Come to the Well that Never Runs Dry
The Gospel of John • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
0 ratings
· 7 viewsText Idea The gifts we desire will consume us. The gift that he offers will sustain. Sermon Idea Nothing of this world satisfies us permanently. But Jesus has overcome the world.
Notes
Transcript
Handout
When Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard he was making and baptizing more disciples than John (though Jesus himself was not baptizing, but his disciples were), he left Judea and went again to Galilee. He had to travel through Samaria; so he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar near the property that Jacob had given his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, worn out from his journey, sat down at the well. It was about noon.
A woman of Samaria came to draw water.
“Give me a drink,” Jesus said to her, because his disciples had gone into town to buy food.
“How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” she asked him. For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.
Jesus answered, “If you knew the gift of God, and who is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would ask him, and he would give you living water.”
“Sir,” said the woman, “you don’t even have a bucket, and the well is deep. So where do you get this ‘living water’? You aren’t greater than our father Jacob, are you? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and livestock.”
Jesus said, “Everyone who drinks from this water will get thirsty again. But whoever drinks from the water that I will give him will never get thirsty again. In fact, the water I will give him will become a well of water springing up in him for eternal life.”
“Sir,” the woman said to him, “give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and come here to draw water.”
THE WORD OF THE LORD
About a month ago a friend sent me some pictures over text. I was immediately taken with the detail and clarity of the images and asked what camera he used. As soon as he told me it was a new iPhone I asked my wife if it wasn’t about time for us to upgrade. Because she is much smarter than me she told me no.
We both have iPhone 11’s which might seem old to some, but they work perfectly fine. There is just this underlying dissatisfaction that we as humans have with stuff. When you get a new vehicle or new clothes, we do all we can to avoid getting them dirty or messed up, but after a few months its importance fades and we desire something else.
It’s interesting that Forbes magazine recently shared an article entitled 10 things that unhappy people do. Number two on the list was spending too much time and effort acquiring things. We are dissatisfied with our current things, so we attempt to acquire more things which further adds to our dissatisfaction.
The Bible says in the New Living Translation of
Proverbs 27:20
Just as Death and Destruction are never satisfied, so human desire is never satisfied
and it rings with the same truth proclaimed by the secular British poet and philosopher, Mick Jagger, I can’t get no satisfaction.
Today we will see Jesus expose this truth in a conversation he has with a Samaritan woman at a well in Sychar. He’ll demonstrate how nothing of this world satisfies us permanently, while the gift that he offers is the only gift that eternally sustains.
We know the reason that the apostle John wrote this gospel was so that we might believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and by believing that we may have life in his name.
Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
In chapter 3 of John we were witness to Jesus’ conversation with Nicodemus, a wise man and Pharisee who visited Jesus at night. Jesus spoke to him with boldness and truth. He told him that people doing shameful things do them in the dark so that no one may see. That the light exposes shame and evil deeds.
In comparison, here in chapter 4, Jesus speaks to a woman from Samaria who encounters him during the middle of the day, when the light is brightest and shame cannot be hidden.
Nicodemus was a Pharisee and ruler of the Jews who did not want to be seen with Jesus, which we see with the time he came to visit. Jesus told him his good deeds would never be good enough to get him in to the kingdom of heaven. And he exposed Nicodemus’ lack by demonstrating his authority. But notice how he interacts with our woman at the well.
He had to travel through Samaria; so he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar near the property that Jacob had given his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, worn out from his journey, sat down at the well. It was about noon.
A woman of Samaria came to draw water.
“Give me a drink,” Jesus said to her,
First off, the Bible says Jesus had to travel through Samaria, commentaries consistently suggest that nothing specific is intended by this. But I like to think Jesus had to make this stop on his journey as part of God’s divine will to expose the lack and the need that we as people so often attempt to overlook or compensate for. By talking to Nicodemus and having to go through Samaria to talk to this woman, Jesus is showing his dominion over those who are looked at with reverence and those who are looked at with disgust. He is Lord of all.
Looking at verses 6-7, we read that Jesus, was worn out from his journey, and in the heat of the day sat down by the well. Where he asked a Samaritan woman for a drink.
Jesus experiences weariness and thirst (4:6-7).
Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, worn out from his journey, sat down at the well. It was about noon.
A woman of Samaria came to draw water.
“Give me a drink,” Jesus said to her,
Jesus experienced weariness and thirst, and exposed his need, before he exposed hers. This is exactly how he came to earth. As a baby, in a manger. Nothing special to look at. Nothing to give anyone. Why? The Bible says he did it to teach us.
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility consider others as more important than yourselves. Everyone should look not to his own interests, but rather to the interests of others.
Adopt the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus,
who, existing in the form of God,
did not consider equality with God
as something to be exploited.
Instead he emptied himself
by assuming the form of a servant,
taking on the likeness of humanity.
And when he had come as a man,
he humbled himself by becoming obedient
to the point of death—
even to death on a cross.
This is the Messiah, the Son of God.
Why did he empty himself of divinity to assume the form of a servant?
To experience need, and ask for help. The posture he takes with this woman is a posture of need. Not authority.
Do you find yourself meeting the needs of others with your ability to figure it out and get it done?
Or do you meet them where they are, as a fellow fallen human being in need of the same grace and mercy as every other sinner?
That is worth considering deeply.
John 4:8–9 (CSB)
his disciples had gone into town to buy food.
“How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” she asked him. For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.
We had to be told that his disciples went to town, or else they would have rebuked Jesus for talking to a Samaritan, whom the Jews despised, and a woman whom all saw as second class citizens at this time.
In stark opposition to his dealings with a man, who was a Pharisee, and a ruler of the Jews, whom he spoke to in authority, exposing his lack and his inability to enter the kingdom through his works; here he experiences weakness, thirst, and comes to a despised, second class citizen in need. What a gracious and compassionate God we serve. He meets us where we are. No matter our sin.
Do we treat people this way?
In verse 10 Jesus exposes our inability to be filled by things of this world.
Jesus exposes our inability to be filled by things of this world (4:10).
Jesus answered, “If you knew the gift of God, and who is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would ask him, and he would give you living water.”
The picture that always comes to mind when I hear living water is of a river or lake or even an ocean. The water that sustains life is flowing, its deep, its unpredictable, its beautiful, its terrifying at times, and it should fill us with awe. But it is teeming with life. Sometimes we go there to swim, but we would rather dig a hole in the ground and sterilize it weekly, so that nothing could ever possibly live there. It’s safe, it’s easy, it’s comfortable, but it has no life. Sometimes I think the Christian walk should be a swimming pool, but to walk out life with Jesus we must faithfully enter the living waters.
Up until now, the woman thought she had been talking to Jesus about a drink from the well. Here, she gets the first inclination that he might mean something more. Jesus exposes her inability to be filled by things of this world. And he also says, if you knew the gift of God? What exactly is the gift of God. Go over to Romans 6:23
For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
What is eternal life?
Go to John 17:3
This is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and the one you have sent—Jesus Christ.
So the gift of God is eternal life. Eternal life is that we might know God. When the rich young ruler asked Jesus, what must I do to gain eternal life? Jesus told him to sell all of his things, give it to the poor and to follow him.
How did he walk away from that interaction?
Sad. Because he had many things. So Jesus exposed 20 centuries ago what Forbes magazine is telling us today. Unhappy people acquire many things, and those many things will never satisfy. They will never bring us peace. We can only know God when we believe that Jesus is the Son of God, and in that find life in his name, which is the entire reason that John wrote this gospel. So that we may know him.
We grow daily in our trust, in our knowledge, that he is who he says he is, because of the consistent transformation we see in our own life. This is what it means to be sanctified. Or be at peace with God. Go to John 14:27
“Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Don’t let your heart be troubled or fearful.
The gift of God is believing God over believing the world. Believing the world brings trouble and fear. Believing Jesus is Peace. The great preacher Alexander Maclaren said that “Peace comes not from the absence of trouble, but from the presence of God.” Which goes right along with the living waters being unknown and frightening. We don’t find our peace in them. We find it in Jesus.
The word peace in the New Testament is eirene, and in the Old Testament the word is shalom. They both convey contentment in heart, but never describe the absence of trouble. In fact, they more fully describe wholeness or completeness or the binding together again of that which has been separated. From the fall of man in Genesis 3, man has been broken, or incomplete, because of his relationship with God. That is what Jesus came to give us. A restored relationship.
Jeremiah 2:13 says
For my people have committed a double evil:
They have abandoned me,
the fountain of living water,
and dug cisterns for themselves—
cracked cisterns that cannot hold water.
We foolishly choose trouble over peace. And because of that we abandon God, the fountain of living water, and are attempting to fill up cracked cisterns that cannot hold any water at all. Jesus exposes our inability to be filled by things of this world.
But Jesus expresses his ability to give us a gift that has overcome the world.
Jesus expresses his ability to give us a gift that has overcome the world (4:10, 13-14; 14:27; 16:33).
“Sir,” said the woman, “you don’t even have a bucket, and the well is deep. So where do you get this ‘living water’? You aren’t greater than our father Jacob, are you? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and livestock.”
Jesus said, “Everyone who drinks from this water will get thirsty again. But whoever drinks from the water that I will give him will never get thirsty again. In fact, the water I will give him will become a well of water springing up in him for eternal life.”
“Sir,” the woman said to him, “give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and come here to draw water.”
As soon as Jesus exposed her need, and his ability to satisfy it in ways that the world could not, she begins deflecting as we often do when confronted by God’s Word. You don’t even have a bucket, the well is too deep, where do you even get this “living water” you aren’t greater than Jacob, or are you?
And again he told her this water will leave you thirsty again. But whoever drinks from the water I give, will never get thirsty again, but it will become a well of water that others will be able to drink from for eternal life. Jesus experienced weariness and thirst. Jesus exposed our inability to be filled by things of this world. And Jesus expressed his ability to give us a gift that has overcome the world.
And that’s all it took for the woman at the well. “Give me this water,” she said. She knew he had something that she needed and she wanted it, so she would never have to come to that well in the heat of the day again, and would finally be able to quit hiding her shame from the people in town.
Jesus experienced weariness for our sake. He hungered and thirsted. On the cross he said I thirst and was given sour wine. He died dissatisfied. Thirsty, feeling forsaken, humiliated and alone.
Why did Jesus choose to die this way?
1 Peter 2 says
For you were called to this, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.
Why did he do it? So we could have peace and be courageous in this world through his example. He gave us a gift and calls us to return to it in the midst of dissatisfaction. The same man who thirsted in
After this, when Jesus knew that everything was now finished that the Scripture might be fulfilled, he said, “I’m thirsty.” A jar full of sour wine was sitting there; so they fixed a sponge full of sour wine on a hyssop branch and held it up to his mouth.
When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, “It is finished.” Then bowing his head, he gave up his spirit.
that same man...is the same God that will satisfy us permanently in the end.
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 price.
Come all you weary, come all you thirsty
Come to the well that never runs dry
Drink of the Water, come and thirst no more
Come all you sinners, come find His mercy
Come to the table, He will satisfy
Taste of His goodness, find what you're looking for
Jesus experienced pain, dissatisfaction and death for us. So that he might expose our Spiritual thirst. Nothing this world gives will ever satisfy, in fact the things of this world will only leave us dissatisfied and consumed. He’s calling us to return to him and experience the gift that only he can give.
I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace. You will have suffering in this world. Be courageous! I have conquered the world.”
The gift Jesus gives has overcome the world.
Let’s pray
ADVERTISEMENT