If someone was to ask you how could you explain what living life was like, what would your reply be? Would it sound like a positive note, or something more negative? Would it be filled with statements of blessings, love and compassion, or something more contrary? We all experience life’s ups and down, don’t we? We experience it in sad as well as humorous ways; life changing events that are so heavenly, to some that are downright evil. However, I cannot help but to think, how we could experience life without having any hope, without any love, without any future or purpose? I am reminded what God told Jeremiah “For I know the plans that I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans for prosperity and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.” You see friends, its in Gods design, from the very beginning, to give His creation, us, to have a whole reason and purpose to experience life at its best; not just meeting the needs, or just getting by. Listen to what God said to the prophet Malachi “The Lord will make each one of us overflow with blessing in such a way that there will not be room enough to receive it.” Where in that statement do we hear or even hint that experiencing Gods blessings will be limited, small or minute?
George Bernard Shaw, the winner of the 1925 Nobel Prize for literature, played the “What If” game before he died. A reporter asked him if he could live his life over, and be any person he has know, or any other person in history, who would he be? Mr. Shaw replied, “I would be the man that George Bernard Shaw could have been, but never was.”
Common to hear, “What could have been”, or “What if!” The sad thing is friends, when we say “what we could be” or “what if we did this or that”, “if I just had more time,” all could have been avoided; our life could be the result of something much more fruitful, liberating and full of life, if ‘only’ we learned to experience the living waters of God.
In starting our journey today friends, let us continue in the Gospel of John with the story of Samaritan women at the well. If you read this dialogue, it is the longest conversation Jesus had in scripture with another person. One thing worth mentioning here, is that the Jewish people and the Samaritan people, hated each other, bordering war. Their beliefs maybe were different, personality was obscured, they drank wine using their left hand verses their right, they liked to raise goats instead of sheep, whatever the true reason was, there was tension between the two races of people; yet, here we have at a lone well in the middle of the hot sun, a Samaritan women, and Jesus.
So He *came to a city of Samaria called Sychar, near the parcel of land that Jacob gave to his son Joseph; 6 and Jacob’s well was there. So Jesus, tired from His journey, was just sitting by the well. It was about the sixth hour. 7 A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.” 8 For His disciples had gone away to the city to buy food. 9 So the Samaritan woman said to Him, “How is it that You, though You are a Jew, are asking me for a drink, though I am a Samaritan woman?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)
Right off, what jumps out at me, the Samaritan women did not know Jesus, only the fact that he was a Jew. Maybe by his appearance, or maybe Jesus’s accent or slang, whatever the way, she knew there was enough to know that there was a hidden law or rule that Jews and Samarians were not to interact, it was forbidden. But did that stop Jesus? Did this women’s appearance or status in being a Samaritan women change His action or thought?
Jesus replied to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who is saying to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.” 11 She said to Him, “Sir, You have no bucket and the well is deep; where then do You get this living water? 12 You are not greater than our father Jacob, are You, who gave us the well and drank of it himself, and his sons and his cattle?” Listen to Jesus response. Jesus answered and said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again; 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never be thirsty; but the water that I will give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up to eternal life.”
Living Water! Eternal Life! These are some miraculous words we find here in scripture. Even though, we see a genuine interaction with a social barrier between a Samaritan and a Jew, this shines brightly to how Jesus, and us today, are to break down old barriers, as Jesus put it, “Give Me a drink,” so that the living water from God can be experienced by all people, regardless of race, creed, sex, social status, whatever. It’s the living water friends that Jesus speaks to the Samaritan women about. And in verse 15, the Samaritan women emphatically ask’s Jesus the question all of us want to ask, “Sir, give me this water so that I will not be thirsty, nor come all the way here to draw water.” I want this living water! How can I get it and what does it mean?
To try and understand, let me skip to chapter 7 and hear what Jesus says “The one who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.’” Being thirsty is something I believe everyone on earth has experienced, both physical and spiritual. Physical thirst encounters the urge to satisfy our dry mouths and our symptomatic body becomes weak while lacking the very important liquid that is absolutely life giving. Since each creature on earth can relate to being thirsty, its something that spells out directly to our personality that when we are dehydrated, lack water, we become something not of ourselves, something we are not intended to become! We lack something that is both life-giving and life-changing. It is true that a person can live longer without food than water, but just as the Samaritan women said, “Give me this water, so that I may not thirst again.” No one wants to be thirsty. Our bodies needs and requires it. And guess what; so does our spirit!
Our eternal spirit thrives, draws upon and requires life giving water to sustain and grow. Its something no one on earth can surpass or even ignore. Listen to what the Psalmist said in Psalm 42, “As the deer pants for the water brooks, so pants my soul for You, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God” Psalm 63, “My soul thirsts for You, my flesh yearns for You, In a dry and exhausted land where there is no water.” Isaiah 55, “You there! Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; And you who have no money come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk Without money and without cost.” Matthew 5, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.”
Friends, it is in Gods design that each of us are to fully depend on Him, and be sustained in body, mind and spirit. We each urgently require something not of ourselves, but something far more paternal in need from our creator, our Heavenly father, even if we do not recognize it, just like the Samaritan women at the well. Down deep, we know we are His creation; even if we ignore the living waters that can only come from the living God. And it is in verse 21 I believe describes what the living water is, and also how not too surprised the Samaritan women was with Jesus answer, however, that very day, she became a true worshiper of Christ; she became a witness to the messiah, son of the living God.
Jesus said to her, “Believe Me, woman, that a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, because salvation is from the Jews. 23 But a time is coming, and even now has arrived, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”… and the woman left her waterpot and went into the city, and *said to the people, 29 “Come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done; this is not the Christ, is He?” 30 They left the city and were coming to Him.
I could quite literally stop right here and say these answers the question. Jesus gives a declaration that no one can argue or ignore. When it comes to experiencing living waters of God, it is something that can only be done, and our thirst satisfied by way of being in Spirit and in Truth. The women actually dropped everything and went to tell others of the living water she just experienced. She witnessed the truth!
Do you remember the one person who asked Jesus the question, ‘What is truth?’ “Then You are a king!” Pilate said. “You say that I am a king,” Jesus answered. “For this reason I was born and have come into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to My voice.” 38“What is truth?” Pilate asked. And having said this, he went out again to the Jews and told them, “I find no basis for a charge against Him.
Jesus came to testify to the truth! Christ’s life friends display truth, breathes truth, speaks truth. Christ is truth. And us, who believe, are to worship God ONLY in Spirit and Truth, no exceptions.
So friends in experiencing the living water, Living Water Is Jesus Himself, there are three things I would like to show that we can do regularly to help us continue to live and draw upon Gods living water.
Being in the truth about ourselves. Do you realize we can hide nothing from God? The woman at the well knew she needed saving and the forgiveness of her sins. God is always near to the humble, so being truthful with ourselves and God about all that we lack is the first step to drawing near to Him so we can access the Living Water. 1 John tells us “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
Being in the truth about who God is. The woman at the well agreed with God as He revealed Himself to her. Sometimes we challenge the Lord’s Word, sometimes we even disagree and disregard it. When we reject His Word, we reject the truth that functions as a pipe for that Living Water to get into our hearts. Gospel of John tells us “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.” Gospel of Luke “No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”
Remaining in the truth. The woman at the well didn’t pick up her water jug and go home to her old life unchanged. She acted on the truth she now held in her heart and we see her life take a significant turn. Such a turn, that the townspeople whom she did so much to avoid, she now ran to gather and, also, they all believed her and followed her — something had possibly changed, even physically in her countenance that they could all see! Sometimes, we let a spiritual truth sit out in front of us but don’t take it in. She took it. She drank the Living Water. Scripture sits at our fingertips, and we are challenged daily to take it up and drink it in. Friends, let me leave you with the words from Revelation, “The Spirit and the bride say, “Come.” And let the one who hears say, “Come.” And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires, take the water of life without cost.” Come to Christ friends, He is the only way. Amen.