The Gift & The Giver | Sunday, May 16, 2021

Hi, my name's Dale. Welcome to church! Invite somebody to church right now.

Heavenly Father, we thank You, God, for this day, Lord, that You have made. We have come here to tell You, Lord, that You are worthy of all our praise. You're worthy of it all; You're worthy of all our worship. God, we just ask that You would help us to draw near to You with everything that we are—our whole heart, mind, strength, and soul. Our desire is to give You the highest praise, our best. We just want to lift You up and lift Your name, O God.

As we minister to You, Lord, we ask that You would minister to us. Thank You, Jesus, for hearing our prayers. Thank You, Father. Thank You, Spirit. And it's in Your name we pray. Amen.

Jesus, You made a way; unlock these chains. Hearing Your presence, strongholds break. You deserve it all; You deserve it all. We give You the highest.

Praise, You deserve it all, God. You deserve it all.

They are on a tree, merciful King. From darkness to life, death falls to light. Heaven will join and sing, Jesus. You deserve it all.

With every breath that's in my lungs, my heart cries out to You. Belongs the glory through every loss or victory. My soul will...

Rise to only bring You glory. With every breath, my soul will rise to glory. You deserve it all; You deserve it all. We give You the highest praise. Praise, You deserve it all; You deserve it all.

Welcome! Thanks for tuning in to our online service. I'm Pastor Garrett, and here at Cross Connection Church, we're all about living life in connection with God, one another, and the world through Jesus Christ.

Part of the way I want to encourage you in living life in connection today, from your home or wherever you're watching this service, is through prayer. We can live life in connection with God through prayer.

Everywhere we're at, we here at church, our pastors and our prayer team, would love to be praying with and for you specifically. If there's anything we can be praying for you this week, let us know at prayer.lifeinconnection.com. Again, God answers; He hears all of our prayers, and He is faithful to answer them. So let's lift up whatever is going on in your life to the Lord this week. We'd love to be partnering with you in prayer.

A couple of changes for next week: we are going to be changing the order of service a little bit. We're still going to be here at the same time online next week, but the order of service and how it's going to be formatted will be a little bit different. I just wanted to give you guys a heads up about that.

Our missionaries in the Middle East are on mission this week, ministering to Muslims. I can't give you too much information to protect their identity and their ministry out there, but please be praying for them. Recently, we received news that as they've been ministering to Muslims, a couple of people have come to faith in Jesus Christ, and that is something we celebrate. We are super stoked for that! However, in their context, this does mean that these new Christians are essentially risking their lives to follow Christ. In that context, it is a very dangerous thing to convert.

We do ask for your prayers for our missionaries out there that they would continue faithfully sharing the good news of Jesus Christ. Also, pray for the new converts that God would strengthen them, encourage them, and give them all boldness to live out their faith, even in the midst of the danger they are facing. So let's be praying for them this week.

If you would like to support the ministry of Cross Connection Church, there are a couple of different ways that I can encourage you to give as we're about to transition back to our worship team with a song. The first way you can give and support the ministry of Cross Connection is simply on your phones. If you have them out, text the number 84321 with any amount, and it will walk you through the steps to give right there.

Second, you can go on our website, give.lifeinconnection.com, and you can give right there through our giving portal, safe and secure. Third, you can always mail in your tithe or offering to our church address: 1675 Seven Oaks Road, Escondido, California. Of course, we are meeting at 10:30 on Sundays, live in person in the sanctuary. We do invite you to come and enjoy our in-person service.

Well, with that, let's go ahead and worship the Lord with our giving and get back to worship. God bless you guys.

Were creation suddenly articulate, with a thousand tongues to lift one cry, then from north to south and east to west, we'd hear Christ be magnified, echoing His eminence. His name would burst from the sky; from rivers to the mountaintops, we'd hear Christ be magnified.

Let us be magnified in me. Oh, Christ be magnified, the altar of my life. Every creature finds its voice in Christ be magnified.

Oh, magnify in me. I'll stand strong and worship You. If it puts me in the fire, I'll rejoice because You're there too. I won't be fooled by feelings; I'll hold fast to what is true. If the cross brings transformation, then I'll be crucified with You.

Death is just the beginning if I join You in Your sufferings, and I'll join You when You rise. When You return, all the angels and saints, my heart will still be singing. My song will be the same: Oh, Christ, be magnified.

Christ, be magnified. Christ, be magnified from the altar of my life. This, Lord, be magnified.

Ask God; that is our prayer, Lord. That is our heart, Lord, that You would be made larger in our minds and our eyes. Lord God, we serve a powerful God. Forgive us, Lord, when we forget that and when we make You too small in our eyes. We worship You, Christ. Would You speak to us in Your Word now? In Jesus' mighty name, amen.

It has been said that life is better in uninteresting times. I'm not sure if that is true; it seems like it could be, though. However, we have not lived in uninteresting times for a very long time. Think about the upheavals we've experienced over the last 25 years: a presidential scandal followed by an impeachment and then a censure of the sitting president in 1998, followed by a tumultuous presidential campaign and ballot issues. Do you remember hanging and pregnant chads in Florida? Ultimately, that was put to rest by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2000.

Then came the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil in September of 2001, followed by U.S.-led wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. We faced the subprime mortgage crisis and the market crash in 2008 and 2009, followed by the Great Recession, as they call it. We witnessed the unlikely presidency of Donald Trump, culminating with all the craziness of COVID-19 and the chaos that has come after that. We are still in that cycle of chaos. We have political chaos, market chaos, racial chaos, and global chaos. There are issues in Asia and problems once again in the Middle East.

This last week, we were most certainly in interesting times. It might be possible that life would be a little bit better in some uninteresting times. Maybe just a little bit of mundane times would be great, but it's hard to imagine uninteresting times. Prior to everything we have been experiencing in the last 25 years, there were problems in the economy and in world politics in the 1970s. Some of you probably lived through that; that was before my time. Then there was the tumult of the 1960s.

Assassinations, Cold War geopolitics, racial tensions, and violence have marked our history. The Vietnam War, before that, and in the 1950s, there was the Red Scare with communism rising. The Korean War occurred in the 1940s, and of course, World War II looms large in our past. Is there really ever a time that is uninteresting? It doesn't seem so, because we live, as I have said many times before, in a broken and fallen world. We live in a world that is affected by sin, a world that experiences both natural and moral evils, a world that is in desperate need of restoration.

In Romans chapter 8, the Apostle Paul says that the whole of creation is groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Currently, we, as individuals, as a society, and as a church, are all trying to reorient back towards some feeling of regularity and normalcy in life. We are revisiting familiar themes here at Cross Connection Church that have to do with our vision as a church. I have been sharing over the last five weeks what our vision is all about.

For those of you who have been a part of Cross Connection Church for a while, this is review. However, reviews are sometimes important, especially right before a test. Some of you might be in that review period right now, as school finals are coming up. In fact, I have a couple of finals going on just this next week. Oftentimes, just before the final, the professor will give you a review sheet and say, "Here are some of the things that you need to know for the final. Be prepared to answer questions on this and be prepared for maybe writing an essay on that."

I believe we are in a time of testing and trial. Some people think that this is a final time of testing. We don't really know; we'll just have to wait and see. But you need to be prepared because there are some things that you are going to be tested on as we go forward.

We were created for connection, and that's going to be on the final. God made us to live life in connection with Him; that's the vertical relationship He created for us. He also created us to live life in connection with one another on the horizontal level. I believe we even see this in the actual makeup of who we are at an ontological level of being. The way that we are made up includes a soul—that's the real you.

Intellect, emotion, and will reside within us, but our soul can't really do much if it's not animated by the body and then by the spirit. The real you, your soul, connects with God at the spirit level and with others in this world at the body level. At the very level of being, we have this understanding that we were made to live in connection with God and in connection with one another.

However, though we were created for connection with God and one another, we lost that connection through rebellious disobedience, through sin in the fall in Genesis chapter 3. We are born separated from God and divided from one another. Despite this separation, we deeply desire to be connected with God and one another.

The biblical gospel, the good news about Jesus, is the story of how God set out to bring us back into connection with Him and with one another. Jesus is the mediator of this reconciliation; He is also the means by which this reconciliation is possible. Through His body on the cross, Jesus makes connection with God and one another possible again. By His death on the cross, Jesus has defeated sin and death.

I have quoted this passage many times before, but it is necessary and important to revisit a well-read passage in my Bible, Ephesians chapter 2, beginning at verse 14. The Apostle Paul writes, "For He, Jesus Himself, is our peace, who has made both one and has broken down the middle wall of separation, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace.

And that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity. And He came and preached peace to you who were far off and to those who were near. For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.

We are connected to God now. Therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone.

In whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In whom you also, being built together, are a dwelling place of God in the Spirit. We've covered all of this in our previous five messages, and we've come to the point at which I was sharing with you last week that we are called to carry this good news to the world.

Our vision, as you know well if you are a part of Cross Connection Church, is life in connection with God, with one another, and with the world through Jesus. Jesus told His early followers in Mark's Gospel, chapter 16, verse 15, to go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He commissioned His followers to make disciples of all nations in Matthew 28, verse 19, what is called the Great Commission. If you are a believer in and a follower of Jesus, then you are called and commissioned by Him to share the good news of life in connection with Him, with one another, and with this world.

We are called to share this good news, the good story, the good news of the gospel. A lot of times, the idea of sharing the gospel, what Christians have for a very long time called evangelism, can frighten us. But it doesn't have to, because sharing the good news, the gospel of Jesus Christ, is just like sharing with someone about the really good restaurant you ate at last week, or your favorite author, or your favorite recipe.

However, I know that it still makes some of us a little anxious when we start to talk about sharing our faith and about evangelism. In fact, at the end of the service here in our sanctuary this last Sunday, I prayed for all of those who were gathered, that we would find ourselves in situations this week where we could not ignore the opportunities that God would give us to share the gospel. I'm sure that prayer was probably fulfilled for a number of people, but that kind of stuff makes us a little anxious.

So, what I want to do today is to give you some practical tips from Jesus about sharing the good news with others. This will be found in one of the great stories of Scripture, where Jesus brought light to someone who was in darkness. Early in the story of John's Gospel, we read that Jesus had been down in Jerusalem.

In the area around Jerusalem called Judea, Jesus was departing to go back to Galilee. On His way from Jerusalem, which is in the southern part of the nation of Israel, back to Galilee, where His main home base was, the Scriptures say that He needed to go through Samaria. We read this in the Gospel of John, chapter four, beginning at verse five.

So He came to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Now Jacob's well was there. Jesus, therefore, being wearied from His journey, sat thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour of the day, or noon. A woman of Samaria came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink," for His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.

Before I go any further with this story, and for some of you who have probably read John chapter four and the story of the woman at the well in Samaria, there are some key things to consider even at this initial stage in the text. First, Jesus sought out people who were in need. He went to where needy people were. We have considered so many times that Jesus came to seek and to save that which is lost. I have shared that quite a bit, even over the last five weeks. Going back to Palm Sunday, I shared from Luke chapter 19 the story of Zacchaeus, where that verse is found in Luke 19:10.

So many times, we go back to that passage where we read that Jesus came to seek and to save that which is lost, and He went to where lost people would be. We are surrounded by lost people who are in need. However, one of the challenges we face, because of tribalistic tendencies—which I spoke a little bit about last week—is that we have a tendency to avoid lost people who are in need. The Jews in Jesus' day did the very same thing; they weren't much different than we are.

Most Jews traveling from Galilee in the northern part of Israel to Jerusalem, which a faithful Jew was required to do three times a year—first at Passover, then at Pentecost, and then during the fall season of feasts—would not go through Samaria. The area that we refer to as Samaria was right in between Galilee in the north and Judea or Jerusalem in the south. But a faithful Jew would avoid going through Samaria.

They would cut over to what we know as modern-day Jordan on the east side of the Jordan River, and they would bypass it; they would go around Samaria. They would avoid it because Samaritans were an ethnic minority that the Jews did not like. My wife and I love to visit Santa Barbara; in fact, we're planning on visiting there in just a couple of weeks. However, I will do just about anything to avoid driving through Los Angeles. Maybe you can relate to that. The Jews basically did the same thing; they went out of their way to avoid Samaria.

But not Jesus. Jesus left Judea, where Jerusalem was, and departed to go back up to the north to Galilee. The Scriptures say in John chapter 4 that He needed to go through Samaria. Jesus went to where lost and needy people were to seek and to save that which is lost because that was His purpose in coming to the world.

We have a very simple application: if you want to fulfill Jesus's commission, He says in Mark 16:15, "Go and preach the gospel to every creature." He says in Matthew 28:19, "Go into all the world and make disciples of all nations." If you want to be faithful to the commission of Jesus, stop avoiding lost people.

The second thing to consider from this text is that Jesus interacted with lost people even when He was tired and hungry. The first few verses in John 4 tell us that Jesus was tired and thirsty, and His disciples had gone into the town of Sychar to find food. He was probably hungry in addition to being thirsty and tired. Jesus interacted with lost people even when He was in that state.

A better way to say it is that Jesus didn't look for excuses to avoid talking with people about the gospel or to avoid seeking out lost people. The fact is that a lot of times we are those who are pretty excuse-prone. We have all kinds of excuses for why we didn't take that opportunity to talk to someone or why we didn't step out of our comfort zone to share with that person. We might say, "I'm busy," "I'm tired," "I have somewhere I need to go right now," or "I don't know what to say." Sometimes, people even say, "They might ask a question that I don't know the answer to," or "I'm not an evangelist; God hasn't gifted me in that way."

We need to stop avoiding lost people and stop making excuses for not engaging with them. Jesus would interact with those in need. He looked for those who were in need, and he did so even when he was tired, hungry, or thirsty. He didn't make excuses.

The third thing we find in those initial words from John chapter 4 is that Jesus was willing to step out of his comfort zone to interact with people who might be considered outsiders. He was in the region of Samaria, a place that most Jews would not go, and he interacted with a person that most people would not engage with. The person Jesus interacts with in the story had several strikes against her.

First, she was a woman. During this period of time and in this place, in Middle Eastern culture—even still today—the idea of interacting with a woman who is not your wife or part of your direct family was considered out of bounds. That is the first strike against this woman.

The second strike against her is that no Jewish man in the first century, especially a rabbi, would have any dealings with a Samaritan woman. The Jews hated Samaritans; they had no dealings with them.

The third thing we see as we go through this text is that this Samaritan woman was likely a moral outcast. The fact that she comes to the well in the middle of the day, rather than during the cooler parts of the morning or evening, indicates that she was probably trying to avoid the normal gathering of women who would be at the well.

So, she is a Samaritan, she is a woman, and she is a moral outcast. However, if you are going to fulfill the commission that Jesus has given us—to go and preach the gospel to every creature and to make disciples of all nations—you need to be willing to step outside of your comfort zone.

I'm not going to lie to you; that isn't always easy. It's not always easy to interact with lost people. But I can promise you this: if you stop avoiding lost people and are willing to step out of your comfort zone, God will enable and empower you by His Holy Spirit.

To find and share, I share with lost people. How can I make such an audacious promise to you? Well, because that's exactly what God says He will do. God does not command what He does not also enable. He commands us to preach the gospel: "Go and preach the gospel to every creature. Make disciples of all nations." He will enable us to do what He has commanded us to do.

Those were the very last words that Jesus shared with His followers before He ascended into heaven. In Acts chapter 1, verse 8, Jesus says, "But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, in all Judea, and in Samaria, and to the end of the earth."

So, Jesus is at this well in Samaria in the middle of a hot day. He is tired and hungry when a Samaritan woman shows up to get water. This Samaritan woman is probably a moral outcast, and He says to her, "Can you give me a drink?"

Quick side note before we go on in the text: evangelism is really, at its base, about persuasion. We are going to people who don't believe as we believe, who don't see as we see, and who don't have the same vision or understanding as we do. We are trying to encourage them, through the message that we bring, to be persuaded to believe as we believe.

So, evangelism is about persuasion, and according to persuasion experts, the first rule of persuasion is reciprocity. Now, I'm not going to go in depth on what reciprocity is, but it's kind of one of the ideas that if you do a favor for me, then I feel inclined to do a favor for you. I believe that Jesus, here in this passage, is employing this rule of persuasion simply by asking for a drink. He is also starting a conversation with this woman, and she responds.

We read in John chapter 4, beginning in verse 9, "Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, 'How is it that you, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman? For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.'"

Now, most of us might be completely shut down by that interaction with this woman. This is the first-century equivalent of saying, "You shouldn't be talking to me. Don't you know that you have crossed a line?"

Cultural lines have been crossed, creating barriers. There have been long-standing ethnic, cultural, and political issues that divided Jews from Samaritans, going back literally hundreds of years—about 800 years. The Jews hated Samaritans, and the Samaritans didn't care much for Jews either.

However, note that Jesus was not distracted by political drama. Let me emphasize that again because it is really important, especially at this moment that we find ourselves in here in the United States and in the West in general. Jesus was not distracted by political drama. As this woman throws out a comment that incites political drama, He doesn't take the bait.

We should not be trolled into worthless, divisive, and unnecessary conversations. Many of the discussions we find ourselves involved in can quickly spiral down into divisive arguments. It is crucial not to get bogged down in things that have no real eternal value. Arguments over politics, strange theological discussions, and personal preferences are rarely worthwhile. Therefore, we should not be distracted or drawn into debates about worthless things.

This can be a challenging task for us, but it is really important. If we are going to fulfill the command to go and preach the gospel to every creature and to carry out the commission to go into all the world and make disciples of all nations, we must do our best not to be distracted or drawn into debates about worthless things. There are many distractions that can pull us away from our mission.

Jesus was not distracted by political drama, and we should strive, as enabled by the Spirit of God, to avoid being drawn into that as well. Instead, in this passage and in many of the interactions we see Him in—especially in the Gospel of John, which contains these private conversations—Jesus zeroes in directly on the issue. He focuses on what is truly important.

In the story at the well, He reveals to the woman that she is ignorant of two things.

Look at John chapter 4, verse 10. Jesus answered and said to her, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that says to you, 'Give me a drink,' you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water." The woman was ignorant of two critical things: the gift of God and the giver of the gift. Here in this passage, Jesus says to her, "If you knew these two things, then you would realize that I have what you actually really want. If you knew who I was, then you would ask me for this thing that you actually really want, and I would freely give it to you."

He says to her, "If you knew the gift of God." The Samaritans were a very religious and spiritual people. In fact, like many of the people you will interact with, they were formerly religious and now claim to be spiritual but not religious. The Samaritans were aimlessly worshipping in the wrong way and ultimately missing the point. This is similar to many people you will encounter, whether in the office building where you work, on the construction site, or in the classroom. We interact with people who are spiritual and religious, or spiritual but not religious, and they are often focused on a whole bunch of things that will not bring them closer to where they want to be.

Jesus suggests to this woman that he might be more important than she realizes. This is true for most of the people we will interact with as well. They have ideas and opinions about who Jesus is, but they probably do not realize who he actually is. He says, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that you are speaking to, you would have asked him." Though Jesus was asking her for a drink, he hints that he might have what she really needs more than she has what he needs.

This is actually another rule of persuasion. Remember, I mentioned earlier that the first rule of persuasion has to do with reciprocity. The second rule of persuasion involves scarcity. Jesus is introducing some scarcity into this situation right now. He is saying, "I have something that you need. I have something that you want." When I tell people that they were created for something more, it resonates deeply.

They were created for life in connection with God and one another, but they are not experiencing that. When Jesus says, "I have come that you may have life and that you may have it more abundantly," these are issues of scarcity we are introducing into the conversation. People start to think, "Am I missing out? What am I missing out on? What am I searching for? What is it that I really want?" These are all really good questions.

Jesus introduces some scarcity into the conversation by pointing out that you were made for connection, and you're not experiencing it. The final thing that Jesus hints at here is that this gift is what this woman really needs. He tells her, "If you knew who I was, you would ask me, and I would give you living water." He explicitly states what it is that she wants and that He has it.

The woman responds in John 4:11, saying, "Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us this well and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?"

In this conversation, Jesus has sown some seeds to trigger deeper dialogue with this woman. He has planted what I would call seeds of inquiry to encourage her to ask more questions and to figure out the answers to two important questions: Who is Jesus, and what is the gift of God? She takes the bait and responds, "You've told me about this living water, but you've just asked me for a drink. You have nothing to draw with, and this well is deep. So where are you going to get this living water?"

She assumes Jesus's limitations because she believes she knows exactly what He is saying. She asks, "Where then do you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob?" Jesus has already told her that she is ignorant of the gift of God, which she assumes is purely material, and that she is unaware of His true identity. She is trying to sort all of that out. He is having this evangelistic conversation with her, prompting her to consider what the gift is, where it comes from, and how to obtain it. These thoughts are swirling in her mind as she asks Him, "Are you greater than the patriarch Jacob?"

Both the Jews and the Samaritans looked back to some common ancestors. Names like Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were common to both Jews and Samaritans. So, she asks, "Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us this well centuries, millennia before?"

Jesus's aim in this conversation is to reveal the woman's need, her problem, and then to reveal the solution to the problem. He does this by talking to her about the gift and the giver. He continues in John chapter 4, verse 13: "Jesus answered and said to her, 'Whoever drinks of this water in this well will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst. The water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up unto everlasting life.'"

The gift that Jesus is speaking about is not material; it's not simply a physical sort of thing like water or bread. It wasn't water drawn from an earthly well. If you seek after things of this world—earthly water, earthly food—then you will ultimately not be satisfied. But if you drink of Christ and what it is that He gives, you will be fully satisfied. Not only will you be fully satisfied in this life, but you'll be fully satisfied on into everlasting life. Moreover, you'll be fully satisfied in such a way that you become a source of life-giving satisfaction for others because you can share this living water with them.

As the woman inquires of Jesus, He clearly communicates to her what the gift of God is. He is not trying to hide anything. He tells her that she is ignorant of the gift of God and the giver of the gift, and He wants her to come to the understanding of what the gift of God is and who He really is. He is leading her into this understanding, and as He communicates, He explicitly tells her what the gift of God is.

The woman responds in verse 15, saying, "Sir, give me this water that I may not thirst nor have to come out to this well to draw water again." What Jesus offers sounds very good to this woman. He had previously said, "If you knew the gift of God, you would have asked for it, and if you asked for it, I would give it to you." At this point, she has begun to understand at least just a little bit.

What the gift is, and so she asks for it, but Jesus doesn't immediately give it to her. He said, "If you knew the gift of God and also the one who is speaking to you, then you would ask, and he would give you." You've got to know the gift, but you've also got to know the giver before you can receive the gift that he gives.

So, Jesus has revealed something about this gift, though not fully. She doesn't understand what living water is entirely, which brings you unto everlasting life, but she knows that she wants what Jesus is talking about. Now, Jesus needs to reveal not just the gift but also who he really is. Remember, she has now asked him a question: "Are you greater than Jacob?"

How does Jesus reveal his true identity? I love this. Look at verse 16 of John chapter 4. Jesus said to her, "Go and call your husband and come here." This is kind of a strange response. She is starting to realize that she wants this gift that he's talking about, and she's now beginning to look into who this man is that she is talking to.

She says, "Are you greater than our father Jacob?" and he responds by saying, "Go and get your husband, and then come here." The woman answered in verse 17, "I have no husband." She has seemed playful up to this point and pretty talkative, but now all of a sudden, she gets quiet quickly. He says, "Go and get your husband, and then come back out here," and she replies, "I have no husband."

Then Jesus said to her in verse 17 again, "You have well said, 'I have no husband,' for you have had five husbands, and the one that you are now with is not your husband. In that, you have spoken truly."

This is a little awkward. In seeing this conversation, this interplay between Jesus and the woman at the well, it is indeed a bit uncomfortable. However, we need to recognize this really important point: don't be afraid to offend. The message that we have, in some respects, is offensive. Before a person can experience the saving grace and forgiveness of Christ, they have to acknowledge their lostness and their sin.

Jesus's response to this woman at this point reveals that he is something more than just a Jewish man at a well on a hot day. He says to her, "Well, you're right; you don't have a husband."

Husband, you've had five husbands, and the man that you're with right now is not your husband. She starts to realize that there's something different about this guy that she's talking to. So she says to him in John 4:19, "Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet."

Jesus told her that she was ignorant of the gift of God, and He has now begun to reveal to her what that gift is: living water that carries you on into everlasting life. He has also told her that she was ignorant of the giver of the gift—His true identity. That is exactly what He is now beginning to do: reveal to her who He truly is. When He says to her, "You're right; you don't have a husband. You've had five husbands, and the guy that you're with right now is not your husband," she responds, "I think you might be something more than I thought you were. I think you might be a prophet."

Now she gives Him a kind of prophet's test or her own personal test to try and figure out who Jesus is. She says this in John 4:20: "Our fathers worshiped on this mountain." The Samaritans worshiped in that area called Samaria, near a mountaintop called Gerizim, while the children of Israel worshiped in Jerusalem on Mount Moriah or Mount Zion, there on the Temple Mount at the temple. She continues, "You Jews say that Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship."

So she turns to Jesus and is basically saying, "Sort this out for us. Who is right?" Jesus goes on in verse 21: "Woman, believe me." That’s important right there. "The hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such 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, who is called Christ. When He comes, He will tell us all things." Then note this in verse 26: Jesus said to her, "I who speak to you am He."

Now, the interesting thing is that when you look at this text in the original language, which was written in Greek, verse 26 literally reads, "I am is speaking to you." If you've been around the Bible for a while and you've read from the beginning in the book of Genesis and through Exodus, you know that in Exodus chapter...

We have this very important point where Moses asks God, who is speaking to him through a burning bush, "Whom am I going to tell my countrymen, the Jewish people in Egypt, sent me?" When he goes down there and says, "The God of our fathers has sent me," God replies, "I am who I am. Tell them that I am has sent you."

Jesus here is mirroring those exact same words. He says, "I am" is speaking to you, and that is in response to the question of the woman when she says to him, "We know that the Christ, when he comes, is going to reveal all things." Jesus responds, "I am" is speaking to you. "I am the Christ" is exactly what he is saying in this passage.

He has now revealed to her the gift and the giver. The gift is living water, which satisfies eternally, and now the giver of the gift, his true nature, is revealed: "I am" is speaking with you.

Notice the woman's response in John chapter 4, beginning at verse 28. The woman left her water pot, went her way into the city, and said to the men of the city, "Come, see a man who told me all things that ever I did. Could this be the Christ?" Then they went out of the city and came to him.

The woman left her water pot, which indicates that she found what she had been looking for. She became an evangelist immediately after discovering the gift of God and the giver of the gift. She apparently receives this living water from Jesus, leaves her water pot, and goes into the city. She becomes an instant evangelist, saying to the people, "Come and see a man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this be the Christ?"

Don't be shy about sharing with others what you have found in Jesus. This is really important. If you have discovered through the gospel this good news about the gift of life—life more abundantly, everlasting life, living water, the bread of life—go through whatever metaphor you want to use: the path of life, the gate, the door. All these different metaphors in Scripture point to the same truth. If you have discovered in Jesus that he is the one who brings connection with God and connection with one another, life everlasting, life abundantly, and you have tasted of that, don't be shy about sharing it.

With others, that's what we're called to do. That's what we're commissioned to do, and that's what we as a church are all about: life in connection with God and one another, and then bringing other people into connection with God and one another as well through the Gospel. Jesus has reconciled us to God; He has made it possible for us to be at peace with God for eternity. He has given us new life forever and ever, and once we have tasted of that, we cannot be shy about sharing that good life and that good news with other people.

My hope is to encourage you to do exactly this. It's interesting; this last week, I was listening to an individual who is a psychiatrist and a doctor. He trained and was a professor at Oxford University. He was talking about how science has discovered that there are three very important things that humans need. This blew my mind as I was listening to this, and it's just coincidence that I was listening to it. He was saying that science in psychology and the social sciences have discovered that there are three very important things that humans need: they need a connection to one another, they need to connect with this world—they literally need to get out in nature and connect with the world—and they need to be connected to a body of like-minded people who are also worshiping and have the same values.

This guy is not a believer, and yet he was saying we need to be connected to one another, we need to be connected to God, and we need to be connected with the world. This is what we find when we come to the pages of Scripture. This is what we find in the Gospel, and this is what we as a church really want to be able to share with other people: the people that we interact with on a regular basis—our neighbors, our family members, our co-workers, our friends. We want to share with them that the way we are going to experience life and that more abundantly, what we truly desire, is to be brought into connection with God, to be brought into connection with one another, and to be connected with all that God has made in this world.

That is where we truly experience what God made us for, where we fulfill the purpose for which we were made. So listen, if you are a believer and you've trusted Jesus Christ, then don't be shy about sharing this good news with others of what you've found in Jesus.

Father God, I pray that you would cause these things to be in our hearts, and not just in our hearts and in our minds, but Lord, that they would be on our lips and we would share them with other people. I pray for anyone who's watching this right now that you would give us those opportunities this week, that we have a hard time getting out of, that we cannot deny, and that when we have those opportunities, we would share the good news.

We share the news of who You are and what You've done in our lives with others so that they might know this life and life more abundantly that we have with You and in You. We desire for them to experience connection with You, with one another, and with all that You have made. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.

Holy, holy is here. Sing a new song to Him who sits on heaven's mercy seat. Holy, holy, holy is to come. With all creation, I sing praise to the King of Kings. You are my everything, and I will adore You.

Golden rainbows of living colors.

Build us wonders. I struck wonder at the mention of Your name. We're filled with wonders. I struck wonder at the mention of Your name, Jesus. Your name is all.

Is with all creation, I sing praise to the King of Kings. Here, I buy everything. Father God, thank you for the opportunity that we've had today to go through the Scriptures and to consider this passage of Scripture with Jesus and the woman at the well in John chapter 4.

Lord, thank you for the opportunity to worship you. You have made us to be worshippers; you've made us to experience connection with you and with one another. I pray that we would really begin to experience that more fully. Not only experience it, but express it in our lives and extend it to other people.

God, do a work in and through your church. Pour out your Spirit for such a time as this, as we are living in a culture that is in desperate need of your grace, your forgiveness, and the reconciliation that is only found in you. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.

And now may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father, and the fellowship of His Holy Spirit be with you all. God bless. Have a wonderful day.

Hi, my name is Daniel. Welcome to church! By the way, have you ever had a Red Bull? I never had a Red Bull before, but I had a Red Bull last night, and I really liked it.