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John chapter 4 once again. I'm really enjoying this chapter.
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I enjoy every chapter, but I like this one too, particularly.
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Let's pray for the Lord's help here as we look into his word. Father, again we ask that you would help us now.
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May the blessed Holy Spirit illuminate our minds to the truth that's in Jesus Christ.
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Help us to see the glory of it, our God, and the relevance of it. And help us to apply these matters to our own souls.
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So give us illumination to our minds. We pray that you give motivation to our wills, our hearts.
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Help us to glorify you, Father. And again, we do pray for those in particular need,
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Lord. We want to pray for John, that you would help him,
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Lord, as he'll be seeing a cardiologist on Tuesday. We pray for Dave Farrar, Lord, with the concerns that he has for his ongoing heart issues.
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Be merciful and gracious to your people. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, let us rejoin our
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Lord Jesus as he was engaged in conversation with this woman of Samaria. Well, they sat together there at Jacob's Well, just about a half mile out of the little town of Sychar, located in Samaria.
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And today we'll consider further the promises that Jesus gave to this woman, glorious promises, that would be realized by her if she knew and understood these promises and who it was who was giving them.
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Her life to this point, up to the point of meeting Jesus, seems to have been characterized by disillusionment, disappointment, degradation.
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Nevertheless, it could begin anew and would begin anew if she would believe on Jesus.
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And so before her was the possibility of a new life filled with joy, peace and righteousness, blessings that she had never known, but apparently had sought, but in the wrong ways, in the wrong places, with the wrong people.
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But thank God, Jesus could enable her to never thirst again and to have within her a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.
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And so the conversation began with Jesus asking her for water from Jacob's Well, but it progressed to this woman requesting living water from him, from Jesus.
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And so he who asks of her is also he who gives to her, and that freely and abundantly.
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And let's certainly apply it to ourselves. If Jesus did so for her who believed, he will do so for you and me who believe.
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Is that not right? And you can come into this place this morning with a life perhaps somewhat parallel to hers.
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It can start anew, afresh. There is a new beginning for those who trust the
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Lord Jesus Christ. And it's a wonderful thing to behold and to witness.
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And we're seeing it happen, it would seem, quite frequently these days, and it's a wonderful thing. We've read the entire account, at least through verse 26, several times, but today we're just going to begin through verse 15, and then in a few minutes we'll read further.
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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
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Judea and departed again to Galilee, but he needed to go through Samaria.
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So he came to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob gave to his son
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Joseph. And now Jacob's well was there. Jesus, therefore, being wearied from his journey, sat thus by the well.
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And it was about the sixth hour. A woman of Samaria came to draw water.
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Jesus said to her, Give me a drink. For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.
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And then the woman of Samaria said to him, How is it that you, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a
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Samaritan woman? For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. Jesus answered, said to her,
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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.
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The woman said to him, Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep.
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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?
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Jesus answered, 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.
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But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.
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The woman said to him, Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw.
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We'll pause there. In our study of this rather lengthy passage, we're in the second section, which tells of the initial meeting of Jesus and the woman.
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And we'll continue where we left off last week, and that will be with verse 15.
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And so here Jesus met and engaged a Samaritan woman in conversation. We read in verse 15 that this woman requested this water from Jesus so that she would not thirst nor come here to draw.
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Now it's difficult to address her true desires at this point in the account from her very few words.
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And yet this has not prevented many from attempting to do so down through history. It's amazing the insight some claim to have.
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And here's a summary of opinions of various commentators through the centuries. Most of these names will probably be foreign to you, probably never heard of them.
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But they were significant at their time in history, going all the way back to the early centuries.
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Some think as Musculus, Calvin, Busser, Brentius, Galcher, Lightfoot, Poole, and Dyke, that the request was made in a sarcastic and sneering spirit, that is, her attitude was not noble.
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As though she would say, truly this water be a fine thing, if I could get it, give me, if you have it to give.
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And so they understood her as having this rather harsh attitude and tone. Some think as Augustine, Cyril, Bollinger, Rollock, Hildersham, Jansenius, Nephanius, that the request was only the lazy, indolent wish of one who was weary of this world's labor, and yet could see nothing but the things of this world in our
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Lord's sayings, like the request of the Jews, ever give more, give us this bread, which the
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Jews requested of Jesus in John 6. It is as though she would say, anything to save me the trouble of coming to draw water would be a boon.
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If you can do that for me, do it. As Bengal says, she wished to have the living fountain at her own house.
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Third, however, some think as Chrysostom, he was known as the silver mouth, he was apparently a great preacher of the early church,
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Theophilact, Euthymius, that the request was really the prayer of an anxious soul aroused to some faint spiritual desires by the mention of eternal life.
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Ask thou eternal life to bestow, give it to me. Well, these varied opinions of what this woman was thinking and what she desired when she spoke to Jesus confirms the fact that we are really incapable of seeing into the innermost working of a soul, assessing accurately, clearly motivations and desires.
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The fact is you and I don't have that capability, do we? Only the
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Lord can see into the heart and know precisely what someone is thinking and what is motivating his speech.
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I wish people in Washington, D .C. and across our nation would understand this truth. We've heard authoritative pronouncements by many of what is in a man's heart and what is the nature of his true motives.
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And I'm afraid such pronouncements reflect more the condition of the pronouncer's heart than the true condition of the one under scrutiny.
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Do you recall how the brother of young David who would later become king, his brother, accused
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David wrongly because he assumed that he could see clearly the motivations, the condition of David's heart?
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David's father, Jesse, had sent young David, the youngest son of the family, to the battlefield to bring some provisions to his brothers.
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He wanted to learn of their condition. And when David arrived to the battlefield, he learned of the humiliation of the army of Israel due to the refusal and failure of anyone to meet the challenge of that giant
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Goliath, the champion of the army of the Philistines. And so David was indignant.
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So we read in 1 Samuel 17, this account, And David spoke to the men who stood by him, saying,
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What shall be done for the man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised
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Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God? And the people answered him,
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Well, you get to marry the king's daughter, you know, you'll be famous. So shall it be done for the man who kills him.
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And then we read of David's brother, older brother. Now Eliab, his oldest brother, heard when he,
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David, spoke to the men. And Eliab's anger was aroused against David. And he said, Why did you come down here?
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And with whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know your pride and the insolence of your heart, for you have come down to see the battle.
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He ascribed false motives to David. And David said, What have I done now? You can imagine the youngest brother saying something like that, right?
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To his oldest, what have I done now? Is there not a cause? Is there something greater and higher, nobler than this that you accuse me of?
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The fact is, Eliab was wrong in his assessment and assertion of the motivation of his younger brother,
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David. And when we claim that we know the heart of a man or woman, just from a casual observation or hearing a few words, we're really acting unjustly and irresponsibly.
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I have to laugh on these talk shows where you have a so -called professional psychologist taking online calls.
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Somebody calls in, describes their condition in 20 seconds, and then this psychologist pontificates as to the motivations, the innermost feelings of this person and what's caused that problem and whatnot.
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We do not have that kind of wisdom to be able to, in just a few minutes, short time, assess somebody's motivations, the condition of their heart.
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Only God can see into a person's heart. You and I can't. Certainly we are to assess and judge other people's words and actions and attitudes, but the heart is hidden from us.
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And yet now it would seem we have a different climate in our culture. There are those who refuse to give the benefit of the doubt to another, but rather they doubt the benefit of everything and everyone to the one to whom they are opposed.
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And it's a sad state of affairs. And I don't know how it's going to be resolved in the current state of our culture.
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True Christian love, however, thinks no evil, hopes all things. Love gives the benefit of the doubt in that it believes all things.
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That is, if we're thinking rightly and feeling rightly as Christians. The fact is only the living word of God is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
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You and I don't have that capability. And so the scripture warns us, do not, therefore, do not judge, judge nothing before the time until the
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Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and reveal the counsels of the heart.
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You and I cannot do that. That's the Lord's job. Again, when it says we're to judge nothing, it's referring to assessing and pronouncing judgment upon those things that we are incapable of knowing clearly and fully, such as the motivations of the heart.
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We are certainly to assess and pronounce God's judgment on things like speech, words, attitudes, actions.
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But we cannot read the heart. I would think,
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I would guess that at this point, however, in this woman's conversation with the Lord Jesus, that she was considering something more than just physical water.
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Jesus said to her that the gift he could bestow upon her would include the gift of everlasting life. There must have been on her part at this time a degree of interest and a desire for spiritual reality, even though probably at this point it was mixed with both physical and worldly concerns.
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And so it is oftentimes when the Lord begins to draw someone to himself.
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They initially come with mixed desires and motivations. We should expect it.
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J .C. Ryle, the 19th century Church of England minister, wrote of this in the context of the
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Samaritan woman. And so after citing the assessments of this woman's heart mentioned by those men above, that was from J .C.
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Ryle's commentary, those three categories of men up above, he wrote these words, and I think they're good words.
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I venture to think that none of these three views is quite correct. True motive of the request was probably a vague feeling of desire that the woman herself could hardly have defined.
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It is useless to analyze and scrutinize too closely the first languid and imperfect desires that arise in souls when the work of the
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Spirit begins his work of conversion. It is folly to say that the first movings of the heart towards God must be free from all imperfect motives and all mixture of infirmity.
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The woman's motives in saying, give me this water were probably mixed and indefinite. Material water was not out of her thoughts, and yet she probably had some desires after everlasting life.
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Enough for us to know that she asked and received, she sought and found. Our great aim must be to persuade sinners to apply to Jesus and say to him, give me to drink.
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If we forbid them to ask anything until they can prove that they ask in a perfect spirit, we should do no good at all.
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It would be as foolish to scrutinize the grammatical construction of an infant's cries as to analyze the precise motives of a soul's first breathings after God.
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If it breathes at all and says give, we ought to be thankful. And I think that those are wise words.
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You never know what the Lord is doing. Give it time and you'll be able to tell. But we ought to encourage any seeking after Jesus, knowing that it might lead to something further.
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We next read of Jesus's response to her request in verses 16 through 18. Jesus said to her, go call your husband and come here.
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The woman answered and said, I have no husband. Jesus said to her, you've well said,
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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.
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She was living together with a man out of wedlock. And so our Lord had made known to this woman the blessing of free and full spiritual life that he could give her.
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But even though she made this request, she was really not ready to receive it from him as of yet.
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She had a sin problem. And that sin problem had to be exposed to her and brought to the forefront of her thinking.
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She would need to know that if she received what Jesus offered her, it would be done solely due to the mercy and grace of God.
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She was not deserving of the least of God's blessings, and that needed to be affirmed to her.
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She needed to understand that. The fact is, her sinful life had discredited her from deserving favorable treatment, if assessed to be worthy of God's blessing.
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She was never going to be understood as worthy of God's blessing, and she needed to know that.
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And so Jesus would reveal her sin to her, before he granted the promise to her.
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She was a sinner and justly under God's condemnation. However, that would not disqualify her from salvation, if she but acknowledged her sin and turned from it in repentance, and believed on Jesus Christ as her
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Savior from sin. The one who's farthest from Christ, the one who has given himself or herself over to the greatest measure and degree of sin in this world, can receive new life if they come to Jesus Christ.
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Openly, sincerely, humbly acknowledging that they deserve God's damnation, but they desire
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God's salvation that's offered to sinners through Jesus Christ. Jesus is a great
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Savior for great sinners. Now notice that Jesus was kind to her in the manner that he confronted her with her sin, but his kindness did not temper his directness.
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He was direct with this woman, wasn't he? But he was kind to her as well. He made it clear to her that she was an adulteress and a fornicator.
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He would have her own up to her sin, to her spiritual guilt and poverty.
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Essentially what Jesus did to this woman, or before this woman, was preach the law of God to her.
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In order to reveal her sin to her, Jesus set forth the law of God. Now, commonly there's an order that we bring the message of salvation to a sinner.
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We first proclaim to them the law of God, by which the Lord reveals to the soul the conviction of sin.
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I'm guilty. I'm under God's condemnation. God's law tells me so. And after that, we declare to them the gospel of Jesus Christ, which is the divine remedy for sin.
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We first show them their sin, and then we tell them the remedy for sin. We first proclaim the law of God, and then we proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ.
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And most of the time, this is the order set forth in the Bible. First, the law is proclaimed, and then the gospel.
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First, there was the Old Testament, which is mostly the law of God. And then we have the
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New Testament, which is principally the gospel of Jesus Christ. First, the law, and then the gospel.
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But to this woman, Jesus reversed the more common order. Jesus first preached the gospel to her, telling her what she could receive from him, and then he set before her the law of God.
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But make no mistake, both are essential in bringing people to true salvation, the law and the gospel.
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I've always appreciated the words of Charles Spurgeon on this matter. He wrote a wonderful book called The Soul Winner, in which he set out in the first chapter what it is to win a soul.
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He wrote that there is a need to make sinners know they are sinners, who are deservedly doomed in their sin, before they may see the glory of the gospel.
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They're not going to see the beauty and the glory of the gospel until they see the horrendous nature of their sin. And so he wrote,
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The withholding of the doctrine of total depravity of man has wrought serious mischief to many who have listened to a certain kind of preaching.
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These people do not get a true healing because they do not know the disease under which they're suffering.
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They are never truly clothed because nothing is done towards stripping them. In many ministries there's not enough of the probing of the heart and arousing the conscience by the revelation of man's alienation from God and by the declaration of the selfishness and wickedness of such a state.
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Men need to be told that except divine grace should bring them out of their enmity to God, they must eternally perish, and they must be reminded of the sovereignty of God, that he is not obliged to bring them out of this state, that he would be right and just if he left them in such a condition, that they have no merit to plead before him and no claims upon him, but that if they are to be saved it must be by grace, and by grace alone.
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The preacher's work is to throw sinners down in utter helplessness that they may be compelled to look up to him who alone can help them.
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And so Spurgeon is talking about the need for people first to see their sin in all of its ugliness, clarity, and the damnation under which they exist in sin before they understand the glory of the gospel.
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Again, Spurgeon was writing to ones who wanted to be soul winners, and he wrote about the need for the soul winner to discern the conviction of sin as an evidence of the work of the
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Holy Spirit, and he speaks about it being an evidence of the new birth, the conviction of sin.
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As this God -begotten spiritual life in men is a mystery, we shall speak to more practical effect.
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If we dwell upon the signs following and accompanying it, for these are the things we must aim at.
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First regeneration will be shown in conviction of sin. This we believe to be an indispensable mark of the
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Spirit's work. The new life as it enters the heart causes intense inward pain as one of its first effects.
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Though nowadays we hear of persons being healed before they've been wounded and brought into a certainty of justification without ever having lamented their condemnation, we are very dubious as to the value of such healings and justifyings.
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This style of things is not according to the truth. God never clothes men until he first strips them, nor does he quicken them or make them alive by the gospel till they are first slain by the law.
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When you meet with persons in whom there is no trace of conviction of sin, you may be quite sure that they have not been wrought upon by the
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Holy Spirit, for when he has come, he'll reprove the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment.
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When the Spirit of the Lord breathes on us, he withers all the glory of man, which is but as the flower of grass, and then he reveals a higher and abiding glory.
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Spurgeon himself was raised in church, he was reading the Puritan books in his grandfather's library, his grandfather was a pastor, from the age of four.
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Raised in church, and yet when he became about twelve, he underwent a period of conviction of sin that lasted five years.
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He was tormented under the guilt of his sin and the fear of damnation, and then the
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Lord wonderfully saved him when he wandered into a church that had hardly anybody in it because of a big snowstorm.
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In fact, the preacher didn't even show up. Some layman got up. Some storekeeper or somebody,
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Spurgeon said, and he opened up the gospel, and Spurgeon saw the light of it utterly transformed.
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But it was after five years of intense misery, conviction of sin. But then he gave this word of caution,
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Do not be astonished if you find this conviction of sin to be very acute and alarming, but on the other hand, do not condemn those in whom it is less intense, for so long as sin is mourned over, confessed, forsaken, and abhorred, you have an evident fruit of the
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Spirit. That's good counsel. Much of the horror and unbelief which goes with conviction is not of the
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Spirit of God, but comes from Satan or corrupt nature. Yet there must be true and deep conviction of sin, and this the preacher must labor to produce, for where this is not felt, the new birth has not taken place.
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And so there must be a conviction of sin present. He further wrote, You and I must continue to drive at men's hearts till they are broken, and then we must keep on preaching
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Christ crucified till their hearts are bound up. And when this is accomplished, we must continue to proclaim the gospel till their whole nature is brought into subjection to the gospel of Christ.
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Good words, good book, the soul winner. Well, again, back in John 4, we see here the
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Lord Jesus brought this woman to see her sin. He basically drew her attention to the law of God.
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He made it clear to her that her life had been characterized by disregard and repeated transgression of God's law, particularly the seventh commandment.
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Thou shalt not commit adultery. The Lord Jesus preached the gospel to this woman, but he also preached to her the law of God in order to bring her soul, to her soul, the conviction of sin.
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One Lutheran commentator, Richard Lenski, I have his entire commentary on the
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New Testament. He gave a good account of our Lord preaching both the law and gospel to this Samaritan woman.
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And this is important because law and gospel are categories that you ought to see everywhere in the scriptures.
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He wrote this. The entire conversation on Jesus' part is misunderstood when it's not observed that up to this point
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Jesus is using the gospel and that from now on he employs the law. This means that Jesus knew that the woman could not yet believe and he did not expect her to believe so soon.
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The law must first crush the heart in contrition, then faith can enter in and not till then.
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So both law and gospel must be preached and Jesus preaches both. The two appear here most plainly marked.
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Either may be offered first or both may be intertwined, though each always remains distinct, likewise the proper effects of each.
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Here Jesus uses the gospel first. It is a mistake to imagine that in doing this he failed and then tried something else.
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Apparently some commentator suggested that. Not one word of the gospel was lost upon this woman.
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Its effect presently comes with a rush when the law begins to take hold upon her heart and to show her sins and her tremendous need of the gospel.
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Law and gospel, both are essential. And yet I would say it's a sad thing that due to the error,
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I would say, of dispensationalism, often the law of God is never proclaimed from the pulpit.
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It's argued we're not under law but under grace and therefore they don't preach the law of God. Yes, the word of God declares, for sin will have no dominion over you since you're not under the law but under grace.
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But what that means is that we do not relate to God under the covenant of works of the law but rather under the grace of God in Jesus Christ.
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And we thank God this is so. We're not under a covenant of works but under a covenant of grace.
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We believe on Christ who kept the law on our behalf. But this verse does not teach that we're not to proclaim the law of God.
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And yet many people wrongly conclude that from this verse. Paul declared that through the law comes the knowledge of sin.
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If you take away the law of God from the hearing of people, they will not be brought to see the full weight of their guilt before God due to their sin.
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And there are some who say we preach grace here. We're not under law, we just preach grace.
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That's all we ever preach. And when you have that kind of situation, you're going to have a people that are going to have a little view of sin.
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Because the law of God is what the Holy Spirit uses to convince people of their sinfulness and their need for salvation.
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And so to the degree that the clarity and authority of God's law is not proclaimed the preciousness of the grace of God in the gospel will not be understood or desired by sinners.
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And this is commonplace sadly in so many places. Notice verse 19.
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This is an interesting response from this woman. The woman said to him, sir,
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I perceive you're a prophet. You know, you've just told me everything about me. Yeah, I've been married five times.
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Man, I'm living with not my husband. You must be a prophet. And so the woman was admitting indirectly that Jesus was right in his description of her life.
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And furthermore, the woman was right. Jesus was a prophet. Now she doesn't understand that he was the prophet that Moses proclaimed would come.
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There'll be a prophet one day that God will send who will be raised up a prophet like me. Him you should hear in all things or else you'll be cut off from among the people is what
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Moses declared and it's quoted in the New Testament. She probably did not know how right she was.
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Yes, indeed, he's a prophet. Notice the woman made no apology.
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She offered no qualifiers or excuses. I perceive you're a prophet. You know, she knew he nailed her.
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Her sin did not lead her to confess something. Her sin did lead her to confess something about Jesus.
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She knew that he knew everything there was about her. She owned up to her sin.
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Now the next statement is probably the most difficult one in this passage in my estimation.
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The woman seems to the casual reader to say these words kind of out of place to Jesus or at least her words seem to be inappropriate.
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At first consideration, it would seem like the woman was now trying to deflect Jesus from addressing her sin.
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We read in verse 20, our fathers worshiped on this mountain, that would be Mount Gerizim, and you
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Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship. And so some commentators say that this should be understood in this way.
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Jesus was directing her to consider her sin, but she sought to divert the conversation to another topic.
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Let's talk about right worship rather than my sin. This, for example, was the view of Leon Morris.
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And by the way, I don't believe this is a correct understanding of what she was saying. Leon Morris wrote, a woman may have been genuinely interested in the topic she now raises, but it seems more probable that she is simply trying to change the subject.
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She wants to steer the conversation away from the unpleasant subject of her sin. And so she introduces a distraction.
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She points to the different ideas held by Jews and Samaritans about the place God has chosen, which men may worship him.
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Donald Carson, who's an excellent commentator, disagreed with this position, but he suggested something kind of similar to it.
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The sudden change of subject has prompted many interpreters to suggest the woman raises a disputed point of theology as a means to distract
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Jesus from the sin question she finds so embarrassing. It is always easier to talk theology than to deal with truth that is personally distressing.
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But this interpretation may be guilty of too greatly psychologizing the text. And he's probably right.
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A simpler supposition is that the woman's discovery that Jesus is some kind of Jewish prophecy prompts her to raise the outstanding point of theological contention between Jews and Samaritans as much to demonstrate her religious awareness as to set the stranger a testing challenge.
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And then he quotes F .F. Bruce, there are some people who cannot engage in a religious conversation with a person of a different persuasion without bringing up the points on which they differ.
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However, to suggest that this woman diverted the Lord's attention from her sin does not seem to be a reasonable conclusion to me.
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And here is one who took issue with this take on her words. What now follows, verse 20, has again been misunderstood.
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In fact, the previous wrong conceptions culminate at this point and create confusion. And thus it is said that a gap occurs at this point and that John skipped what lies between.
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Again, that the woman with quick wit here turns the conversation away from these delicate and painful personal matters to a question that Jews and Samaritans argued that she makes a tricky dialectical evasion.
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But then Jesus, and this is the commentator's opinion, and I think he's right, but then Jesus would never have answered as he did carefully and to the point the very question the woman raises.
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He would have rebuked her and have driven home or driven in more deeply the hook of the law she would thus be evading.
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In other words, I don't think she was successful in diverting the Lord away from her sin issue.
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However, most commentators take this position. In other words, after determining that Jesus was indeed a prophet, she would pose the question that would have been foremost on the mind of a
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Samaritan. How do you understand the great difference between the way Jews and Samaritans believe God should be worshipped?
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But it seems to me that this is a serious break and change in the matter at hand. Jesus just confronted this woman with her great sin and her need to obtain
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God's forgiveness of her sins. And therefore, I believe that the point is this.
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She was not attempting to change the subject. Rather, after Jesus proved himself to her as a prophet of God, who had supernaturally recounted her life's sin, she was now inquiring of Jesus where she should go to worship
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God and thereby receive cleansing of her sin, the sin that Jesus set openly before her.
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She wanted forgiveness of sin. Do I need to go to Jerusalem to the temple or will this temple do here on Mount Gerizim?
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How do I deal with this? It seems to me a sincere question about her sin, not a diversion.
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The Jews said Jerusalem was where you needed to worship God in order to be forgiven of your sin. The Samaritans said that the temple on Mount Gerizim, right in front of them, was a place where they could meet with God and receive his forgiveness for sin.
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Consider these comments. The woman recognizes that the exposure of her sin means that she is confronted by a prophet.
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And since it is the work of a prophet to point also to the place of forgiveness, she asks him to make known to her the proper place of worship.
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The distinction between the true and false worship of God had already formed the theme of the classical passage in the
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Old Testament concerning the Samaritans. And it was also the subject of contemporary controversy between Samaritans and Jews.
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According to the Samaritans, Mount Gerizim had been the scene of the sacrifice of Isaac and of Abraham's meeting with Melchizedek.
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And in their version of the Pentateuch, they had a different version of the first five books of Moses.
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And not Mount Ebel was it, that is, Mount Gerizim, and not Mount Ebel was the site of the first Hebrew sacrifice after the people had passed over Jordan into the
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Holy Land. To the Jews, however, the sacred Samaritan mountain was no more than a seat of sectarian worship founded by the renegade
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Manasseh, the tribe of Manasseh, who had been expelled from Jerusalem, or this is the man Manasseh, for marrying the daughter of Senballot, and who had assisted his father -in -law to establish a separate sanctuary on Mount Gerizim.
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Josephus described the Samaritans as perishing in their separate worship. Rabbi Eliezer held that they were men who for motives of fear had externally adopted
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Judaism whilst remaining heathen at heart and who were consequently to be treated as not
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Israelites. And Rabbi Ishmael ben Hoseh, AD 180, commenting on Genesis 35 .4,
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suppose the image were still hidden under the mountain and therefore pronounced Gerizim to be an idolatrous sanctuary.
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There's a great difference of opinion between Jews and Samaritans on the right way and the proper place of worship.
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To understand the woman's statement about the place of true worship, let us affirm that a significant aspect of offering worship to God was obtaining cleansing from sin by God, which would be obtained at the temple of God.
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I'm not going to read that passage from 2 Chronicles 6, but basically it describes
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Solomon dedicating the temple and asking God that when his worshippers come before him at the temple that God would forgive your people who have sinned against you.
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That was a part of worship. You would bring your animal sacrifices to the temple and offer them in order to receive forgiveness of sins.
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We understand, of course, as it pointed to the coming Messiah. The woman's concern was a real one, however.
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Could she, a Samaritan woman, hope to be received by the priesthood at the temple in Jerusalem? If she were to travel there to worship
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God to receive the forgiveness of sins, would not the temple of Mount Gerizim be more suitable for her, a
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Samaritan woman? Actually, when Solomon dedicated the temple originally, he made provision for the
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Gentile. He requested God when he dedicated the temple, God, if a foreigner, if a
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Gentile, looks to this temple and prays to you to forgive their sin, may you please forgive them.
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And though during the days of our Lord's earthly ministry the temple in Jerusalem had an outer court dedicated to non -Jews, the court of the
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Gentiles, you'll recall back from John chapter 2 that that had been taken up with money changers.
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Remember? There were no place for Gentiles there. That's where the money changers were. And Jesus cleansed that temple.
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And by the way, in that account, John, the apostle, writing the gospel, makes it clear that when
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Jesus cleansed that temple, he was setting himself forth as the new temple, the true temple.
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And the old temple was going to be destroyed. He was cleansing the temple and setting himself up as the true temple.
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And of course, the Lord Jesus, when he cast those money changers out of the temple, he said to them, destroy this temple and in three days
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I will raise it up. He was setting himself up as the true temple, the place where you can receive forgiveness of sins.
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He was speaking of the temple of his body. We don't have time, but if you consider the account in Acts, you remember how
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Paul was accused of bringing a Gentile into the temple. He never did, but he was accused of doing so and brought a riot.
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How is this Samaritan woman going to go to the temple in Jerusalem and worship God and get forgiveness of sins?
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Look at the block quote right in the middle of page 8. The woman really asked Jesus, who are right, her ancestors or the
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Jews? Her ancestors or the Jews. This she does in connection with her unqualified admission of sin and guilt.
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I perceive your profit. I'm acknowledging my sin. You got me. I'm guilty.
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She admits she needs cleansing. Where is she to obtain it? Where her people say, in this mountain,
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Gary's in, looming up not far from the well, or where the Jews say, in the temple of Jerusalem. Will not
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Jesus send her to the latter place to bring her sin offering and to obtain absolution or forgiveness?
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I think last week, maybe the week before, or a couple weeks ago, we talked about how the Jews destroyed that temple of the
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Samaritans in what, 129 B .C.? It was just ruins up there on the hill. But the
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Samaritans continued to offer sacrifices up there. They had their own priesthood. They had their own form of the books of Moses.
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In fact, there's still a group of Samaritans there today. They've been there for these last 2 ,000 years and they're still doing that today.
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Can you imagine the joyous reaction of this woman? After she asks, is it
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Jerusalem or Samaria? Mount Gary's in. Jesus said to her, woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the
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Father. You worship what you do not know. We know what we worship for salvation of the
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Jews. But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the
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Father in spirit and truth. For the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is spirit, and those who worship
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Him must worship in spirit and truth. Can you imagine what kind of release that must have been for this woman?
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She didn't have to go to Jerusalem. She didn't have to go to Mount Gary's name either. Forgiveness was in Him.
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He was the true temple. In Him is forgiveness of sins. Believing on Him.
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We have to wrap things up. He addressed her as woman. That may sound to our English ears as rather harsh, but it wasn't a derogatory address.
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In fact, it was just the opposite. By addressing this woman as woman,
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Jesus was actually speaking affectionately to her, just as He spoke about His mother, speaking respectfully, even possibly affectionately.
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Then Jesus gave her the command, Believe Me. That's a command. Believe Me. He was a prophet.
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She knew that He was. He was going to speak a truth to her that few ever heard or even understood, ever imagined, even though it's set forth all over the
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Holy Scriptures. She should believe His word to her. And then He said, The hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem worship the
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Father. The Lord Jesus declared in these few words that a major change in God's dealings with mankind was taking place.
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God the Father would be worshipped by His people irrespective of any place on earth.
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If this truth was known by humanity, there would be the reason for a lot of warfare dissipated, removed.
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The idea of a holy place. The hour is coming when there will no longer be a holy place.
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This is the declaration Jesus made. There's no place on earth where God will accept your worship more than right here as you're gathered with the
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Lord's people. When two or three are gathered in my name, I'll be there in the midst of them. There is no holy place in the world.
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Mecca is not a holy place. People are not closer to God because they traveled to Mecca at least one time in their life.
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Jerusalem is not a holy city. It's not a holy place. The Wailing Wall is not a holy place.
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The Temple Mount is not a holy place. Jesus Christ is the holy place.
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And wherever His people meet, they can receive the full forgiveness of sins and enjoy full fellowship with God irrespective of a place.
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In fact, the scriptures describe the present -day earthly Jerusalem as spiritually
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Sodom and Egypt. Paul in Galatians 4 likens
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Jerusalem to the children of Hagar.
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They're not even Israelites, he says. No, our Jerusalem is above. Our Jerusalem is the collective people of God who know
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Jesus Christ. And Jesus Christ Himself is our Temple. We should understand that.
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All these pilgrimages that are advocated by Islam, all the pilgrimages advocated by Roman Catholicism, if you travel to this cathedral, which is a recognized, dedicated, holy place, and it's made holy because there's some relic, some piece of a saint that has sanctified that place, and if you travel there, you are going to meet
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God in a special way that is repudiated by what our Lord Jesus said here in John chapter 4.
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You meet God through Jesus Christ, through faith in Him. Not on this mountain, not on the mountain, not anywhere.
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Coming into the presence of God was Jesus standing right in her presence. And it must have been of great relief to her.
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We've got more to say. We'll have to pick it up next time, however. There's a great deal said about the true worship of God in this passage.
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We worship God the Father principally, through Jesus Christ, by the power and presence of the Holy Spirit, but the
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Father, God the Father, is such to worship Him, or is seeking people to worship
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Him. And we're Trinitarian, but we need to have our understanding of worship with right priority and follow the directives of Scripture.
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May the Lord help us as we study these things more fully. But it must have been a profound truth if this woman did indeed perceive it.
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She could have full forgiveness of sins, this new life that He was offering her through Him.
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Believe me, He said. And she could have everything that was offered by God to believers.
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Thank God for this. That's the gospel, isn't it? The good news of Jesus Christ. Let's pray.
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Thank you, Father, for your word. Thank you, Father, for the glorious gospel. We thank you for your law, too.
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For had it not been for your law, we would have never known our sin. But your law has made it clear that those who transgress your law will be damned.
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Every thought, every word, every action, every attitude will be brought to light on the day of judgment.
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Who could stand? And therefore, our Father, we have fled to Jesus Christ, who alone could stand on that day as our advocate.
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He's both the judge as well as our defense advocate. And so we thank you, our
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God, for Him, our Savior. Help us, our Lord, to see in Him all the promises of God realized.
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In Him is yes, yes, amen. And help us to go forth here, Lord, with utter and whole confidence in Jesus Christ.
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Remove, Lord, any error that may be in our thinking about these matters. Help us to glory in Jesus Christ and Him alone.
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For we do pray these things in His name. Amen. Let's stand.