Let's open our Bibles to John
chapter 4. Once again, John chapter 4. Let me refresh your memory by
reading just a few verses beginning at verse 25 of John chapter 4. The Savior and the woman of Samaria,
the woman said to him, I know that Messiah cometh, which is
called Christ. When he has come, he will tell
us all things. Jesus saith unto her, I that
speak unto thee, am. And the word he is in italics. which means that our translators,
they put that in. The 27th verse, and upon this
came his disciples and marveled that he talked with the woman.
Yet no man said, what seekest thou? Or, why talkest thou with
her? The woman then left her waterpot,
and went her way in the city, and saith to the man, Come, see
a man which told me all things that ever I did. Is not this
the Christ? And they went out of the city,
and came unto him. And then it says, In the meanwhile
his disciples prayed him, or begged him, saying, Master, eat. But he said unto them, I have
meat to eat that ye know not of. Therefore said the disciples
one to another, hath any man brought him all to eat? Jesus
saith unto them, my meat is to do the will of him that sent
me and to finish his work. Here our Lord meets with one
of his lost sheep and he brings her into the fold of salvation. He is the great, the great I
am. And he had a work to do that
God the Father gave him. And that work is being, at least
to some extent, is being revealed in this passage of scripture
because one of the jobs that he has to do as the shepherd
of the sheep is to seek out the lost sheep and then to draw them
unto himself. We know that our Lord in the
covenant of grace, he stood as our spokesman, he stood as our
agent in that great covenant, the second person of the trinity,
He was there to represent our interests and to deal with the
Almighty God on our behalf. And as he dealt with God on our
behalf, so he dealt with God on the behalf of this woman of
Samaria. He is, after all, our Savior. He is the one who came to rescue
us. came to deliver us from our sins. He is indeed our surety. He bears responsibility for the
safety of all of His people. He is the shepherd of the sheep. He is our substitute. All of
these things were set forth in the covenant of grace. He's God's
appointed servant and He's God's sin offering, the offering for
sin. And this great responsibility
of the salvation of all of His people, it fell upon the Savior. And it's a responsibility that
He willingly and voluntarily took upon Himself. Now let me
set forth a couple of questions for you here at the beginning.
First of all, was God the Son? Did He have the power? Did He
have the strength? Did He have the ability to take
care of? and to accomplish the duties,
the work that God assigned him. And indeed, he does have that
ability. He does have the strength. We
read over in the 89th Psalm and the 19th verse where God says,
I have laid a help upon one who is mighty. That's the Savior
we need. We need one who's mighty. His
name is, as Isaiah chapter 9 verse 6 says, one of His names is the
mighty God. Our salvation rests upon Him
by divine appointment. And His success His success is
dependent upon his strength, his ability, and his power to
get the job done. So here's the issue. Is Jesus
the Lord? Is he able to do the work that
God gave him to do? And the answer is yes. God said,
I have laid help upon one who is mighty. The one we rest in,
the one we look to, the one we rely on, God has made him to
be our help. He's mighty to save. He's mighty
to keep. He's mighty to redeem. He's mighty
to reconcile. His blood is of such great power
that it washed away all the sins of His people. And that righteousness
that He established, which He freely imputes, to all of His
people is of such a nature that all of those for whom He died,
all of those for whom He shed His blood, were made the very
righteousness of God in Jesus Christ the Lord. Yes, He is able. He is able to save. He is the
Mighty One. In Isaiah chapter 63, we read
in verse 1, Who is this that cometh from Edom? with dyed garments
from Basra, this that is glorious in His apparel, this One who
is traveling in the greatness of His strength. And listen to
what the Savior says, I that speak in righteousness, mighty
to save. He is mighty to save. Go over
with me to Hebrews, if you would, chapter 7. In the book of Hebrews
chapter 7, Note what is written here by the Spirit of Grace. Hebrews chapter 7, and of course
we know about the book of Hebrews and it sets forth the grand superiority
of our Lord Jesus over all, over everybody, over all of the angels
and over all of the prophets, over all of the priests of the
Old Testament. Here in Hebrews chapter 7, notice
the 23rd verse, but this man, But this man, Hebrews 7, verse
23, they truly were many priests, because they were not suffered
to continue by reason of death. We understand that. These priests,
they died off. Another one had to take his position. No high priest just kept on living,
so when Aaron died, one of his sons took over. When he died,
another one took over. There was a continuation of virtual
change within the priesthood. But this man, And you notice
the word man is again italicized. This one, this unusual, extraordinary
one, who is the God-man. But this one, because He continueth
forever, well, He hath an unchangeable priesthood. Wherefore He is able
also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by Him, seeing
He ever liveth to make intercession for them. He's able to save to
the uttermost. He's able to save fully. He's
able to save us perfectly. He is able to save us completely. because He's God Almighty. We
don't have a Savior who is weak. We don't have a Savior who is
unable to do the Father's will. He is fully able to do God's
will, to finish the work that the Father gave Him to do, because
our Savior is Himself God Almighty. He is mighty, mighty to save. So He's able to fulfill all the
responsibilities that were laid upon Him, those responsibilities
which He volunteered to accomplish. So now we know He's able to do
the work. He's able to finish the work
that the Father assigned to Him in the covenant of grace, and
part of that work was dealing individually with all of God's
elect, like He dealt with this woman of Samaria, drawing her
unto Himself. He's able to save her. He's able
to redeem her. He's able to make her righteous.
He's able to effectually draw her unto Himself. He's able to
preserve her, He's able to justify her, He's able to keep her until
that day when she went home to glory, and He's able to glorify
her. He's able to do the work that
God gave Him to do for that particular sinner, and not only that particular
sinner, but every sinner that God entrusted to Him in the covenant
of grace. He's able. Now here's the second
question. Was He willing to do the work?
Was he willing to do the work? You are in Hebrews chapter 7,
look over to the chapter 10. Hebrews chapter 10. Look at verse
4. It is not possible that the blood
of bulls and of goats should take away sins. Wherefore? Wherefore, when he cometh into
the world, he saith, Sacrifice an offering thou wouldest not,
but a body thou hast prepared me. In burnt offerings and sacrifices
for sin, thou hast had no pleasure, you had no satisfaction in those. If God had had satisfaction in
the Old Testament offerings for sin, in the trespass offerings,
in the peace offerings, in all of the offerings, in the burnt
offerings that were offered every day, and in the offerings that
were offered on the Day of Atonement yearly, if those had actually
put away the sin of the people, then no more offering would have
been required. But they didn't do the job. They didn't finish the work of
redemption. In fact, they didn't even start
it. Did they? They didn't even start it. All
they did, they pictured the work of redemption. They set forth
the work of redemption in shadow. But they had nothing to do with
redeeming the sinner. They couldn't put away even one
sin. And after it had been firmly
established that all of these sacrifices together, rivers of
blood that flowed from Jewish altars down through the centuries
when it had been well established that they could never put away
sin, then God sent His Son who came into the world to do what
all of those sacrifices could never do. That is, save His people. And so the Savior said, In verse
7, in burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin, God had no satisfaction. He had no satisfaction. God's
justice has got to be satisfied, but it wasn't satisfied in them.
So then said I, lo, I come. In the volume of the book it
is written of me. In the volume of the book of
God's predestination. in the volume of the book of
the Old Testament. To do thy will, O God. Above, when He said, Sacrifice
and offering, and burnt offerings, and offering for sin, thou wouldest
not, neither has pleasure therein, which are offered by the law.
Then said He, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. He is not only
able to do the will of God, But He's willing to do the will of
God. He's willing to save sinners. He's able, He has the strength,
and He has the willingness, He has the desire within His own
soul to save the elect of God. Lo, I come to do Thy will, O
God. He taketh away the first, that
He may establish the second. What those Old Testament offerings
could never do, What they could never accomplish, He came to
do. Well, what did He do? Well, look
at verse 11. And every priest standeth daily
ministering, and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which can
never take away sins. But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice
for sins forever, he sat down on the right hand of God, And
we've heard this a number of times and it still bears repeating
within the tabernacle and the temple, there was no chair because
the work of the priesthood, the work of the high priest was never
finished, it was never done. There was always yet another
offering to be offered. After a priest had received an
offering from somebody that brought an animal and said, this is to
be killed for the sins of my family, and that priest offered
that one, while he is offering that one, here is another family
walks up to another priest and says, this is an animal for my
family, I want you to kill it. This is non-stop, non-stop. They stood daily, daily ministering
and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices that could never take
away sin. But this man, after he had offered
one sacrifice for sins forever, he sat down on the right hand
of God. What does that tell you? His
work was done. That work that God assigned Him
in the covenant of grace to save His people? That work of redemption
and reconciliation? That work of a rescue of the
lost? He had finished that work that
God the Father gave Him and He went back to glory and He sat
down. It says, "...from henceforth
expecting till His enemies be made His footstool. For by one
offering..." What did He do? "...by one offering He hath perfected
forever them that are sanctified." He did the job. He did the job. He was able to do it and He was
willing to do it. Now go back to our text in John
chapter 4. Now, I want you to notice And
it's the last verse that I read, which is verse 34, Jesus said
to His disciples, John 4, 34, My meat, My food, that which
strengthens Me, that which brings nourishment, as it were, to My
heart, is to do the will of Him that sent Me. He's able to do
it? And he's willing to do it and
to finish his work. To finish his work. Now this work is set forth as
one work. It is singular. It is singular. But though it is indeed one work, it is one work with several parts. Go back with me to Isaiah chapter
61. And the reason it is set forth as
just one work is because every facet of it is necessary to finish
the whole work. But it's made up of several different
segments. Let's put it that way. Look at
Isaiah chapter 61. The Spirit of the Lord God is
upon me. And we know that this is about
our Savior because in Luke chapter 4, the Savior reads this when
he was in the synagogue and he said, these are about me. He
said, today this is fulfilled in your ears. This scripture
is. So we know it's about him. He says, the Spirit of the Lord
God is upon me because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good
tidings unto the meek. He sent me to bind up the broken
hearted. to proclaim liberty to the captives
and the opening of the prison to them that are bound, to proclaim
the acceptable year of the Lord and the day of vengeance of our
God, to comfort all that mourn, to appoint unto them that mourn
in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for
mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness,
that they might be called trees of righteousness, of the Lord
that He might be glorified. Our Lord had one work to do,
but it had different facets of that work, different segments
of that work. He had to become incarnate in
that part of the work. He had to become incarnate. He
had to make His entrance into this world. He had to live a
life of obedience to the law. That's part of the work. He had
to confront sinners with the truth as He does this woman. And everyone given to Him in
the covenant of grace, He will by His Spirit confront them with
the truth. That's part of the work, isn't
it? Sure it's part of the work that He alone has to do. He has
to grant unto His people spiritual life. This work, it also included He
had to conquer all of our enemies at the cross. Those enemies being
Satan and sin and death in the world. And the biggest part of this
work was redemption. The redemption of His people
by blood from divine justice. The law of God, it held us for
ransom. It demanded a ransom be paid
if we're to be released. There will be no release of those
who are held captive by God's law unless the Son of God does
the work of redemption, rendering to the justice of God the only
ransom price that will result in our liberation. That's His
own death. And all of these things are necessary,
but the Savior refers to it as one work. One work. And that one work is certainly
summarized in Matthew 1.21. He shall save His people from
their sin. That's the work. That's the work. And over here in John chapter
4, here's one of His lost sheep. Here she is. And she comes to
the well. She isn't searching for the Lord. She didn't hear that Jesus of
Nazareth would be passing by and then she arranged to meet
Him. No, that's the furthest thing
from her mind. This is not something that she
initiated. This is part of the work that
the Savior came to do. To make sure that His people
are confronted with the reality and the identity of who He is. She's got to find out who He
is. So does all of the elect. You see, as you look through
the Gospel narratives, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, And I thought
about this again today a good bit. Nowhere does our Lord make
a fuller revelation of Himself like He does here in John chapter
4 to the woman of Samaria. He identifies Himself as Messiah. You know, He didn't do that to
the Jews. In fact, He didn't even do that
to Nicodemus. That He revealed to Nicodemus
the necessity of the new birth. He revealed to Nicodemus the
necessity that the Son of Man must be lifted up. But He did
not identify Himself to Nicodemus like He does to this woman. He
tells her, I'm the Messiah. He says, I am. That's what He
says, I am. Look at it again. Go back up
there to verse 25. John chapter 4. The woman said
unto him, I know that Messiah is cometh, which is called Christ. When He is come, He will tell
us all things. Jesus saith unto her, I that
speak unto thee am He. I am the Messiah. And more than
that, He is saying, I am. I am. Our brother read that passage
of Scripture from Exodus chapter 3. The one who spoke to Moses
out of the bush that burned but was not consumed is the same
one talking to the woman at the well. He's the great I Am. He's the
I Am who came to fulfill the work that God the Father assigned
to Him in the covenant of grace. And part of that work is to rescue
this vile sinner. She's not looking to be rescued.
She doesn't even know that she's in danger. She's got her religion. Our Father's worshipped in this
mountain. You say Jerusalem's where you
ought to worship. She's got religion, but she doesn't
have Christ. She doesn't have spiritual life.
And the work that the Savior came to do, indeed He came to
redeem her, He came to reconcile her, He came to forgive her of
her sins by the shedding of His blood, He came to establish a
righteousness for her, and also He came to seek and to save that
which was lost. And she's sure enough lost. She's
lost. She is ignorant. Go back. Look back in chapter 4. Look
at her ignorance. Go back in verse 9 of chapter
4. Our Lord is at the well. Then saith the woman of Samaria
unto him, How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of
me, which am a woman of Samaria? 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 wouldst have asked of him, and
he would have given thee living water. She doesn't know the gift of
God. She doesn't know who she's talking
to. She doesn't know who is dealing with her. And neither did we. Neither did we when the gospel
first came our way. We heard the message, and then
in God's own time, He began to give us an interest, and then
we found out, oh, this is a message that comes from the lips of God
Himself. Our Lord begins to deal with
her. She doesn't know. She's ignorant. In fact, she
says this in verse 12, Are you greater than Jacob? Are you greater than Jacob? And
you want to say to it, greater than Jacob? This is Jacob's God. This is Jacob's creator. This
is the one who said to Jacob, I am thy redeemer. She doesn't know. Like all of us. And you know what the Savior's
work was right here on this occasion? To give her knowledge. To make
a revelation of Himself to her heart. And He does that. He does that. And so much so,
that you can't go back down a little further in the chapter. Look
at verse 28. The woman then left her water
pot when the eyes of her soul were open. You see, up to this
point, the only thing that mattered to her was literal water. But
now the eyes of her soul are open. And she just, she drops
the water pot and forgets all about the water. Here's what
happens when the Son of God makes a revelation of Himself to our
hearts. The things of this world, as
the hymn writer said, become strangely dim. And all of a sudden,
our eyes and our hearts and our minds are open to Jesus Christ
and Him crucified. And He gives to our souls a saving
interest in Himself. Now, are we still going to have
to have the water of this world? This woman is still going to
have to drink water like this. But all of a sudden, it's this
man who is more important to her than anything. Than anything. And what brought this about?
His power. His power, there was a work assigned
to Him in the covenant of grace. And in that work was included
the salvation of this Samaritan woman. And therefore, we read
earlier in the chapter, in verse 4, he must needs go through Samaria,
because in the covenant of grace God the Father gave to him, this
woman of Samaria, she's one of God's chosen vessels of mercy. She must be confronted by the
Savior. She must be regenerated by His
mighty power. She must be brought to a saving
knowledge of Himself. And now's the time for him to
bring all of that to pass. This is the work. This is the
work that he came to do. And with you and me. We know
that our conversion, it wasn't, it didn't just happen by accident. It happened right on schedule.
Back in old eternity, in the covenant of grace, all the particulars
of this work were worked out and ironed out by the triune
God. And it was ordained that Christ
would give His life a ransom for you and that the Spirit of
God, using the Word of God, would cross your path. Just like our
Lord Jesus crossed paths with this woman. You see, we cannot believe an
unrevealed Savior. You just can't do it. You listen
to the Super Soul Winners, they say, just believe on Jesus, just
believe on Jesus. Well, who is He? Who is He? The man born in John chapter
10, the man born blind. You remember this man had been
executed because the Savior healed him and everybody has asked him
all these questions. The Savior came up to him and said, you
believe? You believe on Jesus Christ? You believe this man?
He said, who is he, Lord, that I might believe? If I find out
who he is, I'll believe him. And when you find out who he
is, that's when you'll believe him. And not before then. This woman has no interest in
Him. When He asked her for a drink
of water, He said, what? You're a Jew. You're a Jew. Why are you even talking to Me? He's more than a man. He's the
God-man. And this is what she found out
by revelation of grace to her heart. He's the Messiah. He's the Anointed One. He said,
one anointed be the prophet, priest, and king of His people.
Who is He? He's the great I Am. He's Jehovah,
Jehovah. And He makes a revelation of
Himself to this woman. He didn't do that to the Pharisees.
In fact, you look back to the first part of chapter 4, He left
Judea, verse 3. He left Judea. He left the Pharisees
in their self-righteousness. He's going after a sinner. He
left them in their blindness. Look at Luke chapter 10. Let
me give you a reference on this. Luke the 10th chapter. Look at verse 21. Luke chapter 10 verse 21. In that hour Jesus rejoiced in
spirit and said, I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and
earth. Thou hast hid these things from
the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes, even
so, father, but so it seemed good in thy sight." Who are the
wise and the prudent? Well, if you want to know, and
they won't mind telling you, just ask the Pharisees. They'll
tell you who the wise and the prudent are. That's us. And the Lord hid them from him.
Hid these things from him. And he revealed them unto babes
like the woman of Samaria. Like you. Like you. He said back over in... Look at Isaiah. Let me give you
a reference here. Isaiah 65, I believe it is. Yeah, Isaiah chapter 65 verse
1. Isaiah 65 and verse 1. I am salt of them that ask not
for me. Isn't that the woman of Samaria? Isn't that you? That's you, isn't
it? That's me. I'm sought of them
that ask not for me. I'm found of them that sought
me not. Was she seeking Him or was He
seeking her? It's like in the garden when
Adam and Eve had sinned and they ran off to hide in the garden.
Who was seeking who? Were they seeking God or was
the Lord seeking them in the cool of the day? You know. And anybody who's honest about
the Scriptures knows too. The Lord does the seeking, does
the finding, because no man seeketh after God. That's what the Bible
says. Romans chapter 3. Thank God He seeks us. He said,
and the rest says, I said, behold me, behold me unto a nation that
was not called by my name. Who is this that seeks the sinners? He's the great I Am. He's Jehovah
our Savior. Throughout the book of John he
identified himself as the I Am. Brother Joe read to us the beginning
of the surface this evening, out of John chapter 8, where
he told the Pharisees, before Abraham was, I am. And they got
mad as hornets. Picked up stones to stone him.
They were ready to kill him. They said, you're not even 50
years old. You're older than Abraham. Before Abraham was,
I am. when the soldiers led by Judas
came to arrest him in John chapter 18. He said, who are you looking
for? He said, Jesus of Nazareth. He
said, I am. And it all fell back backwards.
That's the power of his name, power of who he is. In the Gospel of John, our Lord
takes His title to Himself several times. He says in John 6.35,
I am the bread of life. John 8.12, I am the light of
the world. John 10.79, I am the door. 11 and 14, I am the Good Shepherd,
John 11, 25, I am the resurrection and the life, John 14, verse
6, I am the way, the truth and the life, and John 15, 1, I am
the vine. He is the I am. He is Jehovah
who saves. And when He comes to you in saving
power, He will make sure to introduce Himself to you and you will know
that He is Jehovah who saves you. And if you think you did
the saving, you hadn't met Him yet. People talk about being saved
and they start off this way, well I made my decision for Jesus. I did this or I did something
else. I tell you, those who have been
conquered by Almighty Grace, here is what they say. He saved
me. He sought me. He chose me. He redeemed me. He sought me. He is the One who
bought me. He brought me unto Himself. He
keeps me and He is going to take me home to glory and all of my
salvations depend upon Him. And these folks who think that
they're doing Jesus' service by letting Him save them. They've
never met the Christ of the Bible. The Lord Jesus introduces Himself
to His people. And here's this woman. Let me
give you this and I'll send you on your way. You know, the disciples Look in verse 27, John 4. He's been speaking to this woman
and in His divine providence, He keeps His disciples at a distance
till He deals with her. See, He controls all things.
It's as though He had a stop sign up and they couldn't come
back to see Him till He's finished dealing with her. And they come
walking up then when he releases him, when it's time for them
to come back. He sees the Savior talking with
this woman in verse 27. They marveled that he talked
with her. They're shocked. First of all,
that he would talk with a woman. And secondly, that he would allow
a woman to talk to him. And thirdly, it'd be a woman
of Samaria. You see, these disciples, they
still had some self-righteousness, and they still clung to some
rules and laws and things like that, traditions. Well, it's
not right! Well, now wait a minute. It's
right if He's dealing with her. It's right because He's doing
it. Here is a poor sinner who had come to Jacob's well, dead
in trespasses and sin. And you know what? She leaves
very much alive. Very much alive. She came to
the well, a fallen child of Adam. She went back to the city rejoicing
in the last Adam. She came to the well concerned
only about the water. Water that would just temporarily
quench your thirst. And she left that well with the
water of life bubbling up inside of her like an artesian well. It is never going to go dry. She came to that well foul with
sin, guilty and ashamed. She goes home washed. and justified
and sanctified. She came to the well very corrupt. She goes home, goes back to the
city consecrated. She came polluted. She goes away
washed. Oh, the power of this man. May he work factually within
each of us to draw us unto Himself and make us to rejoice in Him
so much so that we just drop our water pots. We still got
a lot of water pots we hold on to, don't we? And one of these
days we'll drop all the water pots of this world. Go home to
see Him face to face. Until then, well, I ask the Lord
for me and for you. Take some more of these water
pots out of our hands, these things of the world, and let
us see Jesus only. Jesus only. Well, let's sing.