Going Through

Going Through

John 4:1-4

by

Reverend Kelvin Lebron Parks

Preached:

13 June 2004

at Maine Street Baptist Church, Brunswick, Maine

BECAUSE HE LIVES

Song by: Kathleen Dunn

CHORUS:

BECAUSE HE LIVES I CAN FACE TOMORROW

BECAUSE HE LIVES ALL FEAR IS GONE

BECAUSE I KNOW HE HOLDS THE FUTURE

AND LIFE IS WORTH THE LIVING

JUST BECAUSE HE LIVES.

1. THERE WAS A MAN HIS NAME WAS JESUS

HE CAME TO DIE; HEAL AND RESTORE

BUT GREATER STILL THE CALM ASSURANCE

WE CAN FACE UNCERTAIN DAYS

BECAUSE HE LIVES.

2. AND THEN ONE DAY I’LL CROSS THAT RIVER I’LL FIGHT LIFE’S FINAL WAR WITH PAIN

AND THEN AS DEATH GIVES WAY TO VICTORY

I’LL SEE THE LIGHTS OF GLORY

AND I’LL KNOW HE LIVES .

REPEAT CHORUS TWICE :

TAG :

BECAUSE I KNOW HE HOLDS THE FUTURE

AND LIFE IS WORTH THE LIVING

BECAUSE HE LIVES !

- Prayer

- Thanksgiving (God, Pastor, Wife, April)

Scriptures: John 4:1-4 Text: (v.4)

(v.1) When therefore the Lord knew how the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John,

(v.2) (Though Jesus himself baptized not, but his disciples,)

(v.3) He left Judaea, and departed again into Galilee.

(v.4) And he must needs go through Samaria.

Subject: Going Through

Turn to your neighbor and say: Neighbor, because He went through ... I can make it through. No matter the problem, no matter the situation, no matter what I’m going through ... I can make it through.

Now lets give the Lord a big handclap of praise for what He has already done. If he doesn’t do anything else ... that’s all right because He has already done more than enough. Its more than enough because He decided to go through for you.

You may be seated ...

I charge every one of you to read this book tonight as your homework. Those of you who are willing to take this challenge you will discover that the Gospel of John is not like the preceding Gospels of Mathew, Mark and Luke.

You see ... the first three gospels are called synoptic gospels because, despite their individual emphases, they describe many of the same events in the life of Jesus Christ.

However, John draws mainly upon events and discourses not found in the other Gospels. Reading the book of John, you will see how John goes to great lengths to prove to his readers the humanity of Jesus. John paints the picture that Jesus is God in the flesh. [1:14] And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us. John paints the picture that Jesus is the eternal Word that came to earth, born to die as God’s sacrifice for human sin.

Walk with me --

[Verse 1]

"When therefore the Lord knew how the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John",

You see ... the Pharisees had a little opposition here in the first verse. You see -- the Pharisees were starting to grow weary of Jesus because of His popularity and the fact they thought that He had baptized more disciples than John the Baptist. This scrap in [verse 1] sort of reminds me of how the Baptist churches of today argue and sometimes boast about who baptizes more in a given year. Seems as though, we get caught up in who is doing what.

When in actually ... Jesus did not do the baptizing. [Verse 2] The Bible says that His disciples did. However, that wasn’t the real reason why they were intimidated.

The bottom line is the Pharisees could have probably cared less about Jesus baptizing more disciples than John could. The underlining issue is that they hated Jesus because He challenged their teachings and exposed them what they were ... hypocrites.

[Verse 3] tells us that Jesus left Judaea bound for Galilee.

But watch this ... the story in the gospel account takes a strange turn. Instead of going the traditional route ... all the way around to reach Galilee, which added approximately three days to the journey, Jesus decided to go straight into the heart of forbidden territory. We might say that Jesus went right into the epic-center of “no-mans’ land.

Well what do you mean preacher “no-mans land’, “forbidden territory” and why is it strange that he decided to go through Samaria?

Well let me paint the picture -- you see this was forbidden territory because of the hatred between the Southern Jews and the Samaritans. You see the Jews had nothing to do with the Samaritans because of a century old feud. Why are they feuding? Well when the Northern Kingdom with it capital at Samaria fell into captivity by the Assyrians, many Jews were deported to Assyria, and foreigners were brought in to settle the land and help keep peace. Well ... intermarriage between those foreigners and the remaining Jews resulted in a mixed race, impure in the opinion of Jews who lived in the Southern Kingdom. The problem we have here is that ... the pure Jews hated this mixed race called Samaritans because they felt like they had betrayed their people and nation by marrying another race of people.