I have, which are not of this
fold, them also I must bring. And they shall hear my voice,
and there shall be one fold and one shepherd. Let's stand together. Tom's going to come lead us in
the hymn on the back of your bulletin. Morning. A scripture reading
is going to be in John 14, starting in verse 22. John 14, 22. Jesus said unto him, or Judah said
unto him, not ascaria, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest
thyself unto us, and not the world? Jesus answered and said
to him, if a man loved me, he will keep my words, and my father
will love him, and we will come unto him and make our abode with
him. What a blessing, isn't it? A
promise. If we keep the gospel, if we
keep believing the gospel, he will come into us. He that loveth
me keepeth my sayings, and the word which ye hear is not mine,
but the Father's which he sent me. These things I have spoken
unto you, being yet present with you. But the Comforter, which
is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall
teach you all things and bring all things to your remembrance
whatsoever I have said unto you." This is what the Holy Spirit
did for those believers when they wrote the scriptures and
what the Holy Ghost does with us in remembering our Lord and
reminding us to look to Christ, reminding us his word. peace
I live with you." What a wonderful peace and this is the best peace
and the best thing he could have left us, peace with God, peace
with the Father which he attained at the cross. My peace I give unto you, not
as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled,
neither let it be afraid. You have heard now I said unto
you, I go away and I come again unto you. If you love me, you
will rejoice, because I have said, I go unto the Father, and
my Father is greater than I. We rejoice because he went to
the Father to present the names of all the elect, of all the
chosen, of all his church, present them holy to the Father. And
now I've told you, before it came to pass, that when it comes
to pass, you might believe. Hereafter, I will not talk much
with you, for the prince of the world cometh, and hath nothing
in me, but that the world may know that I love the Father."
And as the Father gave me the commandment, even so I do arise
and let us go hence. Let's go to the Father in prayer.
Father God, we come before you in the name of the Lord Jesus
Christ and by his righteousness and by his death on the cross,
we have access to you by this grace. We thank you, Father,
for your wonderful blessings, the wonderful Holy Spirit that
we require, Father. ask you that you may now, through
the Holy Spirit, point us to Christ. Then we may be able to
see more of his glory. Father, open our ears, open our
eyes, Father. Fill the past, Greg, with the
Holy Spirit, Father, that his message might be clear, that
his message might glorify the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray this
for all the other brothers and sisters that are throughout the
world where the gospel is being preached, that the gospel may
be clear, and that the Lord Jesus Christ may be magnified and glorified,
Father, in our hearts. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Let's stand together once again.
We'll sing hymn number 352 from the hardback hymnal, and then
Bree will bring special music afterwards. Let's all stand together.
Number 352. I am delirious. I see the stars. I hear the rolling thunder. Like art through love. How great Thou art, how great
Thou art. Then sings my soul, my Saviour
God, to Thee How great Thou art! How great Thou art! When through the woods and forest
plains I wander And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees. When I look down from lofty mountain
grandeur, and hear the brook, and feel the gentle breeze, Then sings my soul, my Saviour
God, to Thee How great Thou art, how great Thou art Then sings
my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee And when I think That God is
so much sparing Sent Him to die I scarce can take it in That
on the cross My burden gladly bearing He bled and died Take
away my sin Then sings my soul My Saviour God to Thee How great
Thou art How great Thou art Then sings my soul My Saviour God
to Thee How great Thou art! How great Thou art! When grace shall come This shattered
life will be strong And take me home What joy shall fill my
heart Then I shall bow in humble adoration And there proclaim,
my God, how great Thou art Then sings my soul, my Savior God,
to Thee How great Thou art How great Thou art! Then sings my soul, my Saviour
God, to Thee How great Thou art! How great Thou art! That was good, wasn't it? Thank
you, Brie. Thank you, Dan, wherever you
are. Would you open your Bibles with
me to John chapter 4? John chapter 4. I've titled this message, from shame
to the Savior. And my hope this morning is that
the Spirit of God will do exactly for you and for me what He did
here for this woman at the well, taking her from the shame of
her sin to find all her hope and all her joy and all her righteousness
in the Lord Jesus Christ. If he does, it will be the most
painful and the most glorious experience that you'll have at
the same time. It'll be the most humbling if
the Lord's pleased to show us the shame of our sin, and it'll
be the most exhilarating if he's pleased to show us the righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ and our place in Him. Let's read this story together.
It's very, very familiar. We'll begin reading at verse
4. the Lord Jesus Christ must, needs,
go through Samaria. Then cometh he to a city of Samaria,
which is called Sychar, near the parcel of ground that Jacob
gave to his son Joseph. Now Joseph's well was there,
Jacob's well was there. Jesus, therefore, being wearied
with his journey, sat thus on the well, and it was about the
sixth hour, high noon, middle of the day. Women don't usually
go to the well in the middle of the day, but this woman was
too ashamed to be there at the time that the other women would
have gone. There cometh a woman of Samaria
to draw water. And Jesus saith unto her, Give
me to drink. And his disciples were going
away into the city to buy meat, and then saith the woman of Samaria
unto him, How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest a drink of
me, which am a woman of Samaria? For the Jews have no dealings
with the Samaritans." Now, the Jews did in fact have business
dealings with Samaritans. The disciples, the scripture
just said, were in Sychar buying food. The word that's written,
no dealings, means literally to share in the same. And it's
obvious that what the woman of Samaria is saying to the Lord
Jesus Christ is, how is it that you being a Jew are asking to
drink from the same vessel that I'm drinking from? A Samaritan,
no Jew would ever do that. But that's exactly what you and
I have to do. We have to be brought by God
to drink from the same vessel. I have a baptism, the Lord said,
that you know not of. And then he told Peter, he said,
you're going to be baptized in my baptism. We've got to drink
from that same vessel. We've got to experience the same
thing the Lord Jesus Christ experienced when He drank the bitter dregs
of God's wrath on Calvary's cross, when He suffered the judgment
of God for our sins. We've got to be in Him. We've got to be found in Him. How can you be in a Jew drink
from the same vessel that I'm going to drink from." And 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 him, and he would have given thee living water.
And the woman said unto him, Sir, thou hast nothing to draw
with, and the well is deep. From whence then hast thou this
living water? Art thou greater than our father
Jacob, which gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and
his children, and his cattle?" Oh, what a question. Aren't thou
greater than our father Jacob? This is the Son of God. This
is the fullness of the Godhead bodily speaking to her. And she wants to know if he's
greater than Jacob. And Jesus answered and said unto
her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again, but
whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never
thirst, but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well
of water springing up into everlasting life. And the woman saith unto
him, Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not, neither come
hither to draw. She still was confused, wasn't
she? She couldn't separate the physical from the spiritual.
She couldn't separate the visible from the invisible. That which
was fleshly to that which was of the Spirit of God. She couldn't
see it. Not yet. Not yet. And Jesus said unto her, go call
thy husband and come hither. And the woman answered and said,
I have no husband. And Jesus said unto her, Thou
hast well said, I have no husband, for thou hast had five husbands,
and he whom thou now hast is not thy husband. In that sayest
thou truly. And the woman saith unto him,
Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet. Our fathers worshipped
in this mountain, and you say that in Jerusalem is the place
where men ought to worship. And Jesus saith unto her, Woman,
believe me, the hour cometh when you shall neither in this mountain
nor yet at Jerusalem worship the Father. You worship you know
not what. We know what we worship, for
salvation is of the Jews. For the hour cometh, and now
is." Right now. when the true worshipers shall
worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father
seeketh such to worship him. God is spirit, and they that
worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. The woman
saith unto him, I know that Messiah cometh, which is called Christ.
And when he is come, he will tell us all things. And Jesus
saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am he. And upon this
came his disciples and marveled that he talked with the woman.
Yet no man saith, what seekest thou, or why talkest thou with
her? The woman then left her waterpot and went her way into
the city, and saith to the men, Come, and see a man which told
me all things that ever I did. Is not this the Christ?" The Lord makes us to be a sinner.
We'll know that He knows everything we've ever done, everything we've
ever thought, every mess we've ever made. Then they went out of the city
and came unto Him, In the meanwhile, while his disciples prayed him,
saying, Master, eat. And he said unto them, I have
meat to eat that you know not of. Therefore saith the disciples
one to another, hath any man brought him ought to eat? And
Jesus said unto them, My meat is to do the will of him that
sent me and to finish his work. That's why it was needs be that
he go through Samaria. He was sent to finish the work
of the father. which is the salvation of God's
people. Say not ye there yet four months,
and then cometh harvest. Behold, I say unto you, lift
up your eyes and look on the field, for they are white already
to harvest. And he that reapeth receiveth
wages, and gathereth fruit unto eternal life, that both he that
soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together. And herein
is that saying true, one soweth and another reapeth. I sent you
to reap that wherein you bestowed no labor. Other men labored,
and you are entered into their labor. And many of the Samaritans
of that city believed on him for the saying of the woman which
testified, he told me all that I ever did. So when the Samaritans
were coming to him, they besought him that he would tarry with
them and abode there two days. And many more believed because
of his own word and said unto the woman, now we believe, not
because thy saying of thy saying, but we have heard him ourselves,
and know this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world." The
challenge in preaching from this passage of Scripture is to limit
our comments to just those that time will allow. There's so,
so much in this story And we cannot consider this story without
setting it in contrast to the previous chapter. For there is
a great contrast between Nicodemus and the Samaritan woman. And
yet with all that contrast their lives, all that contrast their
virtue, their experience, their education, their reputation in
the community, with all that sets them in such stark contrast
to one another, there is also a great, great comparison between
the two. And I'm sure that that's the
reason that the Lord has recorded it this way in the scriptures. We don't package the gospel to
try to meet the specific needs of particular individuals. We don't try to make it culturally
relevant to where men are. Why? Because in spite of the
fact that we are different in so many ways, we have exactly
the same problem and we have exactly the same solution. We're sinners. We have no righteousness. We're undone. We're blind. We're halt. We're crippled. And it doesn't really matter
whether we're like Nicodemus, well-respected, a leader of the
Jews, or like this woman of Samaria, a well-known adulterer and fornicator
in the community, even among the Samaritans considered an
outcast, it doesn't matter. And it doesn't matter what your
experience is. It doesn't matter what my experience is. Our need
is exactly the same. And the gospel speaks to that
need. It doesn't matter if you are
well-educated like Saul of Tarsus, or if you're uneducated like
the fisherman Peter. Doesn't matter if you're a wealthy
tax collector like Zacchaeus or if you're a poor blind beggar
like Bartimaeus. The message of the gospel is
exactly the same for you as it is for the other. Doesn't matter
if you're a king like David or if you're a notorious criminal
on death row like Barabbas. Your need is the same. It doesn't
matter if you are the virtuous mother of the Lord Jesus Christ,
Mary, or whether you are Mary Magdalene, the one whom the Lord
had to cast seven demons out of. It doesn't matter. We're not unique. And we are
to one another. My children, my wife is very
special to me. You're special to me. We have
special relationships in this world. But when we stand before
God, it doesn't matter what sets us apart from one another. We're
all in need of grace. We're all in need of the Lord
Jesus Christ to do for us what he did for this Samaritan woman,
what he did for Nicodemus. This is our need. And it's going
to be painful, We're not talking about the doctrine
of total depravity. We're not talking about men go
around and they say, well, I know I'm a sinner. I know I have no
righteousness. And they quote things like that as if it was
just so common. God makes you a sinner, you're
going to lose sleep over it. You're going to be broken. You're
going to be devastated when the Spirit of God opens your heart
and shows you the shame of your life. It's gonna happen. I pray it will. I pray it has. Because it's that shame that
will drive you to the Lord Jesus Christ to find the only place
of rescue, the only place of refuge, the only hope of salvation
that you're gonna have. is going to be in the Christ,
the Son of the Living God, who laid down His life for sinners. Humiliating, humbling, and exalting,
and glorious. Truly, truly, the way up is down. That's God's way. There's no
other way to be saved. The woman of shame finds the
Savior. It's the reason why every time
we come together, all we do is open the Word of God and preach
Christ. We don't have children's ministries
and youth ministries and singles ministries and senior adult ministries
and programs for this particular section of society and programs. We don't do that. We don't do
that. Why? Because if you're a senior
adult, if you're a single adult, if you're a young person, your
need is exactly the same as my need. We're just all worms in the same
dung pile, aren't we? And one worm doesn't look down
at another worm and think that he's in a higher position. He's just closer to the next
load being unloaded on him, isn't he? That's what we are. That's
what we are. That's why we need to hear about
Christ. We're sinners. The world goes around, you know,
boasting in their righteousness and hoping in their good works. Oh, may God be pleased to make
you and make me a bona fide sinner. Because only then are we going
to be mercy beggars. There's no difference between
Nicodemus, the leader of the Jews, the well-respected man
of God who walked the streets of Jerusalem with his chest out
and his head held high, and this Samaritan woman who had had five
husbands and was living in fornication and was too ashamed to be with
the other women of Samaria when she went to the well. No difference. They both needed Christ. They
both needed to be born again. Born from above. Look with me
at verse 10. And please, please pay special
notice of this. What does the Lord say to this
woman? If thou knewest the gift of God, And who it is that saith
unto thee, Give me to drink, you would ask him." Now did you
get the order of that? You've got to know before you're
going to ask. Knowing Christ is not the reward
that God gives to you for asking. Salvation is not the result of
your faith. Faith is the result of salvation. Light is the result of life. John chapter 1 says, And in him
was life, and the life was the light of man. You've got to have
life before you can have light. Regeneration necessarily precedes
faith. And what this means is that it's
salvations of the Lord. If you knew the gift of God, if you knew that all of your
salvation was of the Lord, if you knew that God had chosen
a people in Christ before time ever began, If you knew that
the Lord Jesus Christ finished the work of the Father, satisfied
all the demands of righteousness and put away the sins of His
people, if you knew the gift of God, if you knew that you were completely
dependent upon the Spirit of God to open the eyes of your
understanding, If you knew that you were completely dependent
upon God's Spirit to keep you from falling and to present you
faultless before the throne of God with great joy. If you knew
the gospel of God's free grace. If you knew who it is that saith
unto thee. If you knew that He is the Son
of God. If you were able to say with
the Ethiopian eunuch, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son
of God. I believe He's sovereign. I believe
He's holy. I believe He hath done whatsoever
He wills, and no man can stay His hand. No man can say unto
Him, What doest Thou? He gets His way all the time.
He reigns as Lord over the living and the dead. If you knew those
things, then you would ask. That's why we preach the gospel.
How can they call upon Him, Dan, that they've not believed? How
can they believe on Him in whom they've not heard? How can they
hear without a preacher? We're preaching Christ. We're
telling dead dog sinners, mercy beggars about who the Lord Jesus
Christ is. Why? Because if you know Him,
then you'll call on Him. He's not going to reward you
with the knowledge of Himself. because you did some calling
or prayed a prayer. You pray because He's opened
the eyes of your understanding. If you knew the gift of God,
and who it is that saith unto thee, Give me to drink, you would
ask Him. So you know what that means?
Are you asking? Are you asking? It's amazing
how few people ask. The Lord said to that certain
man at the pool of Bethesda, Would thou be made whole? Are
you asking? Are you asking God to have mercy
upon you? Are you asking Him to show you
more of Christ? Are you asking Him to save you
from yourself? Have you, like this woman, made
a mess of your life? And everybody else around you? Ask Him. If you're asking, that's
the best evidence that you've got that the Lord has already
saved you. That's right. Faith is the evidence
of things hoped for. And no one asks without faith. The just shall live by faith.
We call out by faith. If God's given you grace to ask,
then that's the hope that you have. Don't look anywhere else. I'm looking to Christ. I'm calling
out to Him. I'm asking Him. He would give thee living water.
Oh, you know what that living water does? It puts out the fire
of shame. It puts out the fire of guilt.
It causes me to rest in Christ, to trust Him. It puts out the fire of God's
wrath. The condemnation of the law. I'm not under the law anymore. My sin was aggravated by the
law. The strength of sin is the law. And all the law did was condemn
me. All it did was judge me. But I've cried out. I've asked
Him. And He's given me living water.
And that living water has silenced the law. It satisfied the wrath
of God. And it settled my soul to wait
on and rest in the glorious person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's my life. I've got no place
else to go. I've got no righteousness of
my own. What am I going to do? What am
I going to do? If you knew, You'd ask and he'd
give you living water. And the woman said to him, sir,
thou now have nothing to draw with. Oh, yes, he does. And the well is deep. They tell
me that this well was a hundred feet deep. I think the well is
still there today. Well, the Jacob gave to Joseph,
and you remember Joseph told his brothers, he said, when I
die, you make sure you bring my bones back, and that's where
they buried his bones. So the tomb of Joseph is there,
and the well is there, and the water is a hundred feet down.
And she said, how are you going to drink from the same thing?
Here I am, an unclean Samaritan, and you're a Jew? You're going
to put your lips on the same thing I put my lips on? No Jew
would ever do that. It's the only hope you've got.
It's the only hope you've got. That He would put His lips on
your sin. Would Isaiah say, I'm a man of
unclean lips. I live among a people of unclean
lips. That's you, that's me. And what did the Lord Jesus Christ
do on Calvary's cross? He took our uncleanness. And the fire that was taken off
the altar touched His lips, made them clean, purged His sin,
took them away, put away our sin once and for
all. There's our hope. He put His lips to the same thing
you put your lips to. From whence thou dost live in
water. All the well He's going to draw
from is a whole lot deeper than a hundred feet. And the dipper that he's going
to use is going to be effectual. He's going to save his people.
I must needs. Did you see that verse? Verse
4? We kind of skipped over it, didn't we? I must needs go through
Samaria. I love the point you made, Dan,
about Lydia coming from Thyatira, which was in Asia, and God brought
her to Philippi, and then told Paul, don't go to Asia, go to
Philippi. Why? Because I've got a lost sheep
there. I must needs go through Samaria.
The Lord knows where His sheep are. He knows where every one
of them are. And He leaves the ninety and nine, and He gets
every one of them. My sheep will hear my voice.
He's not going to lose, not one. So that Onesimus runs from Philemon
and goes to Rome to the big city and gets lost in the big city
of Rome and then finds himself in trouble with the law and he's
in the same jail cell with Paul, the apostle. Does the Lord not know how to
save His people? Sure he does. Sure he does. You know, on another occasion,
God put Paul into prison in order for that Philippian jailer to
hear the gospel, didn't he? The Lord's not limited in what
he's doing. He sent Philip down to the backside
of the desert. Gaza! Why? To find a eunuch, an Ethiopian
eunuch, who's riding in his chariot, reading the Word of God, and
he doesn't have a clue what he's reading. Ruth just happened on Boaz's
field, didn't she? Yeah, in God's providence she
did. And you just happened to find your way here, didn't you? I just happened to be put onto
the sound of the gospel. All in God's providence, I must
needs go through Samaria. Why? Because there's some sheep
there that I'm about to die for. Matter of fact, there's some
sheep there that I've already died for. He's the lamb that
was slain before the foundation of the world. What the Lord Jesus
Christ performed on Calvary's cross was already purposed by
God in eternity past. You know, I love these scientists
today, you know, the quantum theorists, they talk about parallel
universes and they, you know, they've gotten so close to the
truth. But they're still trying to discover
this parallel universe through a microscope or a telescope.
They're looking for the God particle. They're trying to find the parallel
universe in the laws of physics. There are parallel universes.
One's visible. That's the one you and I live
in. The other one's invisible. One's temporal. The other's eternal.
And everything God purposed in that other universe is taking
place in this one. God's people are being saved. Why? Because he purposed it. He chose them in Christ in eternity
past. He's not going to lose one. Not
a single one. He can get to the water. He's got
sufficient rope to tie you up, to tie me up, and to feed us
with the bread of life. to sit us down. Verse 13, Jesus answered and
said to her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again. Oh, she's still thinking of that
physical water, wasn't she? How bound we are to the physical. How bound we are to the visible.
How bound we are to this flesh. And only by the great, the natural
man cannot receive the things of the Spirit. They're spiritually
discerned. God has to open the eyes of our understanding. There's
no amount of education, no amount of effort on your part or my
part that's going to discover to us the truth of the Lord Jesus
Christ. You're gonna thirst again. She'd
been looking in all the wrong places for happiness, wasn't
she? And isn't that what you and I
do? We're just looking for love in
all the wrong places. I mean, that's really what we're
doing. That's what sin is. Can you see yourself in this
woman? Can you see yourself having made
a mess of your own life? Can you see yourself in need
of a Savior? Can you see yourself having no righteousness? Can
you see yourself in need of living water? Not the water that satisfies
the natural thirst of the flesh, but the water that satisfies
the craving of your soul, the thing that you're trying to satisfy
in the means of earthly, fleshly ways. Only He can satisfy that
need. He's got to give it to us, doesn't
he? What was the source of her shame?
The first thing is that she was a Samaritan. She was a Samaritan. And when the children of Israel
were taken off into Babylonian captivity, a lot of the weak
and the old and the crippled were left behind. And the way
they would do is the Babylonians would take other citizens from
other places and bring them in and mix them together and dilute
their culture and they would get control of people that way.
That's the way they did it. And so when Ezra and Nehemiah
came back from the Babylonian captivity 70 years later, They
found these Jews in Israel that had intermarried and had children
with Gentiles from other nations. And Ezra told them, put away
your wives. And you remember Sanballat and
Tobiah? Those are the fathers of the
Samaritans. And they were the ones who said
to Nehemiah, come down off that wall. And they told Ezra, we
want a part of your work. And Ezra said, no, you've got
no part in this work. This is for God's people. And
a division happened right there between the Samaritans and the
Jews, and hatred grew from that day forward. The Samaritans believed
in the first five books of the Bible. They said, you know, we're
children of Jacob. We're the sons of Jacob. This
is Jacob's well. Joseph's bones are buried here
in our land. And we believe in the books of
Moses. That's all they had, the five
books of Moses. and they mixed with the approved
means of worship that God had given to Israel pagan practices
so that now on garrison they're making sacrifices to false gods
and they're doing it in the name of Jehovah. That's exactly what men in religion
are doing in the United States of America and all around this
world today. They've mixed the practices of
paganism with the gospel of God's grace, and they've still got
his name. And they're making sacrifices to false gods. The
Lord said to her, you know not what you worship, for salvation
is of the Jews. The greatest source of her shame
was that she was an idolater. And that's the greatest source
of your shame and my shame, is that we would mix with God
the practices of man-made religion, that we would mix with the things
of God, the things of this world, and we do it. We do it. And it's the greatest source
of our shame. More so than the... Our adultery is just symbolic,
isn't it? It's a picture of how unfaithful
we have been to the God who creates us, to the God with whom we must
do. We're in need of one who has
been perfectly faithful to the Father to present himself to
God on our behalf because we haven't been. We haven't been. And God requires it. He requires
us to be chaste virgins. And we're like the Samaritan
woman? How's it going to be? The Lord Jesus Christ is the
only one that never committed spiritual adultery. Never. Never committed physical adultery.
Never committed adultery of thought. He's the only one. Is He your righteousness before
God? Is He the hope of your salvation? If He's not, you're still in your sins. The source of her shame is that
she was a Samaritan and she was a sinner. She was a sinner. God makes you and I to be sinners.
We will say with Job, we will say with Job, in the most gut-wrenching
way, it just be, I am vile. And we'll believe it. We'll believe
it. We'll say with Paul, with the
Apostle Paul, in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. We will believe ourselves to
be the chief of sinners. And that's what makes it so wonderful
to be around other believers. You know, we're not competing
with one another. We're not trying to prove or justify ourselves
to one another. We're not trying to get an advantage
over the other. That's all the stuff that goes
on in religion, isn't it? We believe ourselves to be in
need of grace more than anybody else. She was powerless to change,
wasn't she? And so are you. And so am I.
When we were yet of little strength, is that what God said? When we
were yet without strength, Christ died for the ungodly. So you've
got to be without strength. You've got to be impotent. You've
got to be ungodly. You've got to be an idolater. You've got to be an adulterer.
And these are the things that the Lord will reveal to your
heart when He makes you to be a sinner. And you'll have no
place to go. I mean, the weight of sin will
be so great on you that you can't deal with it. You can't do anything
about it. You can't fix it. You'll only have one place to
go. You'll be shut up to Christ and you'll say with the apostles,
Lord, where can we go? Thou alone hast the words of
eternal life. I've got no place else to go to get rid of this
burden. You've put this weight on me. You've put more on me than I
can bear. My punishment is too great for me. I'm of heavy burden. I've got
to flee to Christ. And oh, His yoke is easy, His
burden is light. When we learn, what did He say?
All ye that labor and are heavy burdened, come unto Me, and I
will give you rest. Learn of Me. If you knew who it is that saith unto thee,
learn of Me, I'll give you rest. You have rest for your soul.
You won't fear the wrath of God. You just keep coming that way. The truth is, the more you grow
in grace, the more what we're describing right now is going
to be your experience. You're not going to say, well
I did that, I've taken care of that, my sin. Oh, the reality
of your sin is what's going to keep driving you to Christ. And
the more you come to Him, the more you fall in love with Him,
the more you're going to fall out of love with yourself. And the
more you see of Him, the more you're going to see of your need
for Him. That's what growing in grace and the knowledge of
the Lord Jesus Christ is about, isn't it? What does she do? I pray that God will give us the joy of going to other men
who don't know Christ. The field is white unto harvest.
Say not that there are yet four months to the harvest. Look around. The fields are white unto harvest. In other words, everybody else
in this world is just like you. They're lost. They're undone. They're in need of a Savior.
They're in need of the forgiveness of their sin. Can we say to them,
come, let me show you a man who told me everything I ever did,
and he'd tell you everything you ever did? God would make us to be His witnesses
in Jerusalem and in Judea and in Samaria and unto the uttermost
parts of the world. Will you pray with me that God
will cross our paths with people that we can talk to about Christ?
I'm not talking about browbeating people and you know making yourself
obnoxious with people. That's not, no. The Lord, you
ask the Lord. Or is it somebody that needs
to hear about what you've done for me? The bottom line is he's
got to do it for you before You can't lead somebody else someplace
you've never been. Lord, do it for me. And then
give me the opportunity to go back into Sycar and tell the
men who you are and what you've done. From Shane to the Savior. It's every believer's experience. Is it yours? Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father,
we thank you for your mercy. Thank you for having compassion
on sinners. Thank you for making us to be
sinners. And then thank you for leading us to Christ, giving
us the faith to find in Him the forgiveness of our sin and the
hope of eternal life. For it's in His name we ask,
Amen. With Tom, number 12 in the Sopactimno,
let's stand together.