Please turn in your Bibles to John chapter four. John chapter four. John chapter four, I'll begin reading in verse one. Therefore, when the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John, though Jesus himself did not baptize, but his disciples, he left Judea and departed again to Galilee.
But he needed to go through Samaria. So, he came to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob gave to his son, Joseph. Now, Jacob's well was there. Jesus, therefore, being wearied from his journey, sat thus by the well.
It was about the sixth hour. A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, give me a drink, for his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. Then the woman of Samaria said to him, How is it that you, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?
For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. 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. The woman said to him, Sir, you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where, then, do you get that living water?
Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock? Jesus answered and said to her, Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again. But whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.
The woman said to him, Sir, give me this water that I may not thirst nor come here to draw. Jesus said to her, Go, call your husband and come here. The woman answered and said, I have no husband. Jesus said to her, You have well said, I have no husband, for you have had five husbands and the one whom you now have is not your husband.
In that you spoke truly. The woman said to him, Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain. And you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship.
Jesus said to her, Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem worship the father. You worship what you do not know. We know what we worship for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour is coming and now is when the true worship worshipers will worship the father in spirit and truth.
For the father is seeking such to worship him. God is spirit and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth. The woman said to him, I know that Messiah is coming, who is called Christ. When he comes, he will tell us all things.
Jesus said to her, I who speak to you and he. And at this point, his disciples came and they marveled that he talked with a woman. Yet no one said, what do you see or why are you talking with her? The woman then left her water pot, went her way into the city and said to the man, Tom, see a man who told me all things that I ever did.
Could this be the Christ? Then they went out of the city and came to him. Amen. Let us pray.
Opening Prayer
Our father in heaven, we come into your presence and our God, we know that you are a holy God and a righteous God, the God full of mercy and grace and a God who has not dealt with us according to our sin. And in this we rejoice, Father, we thank you for that forgiveness of sin that we have through the living water, which is Christ Jesus, our Lord. We pray that even now you would help us to understand your word. Help us, Lord God, to receive the things that you would have for us and do wash us afresh in the blood of Christ.
Do help us, God, to come with clear consciences and with a genuine desire to be taught of God. We just pray, Lord, that you would be exalted and glorified, that we'd learn something of what it is to to come into your presence and to know that communion that you have made us for. And we ask through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.
Introduction
If I ask the question, why are you here, what would you answer? I don't mean why are you here in this particular room, on this particular day, in this particular town, but why are you here with reference to your existence on earth? You might say, well, God made me to be a teacher, God made me to be a mechanic, or God made me to be this or that. God made you to worship Him.
That is the primary purpose for which we have been created. God made man upright. He made him in his own image. He gave us rationality.
He gave us the ability to think his thoughts after him. He gave us the gift of language. He put us in a garden, a beautiful place. wherein man could commune with his God. If you look at the construction of the garden, it was set up as a temple.
It was set up as a place where God and sinners or God and man rather would come. and engage with one another, and all of redemptive history is moving to that place when that temple will be restored. It is no accident that when John the Apostle looks and he sees that New Jerusalem coming down out of heaven prepared as a bride adorned for her husband, It is described as a temple. Paradise was lost in the garden. Paradise will be restored again through the power of Jesus Christ.
So God made us to worship, but man departed, man defected, man against the living and the true God. So, the remainder of the Bible teaches us how the Lord rescues, how the Lord redeems, how He restores us to that place where we worship Him properly. And this morning, we're going to consider the doctrine of worship, and it is well expressed here in John 4 in Jesus dealing with this woman, this Samaritan woman. Now, just for the sake of definition, worship is the giving of praise, honor, adoration, devotion and service to God.
That's a great explanation. It is the giving of praise, honor, adoration, devotion and service to God. The Greek word often means or the Greek word that is employed often means to fall down and to kiss someone. The idea is that we're falling before the Lord Jesus Christ in submission. and in service and we are rendering to you that honor and that devotion that is due to his name.
It is primarily a matter of the heart. But it does express itself through the body. And as you survey worship in the Old Testament and as you surveyed in the New Testament, it is a whole soul, whole body exercise to present ourselves unto the living and the true God. There is no higher purpose for which you have been created than to glorify God.
Dr. Morecraft says we are never more fully human than when we are singing praises to God. That's a great concept. You are never as fully human as you are when you are worshipping your creator, because that's why he made you.
That is the purpose for which he made you. John Piper says that missions and evangelism will cease. Missions and evangelism are a means to create worshippers. Worship never ceases.
Worship will never stop. In heaven there won't be missions or evangelism, but worship will continue. The primary function for missions and evangelism in our own day and age is to go forth with the gospel of free and sovereign grace, to see men bow down to the Lord Jesus Christ, and to give themselves up in worship to our God. So missions and evangelism are a means to create worshippers.
Worship is why you break. Worship is why you eat. Worship is why you drink. Worship is why God has made you.
And there are four topics or four ideas or four themes, really, that Jesus and this Samaritan woman talk about. But the central, the primary theme is that whole idea of worship and giving glory and honor to God. The first thing they speak about is this water, specifically the living water. Secondly, they talk about her marriage.
Thirdly, they talk about worship proper. She changes the subject as she goes into a different direction. She asks him specifically about worship. And then the fourth topic they discuss is the Messiah, the Messiah ship, the one who is the Christ who would come from God to save his people from their sin.
So living water, the woman's marriage, worship itself and the Messiah ship.
The Living Water
But let's look, first of all, at this discussion concerning the living water.
Setting: Jews and Samaritans
The setting is important. You need to know something about Samaria. The Samaritans were not the favorite people in Palestine of that day. There was quite a rift between Jews and Samaritans.
In fact, that's why the woman says, you being a Jew, why are you talking to me, a Samaritan? Then the disciples are a bit blown away because he's talking to a woman. There was a thought back then that you would be better spent studying theology than wasting your time talking to a woman. So this woman had two strikes against her going into this very meeting.
But I think there's even more than meets the eye and more than that we can survey concerning her situation. But Samaria was founded ultimately as the northern, the capital of the northern tribes after the division of the kingdom under King Omri. Remember, God split Israel and Judah into two, the ten northern tribes, and then you had two southern tribes. Well, then God used Assyria to judge the northern tribes in 722 BC.
And what Assyria's plan was, or one of the means by which they extended their dominion and culture, was to take lands that they had captured and bring Assyrians in and make them live in the land with the people who remained. The idea being that the people who remain would absorb the culture of Assyria. And when you have time, you can look at Second Kings chapter 17 to see how the worship of God in Samaria was thoroughly corrupted. They did agree or the Samaritans rather agreed with the ten of the first five bucks.
They said they believe the first five bucks or the penitent. That's why she's knowledgeable about Jacob. She's knowledgeable about worship. She has some understanding of these things, but they were downcast.
They were looked down upon as doctrinal mongrels. You know those dogs that you say is a Heinz 57 dog? That's what the Samaritans were, theologically and religiously. They were mutts, they were mongrels, they were not orthodox.
And something else that I think we need to notice about this particular meeting is that I think there's a specific contrast set up between this woman and Nicodemus in John chapter 3. I go back just for a moment to John two, the very end of John two. I want you to see something here that helps us understand these accounts where Jesus interacts with private individuals. John chapter two, verse twenty three.
Now, when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover during the feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs which he did. But Jesus did not commit himself to them because he knew all men and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for he knew what was in man. Right on the heels of this statement, here comes Nicodemus. Nicodemus says, we know that you're a teacher sent from God.
What does Jesus do? He knew the man. He knew what was at the heart of this man. He said, unless a man is born again, he will not see the kingdom of God.
He is dealing with him on that spiritual level. He is dealing with him on that most perceptive way. He knows what's in man. Here comes this Pharisee or here comes this leader in the land of Israel.
And Jesus deals with them concerning the new birth. We get to John 4 and he deals with basically the opposite of Nicodemus. I mean, you couldn't get further from Nicodemus than you could in this Samaritan woman.
Nicodemus and the Woman Contrasted
D.A. Carson said, John man and a contrast. I think he not only may intend, but he definitely intends a contrast between the woman of this narrative and Nicodemus of Chapter three. He was learned, powerful, respected, orthodox, theologically trained.
She was unschooled, without influence, despised, capable only of folk religion. He was a man, a Jew, a ruler. She was a woman, a Samaritan, a moral outcast. And then his final statement is penetrating.
And both needed Jesus. She'll love that. There exists such pride in the church today. It's almost like our centers are more important than your centers.
We got to go out and win the adulterous is we got to go out and win the harlots. Yes, we do. We need to win Nicodemus also because Nicodemus goes to hell without the gospel of Jesus Christ. He's a valuable and precious soul.
We not only need to target the Nicodemuses or the Nicodemi, we need to go after the adulteresses. We need to go after the harlots. We need to proclaim this living water that is powerful to save to the uttermost all that draw near to God through Jesus Christ the Lord. We have been given the great blessing and privilege as the Church of Christ to take these big containers of living water and seek to dump them on all comers, on all people.
John is showing us here how Jesus deals with souls, how Jesus deals with sinners, whether they are from the upper echelon of society or they are from the lowest part of society. And the common denominator, the common theme is that Christ alone is able to save sinners. So, we notice here, Jesus comes to this well in verse five and six. Jacob's well was there.
Verse six. Jesus, therefore, being wearied from his journey, sat thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour. That means it was about noon.
His disciples went off to buy some food. It's noon. He's weary. He's tired.
This underscores his genuine humanity. Yes, he is God. He is man. Fully God. fully man, the Council of Calcedon in 451 A.D. or A.B. 451 spelled this out beautifully, reflecting what the Bible teaches.
He is true man. He is weary. He is thirsty, but he's also there by divine necessity. Notice back in chapter four at verse four, but he needed to go through Samaria, not just because it was the most direct route.
Not just because it was the most appropriate way for him to travel from one place to another. He needed to go there because there was a sinful woman that he was going to save. There is divine necessity in this text that we must not miss. Not only does Jesus need to go and rescue this sinful woman, but God must be worshipped in spirit and through a lot of divine necessity in this particular chapter that we do well to take notice of.
Jesus Asks for a Drink
So Christ comes, he asks for her to give me a drink. And the fact is, brethren, she's by herself. This is another indicator that she is not well favored among even her own people. Usually the women would have went to the well together.
So she's not only a woman, she's not only a Samaritan, but she's also an outcast from her own people. The fact that she goes ultimately and witnesses to the men leads some to conclude that she was a harlot and she went to go preach to the men who knew her best. She didn't go to the women, not to say she neglected them. I don't know about all that, but she definitely had a spotted and assorted past.
And Christ deals with her in this grace and mercy. So Jesus asks her, give me a drink. Notice in verse nine, then the woman of Samaria said to him, how is it that you being a Jew ask a drink for me? A Samaritan woman for Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.
John wants us to understand that John wants us to see. John couldn't make it any more conspicuous that that Jesus is doing something here that you just didn't do that. You just didn't talk to a woman who was a Samaritan like this. But he was divinely constrained.
He had necessity laid upon him. No, she doesn't give him a drink. No indication whatsoever in the text that she says here. So what do you mean you're asking me for a drink?
I don't think she gave him a drink. He's thirsty. He's tired. He's hot.
But Jesus uses this occasion to move from physical water into this living water. He does this in various occasions in John's gospel, take something physical and then penetrate to the spiritual behind it. You must be born again. Nicodemus says, what do I have to walk?
I'll go back into my mother's womb. There's a spiritual meaning here. And so, Jesus uses this occasion. It's interesting, the fountain of living water himself asks for a drink of water.
She refuses him and then he uses this opportunity to teach her concerning living water. Notice verse 10, 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. What do you think Jesus is doing here? You might actually translate this, if you knew the gift of God, that is the one who says to you, give me a drink.
Jesus is the gift of God, isn't he? God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Jesus is about this woman's soul. He's going to save her.
He's going to deliver her from the kingdom of darkness and transfer her into the kingdom of his own light. And then notice the woman says in verse 11, the woman said to him, Sir, you have nothing to draw with in the well is deep. Well, then you get that living water. Are you greater than our father, Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and livestock?
She understood that he was asserting superiority over Jake over Jacob. Jesus can give her something that Jacob couldn't. And you know what? She's suspect of him.
I don't think she thinks he can deliver the goods. She doesn't know yet just what it is or who it is she's run into when you talk about a meeting here. Talk about an amazing time in this woman's life. And notice what Jesus says.
He doesn't allow her to deter him. He doesn't allow her to refuse him. He doesn't allow her to reject him. He pursues with patience.
He answers her questions and he explains this whole issue of living water.
Living Water Defined
Notice in verse 13, Jesus answered and said to her, whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, that physical water where they came to draw from the well. He goes on to say in verse 14, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst, but the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life. We need to notice three things about this statement. The first is only Jesus gives this.
You cannot come away from reading this account with Jesus and the woman at the well and conclude that all roads lead to heaven because they don't. There's one found, one source of living water and it's Jesus. He will say this very clearly later in John 14 says, I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the father except through me.
He's saying essentially the same thing here. He says, whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him. Whose will is supreme in the matter of salvation? The divine will.
It is Jesus who saves. It is Jesus who liberates. It is Jesus who rescues. It is Jesus who washes.
Jesus who sanctifies. Jesus who justifies. It is not her will that is primary here. It is not her making a decision for the Lord Jesus.
It is Christ saying, I give this water and I give it freely as I determined to. Secondly, this living water is eternal life. He says as much at the end of verse fourteen, but the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life. That is the grand purpose for which Jesus came to die for sinners and to rise again so that they might have everlasting life.
Jesus was a good example. Jesus was a good teacher. Jesus did mighty deeds. Jesus healed a lot of people.
Jesus fed the poor. Jesus raised the dead. But his primary act The primary focus in his ministry was to die for sinners and to rise again. This is why Paul in 1 Corinthians 1 can say that the Jews, they seek after a sign and the Greeks, they seek after wisdom.
But we preach Christ crucified to the Greeks, foolishness to the Jews, a stumbling block. But to those who are being saved, Christ, the wisdom and power of God. Brethren, look at Jesus as your example. Look at Jesus as a great teacher.
But first and foremost, look at Jesus as a substitute, as a sacrifice, as the bloody savior for sinners. I love the way a brother prayed the bloody and battered savior. That makes us a bit uncomfortable. Sometimes you read old Spurgeon sermons and he says, look at the door at Calvary.
We don't like to think that way. People get offended when we sing Cooper's hymn. There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins. But, brethren, we must be blood-stained as individuals.
We must be blood-stained as a church. We are not here because of our merit. We are not here because of our righteousness. We are not here because of our works.
We are here because we've been redeemed through blood. is the giver of eternal life. And he does this through his doing and through his dying and through his resurrection and his current session on high. And then he says very specifically the means by which this living water is received faith. He calls it drinking here.
He calls it eating in John six. Those are all metaphors of the act of faith. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved. Jesus says whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst, but the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.
The metaphor is rich and it's beautiful and it's wonderful. What do we need more than water? Y'all can leave here right now and not eat for another week or two and still live. Some of us might live even longer than a week or two.
You cannot live without water. You cannot go without water. You must have it to satisfy. You must have it to refresh.
You must have it for vitality and for life to Jesus to say he is the living water. He is the one that not only refreshes, but he revitalizes, he makes alive, he sustains that life. He is the very life, the very substance that we need continuously. Christ is dealing graciously with this woman.
She Desires the Living Water
Notice now, she says in verse 15, the woman said to him, sir, give me this water that I may not thirst nor come here to draw. Can you imagine her excitement for a moment? See, biblical interpretation means transporting yourself back there. She's excited.
Somebody came to your house and said, look, I got something for you that will satisfy you forever. No, we wouldn't be like that. What is it? Tell me.
How can I obtain this? What is it? There's excitement. That's where this lady's at.
She's gone from, how come you're talking to me to, where is this living water? I want some. I want a drink. She's a social abcast.
She's a Samaritan woman. She is weary. She is heavy laden. Her life, Reverend, is a big zero in the grand scheme of things.
She's not Nicodemus. She's not accomplished. She's not looked on well in Israel. She's not called a teacher in Israel.
She doesn't wear fine clothes. She's not. She's not respected in the community. She's everything opposite.
So Jesus comes and says, I've got living water. You drink this water and you'll never thirst again. It shouldn't surprise us that she says, give me this water that I may not thirst nor come here to draw. Some of you have never come to this point.
You've heard the glory of the gospel. You've heard the truth that there is a Savior who will receive you, that will forgive you, that will cleanse you from your sins. And instead of saying, sir, give me this water, you said, well, I'll hear it another time. I'll go home and sin.
I'll continue living in sin. I'll continue doing this activity. I like pornography, or I like drugs, or I like the white collar crime, or I like my embezzlement, or my lying, or my cheating, or my thieving. She is feeling better than this living water.
Praise God, this woman is getting it. Praise God, she sees what matters. Some here don't see what matters. And it reflects in the way that we live.
It reflects in the way that we conduct ourselves. Always amazed me how people get so excited and zealous for things like a two hour hockey game. We're a rugby game. They get all fired up.
It's not necessarily wicked to get fired up. Then we come into the church and we get around Christians. We start talking about Jesus and it's like we're dead. It's like there's no reality that there is a heaven.
There is a hell. There's no effect upon us. We can traffic in some of the most lofty and most holy things and come away saying, man, I wonder what's for lunch. Probably some right now are thinking, I wonder what's for lunch?
Can they turn this down? It's too loud. You know, learn something from this woman. With all of her issues and all of her problems and all of her past, when Christ came and said, look, I've got living water, she says, I want that.
I want living water. I'm not content with my life. I'm in a mess of it. It's wretched.
It's horrible. I'm defiled. I've got to come to the well on my own, because the ladies of the town don't like me. Maybe they think I'm trying to steal their husbands.
This is a real sinner, a real bona fide sinner that Jesus is dealing with there.
The Woman's Marriage
And that brings in, secondly, to consider her marriage. She's in a good place. Sir, give me this water. I want a drink.
Oh, go call your husband. What's Jesus saying? There's a sin problem. There's an issue that stands between you and the living God.
Go call your husband and come here. I love that. Love what Jesus does. He doesn't say go fix your broken relationships.
And when you've succeeded, come back to me. That's not what he does. That's your idea of salvation. You got it wrong.
People say, oh, my life is so messed up. I got to get things in order and then I'll come to Jesus. Wrong. Jesus puts things in order.
Remember, God, through the prophet Jeremiah, said to Israel, come ye backsliding children and I will heal your backsliding. Don't try to fix it up. Don't try to repair yourself. Don't try to make yourself better.
We're not preaching moral reform. We are preaching the bloody and risen Savior. He says, go get your husband and come back. What does she say?
I don't have a husband. Jesus commends her formally. She's right. You have well said you don't have a husband.
You've had five and the one you're with is not your husband. What's he doing? It's bringing that law, he's bringing that conviction. He's bringing us to that place where we need to be before we'll ever worship God are right.
You don't just strut into the presence of God with all your sin, without any conviction, without any thought, without any dealings whatsoever and say, Lord, here I am. Butler said I was made to worship you. Here I am. No, you have to come through the blood.
You have to come through the living water. That's what Christ is doing here. That's God saying in Isaiah 66 too. He says, Heaven is my throne.
The earth is my footstool, but I look upon him who has a humble and a contrite heart. I look upon him who trembles at my word. See, Christ says to this woman, before you can worship God in spirit and in truth, you first need to receive this living water. You first need to believe the gospel.
Some of you probably have never worshipped in your life. Just going to a worship service doesn't mean the magic happens. Just singing the song doesn't mean the magic happens. By magic, I'm not saying it is a magic act.
I'm saying that connection with God, that intimacy, that union. Some have never worshipped. Why? Because they've never drank the living water.
They've never dealt with these five men plus one. They bring all their sin, they bring all their unconverted self into the presence of the high and holy God and think if they do the right things and say the right things and think the right things while they're told, they will somehow worship. Absolutely not. The only way you'll worship is to drink first of this living water.
Go call your husband. He wanted her to understand that coming to him includes conviction of sin. You trace through the Bible, you read from the very beginning to the end. What is sinner?
What is the sinner's response before God? What happened with Adam and Eve after they fall into sin? They make these leaves, they cover their waste areas, and that wasn't enough, so they go and hide themselves among the trees. Instead of running to God for forgiveness, they run from God.
Why? They were convicted of their sin. What's Isaiah the prophet do when he is seen or given that vision of the throne room of God in the year that King Uzziah died? He sees the Lord high and lofty.
He sees the train of his robe filling that holy place. He sees the pre-incarnate Christ, according to John chapter 12. He sees these things. He hears the angel saying, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts.
The whole earth is full of his glory. What does Isaiah the prophet do? Oh, wow, Lord, aren't you lucky? I'm here to worship you.
He said he cried out. He said, well, is me, for I am undone. I am a man of unclean lips. I dwell among the people of unclean lips.
My eyes have seen the Lord. What's Job do after God answers him out of the whirlwind? Remember, Job, at one point, I don't know, too big for his britches, starts to question God. God says, I want you to study yourself because I'm going to answer.
Job, where were you when I laid the foundations of the world? Job, where were you when I told the water how far I'm not anymore? Job, where were you when I put the stars up in the sky? Job, can you answer me?
No, you can't, right? Let's keep going. What's Job's response but to cover his mouth? He couldn't look upon this holy God.
We have this idea that as sinful men, we just wander into the presence of God. We need mediation. We need a redeemer. We need the living water.
What's God say to Moses when he shows himself at the burning bush? Take your sandals off, because the ground upon which you stand is holy ground. What about Nehudah and Abihu? Remember Leviticus chapter one to nine, God spells out how he is to be worshipped.
God declares in vivid detail how he is to be approached. This is the law of sacrifice. This is the way you do it. These are the ones who conduct it.
Chapter nine, the very end. Israel offers up an acceptable sacrifice and the glory of God consumes their offering. It says the people shout. Do you love that?
They shout. I've always wondered what kind of a shout that was. A wow or a Just an amazing display of God sending fire down and consuming their altar. Lo and behold, Leviticus 10 starts and Nadab and Abihu think, well, we can do something that God hasn't commanded us.
We'll offer up some strange fire unto the Lord. After all, he's already shown his approbation of what we offered. He'll take this too. No, he won't.
God sent fire again, but this time it didn't consume their sacrifice. It consumed Nadab and Abihu. What's God's lesson? What's God want you to learn from that passage?
What's God want you to bow your head and say, Lord, please teach me this and then say amen and go live on your way. I am holy and by those who approach me, I must be regarded as holy. God will deal with your sin. I'm not suggesting otherwise.
Jesus covers sin. Jesus washes sin, Jesus justifies and sanctifies, but so many of us want to enter in and enjoy the worship of God without having made peace with God through our Lord Jesus. How can we have worship with one who is our sworn enemy? How can we have worship with one who is our enemy?
Because if we're not reconciled through our Lord Jesus Christ, that's exactly the situation. So the word reconciliation has to do with God is reconciling sinners to himself. That means bringing peace. So the words the Bible uses about salvation are very important.
It does us well to understand that words like redemption. Jesus buys us out of the slave market of sin. He redeems us. The word propitiation used in a few places by the Apostle Paul means that Jesus takes in himself the wrath that is due to us.
It's a good word. You don't want to get rid of that one. It's important. reconciliation, God and sinners reconciled in the Lord Jesus Christ. He's willing and he's able and he will deal with your issue is you got to deal with your sin.
That's what Jesus is impressing upon this woman and notice something to Jesus commands her to do something she can't do. That really bothers people. How can he command me to this and I can't do it? Because he's God?
That's a good answer right there. Go call your husband. She couldn't. Why would we preach the law to someone when they can't?
Because through the law is the knowledge of sin. Please don't forget that use of the law. Christ is bearing on this woman. And then notice what she does.
True Worship
She wants to talk about worship. Is that great? Sure. I perceive that you are a prophet.
Our fathers worshipped on this mountain and you just say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship. Two different views on this. Some say it's got a psychological element. She's found out.
She's like a cornered animal now. She's got to come out fighting or change the subject. She can say, well, you know, the husband thing, they all died. I got divorced.
You know, try to justify her sin or just not say a word. Let's just change the subject. Sure, you've had that happen before. You're out witnessing to someone, you bring them, you know, they're found out in sin.
Well, where did Cain get his wife? It's a debate time. Let's change the subject. I don't want to talk about me and my sin.
Usually, it's not a real happy subject. Especially if I'm not a forgiving sinner. I really don't want to talk about it. John 3 tells me that as darkness, I don't want to come to the light, lest my evil is exposed.
Or she's legitimately interested. She's standing in the midst of a prophet. It's some theology here. The difference between the Jews and the Samaritans.
I want to know. I want to learn. She asks about worship. I leave that to your own prayer, your own meditation as to which of the two.
But the point is, the direction changes now to a consideration of the worship of God. Jesus goes. Jesus doesn't say, wait a minute, I want to talk about this, because all that he says is going to continue to expose her and show her her need for him. But you want to talk about worship.
Let's talk about worship.
The Place of Worship
The first thing is the place of worship. Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, verse 20. And you do say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship. The woman asks, where do we go?
Do we go to Jerusalem or do we go to Gerizim? Do we go to Samaria or do we go to Jerusalem? Where do we go? Jesus' words are beautiful.
So one of the aspects of John's gospel is to show us throughout that Jesus is the fulfillment of all that the Old Testament taught. Woman, believe me, he says, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem worship the father. You worship what you do not know. We know what we worship for salvation is of the Jews, but the hour is coming and notice verse twenty three and now is talking about.
Talking about the fulfillment of all those promises of God, where the worship of God would be universalized, universalized, does not mean every single sinner will be saved. But it means that the worship of God will transcend Palestine. Can someone turn the fans on, please? It's quite warm in here and I don't want to lose anybody.
If we could just flip those ones on, that would be good. Maybe we'll get the blood flowing. As Spurgeon said, the next best thing to the spirit in the heart is oxygen in the head. I don't want a lack of oxygen to restrict any of us from seeing what Jesus teaches this woman concerning worship.
Thank you. This place, where do we go? Where do we go? Where do we go?
Where do we go? Jesus says the hour is coming and now he is, when it won't be localized. See, the temple was very much the center of Israelite worship. Nobody's disputing that.
But what was the temple pointing to? The temple was pointing to Jesus. That's the whole point of John 2. Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.
It took our fathers 46 years to build this temple. You're going to raise it up in three days. What's John the theologian tell us? He was talking about the temple of his body.
Remember, I referenced Revelation and the movement of redemptive history. When we get to Revelation 21 and 22, what do we learn? There's no physical structure there. The Lord God and the land are the temple.
Christ saying is the hour is coming and now is with his life, with his ministry, with his redemptive activity, when it won't be localized in Palestine, but the worship of God will be universal. I believe that in the mind of Christ or some of the texts that that perhaps Christ had in mind, one of them is Malachi chapter one, a book that deals very specifically with the worship of God. In Malachi chapter one, verse eleven, for from the rising of the sun, even to its going down, my name shall be great among the Gentiles in every place. Incense shall be offered to my name and a pure offering for my name shall be great among the nation, says the Lord of hosts.
This is the time Christ is inaugurated. Malachi's prophecy, Isaiah's prophecy, the promise made to Abraham in Genesis 17. In you, all the families of the earth will be blessed. Christ says, here it is.
The Object of Worship
Notice, secondly, he speaks of the object of worship. She wants to talk about the place, the where. He wants to talk about the who. You get that she was talking about the place where I go to worship.
He was talking about who you're worshiping. He says salvation is of the Jews and is insofar as that goes, the Jews were giving the oracles of God in Judah. God's name is known according to the psalmist. Paul says that they were given all these blessings, all these good things, all these good words from the Lord.
Yes, of the two Samaritan and Jew Old Covenant wise, the Jews are right. So he says. You worship what you do not know. We know what we worship for salvation is of the Jews.
When Assyria came into Samaria and started planting all that wicked doctrine and all that religious heresy and the Samaritans started following that, y'all abandoned the true and living God. You became apostates. You became defectors. You are gone.
You are outside the covenants of promise. You are strangers to the Commonwealth of Israel. But now, is the time for you, even you, to be brought through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. The issue is not where, but whom is worship.
And, you know, this is a big difference as to what we hear today. Today, false religion says, as long as you worship, doesn't matter. As long as you worship. Man is a worshipping being.
All you gotta do is worship. Doesn't matter if you worship a doorknob. Doesn't matter if you worship a man. Doesn't matter if you worship a cult.
Doesn't matter if you worship an organization. Doesn't matter. What's important is worship. We hear a variation of that with reference to believe.
We come and say, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. No, you just need to believe. As long as you believe, then you're gonna be alright. No, you're not.
It does matter who you believe on, and it does matter who you worship. You may be worshiping a God you have created according to your own image. You must come to the Bible to learn of the true and the living God. It's been well said, God created man in his own image, and ever since the fall, man has been recreating God in his own image.
Jesus says it's important to know, it's important to understand, it's important to take the scriptures and learn of this God.
The Foundation: God Is Spirit
Notice he speaks of the time. We've already referred to this. The hour is coming and now is. This is all affected by the Lord Jesus Christ and his coming.
He says the foundation upon which worship is possible. He says, God is spirit. Those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth. The fact that God is spirit means we can universally come to this God.
We can come to this Lord. But I think even more what Jesus is highlighting is the character of God here. Teaching something that we need to understand concerning the Trinity, God is spirit and those who worship must worship in a Trinitarian manner. They must worship in spirit and in truth.
The spirit is talked about throughout the upper room discourse. The father is to be worshiped through the mediation of the son by the power of the Holy Spirit. This is what Christ is highlighted. He's saying that our worship of the true and living God must be based on his character as it's revealed to us in the whole Bible, which means Trinitarian.
If the church today can have in its ranks Unitarians, can have in its ranks people that deny the Trinity, the church is failing. The Bible is Trinitarian to the core. There's this idea that when Matthew 28 speaks about the Trinity, no, Genesis 1-1 to the end of Revelation speaks of the Trinity. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
God, plural Elohim, well, that's the plural of majesty. No, it isn't. It's the tri personality of God, a plural verb with a singular or a plural subject with a singular verb. The triune God presents himself in the first chapter of Genesis.
The Spirit of God is brooding over the waters. Psalm 33 tells us that God, by his word, created. We get to John 1, 1 to 3. In the beginning was the Word.
The Word was with God and the Word was God. It was through the Word that all things were created. Christ is saying that Unitarians, Oneness Pentecostals, Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, humanists, pagans, everyone who does not worship the Trinitarian God is wrong. Jesus couldn't come to some ecumenical gathering and make everybody happy.
See, for Jesus, truth and doctrine really did matter, because if you don't know the true God, can't worship the true God. That's why preachers come up here and yell at you every Sunday. Read your Bible. How could you possibly worship this God?
You don't know. Paul picks this up in Ephesians 3 or 2 18 for through him, through Jesus Christ, we both have access by one spirit to the father. How are we supposed to worship? We're supposed to come to the Father through the mediation of Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit.
In other words, according to Jesus in John 4, God is spirit and those who worship it. Notice again, the necessity of this must worship in spirit and truth. Do not ever say, well, that doctrine of the Trinity, it's just a mystery, just a paradise. It's just a contradiction.
No, it isn't. God is not a mystery. God is not a paradox. God is not a contradiction.
Now, there are aspects concerning God that we cannot penetrate because he's infinite and more finite. But when the Christian church goes on, say, well, yeah, it's hard to believe. What are we saying? We are betraying the Word of God itself.
I just, I repudiate and reject this approach to the Trinity. It's just too hard. It's the foundation for our communion and our dependence upon God. You better get your mind in gear then and start learning.
This is who God is. This is his character. This is his essence, one true and living God, three persons in the Godhead, the father, the son and the Holy Spirit. And these three are one, the same in substance, equal in power and in glory.
Knowing that God having been washed in precious blood, being aided by the Holy Spirit, we can come here on the Lord's Day and really worship.
God Initiates True Worship
But don't miss this. Last thing we need to understand about true worship. God initiates it. God initiates.
God sustains. God is the power in true worship. Look what he says here. The hour is coming and now is when the true worshippers will worship the father in spirit and truth for the father is seeking such to worship.
Grace that taught our hearts to fear. You didn't wake up one day and say, you know, I really think I should just go worship God. If you're here and you're truly worshiping, it's because God sought you. The glorious.
Is that how the Bible presents our God to us? Sometimes, and this is common in reform circles, oh God, he's just this big, angry, mad, mean God back there who's just going to get you. I'm not going to minimize the fact that God is a consuming fire, that God did kill Nadab and Abihu, but this God jumped off his porch, ran down a dirty, dusty road, and fell on his prodigal son, and kissed him, and put a ring on his finger, and ordered the slaying of the fatted calf. Why?
Because the father is seeking such to worship him. God doesn't seek us, we'll not worship. He knows that. You see, this is his world, this is his decree, this is his plan.
He understands all too well no one can come to the father or come to the son, except the father who sent him draws him. The effective power in worship is due to the God who we worship. We need to keep that in mind. And we need to let that affect us so that when we testify to others, We're not trusting in their power and in their ability to make themselves worshippers.
We're trusting in a God who seeks men and women and boys and girls, not just in Palestine, but from every tribe and every tongue and every people and every nation. This God, who in the prophet Malachi promised that wherever his name was, the peoples would be blessed. Brethren, learn this of God. He is a seeking God.
We saw a few weeks ago in our Sunday night service, Adam and Eve sinned, they run from God, God runs to them. And we saw in that covenantal structure in Genesis chapter three, it wasn't just to get them, it was to bless them, it was to recover them, it was to restore them, it was to promise them the Christ, the seed of the woman who had crushed the head of the seed of the serpent. God is a seeking God, so much so when he has dealings with Zacchaeus. What do the people do when Jesus says, come down from the tree?
I need to go eat at your house. What do people do? Why is he going to go eat there? They're just like us.
Why is he saving him? Why is he dealing with him? Why is he talking to that woman? This is a disciple.
Isn't that amazing? Why are you talking to her? I have meat to eat that you have no clue about. That's a bad indictment.
That's a true indictment of our hearts. What are you talking about? Because I'm going to save her from her sins. We give her everlasting life.
She's going to go into this city of the Samaritans and she's going to tell that. Come and see a man who told me all things that I ever did. And they're going to come and they're going to believe. And then they're going to say what underscores this whole event is that, yes, we have learned not only from her testimony, but because we have come to believe and know that he is the savior of the world.
Our God is a seeking God. Jesus said to that crowd grumbling in Luke 19, the son of man has come to seek and to save that which was lost. We're not preaching that Christ. We're not preaching Christ.
We're not testifying of that Christ. We're not testifying of Christ. We're not preaching a God who calls us and commands us to worship, but also enables us to worship. We've missed the point.
We're not preaching the glory of the Trinity. We're not doing it right. We need to repent. No Jew, no one that's Pentecostal, no Muslim should ever be content in Christian worship.
They better be up and out of there because the Trinity in his glory is being proclaimed. Well, we've seen the divine initiative. We've seen the living water.
Application and Conclusion
In conclusion, I want you to see one thing. We'll look at the Messiah ship, God willing, this evening straight in verse twenty six. Jesus said to her, I am. John's gospel is the gospel of the I am, isn't it?
It's not translated that way in the New King James, I who speak to you, am he literally I am. That I am that will later cause the opponents of Christ to pick up rocks and throw at him because he's claiming to be God. When she says, I know that Messiah is coming, who is called Christ, when he comes, he will tell us all things. Jesus answers her very clearly.
I am. I am. Look at that, God willing, this evening, but I just want to end with the necessary connection. In this passage, two connections that we need to see, the first is conviction of sin and faith in Christ precede true worship.
You don't come into the presence of work and worship God without having dealt with sin. You don't deal with your sin by self-atonement. You don't deal with sin by going away for a little while. You don't deal with sin any other way than coming to this living water.
Coming to that fountain that is open for sin and uncleanness, if you want to worship God, If you want to worship God truly, you must first believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. It can't be otherwise. You have to have your sin dealt with, and Christ is the only dealer, the only one who deals with sin. When he said in verse fourteen, whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst, but the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.
You need to drink that water. You need to believe the gospel. You need to understand who Jesus is and believe on him. Believing will involve repentance.
Leaving those five husbands plus one. Leaving whatever it is that really kept you happy before turning your back on those sins and coming to the Lord Jesus Christ. And it is through him that you're ushered in to worship. And then the second connection we cannot miss is the connection between worship and witness, worship and witness.
If we look at our church, we say, well, evangelistically, we're not doing that well. The problem probably originates in worship. Not saying we got to whoop it up and, you know, be like banshees and, you know, we got to have more excitement in order to go out and be proper witnesses. You know, worship is not a spectator sport.
You don't just come in here and just kind of sit. You better come here having prayed. Come here, expectant. Come here, beseeching the Lord to give the Spirit, because this is a spiritual activity.
And if you were honest, you would say that in the last 55 minutes, you have had about a hundred thoughts not connected to the worship of God. Why is that? Because it's hard. That's why so many churches get a lot of fleshly things in there to help it be easier.
Let me face it, if we're standing up or dancing around, we're doing a jig. There's involvement. You need to be thinking, believing, hoping, expecting, praying, submissive, having dealt with your sin. Don't come running into church at the last minute, yelling at your wife and saying, bless me, Lord.
It's mockery, man. We've got a problem out there, it probably originates in here. You see, when you come face to face with this triune God, when you come to the father through the son, by the power of the Holy Spirit, you do what this lady does. You go back to your city and you say, you got to hear this.
I mentioned on Wednesday night, I just listened to some lectures by Joey Piper, the president of Greenville Seminary, Presbyterian Seminary, said, you know, we're afraid to bring people to church. We're afraid to invite someone to church, got to have a halfway house first, get them to a Bible study, get them to coffee. I'm not against Bible study, not against coffee. Do you know what?
Bring them to church. And I dare say, brethren, the non church expect church to look like this. Not to say we got it, that's not if that sounded like that, I'm I messed up, but they don't expect me to be wearing sandals, sipping Starbucks and chatting about the latest whatever. So you can't say, well, we're just not here for cool, so we can't invite people to church.
They expect to come in and see weird things. not give them any cause to expect otherwise. I'm saying we should be winsome, we should be loving, we should be kind, we should be gracious, but we shouldn't compromise those central emphases that the Bible presents. A simple worship of a glorious God through the mediation of Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit with a lot of emphasis upon his word because it is through the foolishness of the message preached God saves sinners. You want to be a good evangelist?
Be a good worshipper. You want to be bold for Jesus? Come in here ready to meet with your God and meet with Him. Do you know what we learned in Revelation chapter 3 in the letter to Laodicea?
Even if the church is jacked up, you can still worship God and get blessed by the Lord. That promise of Revelation 3, 20, where Jesus says, Behold, I stand at the door and knock. It's not an invitation to be saved. It's not Jesus standing outside of a door that has no handle, because the handle's on the inside, and you've got to open it up in order for Jesus to come and save you.
It's not an evangelistic text. It's a promise to a church, a very messed up church, too. A church whom Jesus was threatening to spit out of his mouth, because they were neither cold nor hot. But even in the midst of that sort of a church, Jesus says to the individuals within that church, behold, I stand at the door and knock.
You hear me? You open up, I'll come and suck with you. I grant, brethren, I have not been the best leader of worship. But you can still worship.
You can still commune with your God. If you have Christ, you have access to the Father. You have the Holy Spirit. You have the truth of God.
And I'm not arguing that we should be the coldest, deadest whatever church. I am arguing just the opposite. These elements that we prize and that we value ought to be the very lifeblood of our church. They ought to make us throb in worship.
They ought to make us reek of our God. And they ought to send us on to these streets to testify. Come, hear a man who told me all things I ever did. And then the sinners come and they say, we believe now, not just because of her testimony.
But because we have come to know and believe that this Jesus is the Savior of the world. Well, let us pray.
Closing Prayer
Our Father, we give you thanks for your word. We give you thanks for your worship and for the fact that you seek us out. God, forgive us that so often we enter into this place and our hearts are cold and we are distant and we are far from you. We confess, Lord God, sometimes we prepare far more for much lesser events. than preparing to worship our triune God.
We pray that you'd put the fear of God deep in our hearts and that you would flood us with joy. We know biblical worship ought to be characterized by joy in the Holy Spirit, that rejoicing in the Lord God most high. We pray that you would just help us as well to to just value these means that you've given to us. And thank you for that living water that you have enabled us to drink.
We praise you for our Lord Jesus. We praise you for his work at Calvary. We praise you for his current session and that he truly is the savior of the world. We pray this gospel would be proclaimed throughout the earth and that a great multitude would come to know him as Lord and savior.
And we pray through Jesus Christ. Amen.