The Woman at the Well

Pastor Kevin, I'm speaking about the woman at

the well. This is a bottle of water. It's

my prop.

Here we go.

Yeah. On a more serious note, when

David was sharing, you know, your wife gets a

diagnosis of cancer and go through six

surgeries, and here she is. You can trust him.

Michelle and I looked at each other because we both experienced this

and said, and when he takes them home, you can

still trust him. Because you can.

You can. Yeah. The last time

I was up, six, seven weeks ago, something, whatever it was

I was speaking, I had been assigned

Ezekiel in the Valley of Dry Bones. And I got up and I

complained about that assignment. I, you know, I said this, you know,

once I found out that was what I was going to be speaking about, I

was going, oh, yeah, great. But. And I started a

trend because the next two or three people who were up

kind of followed suit. I, I need to

somewhat make amends this morning and say, I love

this story. I, I,

Kevin had asked us, Pastor Kevin had asked us last year

for some topics that we would like to cover under

Greatest Stories Ever Told. And I think I

sent him five, four, five, six, something like that. I got one,

but it was the one I really wanted. And it's,

and it's this one, the story of Jesus coming to the woman in

Samaria. And I love the fact that it

happens one chapter after another

encounter over in John chapter 3, that

John 3 · chapter mention

Jesus has with a prominent Jewish leader

named Nicodemus. Last week, Pastor Justin,

where is he? He baptized somebody. Oh, there he is. Okay, over there. I just

wanted to be sure you hadn't snuck out on me. Now, last

week he brought a terrific sermon about the

wedding of Cana, turning the water into wine. And he started

out by, I want to give you some context. So he went back and he

preached through chapter one as well. And I went, you don't have enough

to say about turning the water into wine, do you? So that's why you went

back and did that. But it turned out that he had

plenty to say about both of them, and he, and he melded them together

beautifully. So this week I thought, well, I'll go

back and do chapter three as well. Well, I'm not going

to, but,

But I love the juxtaposition. I'll talk about it a couple of times.

The juxtaposition of this prominent

religious Jewish leader coming to Jesus and the way

Jesus shared with him and ministered to him, and then

this Samaritan woman and Jesus coming to her

in the way that he ministered to Her.

I love the

juxtaposition there.

Jesus left an area of fruitful

ministry. In fact, it says, we're going to read it here

in just a minute, that he was making and baptizing more

disciples than John, than John the Baptist was. He left an

area of fruitful ministry, not because of opposition,

but because he had a divine appointment

in a little town called Sychar. It's the only time it's ever mentioned in

scripture, and it may still exist, but it

not Sychar anymore. That's lost to history.

With an unnamed woman. And we

don't know her name, but God does.

Jesus wasn't just telling a parable.

He wasn't just blowing smoke when he talked about

leaving the 99 and going after the 1. He did

it, and he's still doing it. He still

does it. Okay, I want you to stand with me. It's going to be kind

of a long reading, but it's a good story. It's really

good.

Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that

he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John,

although in fact, it was not Jesus who baptized,

but his disciples. So he left Judea and went

back once more to Galilee. Now he had to go

through Samaria. So he came to a town in

Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground

Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob's

well was there. Jesus, tired as he was from

the journey, sat down by the well. It was about

noon when a Samaritan woman came to draw water.

Jesus said to her, will you give me a drink?

The Samaritan woman said to him, you are a Jew

and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me

for a drink? For Jews do not associate with

Samaritans. Jesus answered her, if you knew

the gift of God and. And who it is that asks you for a

drink, you would have asked him, and he would have given

you living water. Sir, the woman said,

you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep.

Where can you get this living water? Are you greater

than our Father Jacob, who gave us the well and

drank from it himself, as did also his sons

and his livestock? Jesus answered, everyone

who drinks this water will be thirsty again.

Whoever drinks the water I give them will never

thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will

become in them a spring of water welling up to

eternal life. The woman said to him, sir,

give me this water so that I won't get thirsty and

have to keep coming here to draw water. He told

her, go Call your husband and come back.

I have no husband, she replied. Jesus said

to her, you are right when you say you have no

husband. The fact is you have had five

husbands and the man you now have is not your

husband. What you have just said is quite true,

sir. The woman said, I can see that you

are prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on

this mountain. But you Jews claim that the place

where we must worship is in Jerusalem. Woman

Jesus replied, believe me, a time is

coming when you will worship the Father. Neither on this

mountain nor in Jerusalem. You

Samaritans worship what you do not know. We

worship what we do know. For salvation is from the

Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now

come when the true worshipers will worship the Father

in the spirit and in truth. For they are the kind of

worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit,

and his worshipers must worship in the spirit. And

in truth. The woman said, I know

that Messiah called, called Christ is coming. When

he comes, he will explain everything to us.

Then Jesus declared, I the one speaking

to you. I am he. Father, I thank you for your

word. I pray for the presence of the Holy

Spirit. I pray, Father, that the Spirit would be

manifest in each person here, giving us ears to

hear, hearts to understand. And I pray, Father, that you would filter

the things that. That come out of me and that

truth would go forth in Jesus name. Amen.

This last week for me has

sort of been a Wayne Berry week.

Yeah. First of all, we

had lunch together. I am a name dropper. I

had lunch when we married. And then

secondly, while we were there, he had a cassette tape that he

wanted me to hear. And in fact, he wanted me to hear this cassette

tape so much, he brought a cassette player to

the. To load it to me just in

case. And it's a good thing he did.

I was listening to it and I'd heard really everything on

it. And a lot of it, I had

a lot of it. I already had recorded in other forms and could

hear it. But one of the songs really

caught me. And it was a song that Wayne wrote

called Word about Jesus. And great

song. It's a terrific song. The full title of it is probably

how come you never say a word about Jesus?

But what really got me was the introduction to the song,

which I will never forget.

I did the introduction. It was not one of my better moments.

And it went on for about two minutes.

I opened up by saying, this song's about witnessing

and I'm the world's worst,

you know, I mean.

And I spent the next Two minutes, just kind of stuttering and

saying, you know and I know and you know, about

50 times. And I finally ended up with,

there's this guy at work and he comes in

almost every day and says, what do you know? And I

hate it when he says, what you know, because

I know what I know. And I don't, you

know, and

I don't. I don't shout out something really great like Jesus

is Lord or Jesus loves you, Bill.

Instead I usually say,

you know, don't you see, I was brought up in a.

In a church culture that was very much about witnessing and

testifying. And, you know, you're supposed to go out there and you're supposed to just

lay it on the line with them.

And it did. It bothered me every day when Bill would say,

what you know. Now, it probably would not have been a very

good idea to stand up in the middle of the Social Security

office and yell, jesus is Lord maybe once.

But he says this every day. And

it probably would have been a pretty good idea

to say, jesus loves you, Bill.

Only I would not have said, jesus loves you, Bill.

I would have said, jesus loves you, Bill. And you need to get that through

your reprobate skull before you split hell wide open

and fry for eternity.

Amen.

This passage that we have read

is how Jesus does it. Perfect

example of

how to witness. The first thing that

he does is he empowers this woman by asking her

for help. You

give me a drink. Kind of dry. I could

use a drink here. We tend to

start off by letting them know that they need our help because

we know what's wrong with them and we can tell them what's wrong with them

and we got the answer. And eventually

we might actually get around talking about Jesus. But first of all, let's fix you.

We need to flip that mentality. We need to turn it on

its absolute head.

News flash. With the way the church acts

in our culture, also known as

arrogance, the last thing

the world is going to respond to is us telling, as

a know it all attitude. Really,

I'm going to say this in this service, too. I bet some of you got

it. But I'm not talking to you. So, Holy Spirit, if you hear,

you know, I'll drive down the road, sometimes I'll see a bumper sticker or

I'll see a, you know, license plate. Sometimes I don't know. In

fact, there was a guy in the first service, had the tattoo. It says,

don't tread on me. And you know,

and I know what they're Saying is, get out of my way

and don't mess with me and everything. There was a guy,

I saw this last week who had taken it up a notch.

He had a bumper sticker and had a snake on it that kind of had

a, you know, a sort of grin on it. And it said,

tread on me, come on, make

my day kind of thing. That's our mentality,

you know, we tend to go out with, okay, yeah, come on,

bring it, big boy. Hey, you got Satan, I got God. Bring it, come

on. Humility is

so disarming

because as soon as we come with,

guess what they come with.

But when you come with humility, like, can you help me?

I need your help. Let's start at that point.

Jesus with this woman uses the metaphor of living

water to draw deeper into the conversation.

He used a metaphor with Nicodemus. Does anybody know what it was?

Born again. That's right. Have to be born again.

Draw Nicodemus deeper because that's, that's what

each have their, each has their own path. And

Nicodemus walked an intellectual path which,

you know, some might deride. I know I was kind of brought

up in the culture that, you know, if you, if you had more than an

eighth grade education, you were kind of suspicious. We were, we were sort of suspicious

of you. But I'm glad,

I'm glad that that's a legitimate path. If it weren't a legitimate path,

we'd all have to learn Greek and Hebrew to read the Bible. But

God, you know, has brought people in who have the ability to

translate and do things for us. And had Nicodemus

not come this way, and Jesus went,

finally said Nicodemus, let me explain it to you plainly,

intellectually, but plainly, if we had not had him there,

we would not have. This is the intellectual

explanation. Plainly. God loves the world

so much that he gave his one and only

son that whoever believes on it would

not die, but have everlasting life.

So, you know, I'm glad that way.

This woman just simply wanted something to drink.

This woman was simply interested in getting some water.

And so that's how Jesus came with her.

What, what you're interested in, what your needs are, the way that you're going,

that's the way we're going to, that's where we're going to start. Because you can

start from anywhere to get to God.

She was simply interested. There is no one size fits all.

So that's the first thing we need to know. You know, somebody.

It may have been, and I don't Think it was the case. In fact, I

think Bill was a Christian. But now that I look back on it. But,

you know, some. It may have worked with some people to go,

jesus loves you, and you need to get that through your thick skull before, because

you're going to hell. Otherwise. That may be what works with some people. That's not

what's going to work with a lot of people. And it's not size fits

all. There's no script except the

Holy Spirit. And we may not have

the perfect metaphor to bring to the

conversation, but living water should flow, not

vinegar.

Jesus said, the water that I give them will become

in them a spring of water welling up into eternal life.

And that's. I don't know about you,

I don't like the smell of vinegar,

but if it's around, I can smell it.

And when it's coming forth, they can smell it.

And then the woman says something that always brings a smile to my face.

I mean, I just have to kind of go, oh, yeah, right.

Are you greater than our Father Jacob?

I mean, think about that for a second. She's talking

to God and going, are you greater than

Jacob? You know, and it would have been. It would have been

easy. Jesus was not offended

nor distracted by that comment. And we

often get so easily offended, so easily distracted.

All it takes is just, you know, a little and we're

gone. Not in the moment anymore. We've

lost point on where we're going.

And it's because we tend to come with an attitude of war rather than an

attitude of humility. We somehow think that the

disastrous approach of the Crusades will somehow work this

time. I think this time it'll turn out good

if we do it that way.

Jesus comes with love. I mean,

who doesn't love love?

In fact, it's what everybody's searching for.

And we know where it is. And the term may be born again,

or the term may be living water, but what it is, is

it's Jesus and it's love.

And he was. He was a revolutionary. He was

a radical revolutionary.

Jesus was not intimidated by social norms.

He was talking with a woman who did not know him.

Now, in our culture, that's not a big deal. Guys do it all the time

or try to do it. You know, if the woman's got any set, she just

kind of goes, yeah, whatever. But you know that.

But there are cultures, and not just. Not just the culture of Jesus today,

there are cultures in the world right now where that's a big, big no,

no. And yet

Jesus wasn't. He was totally

disregarding or disrespectful of the cultural norms because

I'm sure this was not something he did all the time, but God had told

him something and that that's more important

than what the culture around us tells us to do. But

it's not just the world that intimidates with social norms. The church

does as well. I

wonder. I wonder if God

had pause when giving the law or having.

What's that guy's name? Paul. Having Paul write some

of the things that he wrote. I wonder if God stopped

and thought, they need to know this,

but they're going to turn it into something it was never intended to be.

Think about that for a second, because that's what we do with it.

The scripture does not instruct us to. To

confront the lost with. To convict the lost

of their sin. That's the job of the Holy Spirit. Jesus

says when he comes, he will convict the world of sin and

righteousness and judgment. That's his job.

Our job, actually. How many of you like to bring bad

news? How many of you like to

bring good news? How many of you just don't give

a flip? I'd always

rather bring good news than bad news.

And we're called to share the gospel of the kingdom,

so. Well, now we're also called to tell people to repent.

To repent means to change your mind, change your

mind about something. And yes, there are things that.

That the world needs to change their mind about in terms

of morals and

other stuff. There are things that I need to change my mind about.

There are things that you need to change your mind about,

but those are just things.

The thing that they really need to change their mind about is how they

think about God. Not sure

if he's there or not. No, I. He is there.

I don't know that he loves. He does love me.

Well, I don't know how Jesus fits all the. Jesus came

and gave his life for me. That's.

That's repentance. That's. That's changing our mind

about things. When I was a. When I was. When

I was a pastor. Yeah, when I was a pastor. Kevin's in charge

now, and if you got a problem, talk to him. If you're a woman, talk

to Barbie. It's that cut and dried.

My number's now unlisted.

But I would try to travel. I traveled incognito

as a pastor. And nothing

against those who. That's not what they're called to. Do,

you know, those who. Because of the structure

that they're in are required to wear a collar. Or those who

feel like they're supposed to dress in a certain way that kind of says,

you know, man of God, woman of God. You know, because there are places, there

are times where people go, man, I really need a man. Oh, there's

one, you know, and that's okay. There's times to be

identified. But I would travel incognito because as soon as

somebody found out I was a pastor, you

could see. You could see them rifling the files and go, what have I said

to this guy? You know, what am I not going to say to this guy

in the future? And the wall's there. You

can't. You can't really get through it that way.

Jesus was not intimidated by social norms.

Jesus was also not concerned with race or ethnicity.

Back in the 80s. A lot of you already know this.

I lived for a while in Zimbabwe, which was just

north of it. Borders South Africa.

South Africa's south, obviously. Zimbabwe is just to the

north of it. And it was a period of apartheid.

And for those of you who don't know what apartheid is, it

was a political system that separated the races from each other

legally. You know, if you're this race, this is what you'll do. And if

you're this race, this is what you'll do. And it was a big deal as

far as the world was concerned. A lot of countries were

boycotting South Africa and all kinds of things.

In fact, interestingly enough, it occurred to me in the first service

that the one country that

was the major trading party was South Africa. So they could get around things

was Israel, which is where Jesus is at this

moment right now.

And they had. They had racial classifications in South Africa,

but probably the most despised were those of

mixed race, as they called them.

That's who the Samaritans were to the Jews.

See, interesting enough, most of the Samaritans were Jews,

but they were not able to trace their ancestry back

the pure line of those returning from

Babylon. It astounds

me that some who

claim to be Christians can make an issue of race.

First of all, if you believe in Adam and Eve,

then we're all mixed race. We all came, we

all got the same daddy, the same mommy back

there somewhere. And also,

Jesus died for all over. In

Revelation, chapter five, there's this scroll, and

it's got seals on it. And no one's found who's

worthy to open the seals. And John is weeping because the

seals can't be opened. And then he's told, don't weep

anymore. The lion of the tribe of Judah, the Lamb of God,

has been found worthy. And a song breaks

out in heaven. You are worthy to take the scroll

and open its seals because you were slain. And with your

blood you purchased for God persons from

every tribe and language

and people and nation.

You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God.

And they will reign on the earth from every tribe

and language, people and nation. And then

there's, you know, there's Galatians 3. 28. In Christ,

there's neither Jew nor Greek. There's neither slave nor free. There's neither

male nor female. You're all one in

Christ.

And yet some of

us don't feel that way.

I was at least 30 years ago. It was more than that.

I remember bringing a sermon over in the old

sanctuary about

race. Had

several people leave the church after it.

What you're saying it's okay

for us to be together? Can't be.

Jesus was not put off by any of this.

The Samaritans were despised. And even she

said, you know, you're a Jew, I'm a Samaritan. You guys don't have anything to

do with us. Jesus didn't fall for it.

He didn't get into a discussion. He didn't talk about, oh, well, let

me tell you why I'm talking. No, he just said,

if you knew who you were talking to, you'd ask me and I'd give you

living water. Is that even on the subject? Yes, it is on

the subject.

Okay, let's get into the good ones. Now, there's two more.

He was not put off by her morals.

There's a reason why she was coming in the heat of the day

to draw water. All the other women came early in

the morning when it was cool. She came in the heat of the day.

I have learned, as I've gotten older,

some things about women.

Yeah, See, the early service crowd was a lot older, so

a lot more of the guys went, yeah, yeah, you know,

But I've learned some things about women, actually.

And one of the things that I've learned about women is

they're mean.

They have a tendency to be mean. Michelle

is the exception. Just

wanted to say, but they're mean. They hold a grudge

sometimes. You know, they can be ra.

And so this woman had a reputation.

And so when it came time to go to the well, all the other women

are going to the well. And there's a reason why she didn't Go with them.

Keep from getting her face scratched.

And she's finally intrigued enough.

She still doesn't get it, but she's finally intrigued enough. Go, yeah, I want

some of this. I want some water. You know, you don't have to understand everything

about God to want God. You don't have to understand

everything about Jesus to want Jesus. The important thing is that

you want him. And so she says, yes,

I'm in. Give me this water so that I won't have

to keep coming here to draw water.

And when she does, he

shines a light on her morals. He doesn't condemn them, he just shines a

light on them because they're

not what this conversation is about.

Had he began going, yeah, you know, well, let's talk about

that here for a minute, then the conversation would

have never gone where it was supposed to ultimately end up.

You're right. When you say you have no husband, go and call your husband.

Come back, oh, you don't have a. Well, you know, you're right. The fact is

you've had five husbands, and the man that you're. You're with right

now, he's not your husband. Even what you have just said is

quite true. In fact,

rather than going, and so, yeah, we need to talk about this because, yeah,

I bet somebody, he goes, I commend your truth.

I commend your truthfulness. I just want

to note that it's true.

God hasn't told me to give you all the details

about what a sinner I am, but

take my word for it, I am.

Paul writes in Romans, chapter seven,

the things that I want to do, the

things that I know to do, I don't always do them.

And the things that I don't want to do, the things I know I shouldn't

do, every now and then I.

Yeah, I do. Am I right, Justin? Yeah.

Every now and then I do those. What a wretched man I

am. Who can possibly save me from this?

Well, actually, I do know who. That's what he says.

When I came back to the lord in the 70s,

there were quite a few. There were a lot of people who would kind of

say, well, now, that was before Paul was saved. After

Paul was saved, that wasn't his condition anymore.

They lied.

Jesus tells the woman, you know, yeah, you. You

don't have a husband right now. You've had five, and you got a guy, but

he's not your husband. That's a word of

knowledge, and that is a

supernaturally revealed piece of knowledge.

According to First Corinthians 12, 8. It's available to all

believers. And

when I say supernatural revealed, it's not like, you know, a parent and a child.

You know, when you were a little child, you do something, and you.

And how your mom knew, how your dad knew

it was just a mystery. And they say, well, I have eyes in the

back of my head. Well, you know, that was not true

either. What they were actually saying is, you're

just not very good at it. You know, I can

catch you pretty easily. And besides, I've already been there and done that.

But God gives sometimes a supernatural

word that's kind of like, oh, my

goodness, you know, the Lord just. Just read my mail. And it's

never given for a floor show.

It's never given for a performance. Lots of maze people here.

Yes. The amazing ministry of Mr. Amaze,

you know, can tell you these things. He gives it

for a purpose, and he gave it here

for a purpose, a godly purpose.

So he's not sidetracked by her

morality. That's not the issue right

now. It's not where he's taking her. And then

here's a pretty big one. He's not put off by her

religion. He's not sidetracked by her religion.

And this is where most of us, we run off the rails.

Yeah. As soon as she realized

that she was speaking to a prophet, she had a question about

religion.

And I believe there was a measure of sincerity in her question. For years, I

kind of could hear her saying it. Our fathers worshiped here. You Jews

say we're supposed to worship over there. Which is it? You know, But I don't

think she said it that way. I think there was some sincerity there. I

really want to know. You know, we've been worshiping here, but I've heard

it's supposed to be over here. You know, what is it?

And Jesus replies with one of the most

powerful declarations, proclamations in all

of Scripture. Woman, believe

me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father. Neither

on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship

what you do not know. Worship in Samaria was set up by the

Northern kings because they were afraid, politically,

people would leave them and go to the southern kingdom if they had to

worship in Jerusalem. We worship what we do know

for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has

now come when the true worshipers will worship

the Father in spirit and in truth. For they are

the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is

spirit. His worshipers must worship in spirit.

And in truth,

some might argue, well, yeah, no, I mean, he. He said right there, you. You

Samaritans got it wrong. We got it right. No, we didn't.

No, he didn't. I mean, yes, they.

The Jews were doing according to what Moses had said, the Samaritans

worshiping according to what the northern kings

had said. But Jesus didn't say one was wrong and one was right.

In fact, he said, the time is coming and is now here.

When that doesn't matter.

When. That's not the point.

So what is the point? Well, this actually brings us to the

point. And the point is this. And it's so

beautiful. I know that Messiah

is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything

to us. And then Jesus declared, I

the one speaking to you.

That's me. That's what this whole

conversation is about. We had the

opportunity to go off the track here and off the trail here and down the

bunny trail there, but we stayed on the road. And this

is what it's about.

I said, this was a Pastor Wayne week for me. I don't

usually look at stuff on Facebook, but occasionally I'll get an email

saying, you might want to look at this. And most of the time I don't.

But if it's Wayne, occasionally I will. And I did.

And Wayne had posted something like this. He said,

a Dear Kingdom cohort of mine said,

when the pulpit has been traded for a podium.

He said, I'll add, the

church at large has a serious problem.

He was completing the sentence, when the

pulpit has been traded for a podium, the church at large has a serious problem.

He was also speaking prophetically

because all you have to do is look around, kind of go,

oh, that's where we are.

Another brother asked for an explanation, said, are you talking

about something specifically? And this just interestingly enough,

was a brother who post a lot of

political stuff and opinions and social stuff. Are you talking about something

specifically? And he asked for an explanation.

And I know this brother and I know that he has a soft heart. And

when I was his age, I was just as dumb as he is.

But I responded to him and I said, oh, so many things.

We were talking about trading the pulpit for a podium,

offers of prosperity doctrine,

social issues, personal opinion,

which, quite frankly, I think those are the same thing

because most of what we feel about social issues is our personal opinion. You

may go, oh, no, Pastor. Everything I believe about social issues is what

God thinks.

Really? Oh, really?

Yeah. Those things

that so easily draw people away, draw people

to themselves, draw people to focus on Them

and away from Jesus.

I, I

guess about the third time through this outline, getting

ready for this morning, this hit me and I'm just going to say

it. I'm going to put it up here and we're going to post it on

Facebook. And so, you know, it's true,

as the church grows in political power and influence,

it declines in spiritual power and influence.

And historically it's true. I mean,

I grew up as a child in the 50s and in the 60s and the

50s and 60s, the church had great influence on

the culture in the nation. And then in the early 70s, we

decided to get political

and you know, our influence in the

halls of power, if you will, of this world has been on the

ascendancy ever since. And the number of people who claim

Jesus Christ as their savior and attend church has been on the decline

ever since early 70s. Go,

go back and check it out.

The real issue is

this. The spirit and truth

issue is always

not what we think about these other things. That's not

the issue. We don't stand before God to hear

him say, well, now there was, let's see how you

what your opinion was on this. And it's

only one question. You know my son,

you know, my son, God isn't even

interested in real religion. He's interested in real

relationship.

Besides, what we think about. Our thoughts are not his thoughts.

His ways are not our ways.

But both our thoughts and our ways can become more like

him, but only as we stay focused on Him. See,

we tend to think we have this kind of thing. Well, if I got the

right opinion about all these issues, I'll be closer to

Jesus. No, you won't.

You get closer to Jesus and all this stuff will

fall into place where it's supposed to be.

Worship team, you can come out. This woman

was the wrong gender, she was the wrong

race, she was the wrong culture, she

was the wrong morality, she was

the wrong religion.

Yet Jesus came to her in person.

And apart from his disciples, she's the only one

recorded in scripture. Jesus plainly

revealed himself. I am

He, I am the Christ.

You got something to say, brother? Oh, you're just gonna sing?

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Okay, yeah, I'll

get there in a second. If you

don't,

no matter what you've done, no matter

which side of issues you come down on,

I've had people, I've had people literally say to me,

I don't know how anybody can be a Democrat and call himself a Christian.

And I've actually had others say, I don't know how anybody

can be a Republican and call themselves a Christian. And I

don't answer that question because they don't. They're not. They don't want

an answer. It's a rhetorical point that they're making.

But if. If you wanted an answer, I got one.

The reason you don't know how anybody could be that other

party and be a Christian is because you don't know

what it is to be a Christian.

You don't know what that means,

because it's not about this stuff.

It's about Jesus. No matter what you've done,

no matter where you come down on particular things or whatever,

if he came to this woman and everything was wrong about

her, he'll come to you.

He's offering you living water as well.

That's just too good to be true. You're just

in the world. In the world,

virtually everything that sounds good is too good to be true. But in the

kingdom, the half has never yet been told.

It's just. We only have a glimpse of what

good actually is.

With those who are going to minister, come forward, if you would stand with me.

We're going to. We're going to do a song here that.

It's probably been 20 years since we've done this song.

And I didn't say anything to Jonathan and

Brittany about it, but just

early service, they started playing it and I went, whoa,

who told you to do that? And we know who told them

to do it. It was God. If you're here, you need

prayer for anything. These brothers and sisters,

all these sinners down here,

they'll pray with you. God will hear.

Let's do this. Let's do this song.