The scripture for today comes from John chapter 4. Please follow along in your own bulletin, your own Bible, or up on the screen.
Now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John, although Jesus himself did not baptize but only his disciples, he left Judea and departed again for Galilee.
And he had to pass through Samaria. So he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph.
Jacob's well was there, so Jesus, worried as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour.
A woman from Samaria came to draw water.
Jesus said to her, Give me a drink. For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.
The Samaritan woman said to him, How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman from Samaria? For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.
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.
The woman said to him, Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob?
He gave us that well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.
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.
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.
Jesus said to her, Go, call your husband, and come here.
The woman answered him, I have no husband.
Jesus said to her, You are right in saying I have no husband, for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband.
What you have said is true.
The woman said to him, Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet.
Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.
Jesus said to her, Women, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem would you worship the Father.
Father, you worship what you do not know.
We worship what we know.
For salvation is from the Jews.
But the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshippers 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 and truth.
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.
Just then his disciples came back.
They marveled that he was talking with a woman.
But no one said, what do you seek?
Or why are you talking with her?
So the woman left her water jar and went away into town and said to the people,
Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did.
Can this be the Christ?
Meanwhile, the disciples were urging him, saying, Rabbi, eat.
But he said to them, I have food to eat that you do not know about.
So the disciples said to one another, Has anyone brought him something to eat?
Jesus said to them, My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.
Do you not say, There are yet four months, then comes the harvest?
Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes and see that the fields are white for harvest.
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.
I send you to reap that for which you did not labor.
Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.
Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony.
He told me all that I ever did.
So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days.
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.
This is the word of God.
Great. Thank you, Justin and Annabelle, for a long reading, but a great story.
Let me pray for us briefly, and then we're going to dive in.
Father God, once again, as we come to your word, we want to hear you speak to us.
The amazing thing about your word is, though it's thousands of years old, it is still living.
It's active. It's real.
It speaks to us even today in 21st century Hong Kong.
God, I pray that you will speak to us from your word, by your spirit, God.
Show us ourselves, show us you, and call us to life, God.
We want to experience fullness of life.
We do that when we come to you, so help us, I pray, God.
Lord, you know the obstacles of our hearts.
You know where our hearts are at.
Jesus, come and help us today.
Spirit of God, we pray, help us to understand your word and to apply it to our lives.
In your great and wonderful name, I pray.
Amen.
Okay, many years ago, I was involved in helping to start a church in downtown Cape Town in South Africa, where we were from.
And as part of kind of getting this church going, a bunch of us were doing kind of very grassroots, informal survey, trying to understand the culture and the people that we were wanting to reach out to.
And so a bunch of us would walk the streets, maybe on a Saturday morning or I guess throughout the week, and we'd kind of interview people and ask people questions.
And we'd ask questions like, how long have you lived in the city?
What do you like about the city?
What do you not like about the city?
Et cetera, et cetera.
Trying to get to know what is the makeup of the people and what gets the people thinking and their hearts moving.
And the questions would start off kind of pretty generic and then we'd go a little bit deeper.
And one of the final questions, the questions that I always found very interesting, was the question, what could you not live without?
And people kind of started off, you know, how long have you lived here?
What do you like about it?
And then when you get to, what could you not live without?
There's always a pause.
Some people maybe would deal with it, you know, superficially, my pet or my job or the weather or my surfboard or whatever it is.
But some people would stop and think, wow, what could I not live without?
Maybe another way of asking that is, what if it was taken away from you, would make you question whether life is worth living?
It's an interesting question, is it?
What could you not live without?
Now, as a church, we are working through John's gospel and Justin Anvil read to us this long chapter.
We've been in it for seven or eight weeks now.
And in John's gospel, the passage we come to today, Jesus and his disciples are traveling from the south of Israel in Judah up to the north in Galilee.
And in order to do that, they need to pass through this area called Samaria.
Now, Samaria is famous for the Samaritans, the people of Samaria.
And for a whole bunch of historical and cultural and religious reasons, the Samaritans, the people of Samaria, don't get along at all with the Jews, the people of Judea or Israel.
They don't like each other.
And the main reason is because the people of Israel consider the Samaritans to be kind of half Jews, half breeds.
A couple of centuries before, some people moved into the area of Samaria.
And the Samaritans intermarried with them and they adopted their culture and their practices and their religious idols and their worship.
And eventually built their own temple.
And so the Jews who consider themselves thoroughbreds, genuine, real worshippers of God, look at their neighbors and they say, you guys are kind of half Jew, but you're also half something else.
Both culturally, ethnically, but most importantly, religiously.
And so they look down on the Samaritans with disdain and kind of disgust at these people that aren't really part of them.
But in order to get to Galilee, Jesus and his disciples must walk through this area of Samaria.
And so they do that.
And they're on their way.
And it's the middle of the day.
They're tired.
They're hungry.
Jesus stops at a well and the disciples go into the village to get some food.
And it's midday.
They don't really expect anybody to come out in the heat of the day to come to the well.
But when the disciples come back, to their astonishment, Jesus is having a conversation.
A conversation with a woman, with a Samaritan woman, a woman of the village.
And this kind of blows their mind for a whole bunch of reasons.
And one of the reasons is Jewish men were not allowed to culturally talk to women in everyday culture.
Especially if you're a rabbi.
A rabbi would not even look at another woman in the eyes, never mind engage her in conversation.
Never mind a Samaritan of all people.
Rabbis, Jewish men would never do this.
But here is Jesus and he's talking with her.
In fact, Jesus initiates the conversation.
He starts the conversation.
He reaches out to her.
And Jesus crosses all sorts of cultural barriers and breaks all cultural and social etiquette to engage in this conversation.
And she's actually surprised.
Look at verse 9.
Jesus asks her for a drink of water.
And the Samaritans said to him,
How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?
And then John, the author, says,
For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.
Not only is he talking with her,
he now wants to share like a drinking cup with her.
I mean, this is just outrageous.
But Jesus is willing to do it.
And she can't quite understand why this man would do this.
But Jesus has something on his mind.
And so he presses on.
Look at verse 10.
Jesus answered her,
If you knew the gift of God and who it is that's asking you for a drink of water,
you would have asked him.
He would have given you living water.
The woman said to him,
Sir, you've got nothing to draw water with.
And the well is deep.
Where are you going to get this living water, this flowing water?
Jesus said to her,
Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again.
But whoever drinks of the water that I give will never thirst again.
The water I give will become within him or her.
Will become a spring of water welling up to eternal life.
Now, what's going on here?
Well, again, in John's gospel,
is usually the case is a little bit of play on words.
The word living water could also mean flowing water as in streams.
I think the lady here thinks that Jesus is saying,
Listen, I have worked out where the source of this well is.
There's the underground source.
And if you follow me, I'll take you to the source.
And you won't need to keep on coming back to this well,
which is 500 meters from the village.
I will show you where the source is.
And she says,
Show me.
Then I won't need to keep on coming back every day to this well
and drawing up this water.
I'll just go straight to this source.
But of course, that's not what Jesus means at all, is it?
Jesus is using this as an analogy.
He's not talking about physical water.
He's using it as an analogy.
And the reason is because obviously water,
especially in a time like that,
in a dry and arid climate,
it's one of the most important things for the people of that day and age.
It's the most basic and essential element of life.
Even still today, if you think about it,
scientists are constantly looking for sources of water on other planets,
on Mars.
Because if we can find a source of water,
then maybe, just maybe,
we can find other life sources.
I don't know what you believe about that.
But anyway, but the point is,
we all know that water is the most basic and essential ingredient
to sustaining life.
And that's why Jesus here,
even in that day,
everybody knows you can't live without water.
And just as any life form needs water,
Jesus is saying that as human beings,
we need something to sustain us and keep us going.
Something that we cannot live without.
Something that we must go back to again and again and again.
You can't just have a drink of water when you're a child and say,
okay, I'm good for life.
I'm set.
I'm done.
Every day you've got to be hydrating yourself.
Jesus says as human beings,
there's something,
all of us were designed,
the way we built,
we've got to go back to some source
that's going to animate us,
hydrate us,
that's going to keep us living.
And so just like this woman intuitively knows,
she must get water every day if she's going to live.
Jesus says that every human being
needs something,
some hope,
some reason to live,
something outside of ourselves to sustain us,
not only physically,
but metaphysically.
And this is where Jesus makes a remarkable claim.
Like he does throughout John's gospel,
Jesus says that what water is for our bodies,
sustaining,
life-giving,
he himself is for our souls.
That in order to truly live,
not just in a material,
physical way,
in order to truly live and flourish
and be a flourishing human being,
we must come to him
and depend on him
and drink deeply
and have our souls drink deeply of him.
You know,
throughout John's gospel,
one of his favorite phrases
is the word eternal life,
the phrase eternal life.
Eternal life doesn't just mean
one day when you die,
you can live forever.
Eternal life in John's gospel means
full,
flourishing,
existential life
in this world,
in this day and age now,
when you go to work
and then you're home,
you're married,
you're parenting,
you're being a son or a daughter
of elderly parents,
fully flourishing life
in this world
that continues
past the grave forever.
And Jesus says
that the key
to that kind of life,
not just physical existence
in a material sense,
existential flourishing,
the key is to know him,
to drink on him,
to depend on him
as your only source
of hope and life
in this world.
Much like anyone
in the desert
is walking,
scouring the landscape.
Where is a water well?
Where can I find
my source of hope?
If you're walking
through the desert
and you don't know
where water is
and the children
are languishing
and they're asking
how much further
and you're constantly saying
not much further,
there's water
just over the hill,
there must be water
because you know
if there's no water
you will die.
Jesus says
as human beings
unless we come to him
and find him
something in our souls
will die.
We cannot live
without him.
Friends,
if you're not a Christian
this morning,
this is one of the main claims
of Christianity
that Jesus Christ
is the source
of all life,
real life,
existential life.
Later on in John's Gospel
in chapter 7,
Jesus very famously
says this,
he says,
if anyone thirsts,
let him come to me
and drink,
whoever believes in me
as the scripture said,
out of his heart
will flow rivers
of living water
and that's what
Jesus is saying here.
He's saying to her,
I am water
for the soul,
I am life.
Now,
why is Jesus saying this
to this woman?
I mean,
what's the reason?
Well,
there is a reason
and the reason is
because this lady,
like all of us,
is searching.
She's searching.
Although she's been
somewhat religious
throughout her life,
it seems that she's been
searching for the meaning
of life for a long time
and Jesus knows
something about her.
Here is a lady
that's been looking
for the wrong sources
for joy,
for peace,
for hope,
for rest,
for security
and as a result
of looking in the wrong places,
she's suffering.
And so Jesus comes to her
like he comes to all of us
and he comes to this lady
that has this deep
existential thirst
in her heart
and just like her need
for water,
she knows how to quench
her need temporarily
but it never lasts.
And so she keeps returning
to the source of water
for her soul
again and again and again
but it never lasts.
And so what is the well
that this woman
is drinking from?
Well,
look at what Jesus says.
Look at verse 16.
Jesus says,
he says to her,
go and call your husband
and come here.
The woman answered him,
I have no husband.
Jesus said to her,
you are right in saying
I have no husband
for you have had five husbands
and the man you're with now
is not your husband,
is he?
Now that seems like a rather
sudden change of subject,
right?
They're talking about water
and wells
and it's a bit philosophical
and suddenly Jesus
sharp turn to the right.
Go call your husband.
Change of subject.
But actually,
what's going on here?
Jesus is using
her need for water
as an analogy
to show her
where her heart's at.
What is the well
that she's been drinking from?
What is the water source
that her heart returns to
again and again
and again
in order to satisfy
her search for peace,
for rest,
for security?
Well, it's men,
isn't it?
It's marriage.
It's relationships.
Just as she returns
to the well
day after day
because the water
in her bucket
isn't going to last,
so she returns
to the altar
or to Tinder
or to the dating app
or to the local bar
again and again
and again
after each relationship
as one relationship
dries up
after another.
And how is this
well that she's drinking from
working out for her?
Well, evidently
not so well.
We don't know
the exact reason
why she's been married
five times,
but the fact that
Jesus says,
listen,
you're with someone now
who's not really
your husband
suggests that she's
not just an unlucky widow.
It's not just that
she's had a bad choice
of husbands
and they've all died on her.
There's something else
going on here, right?
No, friends,
here is a lady
that goes back
and has tried
one relationship
after another
and they do not
satisfy.
And so she keeps
on going back
to the well.
I'm not sure
if you picked up
verse 6.
Verse 6,
there's a funny little
sentence at the end
that says this,
and it was about
the sixth hour.
In that day and age,
time was measured
from 6 a.m.,
from sunrise,
the beginning of the day,
right?
And so when is
the sixth hour?
Well, the sixth hour
is midday.
It's 12 noon.
We know from
historical records
that in that day and age
nobody would go
to the watering well
at the midday.
It was the heat of the day,
the sun was right above you,
it's baking hot.
You'd always go to the well
early in the morning
when the sun is not up
and also said
you've got water
for the day
or at the end of the day
in the cool of the day,
right?
To walk a kilometer
and back with heavy water gels
in the heat of the day,
no one would do that.
We also know
that women would typically
go to the well in groups.
They'd never go alone
because there's safety
in numbers.
But here is a lady
that goes to the well
in the middle of the day,
in the heat of the day,
all on her own.
Why is that?
Well, commentators tell us
the reason is
because she's a social outcast.
She's avoiding
the other people of the town,
the other people of the village.
Here she is,
she's shunned,
she's rejected,
maybe she's called names,
maybe she's taken
some of their husbands,
we don't know.
But here is a woman
that has gone through
a bunch of the men
of the town
and everybody knows it
and everybody is
despising her for it.
How has it worked out for her?
Well, not very well.
Friends, here is
everybody knows her
and yet nobody wants
to be seen with her.
And here is someone
whose desire,
whether it's for romantic love
or acceptance
or maybe it's financial security
or whatever it is,
something is driving her
to one man after another.
And just like the bucket
in her well,
after each trip to the well,
it's not long
before she finds
the relationship
dry and empty.
They cannot last.
They cannot satisfy.
Jesus says here to her,
everyone who drinks
of this water
will be thirsty again.
He's not just talking
about the physical water,
he's talking about
the wells that we
sink our hearts into
and we try to plummet
in order to find hope
and peace
and rest
and joy in this life.
Everyone who drinks
of this water
will be thirsty again.
But Jesus says
there's another option.
But whoever drinks
of the water
that I give,
whoever comes to me
will never thirst again.
In the Old Testament,
the language of water wells
was familiar
to God's people.
And God's often
describing his people
to those that
are looking for water.
And he says to his people
over and over again,
if you follow me,
that means you depend on me,
you drink of me,
you hope and you trust in me,
just like someone in the desert
hopes and trusts
in the watering well.
And so,
in Jeremiah 2,
there's this very famous passage.
Let me put it up
on the screen for us.
God says this,
he's been calling his people
to trust in him,
to hope in him,
to depend on him,
but they do not.
And they go after
other gods
and other idols
and other loves
and other hopes
and he says this,
be appalled,
O heavens,
be shocked,
declares the Lord.
For my people
have committed
two great evils.
They have forsaken me,
the fountain of living water
and they have cut out wells
or cisterns for themselves,
broken cisterns
that hold no water.
See what God is saying?
He's saying,
my people,
they reject me
and they go looking after,
looking for other wells,
other hopes,
other joys,
other things to find peace
and security
and life
and joy in,
but these things are broken.
They can't hold water
and they are toxic
and they make my people sick.
They trusted in lifeless idols
and they become lifeless themselves.
And so Jesus comes to this lady
and he's pointing out
exactly what Jeremiah said,
that in a spiritual sense,
she's drinking from a broken well.
She's looking for something
other than God himself
to fill her,
to satisfy her,
to give her hope
and peace and rest.
But what she's consuming
is not just unsatisfying,
it's deadly.
It's toxic.
Jesus says,
you drink of this again
and again and again,
it's not going to satisfy.
It's not going to make you well.
So friends,
here's the question
this passage asks of us.
What well are we returning to
again and again and again?
Where do we keep on returning?
Hoping or believing
it'll give us life.
It'll give us peace.
It'll give us security.
Friends,
what do we believe
we must have
in order to be fully alive,
fully human,
to flourish?
For myself,
about two years ago,
maybe a year and a half ago,
I went through
a strange period
in my life
where I'm not
like very
financially savvy person.
I'm not
a complete idiot,
but I'm not,
you know,
like an investment banker
or something like that.
But about,
probably a year and a half ago,
partly because of conversations
with friends and family
and,
you know,
the stock market is flying
and the Magnificent Seven
are doing their thing
and I felt this pressure
like,
hey,
I've got to get in
on the game,
right?
And so,
I kind of started thinking
a bit about stocks
and investments
and thinking about my future.
Okay,
you know,
I'm getting old now,
I'm over 40,
I've got to start thinking
about these things
and I started to,
to kind of follow
a little bit of stocks
and investments
and trading
and that kind of stuff.
And at first,
I told myself,
you know,
I'm just being a wise steward,
just taking care of my family
and just thinking about these things.
But pretty soon,
if I'm honest,
it got its hold in me
and I got sucked in
in a big way
and so,
I would find myself,
I'm sure none of you
have ever found yourself
doing this,
but I find myself
waking up
and the first thing
I do in the morning
before I'm even out of bed
is I'm looking at my phone,
right?
And there's this stupid little app
that tells you
what's happened
in the stock market
overnight,
right?
In the US.
And so,
I'm in bed
and the first thing I do
is I'm looking,
hey,
what happened overnight?
And then I find myself,
the last thing I do
before I turn out my light,
before I close my eyes,
you know,
just final check before,
just want to see what's happening
in the markets open
in the US.
And I find that
my waking up
is the first thing
and the last thing
before I've even said
hello to my kids,
before I've got out of bed,
before I've even considered
my Bible,
Jesus,
or any of that,
I'm thinking,
what's happening?
What's happening?
How are my investments doing?
Now,
friends,
is it wrong
to follow your investments?
No,
of course not.
I think the Bible
actually says it's unwise
to not know
what's happening financially.
You can get yourself
in a lot of trouble like that.
So it's a good thing
to be aware
on top of your finances.
Don't be not on top
of your finances.
But for me,
if I'm honest with you,
it wasn't about wisdom
or planning,
it became about seduction.
It was a well
that I was returning to
a couple of times a day.
First thing in the morning,
last thing at night,
because in a sense
it promised me freedom.
It promised me joy,
it promised me security,
it promised me peace.
In a word,
it promised me life.
Now,
here's the scary part,
is that during all this time,
for probably six months
or a year or so,
I was still worshipping,
still reading my Bible,
still leading Bible studies,
still preparing sermons,
preaching sermons.
Still,
I wasn't a heretic.
I didn't deny the gospel.
I wasn't living a double life,
one life to you
and then another life
on the side.
I wasn't visiting
places in the city
that I shouldn't be visiting.
But friends,
if I'm honest with you,
something else
had gripped my heart.
Something else
was more real to me,
more vivid to me,
more precious to me
than the person
of Jesus Christ.
Something else
was giving me
a sense of hope
and peace
and the prospect
of security and joy
more than God Himself.
And if I'm honest,
it wasn't black and white,
it was a little gray.
If I'm honest,
I could sense it.
There was something
inside of my heart
that wasn't quite alive.
Friends,
Jesus says to us,
everyone who drinks
of this water
will be thirsty again.
It cannot quench
the craving of the soul.
Only the God
who made us for Himself
and to know Him
and to love Him
can give us this peace.
And many of us
would have heard,
it's a very famous quote,
many of us would have heard
of David Foster Wallace's
commencement address,
Kenyan College,
2007.
Very famous.
You might have heard
this before.
But I want to read this to us.
David Foster Wallace,
if you don't know him,
was an American novelist
and writer.
He was an agnostic.
He wasn't a Christian.
He unfortunately
took his own life
in I think it was 2013.
But before he died,
he gave this commencement
address to Kenyan College.
I want to read this to us.
This is profoundly insightful.
He says,
In the day-to-day trenches
of adult life,
there's actually no such thing
as not worshipping.
Everybody worships.
The only choice you get
is what to worship.
And the compelling reason
for maybe choosing
some sort of God
or religion
is that pretty much
everything else you worship
will eat you alive.
If you worship money
and things,
if they are where you tap
real meaning
in this life,
then you will never
have enough.
Never feel
you have enough.
Worship your body
and beauty
and sexual allure.
You will always feel ugly.
And when time
and age start showing,
you will die
a million deaths
before your loved ones
finally plant you
in the grave.
Friends,
worship power.
You will end up
feeling weak
and afraid.
You will need
ever more power
over others
to numb you
to your own fear.
Worship your intellect.
Being seen as smart
and you will end up
feeling stupid,
a fraud,
always on the verge
of being found out.
The insidious thing
about these forms
of worship
is not that they are evil,
but that they are
unconscious.
Isn't that profound?
Whatever you worship
will control you.
It will eat you alive.
So friends,
again,
ask us the question,
what is it
that we are worshiping?
What is the well
we're returning to
week after week,
day after day?
Where does your mind
drift
when you're feeling
anxious and worried?
What fantasy
do you go to
that can give you
a sense of peace?
Friends,
what do you think
if only you'll gain it,
you'll find freedom
and joy,
security,
life.
Maybe for some of us
it's our investments
and our portfolios
and we're checking
our portfolios
all the time.
Friends,
maybe for some of us
it is like this woman,
it's romantic relationships.
We bounce from one
relationship to the next
to the next,
never feeling like
we can be alone,
be ourselves.
Always need somebody
to affirm us
or build us up.
Friends,
maybe for some of us
it's our children's
accomplishments
and so we're sending
them to one exam,
one accomplishment,
one accolade
off the other
and as soon as they
get their one accolade
we're rolling them up
for the next one,
right?
Because we've always
got to keep
their portfolio growing.
Friends,
maybe for some of us
it's a hidden addiction,
pornography,
prostitution,
substance abuse.
On the side
we return there
again and again
and again.
For some of us
maybe it's social media,
always posting,
always checking
who's liking my post,
what's the response,
what are they saying?
For some of us
it's our work life,
always online,
never switching off,
always responding
to our boss,
our clients,
compromising even
our values,
our ethics
in order to win
that client,
advance our careers.
Friends,
what is the well
we keep returning to?
Where do our hearts
and minds go to
to give us peace?
And I know this is
something we talk about
in a lot of churches
and so it's easy
to roll eyes
and say yes,
yes,
I know,
okay,
I know,
I know.
But friends,
I've preached this message
hundreds of times,
I know this stuff
and yet for me
it's easy to stay
in my head
and my heart
to drift.
And Jesus doesn't
just want our heads
to know it,
he wants our hearts
to own it,
he wants our hearts
to be transformed,
which is why
he takes the conversation
where it goes.
And so look at the
last section here.
Where does Jesus
take the conversation?
Well,
he takes it to worship.
And so look at
what happens here.
Jesus directs
the conversation
towards worship,
he says,
he tells the lady
about herself
and she says,
sir,
I perceive
that you are a prophet
and she then says
this really interesting thing.
She says,
listen,
I have tried,
let me just find it here.
It says,
our fathers worshipped
on this mountain
but you Jews
say that Jerusalem
is the place
where people
ought to worship.
I think she's saying,
listen,
I've tried to worship God
as our fathers
have told us
here on this mountain.
You Jews say
that we Samaritans
are not really
very orthodox
or real.
You say we've got
to go to Jerusalem
to worship.
Listen,
I don't really know
what's going on.
I've tried to follow
what God wants for me.
The Samaritans
don't believe
in most of the Old Testament,
only the first five books
of the Bible.
And so when they read that,
they say,
on Mount Gerizim,
that's where God
wants us to worship.
But the Jews say,
no,
well,
David,
God promised David
that he would build
him a house in Jerusalem.
So they say,
you must go to Jerusalem.
And she's saying,
there's a bit of,
who's right here?
Are you guys right?
Are we right?
What does God want for me?
Does God want me
to go worship here?
Does God want me
to go worship there?
Must I believe
the whole Old Testament
or just this?
I don't really know.
What does God want for me?
And look what Jesus says to her.
What God wants for us
is a good question to ask
if God is a moral policeman
who simply wants us
to obey the rules.
But God is not
a moral policeman.
He's a father who loves us
and he wants us to be free.
We sang earlier,
what is the line?
Something about
the God who needs
nothing from us.
Jesus doesn't want
anything from us.
He wants life for us.
And because Jesus loves her
and he wants her to be free
and he wants her to come
and draw from the living water
of the living God
so that she can be free
from the false gods
that she's worshipped
and the false hope
she's put her hope in
and the false worship
she's giving herself to,
he offers her a lifeline.
And he says this,
woman, believe me.
Verse 22.
The hour is coming
when neither on this mountain
nor on that mountain
will he worship the Father.
Verse 23.
Indeed the hour is coming
that the hour is now here.
The time has come
when true worshippers
will worship the Father
in spirit and in truth
for the Father is seeking
such people to worship him.
What's Jesus saying?
Jesus,
for the Samaritan
there's this big debate.
Who's right
and who's wrong?
Are the Jews right?
Are the Samaritans right?
Maybe that clan over there's right.
Actually maybe we're all wrong.
Maybe those guys are right.
Who's bringing right worship to God?
And Jesus says
the hour has come,
the time has come
when all people,
religious, rich,
elites like Nicodemus
or poor Samaritan outsiders
like you,
all people,
no matter their cultural background,
their religious background,
their ethnic background,
their social standing,
their family background,
all people,
whether Jews or Samaritans,
whether Asians or Africans
or Americans,
all people,
the time is coming,
God has made a way
where all people can come to him
and find life.
And what do you need
to be included
in this community of people
that worship God
and find life?
Do you need to go to Jerusalem?
Do you need to go to this mountain?
Do you need to wear a certain garb?
Do you need to speak a language?
Do you need to be educated
like Nicodemus?
Do you need to worship this God
and find life?
And Jesus says,
there's one thing you need.
It's genuineness.
It's sincerity.
That's what he says
by worshiping in spirit
and in truth.
Spirit and truth
are not two different things.
They're one thing here.
Jesus says that
the only thing you need
is to come to him
and to worship him
from your heart
in sincerity
and genuineness
and to trust in Jesus.
Jesus is showing her
that the reason
for her struggles
with men
and relationships,
the reason why
she keeps going back
for more and more and more,
it's probably the same reason
why these relationships
don't last.
And it's not a social problem.
It's not an EQ problem.
It's not a psychological problem.
It's a heart problem.
She's been worshiping
at the altar of men
and relationships
and it hasn't satisfied.
And Jesus says
there's one thing
that satisfies.
Come to me.
Come to me genuinely.
Come to me sincerely.
Come and worship me
from your heart
in spirit and in truth
and you will be set free.
And Jesus says
that if you do that,
if you will worship God,
if that's,
sorry,
Jesus says that
if you will worship
at the altar of relationships,
if that's where your heart is at,
if that's what you sincerely
and genuinely give yourself to,
if that's what you functionally think
that you can't live without,
it'll never satisfy.
But I've come to change that
and I've come to change you.
And this lady does change,
doesn't she?
Because look at how the story ends.
Jesus reveals himself to her
and he helps her see
that he is who he's been saying that he is.
He really is the Christ.
He's the Messiah.
She says at one point,
listen,
I don't know about all this stuff,
but when the Messiah comes,
he will tell us all things.
And Jesus says,
I who speak to you am he.
Or another translation says,
the one who speaks to you
is I am.
I am him.
I'm God.
I'm the Messiah.
And she puts down her jar of water
and she runs into the village
and she goes and calls everybody
that up until now
has been shunning her
and rejecting her.
And she says,
they've all been,
they've all nothing to do with her
because she's this pariah.
She's maybe been taking all their men
or whatever it is.
They've been rejecting her
and she calls out to them.
She says,
come everybody,
come listen to me.
And she says,
I just met a man
who knows everything about me.
And they say,
yeah,
so what?
We know everything about you anyway.
What,
you know,
this village is a small village
and people talk,
we all know about you.
And she says,
no,
this man is different.
This man knows everything about me,
but he's not rejecting me.
He's not shunning me.
I met a man who knows,
who knows me fully
and yet he's welcoming me.
He's accepting me.
The people of the village,
even though she's part of their village,
they want nothing to do with her.
Jesus' culture says
you should have nothing to do with her
and Jesus moves towards her.
He starts the conversation.
He initiates.
Jesus knows everything about her,
her sin,
her shame,
her past,
everything about her
and he welcomes her.
And that blows her mind,
but it also changes her.
And she runs back to village
a different person.
Friends,
here is a lady
that came to the well
a different person
from the one who left the well
because she encountered Jesus.
So friends,
what about you?
What could you not live without?
What if it were taken from you
would make you question
whether life is worth living?
What do you keep giving yourself to
again and again and again?
Friends,
what or who are you worshipping?
Two weeks ago,
we looked at Jesus' conversation
with Nicodemus
and today we've listened in
on a very different conversation
with a different conversation partner.
And despite all their differences
in culture,
education,
background,
religion,
socioeconomic status,
rich,
religious,
Nicodemus,
poor,
uneducated,
Samaritan woman
whose name we don't even know,
despite their very stark differences,
these two stories
are actually very similar
in some ways.
In both these stories,
Jesus comes to these
very different people
and he approaches them
not as an idea
but as a person.
He speaks honestly.
He speaks frankly.
He speaks genuinely
to their hearts.
In both of these stories,
Jesus calls them
to trust in him.
He doesn't just give them
a religious data
or dogma.
He doesn't just give them
a theology.
He calls them
to trust in him,
in him alone.
And in both of these encounters,
Jesus points himself
as the solution.
And it's amazing,
John is telling us
that the deepest longings
of the human heart
transcend culture.
They transcend ethnicity.
Friends,
whether you are Asian
or African like me,
whether you're American,
whether you're Chinese
or Caucasian,
whether you're Australian,
it doesn't matter
what your culture,
your background,
whether you're rich
or whether you're poor,
you're uneducated
or you're a professor,
the deepest longings
of the human heart
are all the same.
Both of these people
need Jesus.
To both of these,
Jesus is willing
to come
and save them.
And friends,
that's true for us as well.
All of us need Jesus
and to all of us,
Jesus is coming
and willing
to offer himself
as the hope
that we need
and the hope
that he wants
to give us.
Why don't we come
to him now in prayer
and let's ask him
to do that.
Lord Jesus,
thank you so much
for the gospels
and thank you
for the Bible.
Thank you for John's gospel
that just again
and again and again,
week in and week out,
show us who you are
and call us
to trust you.
Jesus,
you are so gracious.
You're so beautiful.
You move towards
our mess and our shame.
God,
the areas of our life
that we feel most shame
are the areas of life
you love to move towards
and bring healing,
redemption,
and freedom.
Jesus,
we love you.
We need you.
God,
come and help us,
I pray.
Come and help us,
God,
to drink of the well
of living water.
Come and help us
to drink of you,
God.
You will satisfy
and never,
never run dry.
God,
through all the economic
upturns and downturns,
the market turmoil,
God,
and everything that's going
on in our world,
you are the one
consistent source of life
that never disappoints.
Come and help us,
I pray.
In your great
and wonderful name,
Amen.