John 4 (Part 1) :1–24 • Living Water and True Worship

We're making our way through the Gospel of John, and on Wednesday night we finished the Old Testament. So, we are actually going to be, we started First John on Wednesday night, so we're actually doing New Testament on both Sunday and Wednesday because we're done with the Old Testament. So, when we finish the New, we will start all over again. So, if you have one of our Bibles, you're going to be turning to page 518. And for the rest of you, we're in John chapter four, so, turn there please. We're going to be talking about some important things today. I’ve got to tell you though, I kind of went into this study a little bit like, I thought, well, it's the woman at the well, and I've read it many times and I've taught it several times and it's cool. We now know what this gal looks like for, thanks to the chosen. But anyway I just, I kind of went into it thinking, well, it's the woman at the well, so the woman at the well, and there's the water and the thing and the conversation. Yeah, but as I started reading through this chapter, I was really challenged with the insights and the things that the Lord wants to convey I think through this. And I was planning on taking a whole lot more in this chapter than what I ended up being able to take. I couldn't get that far because there was just too much to talk about. So there you go. John, chapter four, beginning at verse one. We're going to read down through verse 24. Follow along with me as I read.

I'm going to have you stop there. Let's pray. Father, as we get into the Word today, we need your help as always. We need you to open our hearts, open our eyes, and un-stop our ears. For, Lord, we've been trouncing around in the world all week long and we've learned to listen like the world listens. But we need to change that right now because we need to hear You. We need to tune into your voice and your heart and hear the message that You have for us today. Father, enable us by Your Spirit we pray. For we ask it in the name of Jesus our Savior, amen. Amen. Well, I'm going to show you on the screen just the two points that we're really going to be covering today. ---

Topics in John 4:1-24  Living Water  True Worship We're going to be talking about living water, and then we're also going to be talking about true worship. And I think these are going to be some important things to kind of talk about. But I want you to notice here first that verse three tells us that Jesus and his disciples departed Judea and started North toward Galilee and then verse four tells us that He had to pass through Samaria. It kind of makes it sound like He absolutely had to, and there was no choice in the matter. He had to go through Samaria. So let me refresh you a little bit on this. I'm going to put a map up on the screen. And this will help a little bit because you'll notice that there are some arrows pointing to the different regions you need to know about. First of all, to the south, you've got Judea, and that's where Jesus was, that's where Jerusalem is. And then just north of that, you have the region of Samaria. And then north of that you have the area called Galilee, and Jesus and His disciples were making the trip from Judea up to Galilee. All right? Now the thing you need to understand about this is that back in the time of the Kings, back in the time of King David, this was all Israel from Judea, which of course was called Judah, because that was the largest tribe in that area, through Samaria, up into Galilee. That was all Israel. It was just all called Israel. And then during the reign of David's son, Solomon, it was all called Israel. And then Solomon's son took the throne, a man by the name of Rehoboam, and through his stupidity he split the kingdom. He split it into two parts. And so, you had the part to the south, which was called Judah, later called Judea from the Greek, and the northern part, which would be Samaria and Galilee was called Israel. Now they were all Jews. They were all Israelites. But you have Judah in the South. Israel to the north. But there's been a lot going on since the time of the kings. Now, here's the interesting thing about this. When the kingdom split into two kingdoms, Judah in the south, the capital of Judah was Jerusalem. The capital of Israel was a city called Samaria. Later on, that became the name for that entire region. But you might remember from your study of the Old Testament, but that the northern kingdom of Israel was conquered first. They were overthrown by the Assyrian Empire and those people were scattered. And other people were invited in to live into that land that the Assyrians had also conquered, and so the Jews who were still in the land in the northern kingdom of Israel began to inter-marry with those other groups. The Jews, intermarrying with Gentiles became Samaritans. The Jews who lived in the Southern Kingdom called them half breeds, and they despised them because of that very reason. So, this is some of the history that's going on. The point is when Jews, in the time of Jesus, wanted to make their way north to Galilee, they had to trounce through Samaria. Well, some people just wouldn't do it. They just, they said, I will not set foot on Samaritan soil. So, some people would actually get to the northern border of Judea, they would cross the Jordan River, and then they would travel up on the east side of the Jordan and then cross again when they got up toward Galilee just to be able to say, I didn't, I didn't step on Samaritan soil. They thought it would defile them. Well, that was what a lot of Jews did. Jesus, however, didn't do that. He walked right through Samaria. We're told in verse five that he came to a town called Sychar and we're, and this is an interesting point, John remarks for us here, that it was near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. You remember Joseph was the son of David that was sold into slavery by his brothers, who lived in Egypt for a number of years and rose to a great position of prominence there in Egypt. But anyway, and we're told in verse six that Jacob's well was also there. And so, Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, just sat down beside the well and were told it was about the sixth hour. Now in the Jewish reckoning of time, that would be high noon. Interestingly enough, verse seven tells us, a woman began to come and make her way to the well in order to draw water. Well, this is an odd thing. Women didn't come at noon to draw water. That was the hottest time of the day. And so, the women would come in the early morning in the cool of the day to draw water, and so you right away are alerted to a peculiar situation. This woman is not functioning with the rest of the women of the village. She's going on her own. She comes to the water, probably very surprised to see a Jew sitting there by the well. And she would've recognized him easily as a Jew by the way he had, was dressed. And in, verse seven we hear Jesus saying to her, give me a drink of water. And we're told parenthetically, and the next verse, that the disciples were not there. They'd gone into a nearby town to buy some food. Now, right away, the woman is put off by this request. In verse nine, she says, how is it you know that you're even talking to me and you're asking me for a drink of water? You're a Jew. I'm a Samaritan woman. And then John even gives us another parenthetical comment saying, Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. That's because they despised them. Well, so this is where we get into a very important conversation between Jesus and this Samaritan woman. And Jesus answered her verse 10, look with me in your Bible.

You might underline or highlight that phrase in your Bible, “living water.” Now,

Now you can see right away that just like Nicodemus, the woman is taking literally what Jesus is saying about living water, and she thinks He's talking about real water that you drink rather than the spiritual implications that are behind it, which we'll talk about. But her misunderstanding is really understandable because back in ancient times, they would refer to water that came up out of a spring as living water.

--- They did it because it used to bubble up out of the ground and it looked like it was alive. So, they literally referred to a fresh spring as living water. So, you can see here that this woman could have very easily thought that Jesus was simply telling her about a nearby active spring. He's saying, hey I know of this other living water. So, she counters, notice in verse 12, by asking or speaking about this whole situation in the form of a question, 12“are you greater, (she says), than our father Jacob who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.” All right, now stop There. You need a little historical background in order to understand what this woman is actually saying to Jesus. She says, are you greater than our father Jacob? Now remember I just told you that Samaritans were part Jew, part Gentile all right? Most Jews in the time of Jesus would've been highly offended by this woman making the claim that she was a child of Jacob and that the Samaritans were in fact an offshoot from Jacob. But that's what the Samaritans believed. They, but they, it was more than that. They believed that they were descended from Jacob through his son Joseph, and Joseph's two boys who were Ephraim and Manasa. They believed, as a people, that they were descended from that particular tribe. It wasn't true, but they believed it alright? And there were other things that they believed too, but, and we'll talk about that in just a minute, but she asked Him this question, are you greater than our father Jacob? And she's essentially saying to Jesus, Jacob himself, the father of the Jewish people came to this area, he had to dig this well with his own hands and get the water from it and water his family and his livestock and stuff like that. Are you telling me that you're greater than him? You're greater than our father, Jacob. And she's kind of wondering what is going on here? Here's this Jew claiming that he's got something better than what we received from our father, Jacob. Little does she know, she's talking to the God of Jacob. So yeah, the answer to her question is, yeah, I am greater than Jacob. But you notice that Jesus doesn't answer that way. He doesn't respond that way. He doesn't say to her, yes, as a matter of fact, I am greater than Jacob. And the reason He doesn't do that is because that's not why He's having this conversation with her. What He wants her to understand, is frankly something about herself. He wants her to understand about her own personal needs, and to do that, he needs to get her to see that he's not talking about physical water, He's talking about spiritual water, and we'll talk about that more. ---

So He goes on and he says to her in verse 13, look with me in your Bible. Jesus said to her,

That's a pretty incredible claim if you're just talking about regular water, right? But He goes on to say,

Now, I've not only taught through this passage before, but I've heard lots of other people teach through it as well. And this is typically where you start, whoever's teaching, preaching whatever, starts talking to you about the meaning of living water. And they talk about the fact that living water is a picture of the Holy Spirit. And then they'll start to ask questions like, have you received the Holy Spirit? Do you have that living water flowing in your life and is it bubbling up and da, da, da… And all that is good and fine. But it fails to see the real emphasis of living water in our lives. We sometimes, we talk about the Holy Spirit in ways that don't fully comprehend what He has come to do. What is the living water doing in your life? I want to highlight and emphasize it for you, and I'll do it on the screen. Here's, here it is again. John 4:14 (ESV)

“…whoever drinks of the water that I will give him, Jesus says, will never be thirsty again. The water that I give him will become in him a spring of water, (and here's the purpose) WELLING UP TO ETERNAL LIFE.” That's the key right there People don't miss it, because you see at the heart of this conversation that Jesus is having with this woman is the fundamental idea that all of us have a deep longing in our lives that the world can't satisfy. We try to satisfy it. We try, we have all, pleasure, physical pleasures, emotional experiences. Sometimes we just try to, it, oh, I don't know, we’ve tried so many things to try to find something in this life that satisfies. But what we long for, even though we may not know it more than anything else, is we long for eternal life. We just can't put it into words, but we were created for it. We were created for eternal life, but we lost it. We lost it when sin entered into the equation. We lost eternal life and we are empty without it. And we have this insatiable thirst, this longing in our lives for something we don't know what. It's hard to put our finger on it, it's hard to put it into words, but I'm telling you what it is. And it's exactly what Jesus is trying to get this woman to understand. You have a need and you've been trying to fill it. And it's not happening, and you're not being satisfied, because only I can satisfy you with the life that I give and that is eternal life. And that's really the message that he's conveying to her now in verse 15, I don't know if she's talking sarcastically or what's going on here, but

So, it kind of, yeah, it kind of sounds like she's really not getting the idea yet of her real deep down need, and so Jesus is going to turn the conversation around as He does so incredibly, so masterfully, and he's going to get her to realize, you have this gnawing need that you've been trying to fill on your own and it ain't happening. Look at how it goes. Verse 16.

(Come on back. We'll have a chat. And the woman responds by saying) …I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, yeah I know, you're absolutely correct when you say you have no husband. Fact of the matter is you've had five of them. And the man that you're currently living with out of wedlock is not your husband. So, what you have said is absolutely true. Now, please understand people, Jesus isn't being mean. This is His way of getting this woman to look in the mirror and see herself. It's the mirror of His Word. Jesus is the Word of God made flesh. And do you know that when you read the Bible, he's getting you to do the same thing, or at least he's trying to. He wants you to read the Bible in such a way that you see yourself in the reflection of the Word. Now, that's not always going to be a pleasant visual experience because right? I mean, don't you read the Bible and get convicted sometimes? Don't you ever read the Bible and you read something and it's kind of like, I didn't really want to hear that because the Lord just convicted me and made me aware of the fact that I'm not living like I should and now I need to repent and come back and say, forgive me Lord, and whatever else, but that's what it is.

We're looking at ourselves, we're seeing ourselves, and that's what He's getting this woman to do, but I want you to notice. She comes back in verse 19 and she said, 19 “The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet.” It's kind of interesting the things that people say when they're kind of being confronted with their bankruptcy. Have you ever been sharing with somebody and talking just about the Lord and their need for salvation and they kind of deflect. People will do that when it starts getting uncomfortable. They'll just deflect. Kind of push it off into another area, and sometimes it can be kind of aggressive. In this case, she just basically says, sir I perceive that you're a prophet and that's all good and fine. But actually, what Jesus was trying to get her to do was perceive herself and her need. And so she says, I perceive that you're a prophet. And really, it really wasn't a prophetic word, it was really a word of knowledge. What Jesus said to her was a word of knowledge. It's a spiritual gift that you can have too. And the word of knowledge is defined as the ability to know something about someone's life without having any previous knowledge of it intellectually, the Spirit just reveals it to you. And we see this throughout the Word of God, people who have a word of knowledge from the Lord. But anyway, rather than this woman perceiving something about Jesus, I think He would've rather had her perceive her own, personal need and so forth and so on. Because it's like, lady you've been driven, you've been driven to be married five times, and the woman or the man rather that you're with right now, it isn't even your husband. So, there's obviously a gnawing need inside of you, and I wanted to make you aware of that. Because you see you're working really hard to try to fill that need with the things of this world, but it's not happening, is it? You just go from man to man, and you keep thinking that maybe this next guy is going to be the answer and will give you the satisfaction you're looking for. But he won't. He never will. Because what you don't understand, ma’am, is that what you long for is something that only I can give. Well, she's going to deflect even a little more. Verse 20. She brings up a debate issue. She says, 20“Our fathers worshiped on this mountain….” And what is that all about? The Samaritans. Okay, you again, you need to know a little history here. You guys remember when. God was giving commands to Moses about when they came into the promised land, you'll remember Moses didn't make it into the promised Land. Joshua led them into the land, but God told Moses, when you get into the land, I want you to gather the people in this valley between these two mountains. And you're going to have Mount Ebal on one side and you're going to have Mount Gerizim on the other side, and the people will be gathered below. And I want you to take some guys and put them up on Mount Ebal. And from there I want them to read all of the curses from the law if they decide, if they determine not to be obedient to the covenant that I've made. But for Mount Gerizim I want you to have your men read the blessings and all the people in the valley will hear this being declared. Mount Gerizim, where the blessings were declared, was considered to be Samaritan soil. The Samaritans believed that because the blessings had been declared from that mountain, that it was a blessed mountain. It wasn't, it was just a mountain. But that's what they believe because people do that. They grab things and they just decide, this is what I believe, right? Well, even more than that, like I said, the Samaritans believed that they were offspring directly from Joseph's children, Manasa and Ephrem. They weren't, but they believed it because when you want to believe something, people will just believe it. It's not true, but they'll just choose to believe it anyway. So anyway, this is kind of what's going on. She says, our father's worshiped on this mountain because we considered Mount Gerizim blessed because from there, the blessings were declared and so forth. And then she goes on to say, but you Jews think that Jerusalem is the only place where it's proper to worship God. And so again, this is a deflection. Jesus is going to graciously respond, but He's still responding to a deflection. He says, “woman, (verse 21), believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain. Nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father.” And this is the first point that I want you to understand about true worship. It has no connection with locality or geography or place. It doesn't matter where you go to worship God, it doesn't matter. And you need to understand that. But you also got to keep in mind that in the Old Testament geography was important because God did command the Jews to worship in Jerusalem, because that's where the temple was, and where the temple was, was the picture of God's presence among his people. Where's the temple today? Where's the temple today? We know it was in Jerusalem back then. Where do God's people worship today? Is it a matter of locality? Is it a matter of where? Look, what Paul said when he wrote to the Corinthians,

You see, this is why there's no issue with locality or geography today when it comes to worship, because if you're a born-again believer today, then the Holy Spirit lives in you and that is His temple. You are a temple of the Holy Spirit. So please understand first when it comes to true worship. It has no reference to place. Verse 23, 23“But the hour is coming, (Jesus says) and is now here. When the true worshipers will worship the father in spirit and truth for the Father is seeking such people to worship him.” And this is the second point that I want to make or that Jesus is making regarding true worship, and he speaks here again of true worshipers. What is a true worshiper? Well, He's telling you. It's someone who worships in spirit and truth. Why is he talking about spirit and truth? Well, because the conversation here is about Jews and Samaritans. He said, the woman is saying, we, Samaritans say, and you, Jews, she says, say this. So, He's responding to this and saying, no, we must worship in spirit and truth, and here's why He said that. The Jews didn't worship in spirit and the Samaritans didn't worship in truth. They both needed an upgrade. And that's what He's saying in this section, because you see, the Jews worshiped outwardly. It was all about their outward ceremonies and sacrifices and all of the food laws and all the things that they did that were all external. But Jesus said, God is looking for true worshipers who worship Him in spirit. And he's talking about this, the human spirit. That part of you as a believer that is God breathed. When you became a believer in Jesus, He breathed into you the breath of life from His Spirit and you became born-again. And it is through that spiritual connection to God that He wants to have that interaction with you and have you worship Him. But you see, we've lost sight of the Spirit. We are, we're made of body, soul, and spirit, but we've lost sight of the Spirit. It's just the craziest thing in the world. Why? Well, it's because the other two, the body and the soul are constantly screaming at us for our attention.

By the way, your soul is, your emotions, your intellect, your will. You know what your body is. I trust you are well aware of that. Aren't those things constantly talking to you, telling you what they need? I mean, my body is. I'm cold. You need to get warm. I'm too warm. I need to get cool. I'm hungry. I got to go to the refrigerator. I'm tired. I got to go lay down. I have a headache. I got to go get some Tylenol. My body's always talking to me and it's demanding and it's saying, do this, do that and I listen for the most part. And that's one of the reasons why fasting is such a powerful exercise. It's a way of taking an opportunity to say to our body – no, no. You remember what the Apostle Paul used to say about his body? He says, “I beat my body and make it my slave.” Why? Because he knew that if I sit and just acquiesce to every need of my fleshly appetites, pretty soon I'm going to be enslaved to my fleshly appetites. I'm going to listen only to them. And you know the world they think that there's no other choice but just to operate under your fleshly appetites. They don't know anything else. And then there's our emotions, how I feel. We are such an emotional people today. We have, there's never been a people in this world that are more counseled concerning their emotional issues than what we have today in this world, and we're still messed up. Because we are just all about feeling, And people write to me all the time and they're confused and they're wondering why they can't make sense of things. But when I read their message, it's just all about how they feel. Pastor Paul, I just feel like, I just feel like God's not listening to me. I just feel like God doesn't love me. I just feel that way. Okay, but is it true? You see, that's the question. If they're going to be honest with you, they're going to say, well, yeah, if I feel it, then it's true. Yeah, wrong. You need to hit the buzzer on that one. That's wrong, and it doesn't mean anything. Your feelings will lie to you. The Bible tells us that the heart of man is deceitful, and so that means it's going to lie. So, you see, here we are listening to our physical bodies, listening to our emotions, and we're all kind of going the Spirit. What's that? What’s the spirit? Define that for me. Define the spirit. Well, it's kind of like the wind. I don't know. We're kind of clueless you know about the whole thing. You know what? God is Spirit and He's looking for people who are going to worship Him in Spirit. And if you're struggling to understand what that means, it just goes to show that the whole thing about the Spirit is just completely out of, it's just off your radar. It's incredible sometimes people will tell me, I just want to hear God's voice. I'm like, why? They want to hear it with their ears, their physical ears. Do you understand that God wants to speak to you through your spirit? Have you ever had God communicate with you through your spirit? It's an amazing thing because God can speak to you something that would take an hour to say with words, and He can do it in a fraction of a second through your spirit. It's the most amazing form of communication. It just blows me away. God wants you to worship in spirit. The spirit is the heart. You say, okay, well, what does it mean to worship him in spirit? Paul told us, Romans chapter one, excuse me, chapter 12 verse one, Romans 12:1

It is your spiritual worship. Isn't that great? We start thinking that all these other physical things are worship. It's like if I were to say, okay, we're just going to worship God. Well, somebody say, well, somebody's got to get the guitar. Get the guitar out here, and we got to turn the mic on, and we got to get the drum, we got to get the drummer here. And we got to, you got to, because we're going to have worship, so we have to have all those things, right? No. Now, those are great. There's nothing wrong with those things. Those are expressions that we use to help, but they're not necessary. They're not required. What is required? Paul says to worship God spiritually is to offer yourself to Him. So you see, if you've gone through a whole worship service and you sang and that was fine, you sang and maybe you were even singing to the Lord and it was becoming a real genuine prayer to the Lord, that’s wonderful. But real true worship is when you say to God, I'm yours. I am yours. I offer myself to you today again. I am yours. You can worship, but you get up in the morning, you throw your covers off and sit up in bed and say, Lord, good morning, I'm yours. You just worshiped God. That is your spiritual act of worship, to offer yourself as a living sacrifice. That means the whole word sacrifice means that you might have to say no to some of the things that you might want to do in order to say yes to some of the things He might want you to do. But that's okay. So, it's really pretty cool when you think about what real worship is. It doesn't take musical instruments or singing or clapping. Some people think, hey, if you don't raise your hands, man, you haven't been worshiping. God. I've been in churches where if you don't dance, you haven't worshiped God. It's like you got

--- to get up and move. Yeah. Or shout, hallelujah. Had a guy call me a number of years ago, he said, do you guys blow the shofar? I said, what? Do you blow the shofar during worship? I knew what that was. It was the horn that the Israelites would blow, to kind of rally the people to, usually for battle, sort of a thing. They did that at the Viking game that I went to in Minnesota. They didn't call it the shofar, but, and it was mostly electronic, but, so do you guys blow the shofar? I said no we don't blow a shofar. Okay. He's hung up on me. It's like, I'm going to go to a church where they've got a shofar. Because that, see, that just becomes worship. It becomes how we define it, but how God defines spiritual worship is to simply offer yourself to Him, I am yours. And that is, that's something that the Jews didn't do, but that's something that we are called to do. But what does it mean? See, we're not just to worship in spirit. We're also to worship in truth. And that's what the Samaritans weren't doing. Why? Because they came up with their own kind of little religious sort of, explanation for how they came about. And you see, we're just descendant from the sons of Joseph, and Mount Gerizim is specially blessed by God. Oh, and you know what? They even believed that Moses told Joshua to build an altar on Mount Gerizim. He didn't. He actually told him to build an altar on Mount Ebal, not Gerizim, but they decided that's what they were going to believe, and they believed it. So, were they worshiping in truth? No, they came up with their own ideas. They came up with their own beliefs. They came up. Have you ever met people like that? Well, I just believe that God isn't going to punish anybody. Well, that's all good and fine, but is that what the Bible says? You see? And we're so captivated today by opinions. People write to me and they say, Pastor Paul, what's your opinion on this? And I'm like, you don't want to know my opinion. My opinion isn't worth anything. You want to know what God's Word says. What is true. What is true. That's the only thing worth your time. So how do we worship God? In truth? We worship Him as He has revealed Himself and as He has revealed all other things in the Word. When we follow the Word and stick to the Word, we are worshiping Him in truth. When we get off our own little rabbit trails and our own little things that we've decided we're just going to embrace and believe because it's comfortable or because I just want to believe it, you're not worshiping in truth. So, worship in spirit, offer yourself to Him every day. And worship in truth according to the Word. Get to know Him through His Word. Get to know what He says is true.

Not what the world says, not what you say, not what your neighbor says. What he says is true. And we will worship as the Father would have us to worship in spirit and in truth. Amen? Let's stand together. So tomorrow morning. I want you to throw off the covers. Put your feet on the floor. Worship God. Just say, Lord, I am yours. I belong to you. If you need prayer this morning, come on down front we'd love to pray for you. Father, thank you so much for giving us this time today to just hang out in your presence, to hear Your Word, to hear what's true, to open our hearts. Father, we desire to be people who understand our condition enough to know that the world will never satisfy the longing of our hearts. Only you can do that as you pour out your Holy Spirit that living water and bring about in our lives, eternal life. Father, I thank you so much for this instruction about worship and how you desire us to worship. And all the things that we do physically are all fine, but that's not worship. Help us, Lord, to worship you in spirit by offering ourselves to you as a living sacrifice, and help us, Lord, to worship in truth, according to the revelation of Your Word. We thank you and praise you in the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior, and all God's people said together, amen. God bless you. Have a good rest of your Sunday. ---