If You Knew - You Would Ask

Turning your Bibles to the fourth
chapter of John, our Lord and his disciples left
Judea and were going to Galilee. Scripture says he must needs
go through Samaria. At about twelve noon he came
to Jacob's well. Scripture says the Lord was weary
with the journey, and he sat down on the well while his disciples
went into the city to buy meat. While the disciples were gone,
a woman of Samaria came to the well to draw water, and the Lord
Jesus said to this woman, Give me a drink. The woman replied,
why do you, a Jew, ask drink of me, a Samaritan? Don't you
know that the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans? The Jews
do not even speak to the Samaritans. And our Lord said to this woman,
if you knew, if you knew the gift of God and who I am, you
would ask of me and I would give you. living water. I want you to notice four things
about this woman of Samaria. I believe we can find ourselves
in her. I know that we can find our day
and our generation in her. First of all, in verse 12, we
note this. This woman had religion. She was not a pagan. She was
not a heathen. She had religion. This woman
was no stranger to Abraham, Jacob, Isaac, Joseph. She freely talked
here about our father Jacob. She believed in God. She believed
in God. She believed the scriptures.
She said in the twelfth verse, Art thou greater than our father
Jacob? which gave us this well. She
knew something about Bible history. I'm sure she knew about Moses
and the Ten Commandments. I'm sure she knew about the ark
and Noah. I'm sure that she knew about
the blood on the door in Egypt. She knew these things. She said,
our father Jacob gave us this well and he drank thereof himself
and his children and his cattle. She was a religious woman. No
question about that. She talked freely of Bible characters
and Bible history. She talked freely about Jacob,
even calling him our father. And then the second thing about
this woman, she upheld her denomination. You'll pardon the use of that
word, but that's exactly what it is. Back here in verse 9,
she says, How is it that you, being a Jew, ask drink of me,
which am a woman of Samaria? For the Jews have no dealings
with the Samaritans. We Samaritans are different from
you Jews. We're all religious. We are religious
Samaritans. You are religious Jews. She said
in verse 20, you Jews claim that Jerusalem is the place to worship.
We worship. You Jews worship. We Samaritans
worship. We're religious. But you worship
in Jerusalem and we worship in the mountains. We've always worshipped
that way. Our fathers and our fathers'
fathers and our fathers' fathers' fathers all worshipped in this
mountain. And all of you Jews worshipped
down in Samaria, down in Jerusalem. She was a woman who upheld her
denomination. And then the third thing about
this woman, now note this carefully. The woman was looking for the
coming of the Messiah. He was looking for the coming
of the Lord. She said in verse 25, I know that the Messiah is
coming. I know that the Messiah is coming.
And when he comes, everything's going to be alright. For he's
going to tell us everything that we need to know. He's going to
save us. The Messiah's coming. We're looking
for the coming of the Lord. God's going to visit this earth,
she said. That's the same thing that Job
said at the latter day. My Lord shall stand on this earth.
This woman believed that. The Messiah's coming, and he's
going to tell us everything that we need to know, and he's going
to save us, and he's going to bring the glory of God among
us, and we're all going to see the glory of the Lord. That's
three things about her. You cannot deny any of those
things. She was religious. She knew, as the people say today,
her Bible. She was a woman who believed
in and who defended her denomination. She was following the leadership
of her father and her father's father. She was a Samaritan and
proud of it. And then this woman looked for
the coming of the Lord. She had been taught and taught
well that the Messiah was coming and she believed this. The fourth
thing about her, she did not know the Lord. In verse 22, our
Lord Jesus Christ said, You worship, you know not what. You worship,
you know not what. You go through the form of religion. You've got a knowledge of Bible
characters. You've got a knowledge of Bible
history. You've got a religious vocabulary. You go through all the motions
and all the form of worship, but you do not know God if you
only knew God, if you only knew the gift of God. That's what
he says back here in our text. If you knew, verse 10, the gift
of God and who it is who saith to thee, Give me to drink, you'd
ask of him, and he'd give you living water. Is this not a picture
of our day? Is this not a picture of some
of us? Men today have religion. They're not strangers to God.
I turned my television on a little after eight this morning and
I watched all the religion. They're not strangers to Bible
history or Bible characters. Men today know something about
creation. They know something about God.
They know something about sin. They talk about heaven. They
talk about hell. They know Abraham, Moses, David. They know about the ark. They
know about the blood on the door. They know about the law. We are
living in a religious day. This is a religious day. And then men today have their
denominations, like this woman, Samaritans and Jews. their peculiarities,
their customs and their traditions. They've always done things this
way. Their fathers did things this way. Their fathers' fathers
and their great-grandfathers all did things this way. We have
our peculiarities. Don't you know the Methodists
have no dealings with the Baptists? Don't you know the Baptists have
no dealings with the Nazarenes. Don't you know the Nazarenes
have no dealings with the seven-day Adventists? Don't you know the
seven-day Adventists have no dealings with the Jehovah Witnesses? Don't you know that we don't
have any dealings with one another? We worship on Saturday, you worship
on Sunday. Our fathers worship in this mountain,
you worship in Jerusalem. We have our priest, you have
your pastors. We have our book of prayer, you
pray extemporaneously. We kneel, you stand. We bow,
you open your eyes. We wear black, you wear white.
We sing psalms, you sing the hymn. We use no instrument, you
play an organ. We sprinkle, you immerse. We
have a Presbyterian form of government, you have a congregational form
of government. Don't you know we can't get along? This woman was religious, and
so are we. This woman defended her doctrines,
her denomination, her tradition, her custom, handed down from
her fathers. And we do too. We're Baptists
or Methodists or Presbyterian, most of us, because that's the
way we were raised. This woman was a Samaritan because
that's the way she was raised. She worshiped in that mountain
because that's the way she was raised. And we're looking for the Messiah.
We're looking for the Lord to come, just like she was looking
for the Messiah. She was no pagan, religious,
informed, prejudiced, sectarian, and she's looking for the Lord.
Might be another Jesus, but his name's Jesus. It may be another
spirit by which we cast out demons, but it's a spirit. It may be
another gospel which we preach, but it's a gospel. It goes by
that name. Turn to 2 Corinthians. Look,
Paul warned about this 2,000 years ago nearly. In 2 Corinthians
11, verse 4, he said they'll come preaching another Jesus.
They'll call him Jesus, but it'll be another Jesus. They'll come
also in another spirit. You'll receive a spirit. You'll
feel a power. You'll feel a twinkling of your
toes, and the hair stand up on the back of your neck, and you'll
experience something unusual, but it'll be a nervous spirit.
You'll receive a spirit. John said, you'd better try the
spirits, whether they be of God. For many antichrists and false
spirits are going out into this world. This world's full of spirits. Everything that's spiritual is
not of God. Satan is a spiritual being. Now
you remember that. Paul says they'll come preaching
another Jesus. His name will be Jesus, but it'll
be another Jesus. And you will receive a spirit,
but it'll be another spirit. When Moses cast down his rod
in Egypt, it turned to a snake. When the witch doctors cast down
their rods, they became snakes. There are all manner of spirits
in this world. We live in a spiritual world. There are principalities and
powers and rulers of the darkness, and everything that is called
spirit is not of God. Satan himself, the Scripture
says, is an angel of light, and his ministers are ministers of
righteousness. Another spirit And he says they'll
come preaching a gospel, but it'll be another gospel. All
religions have a Jesus. All religions have a spirit.
All religions have a gospel. And they travel under those names. If you don't think this is a
frightening day in which we live, it is a day of much religion,
many churches, It is a day of sectarianism, denominationalism. It is a day when men are sitting
around arguing tradition, not praising God, arguing doctrine,
not glorifying God. It is a day when men preach another
Jesus by another spirit, and men receive another gospel. And
the thing we all have in common, though, is that most of them
don't know the Lord. That's what Christ said to this
woman, if you knew, if you knew who it is that speaks to you,
you'd ask of me and I'd give you living water, if you knew. You step into that fashionable
cathedral today, that multi-million dollar church where men and women
are going through the formality of worship, and that's what it
is. I've been to them, you've been to them. confessing what
they've never felt, professing what they've never believed,
claiming what they know nothing of. They have formality, they
have tradition, they have fashion. You walk up to the dull, lifeless
individual going through the formality of a Sunday morning
worship and say to him, if you knew the gift of God, or if you
knew the gift of God. You'd ask of Him and He'd give
you something that this church can't give you. He'd give you
something that the formal traditions and customs of religion and the
ceremonies cannot give you. You go today and step in there
where the ritualist has dressed himself in his gaudy robes of If you've never been to those
places, you can see them on your television set. They have all
the beautiful, all the fine robes of religion. They have decked
themselves out with their relics and cups and candles and stained
glass windows and robes, flaunting themselves around like a peacock
in front of God Almighty. And you can step up to one of
them and say, my friend, if you knew, if you knew the gift of
God, You'd come before him in sackcloth and ashes, not in these
gaudy, flaunting robes of religion. You'd come before him in sackcloth
and ashes and you'd ask of him the water of life. You step into the pulpit and
listen to the average preacher today, delivering an eloquent
address, full of clichÃ©s and flowery intellectual language.
saying a whole lot about nothing. And you say to that preacher,
my friend, if you knew the gift of God, if you knew, you'd be
giving the water of life to these thirsty souls that are sitting
before you. You'd be conscious of their need
and not so much your own need. You'd be conscious of the glory
of God and the mercy of God and the grace of God. and not the
honors that come to men who lead. Step into the sick room where
a sinner full of doubt and fear and dread faces a crashless eternity. The world has been his portion
and now he has no hope. He's leaving this world. This
world has been all that he's ever known. He's known nothing
of God. Now he leaves this world without
any hope. If you could step up and say
to him, my friend, if you knew, if you knew the gift of God,
if you knew, you'd ask of him and he'd give you living water,
if you only knew. Aren't you weary of it? all of the religion, and the
sectarianism, and the denominationalism, and the traditions, and the customs,
and the ceremonies, all of the profession without faith, if you knew. Oh, world today,
twentieth century world, if you knew who he is. If you only knew,
you'd ask, and he'd give you living water, if you knew the
gift of God. What is the gift of God? Well,
turn to John chapter 3, right across the page here, and look
at verse 16. Christ Jesus is the gift of God. He's the gift of God. Here's an old familiar verse
of Scripture, but look at it for the thousandth time. Maybe
today you'll see it. Maybe today you'll see it. For
God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. God so loved the world that He
gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should
not perish, but have eternal life. Christ is God's gift. And Paul called Him in 2 Corinthians
9.15 the unspeakable gift. God gave his Son to be our sin
offering. God gave his Son to be our sacrifice. God gave his Son to be our substitute. And Christ gave himself. He left
heaven's glories and came into this world and clothed himself
in the likeness of sinful flesh and became obedient unto the
law, his law. obeyed it, and every jot and
tittle went to the cross, bearing our guilt and our shame and our
transgressions and our sins. He was wounded for our transgressions. By His stripes we are healed.
He's God's gift to sinners. He is God's gift. If you knew
this, if you really knew this, you'd ask of Him, and He'd give
you all of the benefits and all of the blessings of His death. all which he purchased by his
obedience and by his sacrifice. If you knew this, if you knew
that the gift of God is a person, and that person is the unspeakable
Son of the living God, unspeakable gift, unspeakable glory, beyond
our human expression. Tell you something else, turn
to Romans 6. Christ is God's gift. Jesus Christ
is the gift of God. He gave us a Savior. He gave
us a Redeemer. And brethren, let me say to you,
God does heal the body if it's His will, if it's for His glory,
if it can be for your eternal good. But the healing you need
is the healing of soul, not the healing of your body. Your body's
going to go back to the dust, it's going to die, it's going
to decay, it's going to wither, it's going to get old. But your
soul's going to live forever. And we need to give our attention,
we need to give our attention to the salvation of men's souls,
to the healing of their souls, and not so much the healing of
their bodies. If God be pleased to heal my
body well and good, if not, well and good. But Lord, save my soul. Save my soul. Eternal life is
the gift of God. Look at Romans 6.23, For the
wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through
Jesus Christ our Lord. This is the spiritual life that
Adam lost in the garden. Eternal life, the word eternal
doesn't have so much to do with how long it's going to last,
though it does. Eternal life has to do with the
quality of it, the nature of it, the principle of it. It's
the life of God. Because it's the life of God,
it is eternal. Because it's the life of God,
it's undying. This is the life that Adam lost.
If you eat of the fruit, you'll die, God said. And when Adam
ate, he died. He lived 900 years longer, but
he died spiritually. Spiritual death is separation
from God. Spiritual death is the loss of
the nature of God. Spiritual death is the loss of
the image of God. Spiritual death is the loss of
the knowledge of God. Spiritual death is the loss of
the desire for God. But this life, this eternal life,
this spiritual life, this life of God, is the gift of God. And
He gives it. Now if you knew that, what would
you do? You'd ask of Him. And He'd give you life. If you
knew the gift of God. If you knew the gift of God. What is the gift of God? I'm
telling you what it is. It's Christ. God gave His Son,
Paul said, the unspeakable gift. What is the gift of God? It's
spiritual life. The wages of sin is death. The
gift of God is life. God has it, God gives it. If
you knew that, what would you do? Ask Him. Ask Him. Christ was sitting here on this
well, and the woman came up, said, give me a drink. She said,
how is it you, a Jew, ask a Samaritan for a drink? The Jews had no
dealing with the Samaritans, if you knew. Oh, you're religious. You're denominationalist. You're doctrinalist. You're traditionalist. You're ritualist. You're a ceremonialist. You're a legalist. If you knew
the gift of God, you'd ask me. You'd ask me. Christ is the gift
of God. Eternal life's the gift of God.
Turn to Romans 2. Romans chapter 2. Romans, the second chapter. I want you to look at verse 4. Repentance is the gift of God. That's right, repentance is the
gift of God. In Romans 2 verse 4, listen to
it, "...despisest thou the riches of his goodness, and forbearance,
and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads
you to repentance." What is repentance? It's a change of mind. Let the
wicked forsake his thoughts. It's a change of manners. Let
the wicked forsake his ways. It's a change of masters. Let
him return to the Lord. But there is no sinner who has
ever changed his mind about himself and about God and about this
world and about sin. There's no sinner who's ever
changed his manners, who has ever loved what he hated or hated
what he loved. There's no sinner who ever changed
his master, who ever fell on his face before Christ and said,
my Lord and my God, except God did a work in his heart. That's
so. The goodness of God led you to
that place of repentance. That place of sorrow, that place
of mourning, that place of conviction, that place of repentance. God
led you there. You got another verse, preacher?
All right, 2 Timothy 2. Let's look at this one. 2 Timothy,
chapter 2. I'm saying that repentance is
the gift of God. If you knew the gift of God,
what would you do? Go on in your religion. Go on
in your denominationalism, go on in your sectarianism, go on
in your tradition, go on in your false worship. No, sir, you'd
ask for it if you knew. In 2 Timothy 2, verse 24, listen,
the servant of God must not strive, but be gentle unto all men, apt
to teach, patient. It takes a while sometimes for
God to open blind eyes. Sometimes he does it in a day,
sometimes it takes years. In meekness, instructing those
that oppose themselves. Everybody's going to hell if
he can. That's right, you have to catch them on the downward
grade. They're all on the slippery slide to hell, and they're not
anxious to stop. If God's puradventure will give
them repentance, he may. I don't know. He doesn't have to. He doesn't
have to. They're going to keep on going
their road. They're going to hold on to their
tradition. They're going to hold on to their false profession.
They're going to hold on to their sins. They're going to clutch
them with all their might. They're going to hell if they
can. They're going to hell if they possibly can. Satan has
damned them. He wants them. God Almighty might! That's what he's saying here.
It may be! God will give them repentance to the acknowledging
of the truth, maybe. You go out there and don't fuss
with them, don't strive with them, don't start a fight with
them, don't argue with them. Be gentle. Because they're blind
and they're deaf and they're lame. Be gentle. In meekness, instruct
them. Instruct those that are their
own enemies. You're your worst enemy. It might be, just might
be, God will give him repentance. But God will have to do it, preacher,
you can. God will have to do it, mama,
you can. You can't break that boy's heart, but God can. And
he may. That's the reason I say seek
the Lord. It may be that he'll save you. He doesn't have to. I can't guarantee you that he
will, but he might. Acts 11, verse 18. He doesn't
have to. That's serious. If God, Acts
11, turn over here, it may be that God will be pleased to give
you repentance to the acknowledging of the truth. Look at Acts 11,
verse 18. Acts 11, verse 18. Listen to
the Word of God. when they heard these things,
they held their peace, and they glorified God, saying, Then hath
God also to the Gentiles granted, given repentance unto life."
Repentance is a gift of God. Christ Jesus, that unspeakable
gift, is the gift of God. Eternal life, spiritual which
we lost is the gift of God. When an old sinner is whittled
down and broken and stripped and stopped on his road to hell
like Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus, God stopped him,
God stripped him, God broke him, and God gave him repentance.
Now, you can keep on if you want to, sticking out your hand, saying,
Do you believe on Jesus? If you do, take my hand and go
to the promised land. You can keep doing that, making
proselytes to your religion and making them two-fold more the
child of hell than you are. But I'm not going to do it. I'm
going to keep preaching the gospel of Christ. It may be. Paul said,
peradventure, God might give somebody repentance. It might
be. Did you know faith's the gift
of God? Turn to Philippians chapter 1. If you knew the gift of God,
you'd ask Him. Oh, here this poor, sinful, thirsty
woman, this poor, sinful, thirsty soul, standing there face to
face with the God of glory. She didn't know Him. Of course,
she had religion steeped in it. She had sectarianism steeped
in her tradition. She knew some things, but she
didn't know God. And Christ said, if you knew
this guilt, you'd ask me. You'd ask me. And I say to you,
Christ's the gift of God. If you knew that, you'd ask for
Him. Eternal life's the gift of God. If you knew that, you'd
ask for it. Repentance is the gift of God. If you knew that,
you'd ask for it. Instead of trying to find your
own repentance and your own sorrow, which is earthly sorrow that
worketh death, godly sorrow bringeth repentance. You'd ask him. I'll tell you something else.
Philippians 1.29. Listen. For unto you it is given in the
behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but to suffer
for him. Face the gift of God. Who gave
you faith? Who enabled you to believe on
Christ? It's given unto you to believe
on Him and to suffer for Him. One preacher says it's fun being
saved. Sometimes it's not too much fun. Sometimes it's not. Ask Paul
when he's being scourged. Ask Paul when he's been beaten
with rods. Ask Paul when he's sitting down
there in the jail, hungry, thirsty, weary, and tired. It's fun being
saved. Sometimes God's people are called
upon to suffer. Who calls on them to suffer?
God does. Who gives them the valley? God
does. God says, I kill and I make alive.
I wound and I heal. I maketh rich, and I maketh poor.
I, the Lord, do these things." Faith's the gift of God. It's
given unto you to believe on Him. Turn to Ephesians chapter
2. Listen to this. For by grace are you saved through
faith, and that not of yourselves, it's the what? Gift of God. Gift of God. I believe any time
I get good and ready, preacher. You don't really believe that
now, do you? You don't really believe that, do you? Faith is the gift of God. It
is God who enabled you to see. It is God who enabled you to
hear. It is God who enabled you to embrace Christ. There were
two thieves crucified. They saw the same thing, heard
the same thing, experienced the same thing. One of them confessed
Christ, one of them went to hell. Who made the difference? Wisdom's the gift of God. If
you knew, you'd ask, he said. If any man liked wisdom, let
him ask of God, James wrote, who giveth liberally. The Holy
Spirit is the gift of God. Look at Luke chapter 11, Luke
11, 13. Our Lord said, if your son asks
for bread, are you going to give him a stone? If he asks for an
egg, will you give him a scorpion? Look at verse 13 of Luke 11.
If you then, being evil, Know how to give good gifts unto your
children. How much more shall the Heavenly
Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him? You see the parallel I'm drawing
this morning. Here was a poor sinful soul,
came to that well She didn't expect when she left
home that morning that her path would cross the path of the Lord
of Glory. She's going about her daily ritual,
her daily tradition, her daily custom. She got up and took care
of the house and put on her clothes and got her water jug and headed
for the well. Here she came to the well and
this man asked her to give him a drink. That wasn't the first
man she'd spoken to or had spoken to her. Now it wasn't the first
man she'd encountered that day, but this man said, if you knew
the gift of God. And I say to you, this Sunday
morning, like any other Sunday morning for the 50, 60, 70 years
you've lived, you got up and went through the motions and
ate your breakfast and drank your coffee and glanced at the
paper and hurried the family together and got them in the
car and headed for church and came and sat down, going through
your religion. You're religious, you've always
been religious. You know Bible history and Bible
characters. You have Bible knowledge. You
believe in God. You've always believed in God.
You're a Baptist or you're something else. You've always been that.
Nobody's going to change you. God help you, nobody's going
to change you. Who knows? Maybe somebody here
will find out who the gift of God is and what the gift of God
is. If you knew, I guarantee you'd
ask, you're looking for Christ, you're looking for the Messiah,
you're looking for life, you're looking for repentance, you're
looking for faith, you're looking for wisdom, you're looking for
the Holy Spirit. If you knew that that is the
gift of God, if you knew that, you don't find it down here,
it's not down here. There ain't no repentance down here. I don't
see any hanging around, do you? There's no faith down here. And
these hands, there's no salvation in them. It can't help you. If you knew who He is, what would
you do? You'd quit walking up and down
aisles and shaking preachers' hands and going to morning benches
and baptismal pools and dedicating and rededicating and consecrating
and re-consecrating and going through the motions of religion,
and you'd fall on your face at the feet of Him! And you cry, God give me mercy! Give me faith, give me repentance,
give me wisdom, give me the Holy Spirit, give me Christ or I die. Now watch this next line, John
chapter 4. If you ask him, if you knew who
he was, you'd ask him and you know what he'd do? Huh? You know
what he'd do? What would he do? He gives you
living water. The only reason you don't have
it is you haven't been to Him who gives it. The only reason
you don't have it is you're looking for it in the wrong places. You're
looking for it in your own heart. It's not there. You've got an
old, dead, tadpole-filled cistern, what you've got. You're not looking
for that bubbly spring of living water that's in Christ. If you
knew who he is, you'd ask him. Oh, you'd ask him. You'd keep
on asking. Ask, and you shall receive. Seek,
and you shall find. Knock, and it shall be opened.
But you know whose door you've got to knock on? Not mine. His. His. Who? Him. Ask him. Quit doing business with all
of these doormen and chamberlains and valets and servants, and
go to him. I'll go to Jesus, though my sins,
like mountains round me, rose. I know his courts I'll enter
in, no matter who opposes." The difficulty is not with God.
He delights to show mercy. He says, Ho, everyone that thirsteth,
come to the water. He's the friend of sinners. He
said, let us reason together. Though your sins be as scarlet,
I'll make them white as snow. Whosoever shall call upon the
name of the Lord shall be saved. The difficulty is not with God.
He delights to show mercy. The Bible is full of examples
of sinners who came to Christ and they were saved, the woman
who bade his feet with the tears of her repentance and dried his
feet with her hair, Saul of Tarsus, the woman of Canaan who kept
crying, Lord, help me, help me, blind Bartimaeus, who said, Jesus,
thou son of David, have mercy on me, the Philippian jailer
who cried, sirs, what must I do to be saved, the open eunuch
who said, I believe. the Roman centurion who cried,
Lord, I believe, help my unbelief. Well, preacher, why am I not
saved? Well, let me ask you a question. If there's a roaring fire over
here in the fireplace, and everybody gathers around it, everybody
gathers around the fire, and everybody's warmed but you. Then the false knot with the
fire is that there's something wrong with you. You've got a
disease in your bones, a chill. Something won't let you get warm.
Nothing wrong with the fire. False with you. If we all sit
around the table each day and we eat, and I get strong and
well and fat, and you keep losing weight eating the same food,
there's nothing wrong with the food. There's something wrong
with you. If we all are sick and we all
take the same medicine, all of us get well but you don't bring
the medicine. The gospel they preach is no
good, it didn't help me. What they're preaching down there
is no good, it didn't help me. It's not what they're preaching,
it's you. That's where the fault is. If Christ Jesus brings joy
to the heart, and peace and rest to the soul, and he doesn't bring
it to you, there's something wrong with you. There's nothing
wrong with him. There's nothing wrong with his gospel. You know
what he said in John 5? Turn over one page and read this. He said, here's your trouble.
John 5, 40, you will not come to me. that you might have life. You've been to everybody else.
You've been to the soul winners and sat down and talked to them.
They all told you about their experience. It didn't help, did
it? You've gone to the church, this church, that church, the
other church. You've tried them all. You've listened to all the
Gospels and all the preachers, and you've done what they told
you to do, but it hasn't helped, has it? You've made one profession,
two professions, three professions. You've been baptized. You've
been sprinkled. You've been confirmed. You've been all these things.
It hasn't helped, has it? What's the problem? You haven't
been to him yet. You will not come to me, Christ
said, that you might have life. He is the gift of God. Life is
the gift of God. Repentance is the gift of God. Faith is the gift of God. Wisdom,
spiritual wisdom, spiritual understanding is the gift of God, and the Holy
Spirit is the gift of God. Now, it may be, Paul said, you
read that scripture again, it may be. You keep preaching, it
might be God will give somebody repentance. I'll tell you who
he's going to give it to. Everybody would ask him. Everybody
would ask him. If you knew the gift of God,
you'd ask of me, and I'd give you living water. Our Father in heaven, for this
promise we thank thee." Our hope and our confidence is not in
our traditions, not in our doctrine. It's not even in this book. Our
hope and our confidence is Christ. Our refuge is not a profession
of religion. It's not a moral life. It's Christ. Thank you, Lord. for your mercies
and your grace through Christ Jesus, our Redeemer. May everybody
in this congregation be brought face to face like the woman at
the well with Him who is the gift of God. And may they be
driven shut up to Christ. May they be turned to Christ
and do business with Him, the living Lord. In His name we pray,
amen.

If You Knew - You Would Ask

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If You Knew - You Would Ask

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