Freedom Sunday

This morning we culminate our messages on freedom as we participate in Freedom Sunday, a day that we emphasize and raise funds to help fight one of the darkest things that happen on our planet - human trafficking. We have far too often ignored this travesty that still continues in our world today.

Let’s turn to

John 4:1–14 NIV

1 Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John— 2 although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. 3 So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee. 4 Now he had to go through Samaria. 5 So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon. 7 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) 9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.) 10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” 11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?” 13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

Samaria is a place that Jews would avoid like the plague. I find it interesting that John says that Jesus had to go through Samaria, but Jews would often go far out of their way to avoid going through Samaria.

The people of Samaria were considered to have prostituted Biblical faith and to have compromised Godly values. They were not only avoided, they were hated by the Jews of Jesus’ day. But Jesus not only went through Samaria, but He had a conversation and offered salvation to a Samaritan woman that he found at the well.

Overview: While journeying through Samaria, Jesus encountered this woman at a well. Jesus broke all socio-cultural norms of this day by talking with her. Not only was it unheard of for a man to speak to a woman in public, but since Jews also hated Samaritans, a conversation with a Samaritan woman would have certainly been taboo. And, on top of that, this woman was not the most upstanding woman of Samaria. She had had five husbands and was now living with a man who was not her husband. She was even rejected by her own community, which explains why she’s drawing water at the hottest time of the day. The other women would have gone to the well early in the morning, but she waited until noon so she could go in peace. Yet Jesus not only spoke to her, but discussed a deep theological truth with her. In her encounter with Jesus, the woman found acceptance, forgiveness, grace, and a new beginning. Jesus did not define her by her past but as someone made in God’s image and worthy of love. Our past mistakes don’t have to determine our futures. God always offers the chance for a new life. And God wants to use His church to offer new life to individuals who have been exploited through human trafficking.

1. Jesus valued the woman enough to go find her. This was a woman so looked down on by her community that she preferred to face the noonday sun over the judgment of other women at the well. Yet Jesus cared enough to seek her out at that particular well during that particular time. Now, I am not saying that she was a victim of human trafficking - she was likely where she was in life due to her own choices, but Jesus saw her as someone worth saving.

Today, sadly, individuals who are victims of human trafficking and exploitation often face prejudice and social stigmas. They need to know that God values them and searches for them.

If Jesus had stayed within the bounds of what society considered acceptable, he would not have spoken to her. Likewise, we also have to be willing to get outside our comfort zones to reach those in need of God’s love.

2. Jesus helped the woman come to a better understanding of who God is. The woman’s conversation reveals a few clues about her beliefs about God. She thought of God as confined to a place—this mountain or in Jerusalem. She thought of the Messiah as someone who might perhaps show up one day—not someone that could change her present reality. Perhaps, given her background, she thought of God as being for other people—not for someone like her. Jesus reveals truth to her: that God cares more about the hearts of his worshippers than the place they worship; that salvation is immediately available; that God cares enough about her to sit down on a dusty well in the heat of the day and have a conversation that changed her life.

Today, trafficking victims may also need to understand truths about God: That God is trustworthy. That God is a rescuer. That God seeks after the lost. That no one is beyond the reach of God’s love. That no sin is so big God won’t forgive. Like the woman at the well, trafficking victims today need to find spiritual healing made possible only in Jesus Christ.

3. Jesus offered the woman new life. Jesus’ disciples went into the town to buy food and returned to Jesus apparently without mentioning him to the townspeople. Yet the woman abandoned her original purpose of drawing water, left the jar at the well, and ran into town to tell all the people about this man who just might be the Messiah. Before meeting Jesus, her past condemned her. She had few options but to go from one man to another as a way to survive. Jesus did not judge the woman, but neither did he excuse her sin. Jesus lovingly confronted the woman’s past and offered her a chance for a new beginning.

In Jesus, this woman found a way to begin again. Today, trafficking victims need that same opportunity for a new life. Survivors of trafficking need healing and help. We have a chance to offer them the grace and hope of Jesus. I am very thankful that the church today is not only shining the light on this horrible problem in our world, but I am thankful that the church is doing something to help victims of human trafficking. The Church of the Nazarene around the world is actively involved in trying to alleviate the suffering and to reduce the demand for human trafficking.

There is much we don’t know about the woman’s story. Where did she sleep that night? What new skills did she need to learn to survive? What physical or emotional scars needed healing? Did she stay in that village or find a new place where her past was not so well known? Likewise, for trafficking victims today escaping their circumstances is only the beginning. They need treatment for physical or mental wounds. They need to learn a new job or social skills. They need to learn how—and whom—to trust. But the woman’s story gives us hope that it is possible.

4. Now, as then, God is in the restoration business.

Today, those that are involved in bringing restoration and hope are in need of our support, so I encourage you to give toward the efforts that are being made.