What Is In Your Life Well?

Scripture: John 4:1-42

THEME: What's Down In The Well Will Come Up In The Bucket

Proposition: The Holy Spirit will assist us in making sure that what's down in our life wells is Jesus' living water. He will assist us in 1. Digging Deep 2. Maintaining , Stabilizing and Protecting our Life Wells

INTRO:

Grace and peace to your from God our Father and the LORD JESUS CHRIST who has come to take away the sin of the world.

One of the greatest football coaches and motivational speakers in our country today is Anthony Kevin "Tony" Dungy. Tony has been both an NFL player and coach and has won a Super Bowl as both a player and coach. In 1968 he won as a defensive back with the Pittsburg Steelers and in 2006 he coached the Indianapolis Colts to win Super Bowl 41. He has authored several books including Quiet Strength: The Principles, Practices, and Priorities of a Winning Life and The Mentor Leader. Both books have become best sellers.

Pastor Ken Whitten has been one of Tony best friends. Pastor Ken was Tony's pastor the years that he coached the Tampa Bay Bucs. One of Ken's favorite little sayings to Tony is this little piece of wisdom - "What's down in the well will come up in the bucket."

WHAT'S DOWN IN THE WELL WILL COME UP IN THE BUCKET

It's inescapable. It makes perfect sense. It's the only thing that can happen when you give someone some time to meditate on it.

[What's down in the well will come up in the bucket.]

The Bible shares several stories surrounding wells and water. In Genesis 21 we have the stories about Abraham and all the wells that he and his servants dug. In Genesis 26 we have the stories that his Isaac had to redig. We have the faith story of Abraham's servant finding Rebekah, Isaac's future wife at a well ( Genesis 24). We have the story of Jacob and Moses both finding their future wives around a well (Genesis 29 and Exodus 2). And in our reading this morning we have Jesus meeting the Samaritan woman at the well.

Wells were both ancient meeting places and life giving stations. We all know that water is essential for our survival. We all need water in order to live, we need it for nourishment, for bathing, for purification and for the preparation of our food. Water is essential for life.

We Americans today take easy access to water for granted. We simply go over to a faucet, turn a handle and water steams out. We forget that just 75 years ago most of America got its water either from a stream or out of a well. Over 15 million Americans still get their water from private well systems. And most most of the world still depends on water from either a well or directly from a body of water.

In our passage, Jesus used the metaphor of water to help explain to the Woman at the Well the meaning of everlasting life. He used the image of water to teach her how to meet the deepest needs of her life. She had confessed to Jesus the dryness of her life. She had confessed that nothing in her life had brought true fulfillment and lasting peace. She had tried many things but they all left her wanting.

Her life paralleled the cisterns Jeremiah speaks of in Jeremiah chapter two. Jeremiah used the image of a broken cistern to symbolize the lives of God's people who had forsaken Him. They were alive but they had experienced no joy and fulfillment in their lives. They were like a cistern that had been designed to hold life giving water but due to its brokenness were dry. No matter how much it rained God's goodness in their lives, their broken cistern life can never retain God's blessings. Without God, His people would never find true and everlasting fulfillment in this life.

Many of us can identify with this woman at the Well. All the world has ever given us are broken cisterns and empty wells. Our lives before we meet Jesus were full of empty and broken promises. We thought that many things were going to bring us fulfillment but in the end all we ended up with were lives full of broken cisterns and empty wells.

Jesus came to bring hope and newness of life. Jesus came to bring to us " a spring of water welling up to eternal life." Jesus came to restore our broken cisterns and fill our life with water that will forever satisfy our spiritual thirsts. The woman at the well received Jesus' healing and salvation. She started that day a broken woman end that day with her life well filled to the brim of Jesus' living water. She arrived at the well void of hope but left a missionary ready to tell her family and friends about Jesus. Jesus transformed her life forever. She was never the same after spending some time with Jesus. When this transformed woman went into town she was able to draw the bucket deep within her soul and come out with a message of hope, of living water and eternal salvation.