Turn with me this evening to John chapter 4. John 4. This is a story which I have personally heard all of my life, but when I studied it in detail several years ago, when I taught through John in my Sunday school class, it gripped me in a way which it had not gripped me before. So I would like us to study this story together this evening. It is the story of the Samaritan woman's encounter with Jesus at the well. Now as we come to the fourth chapter, let me explain John's purpose in writing this gospel. His single purpose is to reveal Jesus Christ as God incarnate. He does that all through this book. Everything you read in this book is focused on that purpose. No story is isolated from that primary goal. The story we will study here in chapter 4 is not primarily the story of the conversion of a Samaritan woman. In fact, it doesn't even tell us directly that she was converted. It is only strongly implied. So the key to chapter 4 is not the conversion of the Samaritan woman, rather the key to chapter 4 is verse 26 where Christ says, I am the Messiah. That's the key verse because John's purpose all throughout his gospel is to present Jesus as God and it's no different here in chapter 4. The focus here is not on the woman, the focus is on Jesus. So as we come to the first part of this chapter, we will see that he reveals himself as the Messiah for the first time in Samaria, initially to a woman at a well, and then to people from Samaria, particularly from the village of Sychar. Now you might wonder why did he decide to reveal himself as to the Messiah there, rather than to the most politically correct and influential target, the Jewish religious leaders. Why choose to reveal that monumental truth to an obscure, despised, immoral Samaritan woman? The answer lies in the sweeping truth that is, that in the matter of salvation, God is not one to show partiality. And that Christ did not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. He chose to hide these things from the wise and intelligent and to reveal them to infants. And when he finally did reveal who he was to the Jewish religious leaders, they didn't believe him anyway. And when John structured his gospel, he intentionally included this story shortly after the story of Jesus' encounter with Nicodemus. The contrast between the Samaritan woman and Nicodemus is striking. He was a devoutly religious Jew. She was an immoral Samaritan. He was a learned theologian. She was an uneducated peasant woman. He recognized Jesus as a teacher sent by God. She had no clue who Jesus was. Nicodemus was wealthy. She was poor. He was a member of the social elite of Israel. She was the dregs of Samaritan society. An outcast among outcasts, since the Jews regarded all Samaritans as unclean untouchables. So this story reveals the character of God towards sinners. Jesus wasn't particular about the type of person that he dealt with Unless they were self-righteous. He had nothing to do with them but he loved those who knew they were sinners and He never played favorites. And so in this account we see him dealing in love because With a woman that no one else would deal with in love Because she was a complete outcast But that was no problem to Christ because His love wasn't determined by the object. It was determined by the character of His love. That's the difference between human love and divine love. Human love says, I love you because I like what you are. Divine love says, I love you. I don't care what you are. I just love you because that's the character of love. Divine love knows no limitations. It transcends all barriers of race, gender, ethnicity, and religious tradition. And here Jesus exhibits the character of divine love. And if it happens to be a prostitute like this woman who falls under that love, that's the way it is, because it's the character of God's love to love. So let me say it again. This is not the story of a Samaritan woman. This is the story of the unfolding of the revelation of Jesus Christ. Jesus chooses to reveal who he is to this sinful Samaritan woman. But she's incidental to the story. The story is always and only about Christ. Don't forget that. God's glory is first and the unfolding of the Messiah is what matters here. Now it's difficult to outline this passage because it is dialogue. But let me give you four scenes within this story by which we can structure it. First we see the circumstances, then the contact, next the conviction, and finally the Christ. The circumstances, this contact, the conviction, and the Christ. Let's begin with the circumstances. And let me read for you verses 1 through 6. It says, therefore, when the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John, although Jesus himself was not baptizing, but his disciples were, he left Judea and went away again into Galilee, and he had to pass through Samaria. So he came to a city of Samaria called Sychar, near the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph, and Jacob's well was there. So Jesus, being wearied from his journey, was sitting thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour. So the word got out that Jesus was really successful. and that the people were flocking down there to hear him, and this really upset the Jewish leaders. The Jewish leaders had been very suspicious of John the Baptist to begin with, even though the people accepted him, but they really didn't like Jesus, because if there's anything that's intolerable, it's someone preaching the truth in the middle of error. So, because of their hypocrisy, they couldn't tolerate anyone telling the truth. They were like religious watchdogs. When anybody walked into their territory, they barked. And so, when John the Baptist came proclaiming the truth, they didn't like it, especially all of that stuff about repentance. And so, you can imagine what they thought about Jesus. So, eventually, word reached the Pharisees that Jesus' ministry was expanding, and they didn't like it. Now, verse 2 is a parenthetical statement that Jesus wasn't actually the person baptizing, but rather it was his disciples. Now, you might wonder why the Holy Spirit would have John insert that tidbit into the text. What relevance does that have for us, since all Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness? Well, think about it. John is drawing a clear distinction between Jesus proclaiming the gospel and the act of baptizing. It's impossible to reconcile this verse with the false doctrine of baptismal regeneration, which is the teaching that baptism is a necessity for salvation. If Jesus himself, who said that he came to seek and to save that which was lost, didn't baptize, That certainly presents a problem for that doctrine. Surely he would have done everything it took, whatever was necessary, to bring sinners to salvation. So John is making a very definite statement here that Jesus didn't baptize anyone because he wants his readers to understand that baptism is not a part of the gospel message. Now someone says, but why did Jesus' disciples baptize then? Weren't they Jesus' representatives and thus their baptism was his baptism? Yes, that is true. Jesus did believe in baptism as he himself submitted to it, although he wasn't required to do so. Baptism is a very important act of obedience for the believer and in our efforts to draw a distinction between the proclamation of the gospel and the act of baptism, we must not diminish the importance of baptism. Every true believer is commanded to be baptized as an act of identification with Jesus in his death, burial, and resurrection. But we must be careful not to include it in the gospel message as a requirement for salvation. So John wants us to understand that Jesus didn't baptize anyone and the reason is so that we will see that it is not a part of the gospel message. So returning to the flow of the passage, John says that when Jesus knew the Pharisees were antagonized because all the people were going out to see him and his ministry was being so successful, he left Judea and he went to the northern part of the country into the region of Galilee. Was he afraid of them? No, of course he wasn't afraid of them. So why did he leave? Well, for one reason, he left because it was not God's time for a confrontation. He knew that the Jewish leadership was after him, but he wasn't ready yet for a confrontation. It wasn't God's time, so he just left. He didn't want a public rivalry to develop between his followers and those of John, and he knew it wasn't yet the time for a squabble with the Jewish religious authorities. Now, notice verse 4. and he had to pass through Samaria. He didn't just go away because Jewish leadership was antagonistic. He went away because he had to be somewhere else. Now you might wonder what does it mean he had to pass through Samaria. That is important because there's a hidden meaning there. If I told you that I was going to go to Tennessee and that I had to go through Georgia, you would understand that in order to get to Tennessee, I had to go through Georgia first. Now, is it a geographical necessity that I go through Georgia? No. I could drive into the panhandle of Florida, cross the border into Alabama, and drive north so that I avoided going through Georgia altogether. But that would be way far out of my way. But that is exactly what the Jews normally did when they traveled from Judea to Galilee. If you look at a map in the back of your Bible or on the screen, you will see that Judea was in the south, Galilee in the north, And sitting in between, stretching all the way from across from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River was the region of Samaria. Now, if a Jew was going to travel from Jerusalem in Judea up to Galilee where Nazareth and Capernaum were, the most direct route was to go straight through Samaria. That was the simplest way to go. But the stricter, more orthodox Jews never went that way. They had their own route, and it went up to the top part of Judea, crossed over the Jordan River into the Gentile area known as Perea, went north along the east side of the Jordan River, and into another Gentile area known as the Decapolis, then crossed back over the Jordan into Galilee. And the only reason they did that was so that they didn't have to walk through Samaria. Josephus tells us that the Galilean Jews, the ones up north, were willing to go through Samaria because it was a much shorter way to get to Jerusalem for religious festivals, but the Judean Jews refused to do so because they considered them to be religious and ethnic half-breeds. There was no love lost between the Jews and the Samaritans. You see, over 700 years earlier, the Assyrians had captured Samaria and deported most of the Israelites. They then resettled the land with foreigners who intermarried with the surviving Israelites, and they developed a strange form of the Jewish religion in which they accepted the Pentateuch, but they rejected the rest of the Old Testament Hebrew Scriptures. So when the Jews returned to the land after the Babylonian exile, they viewed the Samaritans as racial half-breeds whose religion was tainted by various unacceptable elements. And around 400 BC, the Samaritans erected their own temple on Mount Gerizim, which was destroyed a couple of hundred years later by a Jewish ruler from Judea. And that act just refueled the religious and ethnic hatred between the two people groups. So by the time Christ came, the Samaritans continued to worship on Mount Gerizim, and there had been hundreds of years of nothing but bitterness and hatred and animosity between the Samaritans and the Jews, particularly those from Judea. So when John tells us that Jesus had to pass through Samaria, he is about to hit his readers right between the eyes with something that's very important. He is telling his readers that Jesus was willing to go against racial, ethnic, and religious cultural barriers that stood between the Jews and other groups. Jesus wasn't required by the geography to go through Samaria, rather it was a divine necessity. You see, it was predestined, it was foreordained that he had to go through Samaria because there were some chosen sinners there. The whole machinery of grace began to move when Jesus Christ started towards Samaria. God the Father's divine clock said, now go through Samaria, and so he went. God's purpose was not so that Jesus would save time and steps in going to Galilee, but rather that he go there because there were some that the Father had given him from all of eternity who needed to be saved. Now, as he traveled north towards Galilee, verse 5 tells us that Jesus came to a city of Samaria named Sychar. It's probably the modern village of Askar. It's located on a slope of Mount Ebal, opposite of Mount Gerizim. And he came to Jacob's Well, which is about a half mile south of Sychar. This was a place that was very familiar to the Jews and also to the Samaritans. the place which Jacob had purchased, dug the well, and later bequeathed to Joseph. When Joseph died in Egypt, they embalmed his body, they took his body, and they carried it around with them in the desert for 40 years. And finally, after getting into the land, the Jews buried Joseph there, so that his bones were buried by that well that Jacob had built. So it was a place of historical significance to the Jewish people. This well is still there today. It is located inside of an Eastern Orthodox monastery, and Joseph's tomb is only a few hundred yards away. The well's shaft is over a hundred feet deep, and it is hewn out of solid rock, which was quite a feat, given that Jacob dug it around 1900 BC. And that explains why this text uses two different words to refer to this well. In verse 6, the word well actually should be the word spring, whereas in verses 11 and 12, it translates it correctly as well. The translators used the word well consistently in the passage in order not to confuse the readers about whether or not it is a well or a spring, but it is actually both. It is a well which has a bubbling spring at the bottom. So you can call it Jacob's spring or Jacob's well. The spring is still flowing, although it was dug almost 4,000 years ago, and the water is still good to drink. So Jesus came to this well, and verse 6 says, So Jesus, being wearied from his journey, was sitting thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour. Now here we have a look at the humanity of Christ. Jesus was not only 100% God, but he was also 100% man. And so, in his humanity, he was just like every other man. He became tired and weary. And so here we see him, tired, hot, thirsty, sitting by the well. And John even throws in that word, thus. Or you could say, in this manner, by the well. In what manner? In a weary, tired manner. He was visibly tired and exhausted. So he wasn't sitting there looking strong and ready to take on the world. He was sitting there visibly tired and worn out from the long journey on foot that he had just made. The end of verse 6 says, it was about the sixth hour. Now in the Jewish means of figuring time, that would have been around noon. The day began at sunrise around 6 a.m. It ended at sundown around 6 p.m. So it was right about noon that Jesus is sitting at the well, hot, tired, thirsty, waiting for the disciples who, we will learn in verse 8, had gone into the town to buy food. So the stage is set. Jesus was at the right place at the right time for an encounter that was a part of the Father's will for Him. He was keeping a divine appointment that He Himself had made before the foundation of the world. Listen, that's what God wants out of every believer, to be God's person in God's place at God's time with a mind to do God's will. Most of the time, most of us want to be where we want to be when we want to be there with a mind to do what we want to do. You say, well, how can you know where God wants you to be? Listen, if God wants you to be somewhere to do something for Him, don't you think He'll let you know? It would be pretty silly for God to want it and not let you know. We just need to be continually asking God to reveal to us how and where he wants to use us and then be willing to listen to the Holy Spirit's voice inside of us rather than crowding it out with our own plans and desires. And so the circumstances set it up and Jesus was in God's place at God's time with the mind to do God's will and that brings us to the next point which is the contact. Notice verse 7. There came a woman of Samaria to draw water. Now keep in mind who John's readers are. Most of them were Jews, and when John includes this story, there is more meaning here than simply an encounter between Jesus and a Samaritan woman. This is a story about a bridegroom searching for his bride. What do I mean? There are three other stories in the Old Testament that would have been familiar to John's readers of men searching for their bride at the local well. One was when Abraham's servant, who was seeking a bride for Isaac, found Rebecca at the well. Another was when Jacob met Rachel at the well. And the third was when Moses met Zipporah at the well in Midian. So how is this a story of a bridegroom searching for a bride? Because here we have Jesus who is the bridegroom and he is here at the well looking for a woman and later on the people of her village to become a part of the bride of Christ. And John puts this story into his narrative right after telling us in chapter 3 verses 28 and 29 that John the Baptist said that he is only the friend of the bridegroom but that Jesus is the bridegroom to whom he had been directing people to follow and become a part of Christ's bride. So that's why I say that this is another story of a bridegroom and a prospective bride at a well. Now, because we don't live there, and it's 2,000 years removed from that time, we can easily miss something that's important here. This well, Jacob's well, was about a half mile outside the village of Sychar. But there were several other sources of water closer to town. There were springs all over the Judean hillside. Another fact you need to know is that in those days it was customary for women to go to the well early in the morning or just before sundown. Why? Because it was much cooler at those times of the day. If you're going to have to fill a large jar with water and carry it home, you want it to be at a cool time of the day from a well that is close to your house. And the women usually went to the well in groups, because since that was the normal time to go for water, it was a perfect time to socialize together. But in this case, it's noontime. The heat of the day. And this well is a half mile outside of town. So the question you ought to be asking yourself is, Why was she walking to this well at that time? Why not go to the one of the wells that was either close to or inside the village and with the other women? And the answer is because she was an outcast. Because of her background, which we shall see, she would rather walk the extra distance in the hottest time of the day than face the hostility and scorn of the other women at the closer wells earlier or later in the day. She knew that the other women didn't want her around, which I am sure they had made quite evident to her, so she just avoided them. And it says, Jesus said to her, give me a drink. That was a stunning breach of social custom in that culture. Men did not speak with women in public, not even their wives. In fact, the rabbinical teachings stated that a man could not talk to his wife, sister, or his daughter in public. There was a provision that he could speak to his mother. Additionally, rabbis did not associate with immoral women. And most significant of all in this situation, Jews customarily wanted nothing to do with Samaritans because they felt that as a biracial people, the Samaritans had destroyed their Jewish heritage. But Jesus shattered all of those barriers. Verse 8 gives us sort of a parenthetical explanation as to why Jesus was sitting by the well all alone. It says, for his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. That tells us something else about Jesus. I'm sure he was the one who directed his disciples to go into the town to buy food. What city was it? Sychar. What kind of city was it? A Samaritan city. Can you imagine how Samaritans in the town market must have been buzzing when this band of Jews comes marching into the city? I can just hear those Samaritans now saying, I thought the Jews hated us. You know, no one ever comes into the city to buy anything. All the Jews who go by stop outside town at that well, but they don't come into town. I wonder what's going on. But the disciples are obeying their masters, so they go into town to do business with Samaritans. And I'm sure that every time the disciples spoke to a food vendor in the market, they must have said something to the effect of, our rabbi sent us here to buy some falafels for lunch. thus letting the vendor know why they were there. I think it's interesting that the disciples had only been with Jesus at this point in time for only a few months, maybe six or seven at the most, and they are already willing to do that which they would have never, ever done before. And that is to go into a Samaritan town and buy food. The fact that they were there was monumental in and of itself. In fact, the stricter Jews wouldn't even eat food that had been handled by a Samaritan. But Jesus broke all of those racial barriers and commanded his followers to do the same. There is tremendous instruction for us in this story. I grew up here in Florida back when it was a very southern state by nature. Now, I must say that as a white kid, I didn't experience the prejudice against me that some of you in this room experienced because of the color of your skin. But I remember the days of segregation when we had separate bathrooms and separate water fountains in public parks so that white people wouldn't have to use the same facilities as black people. And our schools were completely separate and were not integrated until I entered the seventh grade. Everywhere you went, you heard and saw evidence of open bigotry and prejudice between the races. That was the kind of relationship that existed between Jews and Samaritans in New Testament times. There was just as much hatred and disdain for one another as existed back in the days of segregation between whites and blacks. And folks, there are people today, some of whom claim to be Christians, who still feel that way. But Jesus' actions and behavior clearly demonstrated that he would never approve of racism or bigotry in anyone. He blatantly challenged the racial prejudice of his day by going right through Samaria, stopping in the middle of it, sending his disciples to buy food from the Samaritans, and then engaging a Samaritan woman in a conversation, even to the point of asking her for a drink from a Samaritan water jar. And later on in verse 35, he refers to Samaria as being a field which is white for harvest. In other words, he saw Samaria as a great place to evangelize souls for the kingdom. You see, the gospel is not just for Jews or just for white people. It is a gospel for Samaritans, for Gentiles, for black people, for Asian people, for Indian people, and people of any other color. Jesus didn't take the gospel only to the Jewish race. He took it to the human race. And He loved people of every color, and so should we. We are to treat others in the same way that our Master treated them, and that is with love, compassion, and impartiality. According to Galatians 3, 26-29, the gospel turns people of different races into one race, the children of God, united in Jesus Christ. Look at verse 9. Therefore the Samaritan woman said to him, How is it that you, being a Jew, ask me for a drink since I am a Samaritan woman? For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. How did she know he was a Jew? Well, he must have had the physical features of a Jew. Undoubtedly, she saw the robes of a rabbi. Perhaps she saw the blue hem around the bottom of his robe. and he would have spoken with a Galilean accent. He was a Jew and it was obvious. But even more astounding to her was his willingness to ceremonially defile himself by drinking from her water pot since he had no cup or jug of his own from which to drink. In fact, in John's parenthetical explanatory note there where he says, for the Jews have no dealings with Samaritans, that word translated no dealings originally referred to using the same eating and drinking utensils with another person. Because a person is only willing to share cups and forks and spoons with close friends, the word eventually came to mean to associate with someone on friendly terms. The Jewish rabbis taught that to eat or drink from a Samaritan's utensils was to make oneself ceremonially unclean. But Jesus was the infinitely holy God of the universe in human flesh. He could not be defiled by a Samaritan water pot. Whatever he touched, even corpses or lepers, did not taint him, but instead they became clean. So she couldn't believe that a Jew would want to drink out of her water jug. That was what really astounded her. So she says in effect, you mean you're going to drink out of my pitcher? You're a Jew. This is Jesus, the barrier breaker. He shatters every barrier. So she doesn't understand why he would even ask her this. And then in verse 10, he says, Jesus answered and said to her, If you knew the gift of God and who it is who says to you, give me a drink, you would have asked Him and He would have given you living water. Notice that he starts out by saying, if you knew the gift of God. What's the gift of God? John 3,16, for God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. He turns her question around. He's thirsty and she's got the source, right? All of a sudden, she's thirsty and he's the source. The fountain comes asking for a drink and then declares that she needs a drink from his fountain. He starts with that physical thirst, turns it around into a spiritual need and says, I've got to supply. That's a veil statement similar to what Jesus said to Nicodemus, you must be born again. His statement was veiled in such a way as to cause confusion and incite curiosity in the hearer. So she thinks he's talking about physical water, but he says, if you knew who I am, if you knew that I was the Messiah, the Son of God talking to you, you would have asked me for living water. And the Old Testament promised living water. Back in Isaiah 55, 1, the prophet wrote, Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters, and you who have no money, come, buy and eat. Psalm 36, 9 says, For with you, God, is the fountain of life. What does she understand? She thinks he's talking about a fresh flowing spring. The water translated living and living water is the Greek word which means to live, but when it's used with water, It refers to bubbling, gurgling, springing water. So look at her response in verse 11. She said to him, Sir, you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where then do you get that living water? This is great because she's thinking, wait a minute. The only spring with living water is at the bottom of this well and this guy doesn't have a bucket or jug to tie to the rope. here at the well in order to reach it. And then by the time you fill the jug and you pull it all the way back up, the water's just sitting in the jug. It isn't bubbling anymore. So where is he going to get fresh bubbling water? Does he know of another spring somewhere that might be easier for me to get my water from? She's still thinking physical water. On the other hand, Jesus is speaking of spiritual water. He's saying that Fresh, pure, never ceasing spring water is a symbol of everlasting life or salvation. Back in Ezekiel 36, 25 to 27, the Lord used the analogy of water in talking about the cleansing of salvation when He said to Israel, Ezekiel 36, I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean. I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you, and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes, and you will be careful to observe my ordinances. So Jesus says to her, if you knew the supreme gift of God who is asking you to give him ordinary physical water, he would have given you living spiritual water, God's gift of eternal salvation. And then she says this in verse 12, you're not greater than our father Jacob, are you? Who gave us the well and drank of it himself and his sons and his cattle. In other words, she says to him, Man, you must really think you're something if you think you can do something Jacob couldn't even do. I mean, he was a great man. In fact, he dug this well through solid rock and drank from it. And it is such a great well. It's still flowing today. So are you saying that you're greater than him? She's still a little confused. The way her question is worded in the Greek, it expects a negative answer. So she really doesn't think this man is greater than Jacob. And in verses 13 and 14, Jesus answered and said to her, everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst, but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life. And with this statement by Jesus, I think this woman has to be as confused as she can possibly be. Jesus draws three contrasts here. First, he says, in contrast to the physical water from this well, which cannot prevent you from becoming thirsty again, my living water will make you lose your thirst for all time to come. In other words, once a believer, always a believer. Once reborn, always reborn. Jesus proclaims the doctrine of eternal security with these words. Second he says this physical water remains outside of the soul and is incapable of filling its needs But my living water enters into the soul and remains within as a source of spiritual refreshment and satisfaction and 30 says Physical water is limited in quantity and it disappears as you drink it, but my living water is a self-perpetuating spring that will never come to an end and Now look at verse 15, she's still thinking in terms of physical water. The woman said to him, sir, give me this water so that I will not be thirsty nor come all the way here to draw. She still doesn't get it. She says, listen, if you've got some kind of water like that, there's no sense in me coming a half mile out here every day. Please give me some. Now you might be wondering, why does she still think he's talking about physical water? Because she's just like every other person with a natural unregenerate mind. That's the only perspective they have. The natural mind is occupied with natural things and everything it thinks about comes from that perspective. That's what it enjoys. So she realizes that Jesus is speaking of a very special kind of water, but she still thinks it's physical in nature and her reason for wanting it is for the physical benefits. She won't get thirsty and she won't have to walk a long way every day to get it. So her interest at this point is still entirely physical. She knew she had a need for water, but she's only focused on her physical need. There's an important principle we need to draw out of this. I'm afraid that many people who present the gospel to others make it sound like an inexpensive fire insurance policy. That is a way to avoid hell that doesn't cost anything. Well, who wouldn't want that? So the people who hear that kind of a gospel presentation are more than willing to accept it because they're only looking at it from the physical perspective. After all, it's painless and cheap. But notice that Jesus doesn't say, okay, that's good, here you go, and just zap her into eternal life. Conversion is not simply a recognition of a need, it's much more than that. It starts there, but it doesn't end there. You see, she hadn't recognized two things which must be recognized before anyone can ever come to God. You know what they are? An understanding of the reality of her own sin, and a recognition of Jesus Christ as the only Savior. The need is not enough. People all over this world know they have a need, but that's not enough. They have to be willing to repent of and turn from their sin and turn to Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. This woman hasn't even found out who He is yet, nor has she faced her sin, but she's about to. So Jesus doesn't buy into cheap conversions. He doesn't say, okay, you like what I have to offer? Okay, here you go. So many people think of conversion like that. They think, I want joy and peace and success in my life, and I don't want hell, so I'll try Jesus. They think that's what conversion is, but that's not it. You know what it is? It's I repent of my sin, I sorrow over my sin, I am undone, I hate my sin, I give myself to Christ. That's what true conversion involves. It's not I want, I want, I want. It's I give, I yield, I trust, I repent. It's a completely different thing. There is no such thing as a cheap conversion. That brings us to an important point, and that's how Jesus brings about conviction of sin in this woman. Jesus goes right to the heart of the issue. She's not going to bring it up, so He is going to take the opportunity. So in verse 16, Jesus said to her, go and call your husband and come here. Jesus is setting her up to confront her with her sin. He tells her to go get her husband and bring him back. So she very carefully tries to avoid lying to him by responding, I have no husband. Now, although she's not lying, she's not telling the whole truth either. But her desperate attempt to conceal her sin from Jesus was futile. She's absolutely trapped and doesn't even realize it. But his devastating reply forces her to face her sin. Jesus said to her, You have correctly said, I have no husband, for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you have now is not your husband. This you have said truly. He has just completely read her life history. I would guess that when Jesus said this to her, she was absolutely shocked. Everything that the people in her village knew, this Jewish rabbi who was passing through knew, and yet she knew that no one had told him. He had given her a chance to confess her sin. He had said, go get your husband. And she could have said, my life is so fouled up, I've had five husbands. But she didn't say that. Instead, she says, I had no husband. So Jesus says, well, as long as you're not going to confess your own sin, I'm going to make it really easy for you by telling you what it is. Just as an aside, I want you to notice that Jesus' refusal to call the man she was currently living with her husband shows that he rejected the notion that merely living together constitutes marriage. There are vast numbers of people in our nation today who are living together without being married, and they'll often justify their sin with a flippant statement of, oh, it's just a piece of paper, what's the big deal? But the Bible views marriage as a formal, legal, public covenant between a man and a woman, and Jesus' statement clearly expresses that He considers cohabitation without benefit of marriage to be sin. And I'd also point out that she had had five previous husbands, all marriages which had apparently ended either by death or divorce. The fact that Jesus is confronting her with her five prior marriages is evidence of her sin indicates to me that most likely all five marriages had ended in divorce, indicating that she was either a very difficult, contentious woman to live with, or else that she was an adulterous woman who had been divorced by her husbands for her sinful immoral behavior. So Jesus was pointing out to this woman that she had a serious sin problem. But Jesus is the bridegroom who is willing to take this woman who despite her sinful past and present can be cleansed of her sin. and made into a new member of the Bride of Christ, as pure and unblemished as can be. And so to get to that point, he must first confront her with her sin. So shaken by Jesus' amazing accurate knowledge of her sinful life, the woman says, Sir, I perceive that you're a prophet. By calling him a prophet, she was affirming that his knowledge of her sordid lifestyle was accurate. She was saying, You're right, that's me, that's my life. Listen, no one can come to the drink of the water of life until they face their sin. That's just the way it is. She saw her need for living water, now she sees that her sin is keeping her from that living water. You've always got to take a person to the point of them seeing their sin for what it is, an offense against a holy, righteous God that deserves His just punishment. There's only one step left, and that's the fourth thing in our outline of this passage. So far we've seen the circumstances, the contact, the conviction, and now the last thing she needs to recognize and know and put her faith in, and it's the Christ. Having been convicted of her sin and her need for repentance and forgiveness, this Samaritan woman wondered where she would go to meet God and seek His grace and salvation, and so she perceived Jesus to be a prophet of God, and so she reasoned that He would know. So she says in verse 20, our fathers worshipped in this mountain and you people say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. Now when you read that you might say, what does that have to do with anything? How did that get into this conversation? What's she saying there? Let me see if I can explain it to you. Jesus has taken her from talking about physical water to recognizing her sin and that he is a prophet. So now she has been convicted of her sin and senses that she has a spiritual need. But the question in her mind is, where do I go to make this right with God? Should I go to Mount Gerizim or should I go to Jerusalem? You see, her comment highlighted one of the popular points of contention between Jews and Samaritans. Both believe that under the Old Covenant, God directed His people to worship Him in a specific location. Because the Samaritans only accepted the Pentateuch, they chose Mount Gerizim, which was close to Shechem, where Abraham had first built an altar to God. And it was from Mount Gerizim that the Israelites proclaimed the blessings of obedience to God's commandments in Deuteronomy 11. the Jews who accepted the entire Old Testament canon recognized that God had chosen Jerusalem as the place where he was to be worshipped. Jesus' unexpected reply to this woman was that the issue was soon going to be irrelevant. He says, Woman, believe me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. In other words, in the near future, true worship would take place neither at Mount Gerizim nor in Jerusalem. During the Jewish result against Rome in AD 70, the temple at Jerusalem would be destroyed and thousands of Samaritans would be slaughtered on Mount Gerizim. More significantly, the new covenant renders all external ceremonies and rituals, whether Jewish or Samaritan, obsolete. However, at the time of Jesus' dialogue with the woman, the Jews were right and the Samaritans were wrong, since this covenant had not yet been initiated. So Jesus says in verse 22, you worship what you do not know, we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. Because they rejected most of the Old Testament, the Samaritans lacked the full revelation that it contained, so they were worshipping what they did not know completely. But the Jews worshipped what they knew, because they had accepted all of the Old Testament. Now there's a twofold sense in which salvation is from the Jews. First, the revelation of salvation first came to them, and then the rest of the world. And second, the source of salvation, namely the Messiah, was himself a Jew. Jesus point was that under the new covenant the place of worship will not be an issue But rather the nature of worship and so he says in verse 23 But an hour is coming and now is when the true worshipers will worship the father in spirit and truth For such people the father seeks to be his worshipers What does Jesus mean by and now is he means that he has arrived so an hour has arrived and when worship should be internal, not external. The word spirit does not refer to the Holy Spirit, but the human spirit. Worship must be from the heart, internal, not external conformity to ceremonies and rituals. And the term truth calls for this heart worship to be consistent with what the scripture teaches and centered on the incarnate word. So worshipping in spirit and truth means worshipping God with a heart in a way which is centered on and consistent with the Word. The worship of neither the Jews nor the Samaritans could be characterized as being in spirit and truth, even though the Jews had a more complete understanding of the truth. Both groups focused on external factors. They conformed outwardly to regulations. They observed rituals. They offered sacrifices. But the time had arrived since the Messiah had come when true worshippers would no longer be identified by where they worshipped, but how they worshipped. True worshippers were those who worshipped the Father in spirit and truth. It is such people the Father desires to be as worshippers by sovereignly drawing them to Himself. Verse 24 begins with the phrase, God is spirit. That is the classical biblical definition of the nature of God. Despite the heretical teachings of false cults, God is not an exalted man. He is the invisible God who dwells in unapproachable light which no man has seen or can see. Had he not revealed himself in scriptures and in Jesus Christ, God would be utterly incomprehensible. But this Samaritan woman is still confused, and so she says in verse 25, You see what she's saying here? She's saying, well, this is very confusing, sir, but I do know one thing for sure. One of these days, Messiah is going to show up and he'll clear it all up. I'm not really with you all the way, I don't quite understand all this, but one of these days, Messiah is coming and he'll clear it all up. Can you imagine her shock when he replies to her in verse 26? Can you imagine what happened to her when he said this? Jesus said to her, I who speak to you, am he. She says, when Messiah gets here, he'll clear it all up. He says, that's right, you're looking at the Messiah. Jesus had avoided such a forthright declaration to the Jewish people because of the crassly political and militaristic expectations they had for the Messiah. They had hoped for someone who would lead a revolt to throw off the yoke of the hated Romans. The faith of this Samaritan woman, on the other hand, is not obstructed by such misconceptions. The word he is not in the original text. Jesus actually said I am the one speaking to you. So this is one of the 23 I am statements that Jesus makes in the Gospel of John. He is proclaiming himself to be Yahweh of the Old Testament. Only the Messiah could claim that title and that is what he is doing. Jesus' words must have rocked that woman to the core of her being. The man who just a few minutes earlier had made a simple request for a drink of water now claims to be the long-awaited Messiah. Unlike Nicodemus, she knew nothing of any signs and miracles that Jesus had performed. But merely because of what he knew about her, the woman does not doubt the veracity of his claim. Did she ever receive Christ? The text doesn't tell us specifically, but I think she did. Because in verse 29, she says to the people of her village, come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done. This is not the Christ, is it? And verse 39 says that from that city, many of the Samaritans believed in him because of the word of the woman who testified, he told me all the things that I have done. So I think she came to genuine saving faith in Christ. So as we conclude, we see that Jesus' conversation with the woman at the well illustrates three non-negotiable truths about salvation. First, salvation comes only to those who recognize their desperate need for spiritual life they do not have. Living water will be received only by those who realize that they're spiritually thirsty. Those who are focused only on physical thirst are never going to find the answers for their parched souls. Second, salvation comes only to those who confess and repent of their sin and desire forgiveness. Before this promiscuous woman could embrace the Savior, she had to acknowledge the full weight of her iniquity. And no individual who does not admit their sin and accept full responsibility for it will ever be truly saved. And third, salvation comes only to those who embrace Jesus Christ as their Messiah and sin-bearer. After all, salvation is found in no one else. He is the way, the only truth, and the only life. He's truly the Savior of the world. So the question that comes to everyone is, do you believe? Have you recognized your spiritual thirst and come to the only one who can give you living water to satisfy your dry soul? Have you admitted your sin and embraced Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior? If not, I plead with you to do that tonight. Don't let another moment go by because you don't know that you will have another moment. There are no guarantees in life, so I call you to come to Him tonight before it's too late. Let's pray together. Father, I thank you for this wonderful story which has so much relevance and meaning for us today. For in it we see that Jesus truly did come to seek and to save the lost without regard for their race, their sex, or sinfulness of their background. Lord, I pray that everyone here tonight has come to the place in their life where they've placed their faith and trust in Jesus Christ alone for their salvation. But if not, I pray that their thirsty souls would be convicted of their sin, as was that Samaritan woman, that they would repent and turn to Him in saving faith and receive that living water that bubbles up to eternal life. And for those here tonight who already trust in Christ, I pray that each one of us would be conformed to his image so that like him we would see every other person around us as having been created in your image and treat them with compassion and love and grace and impartiality. May racial or ethnic bias never be a part of our thoughts or words or actions. Thank you for your abundant blessings to us and now take us from this place to be shining lights in a very dark world. In Christ's name we pray, Amen.