John chapter 4, I think probably
all of you this evening are familiar with this passage. This is the
first time in the Gospels that the Lord Jesus openly turned
to another nation other than the Gentiles. And that's one
of the things that makes it interesting in and of itself. And I think
probably this was a preview what was to come, for good and
for bad. The Lord left Judea, we're told
here in this chapter, and went down to Samaria, went through
Samaria. And he told his disciples after
he had raised from the dead that they would be witnesses there
at Jerusalem in Judea and in Samaria. The sad part of this
is that he was to turn from Jerusalem. He was turned from Israel to
the Gentiles. He told the Jews, he said, if
you had only known the things that belong to your peace, but
now they're hid from your eyes. And he said that, I'm ready to
leave you, and I'm going to leave you desolate. I'm going to leave
you desolate. So it's sad. It was good for
the Gentiles, but it was sad for the Jews. Here in verse 1,
let me read a few verses. I want to not look at the whole
of this chapter, but here in verse 1, when therefore the Lord
knew how that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized
more disciples than John, though Jesus himself baptized not, but
his disciples. He left Judea and departed again
to Galilee, and he must needs go through Samaria. And then
cometh he to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near
the partial of Graham, that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Now Jacob's
well was there, and Jesus, therefore being weary with his journey,
sat thus on the well, and it was about the sixth hour. And
there came a woman of Samaria to draw water, and Jesus said
unto her, Give me to drink. For his disciples were going
away into the city to buy meat. Then said 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 dealing
with the Samaritans." Now, as I said, this was probably,
as I read today, I thought this could very well be a previous
of what was coming for the Jews, the Lord turning from them, but
it was prophesied of this day. You would have thought that when
the Lord Jesus came, maybe it would have been a time of great
revival. But you know it was one of the saddest times in the
world. And it was prophesied that it would be. In Isaiah chapter
53, that wonderful chapter that we all love, it was said of the
Lord Jesus that He should grow up, grow up before the Father
as a tender plant, but as a root out of a dry grain. And spiritually
speaking, this time, this generation that the Lord lived in here was
a dry time spiritually. A desolate time. I want to show
you some of the things that John said about it. Look over here
in John chapter 1. A dry time, root out of a dry
ground. Things have so fallen away. True worship, true
knowledge of God and His Word. True service of the priest and
the Levites. Look here what's said about them
in John chapter 1. Look here in verse 19. And here's
what's said about the priest and the Levite. And this is the
record of John, John the Baptist, when the Jews sent priests and
Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, who are they? And he confessed,
and did not not but confess, I am not the Christ. But look
now what he tells them down in verse 26, who the Christ is.
John answered them saying, I baptize with water, but there stands
one among you, look at this, whom ye know not. Now this was
the priest. When the Lord chose these priests
way back in Aaron's day, He chose them and anointed them to teach
to the people. They were such a blessing to
the people, they stood between God and the people. And John
says, you're to these priests, you don't even know Him. He's
right in your midst, the Son of God, and you don't even know
Him. Some of these priests were no doubt offering sacrifices
during the temple. And they took of those sacrifices
and as they ministered in the temple, these very things that
pictured the Lord Jesus Christ, they had no idea who He was.
John said, you don't know. And these Levites that went into
the temple and kept it clean, they kept it repaired, they did
all the service in the temple. They were familiar with those
instruments in the temple. And what did those instruments
represent? What did that temple represent? The Lord Jesus Christ. His redeeming glory. And John
said, He's standing right in your midst. And you don't even
know it. You don't even know it. That's
how this office of the priest had degenerated. Look over here
with me. Hold this chapter 2. And look
over here in Numbers with me. Just for a minute. All the way
back over in Numbers. Chapter 6. Now this is the first priest
under the ceremonial law, Aaron, Moses' brother, that the Lord
ordained. And look here at their attitude.
In Numbers chapter 6 and verse 23. Here's where the Lord was giving
instructions here to Aaron, the first high priest, and his sons. And look what he said. When the
service had ended, and when the priest had offered the sacrifices
for the people, and they no doubt had prayer and probably sang
a hymn, And here's what the Lord told those priests to do. Look
at verse 23. Speak unto Aaron the priest,
and to his sons, and of course this was his grandsons and great-grandsons,
and all his descendants who were priests. Speak to them, saying,
On this wise, ye shall bless the children of Israel, saying
unto them, The Lord bless thee, and keep thee. Isn't that wonderful?
The Lord bless thee. The Lord keep thee from evil.
The Lord make His face to shine upon thee, and be gracious unto
thee. They knew something about that,
didn't they? They knew something about a man's dark heart, and
the Lord shining His light upon him, and being gracious. They knew something about sovereign
grace, didn't they? The Lord be gracious unto thee,
and the Lord lift up His countenance upon thee, and give thee peace. And they shall put my name upon
the children of Israel, and I will bless them." This was the priest. Here was the office. They were
to teach the people, stand between the people and God, and bless
the people on God's behalf. And it had so degenerated in
our Lord's day that John told those priests, he said, He's
standing right before your eyes, and you don't even know it. How
are you going to bless somebody else in the name of the Lord
when you don't even know him yourself? That's how it degenerates.
And look in chapter 2 of John, a dry time, a dry time. Look in chapter 2. They had desecrated the temple. of the Lord. There were God's
presence. Remember how David sometimes
said it when he talked about the temple of the Lord and the
cherubims. Remember he talked about sat
between those cherubims. God! Those cherubims were those
two angels that sat on each end of the mercy seat. And they spread
out their wings and overshadowed that mercy seat. And sometimes
God would manifest His Yerkanah glory. He dwelt there between
those cherubims on the mercy seat. His presence was there. This temple where Christ was
preached and His promises and His prophecies and shadows. The
temple. What a wonderful place where
God's people come together in unity to worship. But look here
now in John chapter 2 how the worship in this place had degenerated. Look here in chapter 2 in verse
13. And the Jews' Passover was at hand, and Jesus went up to
Jerusalem, and he found in the temple those who sold oxen and
sheep and doves, and the changers of money said, And when he had
made a scourge of small cords, he drove them out of the temple,
and the sheep and the oxen, and he poured out the money changers,
and overthrew the tables. And he said unto them that sold
up, Take these things out of here. Make not my father's house
an house of merchandise. This had always been a place
of worship. God's presence was there. But
they had made it a den of thieves. And that's where it was in this
day when the Lord Jesus Christ came. And look at John chapter
3. A dry time, a desolate time. Here we're told here about this
man who was probably one of the chief theologians of the Jewish
nation. May have been a head over the
school, one of the chief teachers. And the Lord Jesus told him here
in this chapter, you must be born again. You came into this
world wrong to start with, and you must be born again. You cannot
see the kingdom of heaven, you cannot know anything savagely
about God, until you are born again. And you know what this
man said, how can these things be? How can these things be? Nicodemus, you've wrote books,
and your articles, you've preached, you've taught in your schools,
You a theologian? You a master of Israel? And look
here what he says in verse 10. Jesus answered and said unto
him, Art thou a master in Israel, and knoweth not these things? What are you preaching when you
preach? What are you teaching when you teach? What are you
writing your articles about? What are you teaching your students?
Here was a master, a chief theologian, and he knew nothing of the necessity
of the new birth. You wonder what he was teaching
Glenn. That's the dry time. This is
the dry time. He'll grow up as a tender plant,
but as a root out of a dry ground. A dry ground. And then we consider all the
terrible And really I would call it profane indifference that
these Jews had to other nations. But especially the nation and
the people of the Samaritans. They hated the Samaritans. Absolutely
hated them. And the sad part about that is,
the Lord had blessed the Jewish nation. Nobody else had the laws
they had. Nobody else had the sacrifice
that taught them of God's redeeming grace in Christ. The Jews only
had that. And here was these Gentiles,
or here was these Gentile Samaritans living right in their midst.
And they hated these people so bad, they wouldn't even speak
to them. That's a sad indifference. Look
here at what was said in him. I just read it to you here in
verse 9. I just read it to you there,
didn't I? How is it that thou being a Jew,
hast to drink of me? Seeing the Jews have no demons,
no devils. You say, Bruce, they weren't
allowed to. There's a lot of things they weren't allowed to
do. But doing good was not one of them. Doing good to the souls
of men was not one of them. And you know, it just didn't
stop with the nation in general. The Lord's disciples felt this
way. They hated them, too. They wanted to call down fire
from heaven one time. Remember that? Boy, they had gifts, but they
didn't have much grace, did they? They had gifts to cast out devils,
and sometimes they acted like devils themselves. Lord, you
want us to call down fire and consume these sinners? Like Elijah
did back there. Elijah. You know what the Lord
told me? He said, you fellas got a bad
attitude. I didn't come to destroy men's lives. I could stay in
heaven and done that. But I've come to save men's lives.
I've come to save men. And that's what we find out here
in this book. He came to save all kinds of
men. And boy, there's such a contrast
as we read the scriptures. All the different kinds of men
our Lord Jesus came to say, let me contrast these two sinners
here that we find the Lord beginning to deal with and say, here in
chapter 3, this man by the name of Nicodemus and here this woman. Look here at the contrast. And
here's one of the amazing things. about the Lord's salvation. He
saves all kinds of people. He saves all kinds of people.
Here was a man by the name of Nicodemus, and the Lord saved
him. Here was an unnamed woman, and
the Lord saved her. Here was a man of great rank. He was a master in Israel. The
Lord saved him. Here was a nobody. that had to
go draw her own water, and the Lord saved her. He was a favored
Jew. Don't you think a lot of people
envied him and his position? He was a rebel around them. They
watched him as he went down the street in all of his garb. Oh,
if anyone makes it all the way, surely he will. Everybody wanted
to be like him. The Lord saved him from that.
But here he saved this despised Samaritan. Nobody envied her. Probably a lot of people hated
her. Here's a prayer, see? He was a strict keeper of the
law and his tradition. The Lord saved him. And here
was an open and profane sinner. Had five husbands. And living
with a man then that wasn't there. And the Lord saved her. Ain't
there a contrast in the people that the Lord saved? Only He
can save people like that. If I saved people, I'd have one
group of people that I'd often deal with. People that I like.
They're pretty women. They're nice men. Ain't that
the way we are? But boy, he has all kinds of
people that he saves. Nicodemus came to Christ by night. Christ came to this woman in
the middle of the day. Christ rebuked this self-righteous
Pharisee to humble him, but he immediately offers this woman
the water of life upon her asking. You ask of me, I give you living. I tell you, there's a parallel
in the way God saves sinners. I realize that. But boy, there
are certain aspects of it that's a contrast to. We all come as
sinners to the same Savior. But sometimes the way He gets
us there is really different. It's really different. He came here to Samaria, to the
Samaritans. Now, you probably know this already,
but I want to show you this again in the scriptures. Who were these
people? Who were these people? And I want to show you this because
there was a time when somebody told me years ago that these
were half-Jews and half-Gentiles. But let me show you now in the
scripture. Who were these people? Who were these Samaritans? And
we'll see here probably why the Jews hated them so. Look over
here in 2 Kings, a little bit of lengthy reading, but you need
to know this. Look here in 2 Kings, chapter
17, and let's begin here in verse 6. Chapter 17 and verse 6. We'll see here who these Samaritans
are. And why they came to be here,
right in the middle of the land of Israel to begin with. 2 Kings
chapter 17, verse 6. Verse 7, let's begin verse 7.
For so it was, 2 Kings chapter 17, you
mark this, verse 7. that the children of Israel had
sinned against the Lord their God, which had brought them up
out of the land of Egypt, from under the hand of Pharaoh king
of Egypt, and had feared other gods, and walked in the statues
of the heathen whom the Lord cast out from before the children
of Israel, and of the kings of Israel, which they had made.
And the children of Israel did secretly those things that were
not right against the Lord their God. And they built them high
places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchman to
the fence city. And they set them up images and
groves in every high hill and under every green tree. And there
they burned incense in all the high places, as did the heathen
whom the Lord carried away before them. And they wrought wicked
things to provoke the Lord to anger. For they served idols,
whereof the Lord hath said unto them, Ye shall not do this thing.
Yet the Lord testified against Israel and against Judah by all
the prophets and by all the seers, saying, Turn ye from your evil
ways, and keep my commandments and my statutes according to
all the law which I commanded your fathers, which I sent to
you by my servants the prophets. Notwithstanding, they would not
hear. They hardened their necks like
to the necks of their fathers that did not believe in the Lord
their God. They rejected his statutes and
his covenant that he had made with their fathers, and his testimonies
which he had testified against them, and they called it vanity,
and they became vain, and went after the heathen that were around
about them, concerning whom the Lord had charmed them, that they
should not do like them. And they left all the commandments
of the Lord their God, and made them no lineage, even two calves,
and made a grove, and worshipped all the host of heaven, and served
them. And they caused their sons and
their daughters to pass through the fire, and they used divination
and enchantments and sold themselves to do evil in the sight of the
Lord, to provoke him to anger. Therefore the Lord was very angry
with Israel, and removed them out of his sight. There was none
left but the tribe of Judah only. Also Judah kept not the commandments
of the Lord their God, but walked in the statues of Israel which
they made. And the Lord rejected all the
seed of Israel, and afflicted them, and delivered them into
the hand of the spoiler, until he had cast them out of his sight.
For he rent Israel from the house of David, and they made Jeroboam
the son of David king. And Jeroboam drove Israel from
following the Lord, and made them sin a great sin. For the
children of Israel walked in all the sins of Jeroboam, which
he did. They departed not from them,
until the Lord removed Israel out of his sight, as he had said
by his servants the prophets. So was Israel carried away out
of their own land to Assyria unto this day. And the king of Assyria brought men
from Babylon, from Cuthah, and from Avah, and from Heboth, and
placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children
of Israel, and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities
thereof." See that? God's anger was killed against
Israel, and he carried them away into these heathen lands, and
The heathen king brought all his people, and probably it was
about like when Britain made a jail down in Australia and
sent the prisoners there. It was probably the worst of
men that he sent here to occupy the land of Samaria. They were
Gentiles. They were Gentile people. They
weren't half-Jews and half-Gentiles. They were heathens. And look
over in verse 32, what they did when they got there. They feared
the Lord, and made themselves of the lowest of them priests,
and of the high places, which sacrificed for them in the houses
of the high places. They feared the Lord, and served
their own gods, after the manner of the nations whom they carried
away from them. Unto this day do they act of
the same manner. Remember what the Lord told this
Samaritan woman? You worship you don't know what.
You worship you don't know what. They hadn't changed a bit. But
can you understand now why Israel hated them? They were here occupying
their land. And they'd been here for hundreds
of years when the Lord Jesus was talking to this Samaritan.
They hated the Jews, and the Jews hated them. When the Jews came back to rebuild
their temple there in Jerusalem, these Samaritans were there and
they stood up. They came up there and told the Jews, and said,
let us help you build a temple. And they said, this ain't none
of your business. This is for us Jews. We worship God. You Samaritans have nothing to
do with us. Get out of here. But they shut them down for a
while. There was this enmity between the Jews and the Samaritans. And it was still in the days
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Still in that day. And this is
the country. And this is the people the Lord
Jesus Christ came to. Here in John chapter 4. Now look
back over your heads again. Look here. Look at what he said
here again in verse 4. Look at this. And he must, needs, go through
Samaria. Now that's not speaking of geography.
He could have went around this place. It would have been a little
walk, but he could have did that. But he's not saying that he has
to go through Samaria to get up to Galilee, to Nantra. There's
another reason he must, needs, go through Samaria. Do you know
why he was? One of His sheep was that. One of His elect people
was that. Other sheep I have. They're not
of this fold. They're not Jewish. And you Jews
don't want to have anything to do with them. But they're my
sheep. And I must bring them. And here He is. Here He is. He's
going here through Samaria because He has one of His sheep there. You know, one of the most encouraging
things to me, one of the most comforting things to me, as a
believer myself, is to know that God has chosen a great host of
people out of Adam's race. He chose them to salvation and
they must be saved. That's always comforting me And
it's encouraging to me as a preacher to know that if there's any of
his elect around, they're going to hear the gospel somewhere.
Somewhere, sometime in their lifetime, them and the Savior
is going to meet together and they're going to be saved. Now,
ain't that encouraging to you? When you go witnessing to people
and you think, well, I said, Lord, who else believed our report?
To whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? I tell you this, I
tell you whom the arm of the Lord is going to be revealed.
His elect. He must bring me. This is the will of Him that
sent me, that of all which He hath given me, I should lose
nothing. It may be three thousand, on
the day of Pentecost that he finds every one of them at the
same time. It may be a man down in the desert going back to Ethiopia. It may be a woman coming here
to set to draw water from away. But if they're one of his, if
they're one of his, he's going to save them. Now that's comforting,
ain't it? That's encouraging. I must, I must. You think, do you think there's
any possibility that the Lord Jesus would not have gone through
Samaria this way? Do you think there's any power
in heaven or hell that could have kept him from going through
Samaria this way? I must. I must. And when he says
he must, he shall. And he did. He did. He must means
go through Samaria. And I tell you, everything, everything
that happened here, everything that happened here was done on
purpose. Nobody knew it until that purpose was accomplished.
This woman sure didn't know. But everything that was done
here was done on purpose. His leaving Judea, that's on
purpose. Him coming right through Samaria
at the middle of the day. Her just happening to be there.
The disciples just happened to go off in to get leave and to
leave him alone. That was on purpose. It was on
purpose. And I bet you if you look hard
enough in your life, you can see the Lord saved you on purpose. I left Tennessee, and I thought
I was coming to Indiana for work. But you know why I was coming
to Indiana? For the Lord saved me. That was why. I mean, He
moves heaven and earth, doesn't He? To save one of His elect.
There's no labor, there's no expense that He will not go to. to save one of His elect, one
of His people. And He says here in verse 5 and
verse 6 that I read to you, that He grew weary. He grew weary. This is the true humanity of
our Lord, and it's amazing, and I hope you and I never get over
this. This was God. This was the Word made flesh.
And the scripture says here that he was fatigued. He was tired. That's why he sat there on Jacob's
way. In the wilderness, Francis told
us about it. He hungered. On the cross, he
said, I thirst. In the shield, he slept. And on the well, he sat with
her. He that upholds all things by
the word of his power grew weary. Can you get a hold of that? He
who commands the heavenly host sat alone on this well. He who is the water of life needed
a drink himself. Now that's amazing to me, brothers
and sisters. The mystery of God. Two truths
are always side by side in the gospel. Christ's humanity and
His deity. When He was born, He laid in
a manger. What humiliation! And yet the
angels announced His birth and said, He's both Lord and Christ.
He was asleep in a boat, exhausted, and yet he raised and spake to
the wind and the sea, and they obeyed him. He stood at the great grave of
Lazarus, and he groaned and he wept, and yet he spake a word,
and he that was dead, lived. The deity of Christ and the humanity
of Christ, we see it everywhere. And it's such a mystery, such
a mystery. Here in verse 7, look at this.
Who initiates salvation? Who comes to who first? Who starts this business of salvation
anyway? He said here in verse 7, there
came a woman of Samaria to draw water, and Jesus said unto her. He initiated salvation. She came here to draw water,
but she wasn't coming to him. She had no idea he was going
to be there that day. This was totally unexpected to
this woman. Salvation is not only unmerited,
but at first, it's unsolved. There's none that understandeth,
there's none who seeketh after God. Isaiah 65 warning says,
I am sought of them that ask not for me, I am found of them
that sought me not. I said behold me, behold me to
a nation that was not called by my name. Every one of us here
this evening that the Lord is saying, we can truly say, It
wasn't us who chose Him. But He chose us. Can we say that?
And we can say we love Him because... We come to Him because He first
came to us. We called on Him because He first
called on us. He initiates salvation. He begins. Oh, if you'd just take the first
step. He's the one that takes the first
step. You and I were pursuing a mad
course of sin, just like this woman was. Totally indifferent
to the excellency of the Lord Jesus Christ. We were in darkness
just like she was. But He came to us. He made us
anxious. He broke in upon us, made us
begin to think of our condition, opened our understanding, though
it was slightly. He did this to Abraham when he
called him out of Mesopotamia. He did this to Saul of Tarsus
when he broke in upon him on the road to Damascus. And He's
done it to us when we were dead and trespassing the sea. He initiates
salvation. This woman came only to draw
water. She was unacquainted with the
Savior. Was not seeking the Savior. No idea that He would be there.
No idea of being converted that day. That was the last thing
up on her mind. And she may have said within
herself, it's midday. It's hot. And no one will be
at the well at this time of the day. But someone was at that
well, waiting on her to get there. And when she got there, He broke
in upon her lust, He broke in upon her prejudice, He overcome
her, He overwhelmed her with His love and grace, and He saved
her soul. But who started the work? Who
initiated it? He did. He did. That's why we don't bother sinners
that come here. But that's why we beg the Lord
to save them. Lord, begin the work. Lord, begin
the sign. And here in verse 8, I like this. His disciples were going away
into the city to buy meat. Now this is amazing, that He
sat here. Did you ever wonder why some
of them didn't stay with Him? It didn't take twelve guys to
go get enough meat for dinner, did it? But He was there along. And this is the amazing part
about this. John represents the Lord Jesus. as being God in the flesh, as
being the eternal Word in our humanity. And yet He speaks so many times
of Him being alone with somebody. That's awesome just to think
about that. This eternal God alone with just
Him and the sinner. That's what we find here in this
situation. Just these two. And we have examples
here in the book of John that he tells us of the Lord Jesus,
the sovereign God, just alone, just Him and somebody else. Nicodemus,
remember that? It was nighttime and it was just
Him and the Lord discussing spiritual life. There was a woman in John
8 convicted of adultery that was ready to stone her to death.
And the Lord Jesus spoke to them, all of them were convicted in
their conscience, and the scripture says they went out, and she was
left alone. Just heard the Lord. Heard the
Lord. The Lord gives sight to a man
here in the book of John, in the ninth chapter. The Jews excommunicated
him from the temple, and the Lord found him. And just him
and the Lord have a discussion. Do you believe on the Son of
God? Who is the Lord that I may believe? I that speak unto you
have faith. Just the Lord and the sinner
alone. And brothers and sisters, there's
where it must come down to. Nobody else around. No human
gimmicks. No human pressure, no orders
to be invited to, no inquiry room to take the sinner into. I believe in instructing the
sinner. Yes, I believe that. But there's a time where the
Lord and the sinner must get along together. And you do business
with the living Lord. Now that's where it comes to.
That's where it comes down to. Well, Brother Mahan said one
time, he said, if somebody, if some human being has talked you
into something, then another human being will come along and
talk you out of something. But when the Lord talks you into
something, just you and Him doing business together, and He convinces
you, ain't nobody going to talk you out of that. Nobody. Get along with the Lord, Just
Him and His Word in prayer. What did this woman and the Lord
talk about? Well, I tell you, they talked
about some precious things. Heavenly things. Essential things. Spiritual things. This woman
had her mind open like she'd never had it open in all her
life. Look here in verse 10. Look here in John chapter 4 and
look in verse 10. He started telling her about
the gift of God. The gift of God. All she heard
about from these Jews was works, works, works. Earn your way.
You've got to marry something. You've got to get your act together.
For the first time in her life, somebody told her about a gift.
And look at what the Lord Jesus said in verse 10. Jesus answered
and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God. Ain't that what
salvation is? The gift of God. Not by works,
but a gift. If you knew the gift of God,
and who it was that saith unto thee, Give me to drink, thou
wouldst have asked of him, and he would have given thee living
water. The water of life. That's what
they begin talking about. She'd never heard that before. That's why it's important to
get along with the Lord, just you and Him. He'll tell you things. He'll
reveal things to you that you've never heard in all your life.
You've never, I've never seen that. I've never seen that. And
look here in verse 14. Look here what He's talking about.
He's talking about life. She come here to get a drink
of water that did her for a few hours. He's talking about everlasting
life. Verse 13, 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 will give him shall be in him a well of water, spraying it
up into everlasting life. Ain't that wonderful? Ain't that
wonderful? Look here in verse 16. Boy, he's
talking about something else too. Her sins and her ignorance. Look here in verse 16. He said
to her, Go call your husband, and come hither. The woman said
unto him, I have no husband. Jesus said unto her, Thou hast
said well, I have no husband. You have five husbands. And he
whom thou now hast is not thy husband. And that saith thou
truly. What's he confronting her with?
Her sins. Her sin, her ungodliness, her
law-breaking, her damnable adultery. Well, I tell you what, men make
excuses for sin, pretend to know they're sinners, pretend to be
sorry for their sin. It is a vast difference when
the Lord confronts us with our sin. Oh, when He gets you alone,
He shows to your conscience what sin really is, how dark it is,
how damnable it is, how black it is. Big difference there,
ain't it? Big difference there. These men
who profess to know the Lord Jesus, and they go on in their
sins, they've never been alone with the Lord Jesus Christ, the
Lord of glory, the Holy One. He's never taught them. He's
just never taught them. And look here in verse 23 and
verse 24. He's going to teach her something
about worship. She said there in verse 20, our
fathers worshipped in this mountain. We just read how they worshipped
too, didn't we? They worshipped their idols in fear of God. Woman, believe me, you shall
neither in this mountain nor yet in Jerusalem worship the
Father. You worship you know not what. We know what we worship.
God's given us his word to tell us salvation is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now
is, when the true worshipper shall worship the Father in spirit
and in truth. For the Father seeketh such to
worship him, God is the Spirit. He's a pure spirit. He's a Holy
Spirit, He's an Eternal Spirit. And they who worship Him, must
worship Him in spirit and in truth. That's the true nature
of God and the true nature of worship. And now here in verses,
look here in verse 26. He said here in verse 25, the
woman said, and I can't understand, I don't understand how this come
to pass. Nothing had been said about the
Messiah that I could see. But you know that's how secret
the working of the Holy Spirit is in a person's heart? He always
turns it to Christ, doesn't he? Oh, here's God, here's the true
nature of God, true nature of worship. How am I going to come
to Him? Boy, that's where Christ comes
in. And suddenly, almost out of the blue, she said unto him,
I know that Messiah cometh, which is called Christ, and when he
is come, he will tell us all things. And he said unto her,
I am that speak unto thee. What a revelation. What a revelation.
And she left her water pot, some man said, and tucked the well
on with her. She come to her to get a pot of water and to
leave the well. She left the pot and took the
well. The water of life. Christ revealed Himself to her.
She was a new creature. And that's how it happened. A
wretched Samaritan woman who had five husbands, and was living
with one man that wasn't hers. False worship, ignorance, and
yet she left here that day with an excellent knowledge of Jesus
Christ. Let's pray.