the guy that came to Jesus by night and said unto Him, Rabbi, we know that thou are a teacher come from God. No man can do these miracles that thou doest except God be with him.

[19:15] And Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. That's a very important passage.

[19:30] It's a very critical piece of information to say that the kingdom of God is coming. Unless you go through this born again stuff, you're not going to see it.

[19:45] It's a very important principle for him to lay out. And so, the conversation goes on. And we're not going to go through that whole conversation about being born again. But we do want to point that out. And then he eventually gets to the concept, like I said, the verse that we read.

[19:58] Where he's trying to get Nicodemus to understand the things about what being born again is. And he leads up to the verse where he says, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

[20:14] He finally gets to the point where he talks about the gift that God gave to mankind. But now think about it from this aspect. Because this really kind of throws throws a wrench in your thinking a little bit.

[20:31] The Lord Jesus is going to have two conversations in this section of Scripture. Alright? He's going to have one conversation with a Pharisee. A ruler of the Pharisees.

[20:42] Okay? He's a religious guy. He's one of the leaders of Israel. Okay? You could say that he's a very religious person. He's got it together. Right? As far as what we think as far as religion goes.

[20:55] He's the guy. Right? He's the guy that you can learn about the Scriptures from. Because he's a Pharisee. You've got this other lady. She's a Samaritan woman.

[21:09] Now for those who don't understand what a Samaritan is, in the Old Testament the Jews had a very specific law. The Lord had given them a law that they were not to take unto themselves a wife from among the Gentiles.

[21:23] That was very bad. You're not supposed to take a wife from among the Gentiles. What the Samaritans were were the result of intermarriages. These Jews didn't follow the rules.

[21:35] They intermarried with a Gentile. And so this lady is like she's half Jew half Gentile as a result of a disobedient Jew going out and marrying a Gentile.

[21:49] And now you've got a Samaritan. So the Jews looked down on these people. Because look, you know, you're a Samaritan. You are a direct result of disobedience to God.

[22:05] That's how the Samaritans were viewed. So now let me ask you this. You've got two subject matters. You need to educate people that they need to be born again.

[22:19] They need to be regenerated again. They need to be they need to come to this knowledge of God and be born again. And the other one you just need to talk about where they need to worship and how they need to properly worship.

[22:32] Which one would you address which subject matter to? Wouldn't you naturally think that you would talk to that Samaritan woman about how to be born again?

[22:47] Because she's part of the apostate. people. Wouldn't you go talk to her and tell her how to be born again? And then you might go to the ruler of the Pharisees and brush him up a little bit about how to worship right.

[23:02] Because he's already okay, right? But no, it's the other way around, isn't it? He goes to the ruler of the Pharisees, he goes to the ruler of the religious people and tells him, you need to be born again.

[23:21] You need to understand this stuff. And when he gets into this conversation with the Samaritan woman, this lowly Samaritan, he talks to her about where to worship and how to worship.

[23:35] worship. It's an interesting concept to think about. Now, when he gets into this discussion, I want to read through this one more time.

[23:49] I know this is repetitive, but I want to read through this one more time to think about when he gets into this conversation with this woman. These are the words, if you believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, he's God in human flesh.

[24:06] The words that he is using are the words of God. And the words that he uses with this Samaritan woman are quick, they're powerful, they're sharper than any two-edged sword.

[24:18] They pierce even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit into the joints and marrow. And it is a discerner of the thoughts and the intents of the heart. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight, but all things are naked and open under the eyes with him whom we have to do.

[24:34] That's one concept to think about as we go through this again. The other concept is this from Ephesians 2.10. We always like to quote Ephesians 2.8 and 9, where for by grace you are saved through faith, not of works, lest any man should boast.

[24:54] But this verse comes right after. It says, for we are his workmanship. We are, and the word workmanship means that we are what he has built. He builds us and he puts us together and he makes us what he needs us to be.

[25:10] How do you think he accomplishes that? It's through his word. And he's got some work to do on this woman because she needs some help, but she's ripe for that help.

[25:25] And what we're going to do is we're going to go through phrase by phrase and see how the Lord helps her. So let's read through John 4 again.

[25:37] And we're going to really pay more attention detail by detail what he says and what it actually means. Like I said, seven times he opens his mouth and he discusses things with her and he tells her exactly what she needs to know.

[25:51] And then the other thing that I want to focus on too is her responses. Because there is no more classic example of how we respond as people than her responses in this conversation.

[26:08] She responds exactly how any of us would respond. And we'll see that as we go through here. So John chapter 4 and verse 3. He, Jesus, he left Judea.

[26:20] He departed again to Galilee. And he must needs go through Samaria. Now think about that. He has to go through Samaria.

[26:31] Now the only really interaction that he has that really kickstarts everything that happens in Samaria is he talks to this woman. So he being God knows that he's got to go through this city.

[26:46] And why? So he can have this one conversation conversation with this one woman. Because he knows she's going to be sitting out there.

[26:57] And he knows exactly what she's been through. And he knows exactly what she needs. So he must needs go through Samaria. Then he comes to a city of Samaria which is called Sychar near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph.

[27:14] Now this is very profound. This is very profound. Jacob's well was there. It's very profound that this is Jacob's well.

[27:26] He goes out there and he sits down by Jacob's well. And what is another name for Jacob? Israel. So do you see the picture that's already developed is the fact that every day this lady takes her water pot and she goes to Israel, Israel's well, to get her water, to get her sustenance, to keep her alive.

[27:54] So she's living off of Israel's well. That's very significant. We'll talk about that a little more as we go along. Jesus, therefore, he was God, but he was also made into flesh.

[28:08] So he's wearied. He's wearied and he sits down on the well. And it was about the sixth hour. And then the woman of Samaria comes out to draw water.

[28:21] And Jesus says unto her, the first thing that he says when he opens his mouth, the first phrase that he says to her is, give me to drink. Now his disciples had gone away into the city to buy meat.

[28:32] So now it's just him and her. And he says, give me something to drink. And you talk about getting a woman's attention. because she can tell right away that he's a Jew.

[28:48] And this takes her totally by surprise. And that's her response. How is it that you being a Jew ask drink of me which is a woman of Samaria?

[29:02] She's saying, I can't do this. This is not how this thing is supposed to work. You're a Jew. I'm a Samaritan. That means we don't even talk to each other.

[29:17] And he comes out here and he says, why don't you give me something to drink? Could you say he's got her attention? He's certainly got her attention.

[29:32] But he's asking her for drink. He's asking her for drink. And the fact that he is a Jew and she is a Samaritan, she knows that under every normal circumstances of everything that's defined in the Jewish culture and in her culture, that this is an impossible thing he's asking her to do.

[29:51] This is not supposed to happen. And this kind of gets us a structure about these seven sayings that we're going to start looking at.

[30:02] Because the first thing, like we said, the first thing that he does when he talks to her the very first time, he asks her to do something she cannot do. Now, you have to ask yourself too, well, why can't she?

[30:14] It's not really her fault that she was born a Samaritan, right? And it's not really the fact that he's a Jew, she couldn't control that. That's just how it is.

[30:26] She's a Samaritan, he's a Jew. But he's going to kind of force the issue anyway. I'm going to ask you anyway. I was involved with a group once that they believed in a doctrine called sanctification or holiness.

[30:48] And they used the reference where the Lord Jesus says, be ye perfect, therefore, as your heavenly father is perfect. And they would say after that, would God tell you to do something you can't do?

[30:59] And then you really think about it and you say, well, yeah. He gave us the entire law. He told me to love the Lord my God with all my heart, with all my soul, with all my mind.

[31:12] He told me to love my neighbor as myself. He gave us the law to show us that we can't do certain things. And at that point when we realize if we're honest with ourselves, we say, I can't do this.

[31:28] If we get to that point and we realize and we're honest with ourselves, we say, I need help. The law does its work and you see yourself as a sinner and it's not going to work, so then you come to the feet of the Messiah, what God has provided for you.

[31:45] And that's how the law is supposed to work. So, does God ask you to do things you can't do? He sure does. He does it sometimes to teach us. So, when this woman comes out, he knows she's a Samaritanian.

[31:59] He's a Jew. He knows the friction or the problems involved there. But he asked her anyway, because he's got to make a point here.

[32:13] Now, she says, I can't do that. What do you mean? How are you going to ask me this? Because you're a Jew and I'm a Samaritan. I can't do that. Now, the second thing. So, the Lord opens up his mouth.

[32:24] And the second thing that he says to this lady, he says, if thou knewest the gift of God and who it is that saith unto thee, give me to drink, you would have asked of him and he would have given me living water.

[32:44] What's the insinuation? If thou knewest the gift of God. Does she know the gift of God? She didn't know anything about it.

[32:58] But he's saying that there is a gift of God. Now, we've read about that gift kind of with Nicodemus. Nicodemus' question was, how can a man reenter his mother's womb and be born again?

[33:10] That didn't make any sense to me. And then the Lord goes on and eventually he gets to the gift of God. God so loved the world that he gave. And here the woman of Samaria says to the Lord, how can you ask me to do this?

[33:28] And he says, if you knew the gift of God. If you knew the gift of God, what would she have done? She would say, no, you give me something to drink.

[33:43] Because the point is, which person is really thirsty in this relationship? Jesus brings up the concept at the beginning by saying, you give me something to drink.

[33:59] But then he turns it around and he says, if you knew who I was, you would say, give me something to drink. Because you would recognize the fact that you're the one who's thirsty.

[34:15] It's not the Lord Jesus who needs the drink. she's the one that needs the drink. But the point is that she has no perception of this whatsoever.

[34:28] She doesn't know the gift of God. So, in the second saying, the Lord is putting that out there and he's saying, there is this gift of God. And if you knew it, you would want it.

[34:40] now, what is her reaction? Well, we've got to point this out first.

[34:50] The second thing is what we just said. He exposes her thirst. She's the one that's thirsty, right? He asked her for something to drink, but then he turns it around and he says, if you knew who I was, you would recognize you're the one that's thirsty.

[35:07] You would ask me for something to drink. Now, her reaction is kind of just like our reaction would be. What are you talking about?

[35:18] Because she says to him, sir, you don't have anything to draw with, and the well is deep. Can you see that she's kind of missing the point? She's like, how are you going to get that water out of the well?

[35:34] Where are you going to get this water? She's thinking physically still, isn't she? She's still got her on physical things. How are you going to get this water?

[35:47] You don't have anything to draw with. The well is deep. How are you going to get this living water? And here's an interesting question. Because this comes up again. It's Jacob's well.

[35:58] Are you greater than our father Jacob, which gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his children, his cattle? Jacob, our patriarch, Israel, gave us this well.

[36:11] Now, we still have to come out here every single day to draw from it, because if we don't, we'll die of thirst. And you're talking about this living water, so are you greater than he is?

[36:27] Well, is he greater than Jacob was? Yes, he is. But once again, she's still focused on just the physical, how am I going to get this water?

[36:40] There's no way you can get it out of there. Now, the Lord Jesus, in the third thing that he says to her, now he's going to correct, he's going to correct her thinking about what she needs to understand.

[36:56] The third thing that he says to her, he says unto her, whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again. But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst.

[37:12] But the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life. Not only is this water something that you need, and if you knew that I had it, you'd ask me for it and I'd give it to you, but you know what?

[37:30] Once you get it, you're not going to come ask me for it again. It's going to quench your thirst. Now, Jacob's well can't do that, can it?

[37:44] And she's asking him, are you greater than our father Jacob? Yep. This water that I'm going to give you, it's going to quench your thirst forever. forever. So, what he's trying to tell her is that her spiritual intake is lacking.

[38:04] He's not talking about how much water she drinks, physical water, is he? He's talking about there's some spiritual input that she should be taking in that should quench her thirst.

[38:19] And it'll quench it forever. And that's the gift that he's talking about that he could give her, right? So, what's her reaction?

[38:31] I'm in. Okay, this is what you got? I'm all for it. Sign me up. She says, sir, give me this water that I thirst not, so I don't have to come out here and drag my water pot every day and walk out here to the well and put it down so I don't have to do all that.

[38:50] Does she get it yet? She still hasn't got it. Because once again, she's only thinking about the work that she has to do. She thinks about the fact that she's got to drag her pot out there and then she's got to fill up the pot and then she's got to carry it all the way back to her house.

[39:06] But she's in. If she can get out of that work, she's saying, sign me up. Now, we talked about the next phrase that the Lord throws at her, as if he was changing the subject.

[39:23] He's not changing the subject. What he's doing here in the next thing that he says to her is he's going to grant her requests. He's going to take her to where she needs to go so she can get this water.

[39:43] How does he do that? How does he do that? So, we said that's all physical. The first three things is how she takes it. But the way that he does it, he says, go, call your husband, and come back here.

[40:07] Now, her response obviously is, I don't have a husband. What's he doing here again?

[40:22] He's asking her to do something that she can't do. Now, the first thing that she couldn't do, because she was born that way.

[40:36] She was born a Samaritan woman. He was born a Jew. She can't help that, right? Can she help the fact that she doesn't have a husband? She had something to do with that.

[40:50] Okay? So, what he does is, in order to leave the conversation where it's got to go, he says, we need to bring this component into the conversation.

[41:05] And so, he asked her something that he knows that she can't do again. and she says, I don't have a husband. And now, what is the next thing that he says to her?

[41:22] He says, thou hast well said, I have a husband. I have no husband. For you've had five husbands, and he whom thou now hast is not thy husband.

[41:35] In that saidest thou truly? You're absolutely right. You don't have a husband. You've had five, the guy you're shacking up with now. He's not your husband either, is he?

[41:50] But here's the rub. Here's where he's trying to go with this. If you look at the structure of what he's doing, isn't he just exposing her thirst again?

[42:03] Because she's out running from husband to husband, the husband to husband because she's looking for something and she can't find it. There's something inside of her that's thirsty and she doesn't know where to find it.

[42:23] She doesn't know how to quench it. And so she's running to this guy, and to this guy, and to this guy, and to this guy. And now she's tried all them, now she's trying another one. She doesn't know what to do.

[42:34] Is she thirsty? And so he brings it into the realm of the fact that you know what?

[42:47] You're not just thirsty for physical water. You're thirsty for something else, and that's what you need to take stock in. That's what you need to realize.

[42:59] That's what you need to see. And so his word gets in there, just like the double edged sword that it is. And it says we need to deal with things the way that they really are.

[43:12] We need to cut away all the stuff and lay it open like it really is. This is what your life has been about. And this is what you've been trying to fulfill yourself with.

[43:27] And it's never going to work. Now, you know what her reaction is?

[43:42] It's all laid out in the open now. She perceives that he knows every single thing about her. There's no more pretension.

[43:54] There's no more hiding things. There's no more showmanship. He knows every single thing about her. And what is her reaction? Her reaction is so typical of every one of our reactions to what we would do.

[44:10] She says, Sir, I perceive you're a prophet. You know, you got me. Where do you want me to go to church? That's what she's saying.

[44:25] Sir, I perceive you're a prophet. Our fathers worshiped up here on this mountain. You say that in Jerusalem is the place where men should worship. Where do you want me to go to church? You got me. I'm a sinner.

[44:35] I'm a bad person. I'll go to church. Where do you want me to go? Is that the reaction he's after? So, you can see that he's still got some more work to do on her, doesn't he?

[44:54] He's cut away a lot of the thing, a lot of the pretension that she's got. He's finally got her talking about spiritual things. But normally she's got this thing in her that most of us have in us.

[45:07] That you say, oh, religion? I go to church over here. Oh, you know, I'm not a great person, but I go to church over here. We instantly want to click on the thing of, well, I do this.

[45:22] Is that what the Lord's after? Not exactly. So, the Lord needs to speak to her once again.

[45:36] The sixth thing that he says to her is basically that's not what it's all about. He says, woman, believe me, the hour cometh when you shall neither in this mountain nor at Jerusalem worship the Father.

[45:56] You worship what you know. We know what we worship for salvation of the Jews is of the Jews. Yes, we do have it correct. If you're going to be doctrinally correct, the place to worship is there in Jerusalem.

[46:07] And the Jews did have it correct because the scripture does say that you've got to bring your sacrifices in Jerusalem. And that is the proper place. But, but the hour cometh and now is when true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit.

[46:21] and in truth. For the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a spirit. And they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. It doesn't matter where you go.

[46:34] It doesn't matter if you're in this mountain. It doesn't matter if you're in Jerusalem. Are you worshiping the Father in spirit and in truth? Do you have a relationship with him?

[46:46] Are you taking in his word? Are you seeking him? No matter where you are. That's what the Lord wants.

[47:01] It's not a matter of just, oh, where do I go to church? There's so much more for us that the Lord would have us understand.

[47:15] So, you see, it's just a repetitive, this structure. Her spiritual intake is lacking. Because if she thinks, now she being a Samaritan, if she thinks by going out to that mountain and just being at that mountain, you know, will make everything all right, it's obviously not made everything all right, because she understands these principles, but she's still as thirsty as can be in her own life.

[47:43] she's still acting out and showing that, you know, it's just not working for me. So, the Lord has to get her and educate her and through His Word, cut away all of this stuff.

[48:00] Say, that's not what it's about. Now, He's taken her and He's got her to understand that there are spiritual things that she needs to fix.

[48:20] He's got her to understand that spiritually, if she starts thinking about herself spiritually, that she is desperately, desperately thirsty. And she needs the living water.

[48:33] She needs what He has to give her. And she also understands that she's not going to get it by just going to the right place to worship.

[48:46] That there is a deeper relationship and that there's something deeper that she needs to grasp onto and comprehend that's above and beyond a worship service or a place where you go worship.

[49:01] There's something deeper. And she says, you know what? I don't really understand that. And what does she say?

[49:13] You can see that the Lord has taken her right where she needs to go. And she says, you know, I don't understand all this. I know that there's a problem.

[49:26] I know that I need this. But I know that when the Messiah comes, the one that is called Christ, when He comes, He'll help me.

[49:41] He'll explain it all to me. And what has He done? He's taken her right where she needs to go, and He's got her right in the position that she needs to be.

[49:55] The Messiah will be my answer for everything. He's going to straighten it out for me. So when He utters the last thing, He gives her the answer.

[50:10] I'm the guy. I that speak to you, am He. So He asked her things that she can't do.

[50:22] She can't do things because the way that she was born. She can't do things because she's made bad moral choices in her life. But can He do things? He can provide things that she can't provide.

[50:43] Jesus says later on in the same book, I am the bread of life. He that cometh to me shall never hunger. He that believeth on me shall never thirst.

[50:55] Once you get this relationship with this guy going, once you establish a relationship with this guy, you're not going to go hungry again.

[51:07] You're not going to go thirsty again. This story is so interesting because you see what the Lord did with this woman through what He said and how it affected and how it moved her and how it took her where she needed to go.

[51:28] But one of the best parts of this story is the end. Because after this, upon Him came the disciples. They marveled that He talked with the woman, yet nobody said, why seekest thou?

[51:40] Or why are you talking to her? Look at this next phrase and see how symbolic this is. The woman then left her water pot.

[51:54] She leaves her water pot and then she runs into the city and tells everybody, come see a man that told me everything I ever did. what's so significant about the fact that she left her water pot?

[52:08] Didn't that show you she's not going to be thirsty again? The symbolism there is just incredible. The word has worked in her.

[52:22] When the Lord was speaking those words to her, they were quick and they were powerful. They were sharper than any two-edged sword. They pierced asunder her soul and her spirit down to the joints and the marrow.

[52:33] They laid everything bare. It discerned her thoughts and it discerned her intents of the heart. She was manifest in his sight.

[52:45] All of her life was naked and open before him. And it worked. It worked. Because now she's throwing her water pot down and she's running off to the city and saying, you guys have to come talk to this guy.

[53:02] This guy's the answer. Thessalonians talks about the same concept of the fact that the word of God, Thessalonians have received the word of God which they heard from Paul.

[53:17] They received it not as the word of man but as it is in truth, the word of God which effectually works in you that believe. Once his words got inside of her, once his words get inside any one of us, it works.

[53:33] It starts to do its thing. It's powerful. This is the same stuff that said God just spoke it and things came into existence. Do you think once we get that word inside of us, it's not going to start working doing its thing?

[53:47] You can see in this woman's life, in this woman's reactions, that it got into her and it started working and it led her where she needed to go. And now she's throwing her water pot down and it's working.

[54:01] And she goes into the city of Samaria and she starts telling everybody, look at this guy, he told me everything that I ever did. And it says in 439, many of the Samaritans that said he believed on him for the saying of the woman which testified he told me all that I ever did.

[54:17] So then the Samaritans, they come up to him and they beseech him that he would tarry with them and he abode there two more days and many more believed because of his own word. And then they say unto the woman, now we believe not because of thy saying, for we have heard him ourselves.

[54:32] We know that this indeed is the Christ, the Savior of the world. All these men in Samaria that come to the knowledge of the Christ and come to salvation, how did they get there?

[54:45] Through the woman. Because the word of God got into that woman and it started working. And you know it made her what the Lord wanted her to be.

[54:58] This is what the Lord wanted her to be. This is what she's been searching for her whole life. And now she's out testifying to the Messiah. And people are being saved and they're coming into a knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ because of this woman and because of the word of God that worked in her effectually.

[55:18] it got in there and it did its work inside of her. The structure of this whole thing is really incredible when you look at it.

[55:31] Because in the first section, the first part of this section, it's all related to the physical. She keeps thinking about the physical. And it is physically, that's why she can't do what he asked her to do at the beginning.

[55:43] She was born a Samaritan. He was born a Jew. Well, you know what? We have problems following the law because we are born into Adam. We can't help that. That's why we're sinners.

[55:56] Because as in Adam, all die. But then we've got a second problem ourselves. The second thing, it gets into the spiritual conversation where he starts talking about the woman and her husband and all the different relationships that she's had.

[56:12] Those are choices that she has made in and of herself. That is her own personal sin. And we do the same thing. We're undone not only because we're in Adam, we were born a son of Adam, we're undone because we've all made choices that are against God.

[56:30] We've all sinned against God. And so the principle is, is that we're all thirsty. And we all need the provision that only he can provide.

[56:44] God. He says at the end of John, in John chapter 6, towards the end of that chapter, he uses the phrase, he says, that is the spirit that quickeneth, the flesh profiteth nothing.

[57:00] The words that I speak to you, they are spirit and they are life. It was the words that the Lord Jesus spoke to that woman that caused this whole revival in Samaria.

[57:17] His words that are that powerful. And it's those words that we have today. The point of this message is we have access to the same words of God.

[57:34] And it is just as powerful as what it did in that woman's life. how much should we avail ourselves of that? At the very beginning when the Lord was dealing with the nation of Israel, remember He fed them manna in the desert?

[57:51] Every day they'd get up and there'd be manna out on the ground. Why did He do that? Deuteronomy 8.3 It says, He humbled thee and suffered thee to hunger and fed thee with manna which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know, that he might make thee know that man doesn't live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.

[58:19] We sit down to eat all the time because we get hungry. God didn't have to design our bodies so that we had to put stuff in, but He designed our bodies like that so we would learn something.

[58:35] There's other stuff that you need to take in. Spiritually, if you're going to live. We talked about the idea of worship, this woman's concept of worship.

[58:53] This is a wonderful church. Church is a wonderful thing where we gather together and we fellowship and we can interact and we can have friends with others in the body of Christ, but there's also a danger that we can slip into there.

[59:10] If you think about the concept of God's word being something that we need to eat and we need to take in, take it over to the realm of physical food, I guess.

[59:23] We've talked about this story in the Gospel of John. And I love studying the story out. I love getting into it and reading it and preparing the message and everything.

[59:41] But, it would be like me going to a nice restaurant or something and I partake of this wonderful food and I get up here and I say, this food was great that I enjoyed eating this food.

[59:55] It was wonderful. Now, if that was the case and you knew a restaurant was very, very good, would you like to just go to the restaurant every week and listen to the people talk about how much they enjoyed their food?

[60:15] But, never take the time to go up and grab yourself a plate. Take yourself a bite. The lesson is that we all need to spend time in God's word for ourselves.

[60:31] because it's powerful. And we can't live by bread alone. And we will struggle to live if we just kind of come up and hear what other people's appetites were and what other people got out of the word of God.

[60:52] We all need to have our own Bibles open and partake of the food that the Lord has provided for every single one of us. Let's close with the Lord of prayer.

[61:10] Lord God, we thank you for this time. We thank you for your word and for just its power, how complete it is, how fulfilling it is.

[61:22] It helps us to know where we are at. It helps us to know how much we are loved. It helps us to know the provision that you've made for us, the care that you have for us.

[61:35] It helps us to know that you're coming back, that we can look forward to that coming. It helps us to know that there are others around us that are just as thirsty and that are just as hungry as we once were.

[61:53] Help us to never fail to share this food with those that we know are starving, those whose lives exemplify the fact that they're searching for something, that they need something in their life that we have found.

[62:09] And that is your precious word by which we live and by which we will forever be able to stay with you. In the Lord Jesus' name we pray.

[62:20] Amen. Amen. Amen.