Jesus IS - The Gospel of John - Part 2 Jesus is All Satisfying
Jesus Is - The Gospel of John • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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GREET EVERYONE-
Good Morning Loved Ones
If I have not had a chance to meet you; My name is Scott and I am a follower of Jesus and have the privilege of serving Him as the Lead Pastor among the people of Stonewater Fellowship.
Our Vision:
We Desire see every follower of Jesus well equipped and fully deployed on the mission of Jesus.
What mission? - This questions leads us to articulate His mission for His church in a simple way.
Our Mission:
Is to engage people into a multiplying relationship with Jesus!
LETS GRAB OUR BIBLES IF YOU HAVE ONE AND
Open it to John Chapter 4 and verse 1 as we continue exposing what God says through the Apostle John about How God describes Jesus.
PRAYER OVER SERIES
AS we began this walk through the Gospel of John a few months ago.
we began by Asking the question From the Text “Who is Jesus?”
We heard and saw, through the text of Scripture, some of these overarching titles through the Holy Spirit that
Jesus is GOD -
Jesus is the creator -
Jesus is the one on whom His name can be called on and
He is the one who can be trusted
Jesus is the One who invites us INTO relationship with Himself to come and see what a difference He can make.
That Jesus is the God/Man sent with a purpose.
And That Jesus is the ONE who speaks of Miraculous Rebirth and Everlasting Life.
In this series, we are currently in, titled “Jesus is”
My prayer is that we will be able to identify Jesus, in our life, with some titles that are more personal and intimate by Saying
Jesus IS -
Jesus is my Bridegroom
Jesus is All Satisfying to me
Jesus IS the sower of Eternal Life for me
Jesus IS my great Healer
Jesus IS God with Authority over my life.
SO here is my prayer -
Not that we can say "Jesus is” things becasue the Bible says Jesus is these things - although that is important!
I pray that we would say these things becasue Jesus actually IS these things in our life!
That He would actually Be these things to us in real and tangable ways.
That He would be these to us through our experience with HIM and our our experience is becasue of our devotion to Him.
In Speaking OF to our devotion to Him - It brings to mind what the Apostle Paul says to the Corinthian Church -
For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.
And I am praying that if for some reason, the love of Jesus is not controlling us, so that we are no longer living for ourselves but for Him who dies for us and was raised - Because we have not turned to Jesus to be all of these things in our life -
I pray WE would turn again and again and again - bowing the knee to Him as Lord and Let Him be all of these things - in real and undeniable ways SO our hearts and lives will cry out loud - Jesus IS
PRAYER OVER THIS MORNINGS MESSAGE
Is that we would take inventory -
IS any of you have ever gone through recovery the words 12 steps would mean something.
The 12 steps of recovery all have titles.
This last week, by providence of God I was reminded what Step 4 in the 12 steps of recovery was.
That step is titled the courage step.
The courage to take a moral inventory. To look inside and be honest!
Actually the full description is to take a Fearless moral inventory to be completely honest with ones self of ones behavior to begin to take responsibility for ones actions.
My prayer is that each one of us this morning, in light of what the Apostle John is going to record for us in this gospel -
Use this passage of text as a mirror over our own life and take a fearless moral inventory of our own life and Ask ourselves:
Is Jesus all truly Satisfying?
And if that is not a complete and total reality in any way large and small we would begin devoting ourselves to allowing the Sprit of God to empower change and bring about repentant change so that Jesus would be ALL satisfying.
ENGAGEMENT –
I I have thought about that question “Is Jesus all Satisfying?” and its implications over my own life and the life of my family and the possible implications over the average church goer in our culture that claims Jesus.
It was very very easy to recon that things can seem very satisfying to us in our abundance.
But that might not be and in many cases is certainly not Jesus that is satisfying.
You see in our culture, in our context, we live in abundance here.
No matter what we have - No matter what the scale in this context - compared to the rest of the world outside of our country we live in extreme abundance.
And that Abundance we claim is provided TO us by God -
And we say that it is provided FOR us to enjoy
And we count that as being blessed by God
and as Christians we then can so easily get wooed into claiming that because of our abundance “Jesus is very very satisfying!”
And there are TONS of things in our life that are tremendously satisfying to our hearts and minds.
I mean think about it -
Going out to a nice Dinner with a loved one or with friends or just the family - Super Satisfying!
I mean think about that - Nice food, its relaxing, no struggle to cook and the best part of going out to dinner, No clean up! Satisfying!
Here is another -
Sitting out on the porch on a cool spring morning as the Sun comes up and we have the perfect cup of coffee in the morning and we reading our Bible in our lap or our devotional.
Satisfying!
Business success! We make an investment - It gives a great return! in any kind of short term speculation - Bigger Paycheck - anything like that - It adds money to our account!
Satisfying!
We look at our longer term investments and they have done well and are healthy over the long term -
Satisfying!
We look at our children - Well behaved - Going to college - Sober - Headed to a life that is fuller and able to be better than the one we have -
Satisfying!
For some of us, who are employed, we are well paid, NOW we don't have a ton of abundance, but bills are paid, collectors are not calling, the tax man is of no threat to us, we rarely if ever have to think “I don't have money for Gas” or “I’m not sure we can buy groceries for this week”
Satisfying!
Our relationships are going well. Either in our families or in the work place or where ever!
We have a good marriage, or we think we do - or dating relationships, and we have a good relationship with our kids and relatives.
Satisfying!
We might even add politics!
If our national politics represent and the policies the law makers are endorsing and advancing align with what we sense is our own Christian Biblical Values
Satisfying!
And if all those or at least some of those, if not most of those are in place in our life -
Many many many who claim Christ would say “Jesus caused them, has blessed me with them, and therefore Jesus is all Satisfying!”
TENSION
These thoughts have brought me to wonder something about all that!
If that is the mark of Jesus blessing...
If that is the characteristics of Jesus satisfying our souls...
If that is what it is to be blessed by God…
and Jesus is to be all satisfying under those conditions…
Then why do we live is such inner turmoil?
Why is secular psycho therapy the number one solution for Christians when facing life problems?
Why are the Anti-depressant medications so vibrantly used and prescribed by those who claim Christ?
Why are the negative statistics of our culture not all that different and sometimes worse among the people in the church verses the people who are not in the church?
Why are divorces among those who claim Christ at an all time High?
Why is addiction the number ONE problem among people who claim Christ?
Addiction? Yes addiction!
Prescription Drugs, Sex via pornography, THC, Alcohol, Materialism via shopping, food addiction?
Why do we live lives of hidden vailed transparency and isolation?
Why are most people who claim Christ more concerned with having these Blessings and Achieving these blessing here on earth, rather than focused on eternity and the consequences of eternity?
I might suggest this morning as I have reflected on my own life - that in reality - every single one of us Struggle in this culture of Abundance to experience Jesus as All Satisfying. Becasue we are so very easily wooed away from Jesus!
Some of you might be thinking “Pastor are you suggesting that we leave this culture so we can experience Jesus as all satisfying? “
Well maybe but not directly!
You see loved ones -
What we will hear and see this morning, from the Apostle John, through this text, is what happens to us when Jesus becomes all satisfying and we begin to step into the All satisfying life that he has for us!
Why do you say this Pastor?
The problem is
I look at the results of our abundant Christian Culture where we believe this abundance is provided TO us by God - and we believe that this abundance is provided FOR us to enjoy by GOD and we count those things a being Blessed by GOD -
We so very easily operate in the farmework that the blessings of God in this huge abundance is ABOUT us
to use on our own pleasure and self indulgence, instead of, dying to self and using everything for His glory and the advancement of His kingdom through the devotion to Christ obedience of His word and the proclamation of His gospel
and this so easily happens to all of us.
And Yet, when it becomes about us, we thirst in this life with an never satisfying thirst.
BACKGROUND
VSS 1-7 kinds of set the backdrop for us.
Jesus was down in the south part of Israel Baptizing people - Actually His disciples were -
What had happened right before this was Jesus was in Jerusalem -
He had spoken to Nicodemus who was a Jewish leader who came to Jesus in the middle of the night and Jesus spoke to him about being “Born again”
Right after that John the Baptist talks to his disciples about jesus being the Bide Groom
all of this happens down south near Jerusalem and at the beginning of Chapter 4 Jesus and crew Head north!
UNPACKING
VSS 4
And he had to pass through Samaria.
Samaria was A Region between Judea and Galilee -
So he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there; so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour.
Verses 1-7 really set the scene for us - Nothing too theological here but there are a couple of things historically significant.
One is Samaria - Samaria has some interesting history
Some 900 or so years before Jesus when King Solomon's sons were up to be king the Geographical area of Israel was divided in to two pieces that became two kingdoms.
The northern kingdom and the southern Kingdom
The Northern kingsom of Israel and the Southern Kngdom of Judah.
The area where the Capital of the Northern kingdom was Samaria and the capital of the southern kingdom was Jerusalem.
About 3-400 years after the kingdoms split the exile and the occupation happen and they took most of the people away from the northern kingdoms and sent other people to live in the capitol .
The Assyrians has sent people into the land to occupy the capitol city and when the Jewish people of the northern kingdom they came an inter married with the Assyrian people there and their children were considered half preens as they were not of pure Abrahamic decent.
They had also developed a different pattern of worship, they rejected most of the Jewish Old Testament and built their own temple to worship in.
And so there was bigotry, discrimination and hatred on both sides, The Samaritan’s hated the Jewish people and the Jewish prop hated them
And here jesus is sitting at the well that Jacob had dug some 1500 years before
A woman from Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.”
Now the setting is interesting - The text says “it was about the sixth hour”
Back then we didn’t measure time from noon till midnight and from midnight till noon
What we did back then is we measured Sun-up to Sun-Down and Sun- down to Sun-up.
So when the text says “IT was about the 6th hour it means to us it was about 6 hours since sun-up and so to us it would have been about noon time.
A woman comes to draw water. This would have been pretty unusual because normally people would come to the well to draw water first thing in the morning and late in the day.
Traffic at the well would have been non-existent in the mid day.
BUT the text says “a woman from Samaria came to draw water”
Here is what is interesting - Jesus Speaks first -
Give me a Drink”
Jesus is a Jewish man - By Him self at this well - The Text says
(For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.)
He is by Himself - In a cultural context that is hostile to Him being a Jewish person and He was also supposed to be hostile toward.
And yet He speaks first.
The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.)
It is almost as if she says to Jesus “What on earth are you doing talking to me you now your not supposed to do that!
And yet Jesus tears down the racial and cultural division and Speak to her.
Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.”
Jesus responds “If you knew the Gift of God” remember she is a Samaritan - the Samaritan’s had rejected all of the Old Testament except the first five books of the Bible. They only knew the Torah - They did not know the prophets they did not know or understand the prophecies concerning the promised Messiah,
They did not know the Gift of God -
Jesus then continues and says “and who it is that is saying to you “Give me a drink”
And what He is specifically implying is that Not only did she to know the Gift from God Because of her lack of knowledge of the only testament but she also did not realize the the gift was standing right in from of her.
Jesus then flips the script and says - IF you would have known and recognized these things you would have ask me for a drink and He would have given Living Water.
What Jesus had just said is “if you had known who I am you would have asked me for what I can give and what I have is living!
And What was implied by Jesus is The living water I give …it will satisfy!
The woman said to him, “Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.”
But watch - watch how she responds!
You have nothing to draw water with - The well is deep and you have nothing !
Where are you going to get that living water?
Are you greater that our father Jacob? - He gave us the well and drank from it himself and so did His sons and His live stock
Watch - Her response was in the practical
Her response was what she could see -
Here response was out of here experience in the flesh.
Can you provide something that is better that all of this - a 1000 years of water - You don’t even have something to get the water how in the world are you going to satisfy anything or any body you can’t even help your self.
Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
Jesus begins to open her heart and mind to the reality that there might possibly be something that is beyond here current experience. Something much ore significant beyond what she has experienced up until this point in her life.
Everyone
Ever body say “Everyone” Who? Every one!
Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again
Jesus has just laid down the difference between the pursuit of weirdly things and the pursuit of eternal things.
You pursue Earthly things you will not ever be satisfied -
What ever satisfaction you get it will be temporary
You will thirst again!
Jesus then clarifies and tells her not only what to turn from but also Who to turn TO
He begins with BUT and when you see the word BUT in the scripture it is always drawing a contrast -
He these says “Who Ever -
Say “Who Ever” -
Who ever drinks of the supply that I give will never be thirsty again
The life and the experience I give with be all satisfying
WHY?
Because it will be a well spring Inside that will overflow to eternal life!.
She Didn’t clearly get it and said
The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.”
Give me the water so I don't have to work this hard!
Jesus then takes here inside her self and life and causes her to take a fearless moral inventory of her own life.
Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.”
I cannot Imagine what went through her head - What My husband? What on earth are you talking about - My husband
She responds!
The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.”
Jesus says “I know”
You see loved ones when we take a fearless moral inventory of our life and where we are - We can do it with no fear of what Jesus will say - We may not like what we see and what we admit but we can come to Jesus and admit our moral condition and Jesus will respond “I know”
Jesus says”you are being honest you have no husband - you have had five and the man that you are in intimate relationship now is not your husband.
This astonishes the woman and she thinks Jesus is a prophet
The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.”
and what She has just done is test Jesus
You are acting like a prophet - Here is the test - Our fathers - meaning Jacob and the twelve tribe leaders worshiped on this mountain
BUT
You say - meaning the Jewish people and leaders say “Jerusalem is the place”
Jesus responds with the current spiritual worship environment and the coming worship and eternal worship environment.
Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, 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. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”
Worship is not done by the sacrificial system - Worship is not longer done in earthly means - it is not done by being in a place where the presence of God is externally present -
Jesus is implying there is a day when the Spirit if God is In dwelling believers- Truth - Jesus, the everlasting ever enduring Word of God and Spirit the indwelling Spirit.
Then it dawns on Her -
The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.” Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am he.”
You see - She had heard, through the community Rumor mill that there Jewish people had this mind set that says “there is a Messiah coming 0 This anointed by God person Comeing
Jesus says “I am he”
Watch what happens -
What she does is she begins to experience the all satisfying life that Jesus was wanting her to experience
The apostles are suprised at this conversation - they did not stand in her way of experiencing Jesus -
And VSS 28 she has her practical needs met and she leaves and begins to experaince the all satisfying well spring that Jesus spoke of
She TOLD SOMEONE -
She began INFLUENCING OTHERS to come to Jesus.
She wen and Said - I have met the one who knew my inventory - Can this be the promised one Can this be the Anointed by God?
Can this be Him?
And the people came out to see Jesus.
She began to live a life towards the eternal things of God -
Later in the Narrative if we keep reading we will head that many came to believe in Jesus through her testimony.
THE GOSPEL CONNECTION
This is what the Gospel Does -
This is what Jesus does!
Jesus changes the sources of our satisfaction and the abundance of worship -
When the Gospel gets a hold of us and transforms us we live for Him -
We represent Christ in how we live making Him known in word and in deed to Anyone, Anywhere Anytime.
One of Jesus first Parables was called the Parable of the soils.
About that Parable, Jesus said we have to understand That parable or we wont understand any parable.
in that Parable Jesus calls us to be Good soil, producing fruit in a multiplier of 30x 60x 100 times.
Many people of us becasue we think the blessing of abundance is ABOUT us - we think we are good soils becasue there is lots of Growth!
In that Parable Jesus says lots of Growth can be a problem because the worries of world and the deceitfulness of abundance can cause NO FRUIT!
and NO Fruit on our life is a problem with Jesus and will bring problems into our life.
When our life is Marked by obedience to Jesus - Fruit bearing obedience When our life is marked by this we have an abundance of worship NOT a worship of Abundance.
And, Loved ones - our abundance of worship comes from our experience with Him that is facilitated by our obedience to Him
and our thirst forever is satisfied!
NON- Believers
STICKY POINT
APPLICATION OR IMAGINE
PRAYER TEAM
