One of the questions I ask, and even ask now, as I near the end of my life, is “So what?
So what? In other words, what difference did my life make, for good or for ill?
I suspect I’m not alone in asking these questions. I think one of our greatest needs in life is for meaning, for significance, to know that there is a purpose for living beyond our own pleasure, and to live according to that purpose.
And I’m betting this morning that at least some of you here want to know how you can be a difference-maker, how you can count for good in other people’s lives, and for the kingdom.
Of course, the person who really has that answer for you if you’re a believer is the Lord Jesus Christ. And for a course in how to make a difference for the Kingdom and for good in other people’s lives we’re going to look at one of my favorite Bible stories, the story of the Woman at the Well in John 4.
Now I’ve preached on this passage many times, so some of you might be fearful you’re going to hear a re-run this morning. But I want to assure you this is not the case. In the past I’ve preached this passage from the perspective of the person who needs to hear the Gospel. This morning I’m going to preach it from the perspective of someone who needs to share the Gospel.
As we’ve read, Jesus and His disciples are on their way to Galilee from Judea. And that necessitated a trip thru Samaria. Historically, the Samaritans were a group of Gentile peoples exiled to Samaria by their Assyrian conquerors 700 years earlier. They replaced the famous 10 Lost Tribes of the Northern Kingdom which Assyria had relocated to other parts of the world. These pagans then adopted the Jewish religion as their own. But there was just one problem. Since they were unclean Gentiles, the Jews would have nothing to do with them. So they weren’t allowed to participate in Jewish in the temple at Jerusalem. So the Samaritans perverted the Jewish faith and built their own temple on Mt. Gerizim in Samaria and claimed that was the place to worship God. So there was this hostility between Samaritans and Jews, because the Samaritans were really Gentiles and because they had perverted the Jewish faith. But Jesus would not avoid them, knowing that they needed to be saved from their sins just like the self-righteous Jews who avoided them.) So he was uncommonly friendly.
And that provides us with our first principle if we want to be a difference-maker. If we are going to be a difference-maker in the lives of others, it’s always going to come in the context of relationship. We are going to have to initiate in love others. We will need to be uncommonly friendly. If necessary, will need to break all the typical taboos and prejudices that would be barriers to a conversation and a relationship. It’s all going to begin with a conversation. It shouldn’t matter whether they’re Jewish, Samaritan, Black, White, Yellow, Mixed, Man, Woman, or in today’s odd society, trans, confused or questioning, Everybody needs to hear about Jesus. Their eternal destiny depends on it. And if we’ve got Jesus, and they don’t, we’re responsible.
And that’s exactly what we ought to be at all times, if we’re following Jesus, because that’s how Jesus was. And it caught that woman’s attention. She knew that this kind of behavior from a male Jew was not kosher. What possessed Him to even acknowledge her existence, much less talk with her? So she asked. She asked what, in a sense, motivated Jesus to do what he did.
Verse 9: “Therefore, the Samaritan woman said to Hi, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask me for a drink since I am a Samaritan woman?”
Jesus couldn’t lie, nor did He have any motivation to do so. It’s because He was on a mission. That mission, as we know from Luke 19:10, was to seek and save the lost. And so His reply reflected that concern for this precious, albeit very sinful, Samaritan woman.
Verse 10, “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.”
It was all for her, all about her, finding that gift of God—the free gift of God which is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Jesus was uncommonly friendly because He was committed to an uncommon purpose, an uncommon commission. He was all about saving this lady, and anyone and everyone who would hear Him from their sins. This would not only consume his life but take His life. He would literally give His life on the cross to save her and save us from the just penalty, hell, for our sins. For God so loved the world . . . !
We derive our second principle about how to be a difference-maker from this this morning. And it’s this. Take on Jesus’ mission as your own. Seek and save the lost. For the love of Christ, and the love of your fellow man, make it your mission as well, to seek and save the lost.
When you consider the consequences of not knowing Christ, when you consider that people are actually going to go to hell if they don’t receive the forgiveness that comes through faith in Christ, how can we, in love, have any other purpose, or ignore that purpose that God and Christ have given us for our lives. How can we be around people who are headed to hell because they don’t know what Christ and say absolutely nothing, and be living in love?
Jesus said, “As the Father has sent Me, so I send you” in John 20:21. He said, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.” The implication is that if you truly trust and fully follow Jesus, you will also be a fisher of men.”
My question for you this morning is this: Have you accepted Christ’s mission as your own? Or have you somehow excused yourself from this most vital responsibility, this most incredibly important effort to share the Good news with those who are going to die without it? And if you’ve excused yourself from it, my question for you is this: How could you?
At the very least you could pray for others! At the very least, you could invite them to church. At the very least, you could offer them a tract or something that would provide them with the information they need, should they be interested? But if you’re unwilling to do any one of these, how are you following Christ? How are you demonstrating Christ’s love? How can you justify this?
Our third point is also found in verse 10: “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.
Do you know that most people don’t know that heaven is a free gift? Most people are just like this Samaritan woman here. They simply don’t know heaven is a gift that God gives people. They don’t have to earn or deserve it. They’re all hoping they’re good enough for God, and deceiving themselves into believing that somehow they are good enough for God. But we know better.
And this is great news! This is what the world needs to hear. Heaven is a free gift. Realize that most people don’t know this incredible news. Jesus here said it is in so many words. “If you knew the gift of God you would have asked me for it. How many people do you meet every day who are still thinking that they’ve got to be good enough for God, and heaven is something you deserve or work for? They’re terrible mistaken, and you can relieve them of this deception, with the good news you know!
As most of you know, I ask people all the time the question invented by D. James Kennedy--the Evangelism Explosion diagnostic question: If you were to die tonight and meet God at heaven’s gate and He were to ask you why He should let you in, what would you say? Almost invariably, if people have any answer at all, and they’re not believers, it’s that they’re good people, that they’ve never done anything really bad, or that they’re better than someone else. No one who is not a believer seems to understand that heaven is a free gift. You’ve got something incredible to offer to others as a free gift—heaven, eternal life! And most people don’t know it’s a free gift. So believe you’ve got something great to offer! And that there will be some who are interested.
In the case of the woman at the well, she certainly was interested. It took some clarification from Jesus between verses 11-15 for her to figure out that this wasn’t actually physical water, but spiritual water that would provide eternal life. And when she figured that out, she was definitely interested, and told Jesus, in verse 15: “Sir, give me this water, so I will not be thirsty nor come all the way here to draw.”
Jesus’ next request will reveal just how thirsty she was, and ultimately will reveal to her just who He is. Verse 16: “Go, call your husband and come here.” Jesus, knowingly, had just landed upon the greatest sore spot, the source of greatest failure and disappointment in her life. I can just see her face fall as she bleakly answers, “I have no husband.” So Jesus responds with the truth that only He as the Son of God or a prophet could know: Verse 17, second half: “Jesus said to her, ‘You have correctly said, “I have no husband;’ for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have it not your husband, this you have said truly.’”
In other words, this woman had been to the well of life time after time after time, and her bucket had always been coming up empty. She had become the consummate Samaritan divorcee. Seeking fulfillment in marriage and men had been her constant occupation, and she had been disappointed and disillusioned time and time and time again until now she had given up on the whole idea that marriage could be fulfilling and permanent. She was just taking what she could get for however long it would last. She was indeed an incredibly thirsty soul, all but hopelessly disillusioned by what life had provided for her. And she’s just like so many people you and I know. Life has never quite measured up to what they had hoped for. Dreams and hopes have been shattered. They’re looking for something more. This is something else you’ve got to know—people are all looking for something more. They had all hoped to find heaven on earth, and none of them have, and they’re wondering what it’s all about, why they have missed out, and you have a chance to tell them that they don’t have to miss out—Jesus can provide the heaven that life on this earth can’t.
I remember well from my days in high school and our study of various American philosophers Henry David Thoreau’s statement about people in his time: People live lives of quiet desperation.
And you and I have an answer to that desperation—Jesus and the gift of eternal life that He offers. People want more. Do you believe that? If you do, how can you withhold what you have from them?
Now the woman realizes she is not talking with any average Joe. This man must be a prophet. He has just told her everything that anyone would ever need to know about her life. So she asks the proverbial $64,000 question—the answer to the dispute between her Samaritans and Jesus’ Jews. Which mountain are we supposed to worship on? We Samaritans say Mt. Gerizim, you Jews say Jerusalem. Who’s right? Jesus ultimately tells her that it’s not a matter of where you worship now, but how you worship, in spirit and in truth in verse 24.
Yes, there may be questions. Some you’ll be able to answer, especially if you know Jesus’ Word.
Use His Word, and you’ll have the credibility and authority of Jesus. Be ready to answer their questions. There are really only 8 or 9 they typically ask, and most of them you’ve asked and answered for yourself. Just be prepared with Jesus’ Word.
But even at that, it appears the woman isn’t so sure of His answer, so she says in verse 25, that the Messiah will clear up the dispute when he comes.
And at this moment, Jesus drops the bomb that will change her life both now and forever. Verse 26: “I who speak to you am He.”
Whoa!!! Can you imagine what is happening in that woman’s mind at this point. She has just met a man who has loved her unconditionally by being uncommonly, incredibly friend, who has just told her everything she had ever done in her life, revealing her desperate spiritual condition, who has spoken with an other-worldly wisdom on every spiritual topic she has touched on, and has offered the free gift of eternal life. He has offered to fill her bucket with a living water that will never, ever go away.
Just at this point, the disciples show up with the “slow food.” And the woman is in a world of her own. Why? Because she has just been introduced to her Messiah and Savior, Jesus, with eternal implications for her life. And she would never be the same again!
You see, we all have a chance to do this. We can introduce people to the Messiah, their Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. And many of them will never be the same again. We can the difference-maker for eternity, for eternal good and eternal life in the lives of so many. If only we’re willing to start a conversation, to be uncommonly friend, and care for all the lonely, thirsty people in this world.
The evidence that her life was different is pointed out by John in verse 28. “So the woman left her waterpot,” which represented her old life and all its pursuits. She left her waterpot because Jesus had just filled her life with what it lacked. And she “went into the city and said to the men, “Come see a man who told me all the things that I have done; this is not the Christ is it?” She went from merely getting some water for a drink that afternoon to sharing the good news of eternal life through Jesus Christ with her whole village in a moment of time.
And you and can have that same impact on others if only willing to share the good news of the gift of eternal through Jesus with others.
The passage goes on to tell us that the men in her city listened, and they began coming out of the village to meet Jesus. In the meantime Jesus’ disciples are preoccupied with the physical while Jesus is preoccupied with the spiritual. They’re urging Jesus to eat something, but He’s telling them what the real priority in their lives needs to be—not their physical needs, but other’s spiritual needs.
Verse 34: “Jesus said to them, ‘My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to accomplish His work. Do you not say, :There are yet four months and then comes the harvest?” Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look on the field, that they are white for harvest. Already he who reaps is receiving wages and is gathering fruit for life eternal, so that he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. For in this case the saying is true, “One sows and another reaps.” I sent you to reap for that which you have not labored,; others have labored and you have entered into their labor.”
Point: Hey, don’t wait. Don’t think the spiritual harvest isn’t ready to be reaped. The crop is ripe for harvest. The plowing, sowing and watering has been done. Now go reap it. And many scholars think that as Jesus said “the fields are white for harvest” that He was referring to the many Samaritans, clothed in white, who were coming out of the town to meet Him.
So this morning, I believe what Jesus is saying to us is the same thing He said to his disciples back then. Look, the fields are white for harvest. Will you be one of my harvesters, and make a difference for eternity!
You can pray. You can be uncommonly friendly. You can invite folks to our upcoming outreaches beginning August 19 and September 22, and you can share the Gospel. Want training? let me know.
But remember, the fields are white for harvest right now. And you can make a difference in many lives for eternity.
Let’s pray.
