Union at the Well

Thank you.

My name is Tyler Payne.

For those who don't know me, my wife and I we serve with mission groups.

We have four rambunctious boys that are running around here.

So it's just an honor this morning to get to preach and open up God's Word and sit underneath that today.

I hope that it brings life and that you feel uh filled as you leave this place this morning.

So we've got a lot of cover.

We're in John 4, and we're gonna be covering 1 through 45.

So there's a lot of ground.

So let's dig into that text.

I want you to uh think back to the year 2014, the month of May, in that third week of May.

So think where you were in that time.

Um for Emily and I, it was a really busy weekend.

We had been training for the flying pig, and that was the flying pig marathon that race.

Uh I had just graduated from college.

We had a college graduation where we roasted a uh a hog, and uh it was also the weekend that we got engaged.

So it was a it was a jam-packed weekend.

That Saturday I left a hundred dollar bill on Emily's doorpost, and there was a note in that that said, Go buy yourself a dress, be back here at this time and get yourself ready.

So when she she went with her friend, she picked out her dress, she came back home, and when she got back, there was another note on the door that said, First time that we met.

So she got herself ready, she got in her car, and it was she went down to a place called Small Park in downtown Cincinnati, and uh we met through mutual friends playing volleyball.

I actually wasn't there uh at that park.

Our friends, the Auttens and their kids were running around the playground and they had a little backpack on, and they ran up to Miss Emily, and she opened up the backpack, and then that was a second note that read, Our first date.

And uh this was February, 2014 was our first date.

There was actually a blizzard outside, and it was Valentine's Day, and I uh blindfolded Emily, not like a weird way, but like I blindfolded her to kind of surprise where we were going.

And uh I she was guessing the directions it wasn't too far away.

I tried to do some alternate rounds to throw her off.

Uh, but it was the fine establishment of White Castle, is what I took her to for our first day.

And on Valentine's Day was really cool.

You could actually call, set reservations, they had candles they would lay out, tablecloth, they would wait your table.

This was the first time Emily actually ate a uh slider and chicken rings, and it was uh fantastic uh being served there.

And when she got there, her friend, uh her lifelong friend from Cleveland was there waiting for her and to give her a hug, and they handed her an ex note to send her off, and it read Grasshopper.

And Grasshopper is not a bug, yeah, it is, but this was a drink that Emily loved.

We um, if you're familiar with the Clifton area, there's a coffee shop called Rose Street Cafe, and uh we would spend time there getting to know one another uh in our friendship and courtship, and uh when she so she got in her car, she went up to Rose Street Cafe, and there's a grasshopper waiting out for her.

And also um her parents who actually lived in Florida came for the surprise as well.

I had never met her parents.

I talked to her dad one time on the phone um to ask to marry uh her, and uh they said yes, and they came up to be a part of these festivities.

So she was shocked uh there, and uh it was it was an exciting time um for that.

They handed her one more note that read, I will love you forever.

At this time, I am in Mount Adams, I'm at another coffee shop, and if anyone knows anything about me, I uh I get when I get uh anxious, I have this like nervous energy that I carry.

I like talk fast, I pace around, I'm uh kind of this weird weird little squirrel.

And uh but I'm like waiting, I'm getting these texts, they're saying, like, hey, she's here, she's now at this stop, she's now at this stop.

And I'm like, okay, we're getting there.

And it doesn't help that I'm at a coffee shop and I've had like four espresso like while I'm waiting for her there.

I uh get into my car and I head to a place called Eden Park, and it overviews all of Cincinnati.

Uh it's a beautiful, uh, beautiful park.

We spent time walking, reading, getting to know one another at this park, and there's a bridge, and underneath that bridge, there's uh there are words that say, I will love you forever.

And I was hoping she would find that spot.

So I pull up, I get there, and it's May, and it's in the third week, and I'm like, all right, this is gonna be great.

You know, it's gonna be a magical moment, and then I pull up, and this is what I see.

Just hundreds of high school kids in their colorful dresses and boxy suits, all taking photos and just hanging out of like, all right, I gotta go stake out my base and kick all these kids out.

So I go down there, and uh when I get down there, I I hold my ground, and then a few minutes later, Emily walks down with a beautiful smile and dress, and I get down on one knee and I ask her to be to marry me.

And you can see a photo.

There's there's her of that time.

We excite we were excited, we hugged, we celebrated, and uh I said we have one more stop.

So we got into my car and we went downtown to uh Molly Malone's in northern Kentucky, and there all of our friends who had been a part of that engagement were there.

We got to celebrate Greater's Ice Cream and uh Eli's Barbecue and uh friends and family was just a great time to celebrate what we were becoming.

At that moment, we were engaged.

I put that ring on her finger.

Something changed.

Everywhere she went, she she showed her, she showed her a ring.

The language that she used changed from a singular to a more of a plural, a we.

The way that we talked changed.

The way that we dreamed changed.

It was a new reality, things that we would no longer do, people that we would maybe hang out in our uh singleness, maybe just those relationships shifted as well.

We were looking forward to our wedding day, but there was something significant about that proposal, something uh altering.

It changed how we lived, how we acted, and viewed the world around us.

This morning, we're gonna, when we dive into John, we're gonna look at a better proposal story.

I had a lot of fun that day, but this one is so much greater.

It's a better reality, one that forever changes how we view the world around us, our identity, and that shaped who we would become.

Our main idea when we dive into this text is a proposal we're gonna see that satisfies, gives us purpose, and unites us to a king.

So this morning's text comes from John 4.

You can open up to that as we kind of dive into that.

But while you're getting there, I'm gonna uh just open this up in prayer.

So bow your heads.

Father, we uh we just give you thanks that this morning that we get to come and be fed by your word.

I pray that you can meet your people here today, wherever they are at, that you can soften hearts, that they can experience the power of the Spirit, who you've made them to be.

I pray that you fill us, you satisfy us with your goodness.

In Christ Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

Amen.

All right, verse one through five.

We'll see that Jesus is intentional.

Now, when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more than John, although Jesus himself did not baptize, but only his disciples, he left Judea and departed again for Galilee.

And he had to pass through Samaria.

So he came to a town of Samaria called Sakar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph.

How many of you guys ever felt uncomfortable with uh maybe a group of people, uh, maybe you had some conflict, could be politically, uh, or just some arguments, and you just want to skirt around those conversations and not even be around them.

Here Jesus has leaving Judea.

You can see in the south, uh, in this map up here, that uh Judea's in the south, and he has he's going to Galilee up north.

Verse 4, we s we see, I love this, it says, it was necessary for him to go through Samaria.

So at first glance, when you look at this map, you're like, yep, this is what my GPS would take me to.

It was a straight shot up from Judea to Galilee.

But this, though, is not the usual way that Jews would travel from Judea to Galilee.

You see, the Jews had a disdain for the people of Samaritans.

You can see that roundabout way up there on the map as well, that this was the more common route that Jews would take to avoid uh engaging with the Samaritan people.

The Jews did not like them for three major reasons.

One, they only affirmed the first five books of the Old Testament.

They rejected 32 after the first five, rejected those other books.

They rejected Jerusalem as the place of pilgrimage, where God's temple was, where people, uh, where God uh dwelt and sins were made atone for, all of the festivities.

Uh, they they they saw something, this was not a part of God's plan.

And Jews saw them also as having religious impurities.

In 2 Kings, the Assyrians actually capture the Samaritan people, and intermarriage runs through there.

There is paganism that becomes rampant.

So they've almost created their own sect of Judaism within the Samaritan folks, and the Jews despise them racially for their intermarriage, politically through their political or their struct political structures with the temple, and religiously through just rejecting the word of God.

A popular prayer in those days was, and Lord, do not remember the Samaritans in their resurrection.

That's a pretty uh deep hate, an eternal hate.

I don't even want to see you in the resurrection.

So while it's faster for Jesus to travel through, it's not the most preferred route.

But verse 4, he had to.

It was necessary.

Why?

Because Jesus, we see in John 1, word becoming flesh, God in creation being uh with his control and his authority, but we also see his presence, his creation of all the Old Testament now in the person of Christ.

Christ is intentional in his aspects.

He did this was not the common route.

He cut through for a glance, it seems like an insignificant reason.

In John 5, 30, says, I can do nothing on my own, as I hear, I judge, and my judgment is righteous, because I do not seek my own will, but the will of him who sent me.

Christ is obedient over his feelings.

I imagine this walk and this heat, walking with his disciples, being bombarded with questions.

If you have children who you drive with on long travels, you're like, you some when one stops talking, the other one starts talking, and it's just constant chatter.

And here they are with Jesus, probably just commute, just asking question after question.

After a long day traveling, this is heat.

But Jesus does not miss this opportunity to be intentional.

He moves towards need, we're gonna see, not towards comfort, toward broken-hearted sinners, not the self-righteous.

Oftentimes we're we're always looking for the final destination.

I hate personally, I'm not a big traveler.

I don't, I don't, just an even a 30-minute drive is exhausting for me.

Some people love it.

But Jesus is intentional in every step to his final destination.

Every part of our life is planned and intentional by God.

Things are, there's no random acts, there's no mistakes, there's no, there's no lucky.

God uses all those things as part of our story.

His grant for his glory.

Uh, my wife and I and our family, we're currently kind of in this travel right now.

Uh, my my mother, 56 years old, uh, she has had stage four cancer for about four years.

We are we're in the final leg of her life right now.

And this has been a long week.

We've been spending a lot of time up there.

And even in watching, even my grandmother, her, her, her own mother sitting beside her bed and watching my mom, my mom's body wither and decay, the suffering and the pain.

Even even in all of that, even in the suffering and pain that we all experience, and it seems you don't even know what's going on, it's not wasted.

And we'll see here in this story that this woman that Christ meets at the well will forever transform her, but the entire city for his glory.

And it's and it's good.

It's good.

In my proposal, I had to be intentional in every step to lead to that proposal.

Christ cuts through Samaria in his intentionality, and he meets with an unlikely individual.

So here we see an unlikely meeting at the well, verses six through nine.

Jacob's well was there, so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well.

It was about the sixth hour.

A woman from Samaria came to draw water.

Jesus said to her, Give me a drink.

For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.

The Samaritan woman said to him, How is it that you, a Jew, asked for a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?

For Jews had no dealing with Samaritans.

I love the continuity of Scripture.

I love how all of it is interconnected to one another, from Genesis to all the books in between to Revelation.

It's a beautiful tapestry where each and there are 66 individual books written by various authors and genres over different times, but there's one overarching theme of the Lord of all creation redeeming his people.

There's a progressive unfolding and revelation as we work through the text.

Here, Jesus is engaging with a woman at the well.

Now, if you haven't read much of the Old Testament, this is actually not the first well seen.

In Genesis 24, Isaac sends a servant to find himself a wife, Rebekah, at the well.

Jacob and Rachel in Genesis 29 meet at the well.

Moses and Zephorah in Exodus 2 engage at the well.

These are huge patriarchs of the Israelite faith.

All of these stories have a common thread.

If you look at these texts, and as we look into today, you'll see a common thread through all of them.

You'll see someone traveling from a faraway land.

You'll see a woman at the well with a man encountering.

There's a drawing, a physical drawing up of water.

There's a witness where the woman will go home and dash to share about her experience.

There's a hospitality, an invitation to come and to stay.

And there's a union between the two parties.

So as we dive into today's text, uh, this is what theologians call a type scene.

Everything in this Old Testament are shadows of things that are to come.

So as we look at John 4, uh, everything to this moment is now, everything from that past is pointing now to these moments.

So it's the sixth hour.

Uh this is about 12 p.m.

in the heat of day.

So on the surface, it seems like they're contrasting to a story.

So if you guys remember John 3, Nicodemus, over here, he is a uh well-thought-of male, religious Jew, comes in the middle of the night.

Then over here we have Samaritan woman, uh, is a woman, has a speckled past, and is coming in the middle of the day.

It's deceiving because on the surface it's day, but the reality, there's a sense of hiding.

How many of you guys water your grass?

Mine is dead, and I've given up on that.

No more, it's just brown.

Um, so if you do water your grass, though you probably know you water it in the early morning, or you water it in the late evening because it's cooler.

If you water during the day, it'll evaporate and end up uh scorching, scorching your grass.

The same way with the woman, women at the well.

They would come in the early morning to avoid the heat, or they would go in the late evening to avoid the heat as well.

So her coming in the middle of the day, even though it appears to be in the light, she's actually hiding.

She wants to avoid people around her.

In John 3 with Nicodemus and John 4, we see John, we see Jesus as the light that he talks about in John 1, coming into the world.

He comes alight in the darkness with Nicodemus, and now this woman who's trying to hide at the well, we see Christ entering those spaces.

Two very different people, but he's meeting them both where they're at.

So Christ asked for this physical water from this woman to drink.

So there's two unprecedented things happening here.

One, we talked about the Samaritan, two, the engagement with a rabbi with a woman.

There was a uh commentator who says Pharisees were called, some Pharisees were called the bruised and the bleeding Pharisees, because when they would they would walk around, they would cover up their faces when they would uh culturally uh see women in public and they would bump into things and bump into walls.

So here we see over and over again in his intentionality, Jesus engages with unlikely people.

He's not afraid to engage with the outcast and the lovely and the lowly.

So Christ meets the woman well in his intentionality, and now he's gonna offer a proposal.

This proposal story.

Proposal at the well, verse 10 says, Jesus answered her, if you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to you, give me a drink, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.

The woman knows all the water sources in this area.

She was she was from this town, she she and she knows that there's there's no flowing streams anywhere.

This is the well that our fathers come to.

This is where we gather our water.

This living water, this language that Jesus uses, though, is is drastically different than anything else.

It's not stale or lifeless, it's full of vigor, strength, rushing, full of nutrients and life.

While the conversation, you know, we're talking about physical water here, they're kind of wrestling with this, uh, is a physical element, like in most cases that Jesus does, he's talking there's about a spiritual element or reality connected to it.

Nicodemus in John 3 was the uh new, the new birth, being born again, flesh and blood, water and spirit.

Now we see Jesus talking about a living water, alluding to the presence of the kingdom of God and the union that those will experience in and through the power of the Spirit.

So this double meaning looks back to uh, this isn't something new, looks back to uh Ezekiel 47.

And there's this imagery that's being used about the temple, the place that God dwells, where atonement and sacrifice were made.

And in that, there's a water that flows from this temple.

And this water in this imagery starts out at ankle deep.

And then he talks about it rising to the knees, and then it goes to the waists, and then it becomes so full that you can't even cut through.

There's a dry land around there.

And this is what verse nine and twelve say.

And wherever the river goes, every living creature that swarms will live, and there will be very many fish.

For the water goes there, the waters of the sea may become fresh, so that everything will live where that river goes.

Even I will be able to catch a fish in this water.

Verse 12 fruit trees and all kinds will grow on both banks of the river.

Their leaves will neither wither nor their fruit fail, for every month there will be they will bear fruit, because the water from the sanctuary flows to them.

Their fruit will serve for food, and their leaves for healing.

What an imagery of life that is.

From this place, this temple, that life is going out for those to experience.

Jesus is alluding to this.

The prophets were looking for the living water that will flow out of Jerusalem.

Jesus is pointing that to the true refreshment is ultimately going to come in him.

So Christ comes, he offers living water, this proposal.

So in my proposal, there's benefits and blessings, or benefits and there's a cost.

The benefits, Emily got to marry me.

The cost, there's a lot of, there's a lot of costs, you know, in a uh an engagement, right?

You there is nothing now hidden before anyone.

You know, every all the finances, all the struggles and things that you worked through, you are now, there, you're laying them bare.

You're saying, you will be mine, um, and you are saying no to other things.

So in verse 11 through 18, we're gonna see this wrestling with this, the benefits of this living water, but also the cost of it as well.

The benefits of this proposal we'll see in 11 through 14.

The woman said to him, Sir, you have nothing to draw water with.

You don't bring a bucket to fill up your water?

Like, what are you doing?

And the well is deep.

Where are you to get this living water?

Are you greater than our father Jacob?

He gave us the well and drink from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.

Jesus said to her, Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again.

But whoever drinks of the water that I give him will never be thirsty again.

The water that I give him will be him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.

Where are you gonna get this water?

It's almost like this rhetorical question of like, what are you doing?

She questions his authority.

Who are you?

Who who are you?

What are you offering?

Are you greater than our father Jacob?

I think this is an important question that us as Christians need to ask ourselves regularly.

Some of us in here may be skeptics.

We may be asking, who is this Jesus?

You're wrestling with these questions, dealing with the things of this world and this culture, and trying to make sense of it.

Maybe you're new believers.

Who is this Jesus to you?

Or maybe a mature believer who's who's going through suffering and pain.

Who is Jesus?

This is what this woman is asking.

Something is drastically different.

And I love how Jesus responds indirectly here.

He goes, What Jacob gave you, this physical well, you're gonna thirst again.

But I'm offering something better.

Everything before this was a shadow.

Whoever drinks from this water will never be thirsty again for eternity.

That's a hard concept, I think, for us to grasp, right?

Everything we have is so temporal, the way we eat, drink, uh, the clothing that we wear, the things that we buy, they fade and rust.

But we're talking about eternity.

Not only will you not thirst, but you will spring up.

Just overflowing.

Uh, my kids love playing at these splash pads at uh water parks.

Um, they love to sit on them for some reason and try to stop them, but they can't.

It is just overflowing out into the pool in the areas that they are.

This language of inner satisfaction, overflowing hearts, transformation brings to mind a string of prophecies in the Old Testament.

Never thirst again, echoes and echoes.

With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation.

For I will pour water on the thirsty land and streams on the dry ground.

I will pour out my spirit upon your offspring and my blessing on your descendants.

Isn't this what we want?

Of course she wants this.

This is what the world is craving.

They want this.

And this it is the spirit who gives life.

The flesh is no help at all.

The words that I have spoken to you are the spirit and life.

How many of you are thirsty this morning?

How many of you are thirsty?

I'm not talking like a Easter, after an Easter dinner, like 1 a.m.

in the middle of the night, like you're salty and you gotta drink your water.

I'm talking about a spiritual thirst.

You wake up each day and you question, well, what?

Time has flown by and you look back.

What are you longing for?

How are you trying to satisfy that thirst?

Is it working?

The truth is, those who drink the natural wells, you will thirst again.

They will never be quenched with natural waters of life.

I am a middle school teacher at Mason.

I teach engineering and science, and uh it's it's fascinating to see these students, 12, 13, 14 years old.

You know, you've all been there wrestling with who you are as a person and trying to fill, find these wells to fill your life with.

Who am I?

You know?

Who am I?

What people do I need to affirm my identity?

And they go from place to place to place, and it's heartbreaking to see.

And then I look and I take a step back and I see the adults that I engage with as well.

We're really not much different, right?

We may we may dress it up a little bit nicer, but we're really just big middle school kids who think that we've maybe figured it out, but we're just uh dressing it up differently.

Almost like a Taco Bell meal, where all the all the meals are essentially the same.

They're just wrapped a little bit differently.

Our health will fade, our wealth you can't take with you, your prosperity, the things that you're trying to achieve, your kids to be professional athletes, living through them, none of that will satisfy.

But in Christ here, we see something different, a new reality being offered.

This is not just for the ethnic people of Israel.

He's engaging with the Samaritan woman and inviting her to come and participate.

So the woman, she's like, Yeah, I want this.

This is great.

This is this totally makes sense.

I want these eternal, this eternal uh benefits.

She responds with a yes.

But Jesus politely hits her with the cost.

So we see here now the cost of the proposal.

Verse 15 through 18.

The woman said to him, Sir, give me this water so that I will not be thirsty or have to come to draw water.

Jesus said to her, Go, call your husband and come here.

The woman answered him, I have no husband.

Jesus said to her, You are right, saying, I have no husband.

For you've had five husbands, and the one that you now have is not your husband.

What you have said is true.

She wants the living water.

It's what we all want.

But Christ shines a light here in this darkness.

This isn't some cheap extension of grace.

There's nothing hidden before the king.

Emily and I prep in our proposal, part of her cost was yes, she got to be engaged to me and marry me, but there was also all of our skeletons, all of our closets were open, laid bare before one another.

D.A.

Carson, a pastor and theologian in his commentary of John, shares, Jesus commonly drives to the individual's greatest sin, hopelessness, guilt, despair, need.

This is all in John 1.

It should not be surprising.

If he is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, inevitably he will deal with sin in those who express some interest in knowing and following him.

When Christ seeks us, which he does, he's going to address our sin.

2022, there was a photo that one, like in the science world.

This is a picture of a skull of a fly, and in it is a fungus.

This is a parasitic relationship.

This fungus actually captures the mind of this fly.

It roots itself in there.

It doesn't kill it immediately.

It releases a chemical and controls it.

It becomes almost like a slave or a zombie-like state.

The chemicals actually compel the fly to move to a more favorable location so that it can continue to grow and thrive until it eventually gets what it needs and kills the fly.

The sin of this woman, the natural man outside of Christ, is disease to the core.

We're not just, we don't just sin outside of Christ.

It's no, all you do is sin.

You think you have control over it.

This woman, as she goes from one relationship to the next, to the next, to the next, she thinks, oh, this time it'll be a little bit better.

This time it'll be a little bit better.

But it only ends up leading in destruction, just like this fly, thinking that he's in control, but he's captivated and enslaved and bound by this parasite.

Her pursuits in life and companionship and intimacy did not satisfy, rather, she was left a slave.

The groom will not leave this unaddressed.

He is going to shine a light into that for those who he will engage with.

Some of you today need to engage, examine where Christ is shining a light in your life.

Where are those dark spots?

Fungus thrives in moist dark areas.

Christ is our only remedy to free our minds and our souls.

He comes to shine a light into those spaces.

Where is he shining a light into those today?

And our propos we see in this proposal, there are benefits, a cost.

Lastly, we see a union.

Union at the well, verse 19 through 26.

The woman said to him, Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet.

Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.

Jesus said to her, Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father.

You worship what you do not know, we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews.

But the hour is coming and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth.

For the Father is seeking such people to worship him.

God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.

The woman said to him, I know the Messiah is coming, he who is called Christ.

When he comes, he will tell us these things.

Jesus said to her, I who speak to you am He.

What a mic drop moment.

Jesus gently corrects her wrong theology, right?

Remember the Samaritans rejecting Israel as the where the temple was.

And he says there, no, the Israelites were God's people to be an example to the nations.

But he says, that's not the point.

That's not the point.

It's not about the mountain.

It's not about Jerusalem as this physical place.

It's not about the law, your works.

The law, the temple, the mountain.

The place that they were seeking to find God is no longer an external place that they must travel to, but it's an inner reality, an inward transformation by the living water.

The true worshipers cannot be identified by their attachment to a particular shrine, right?

Or a place of worship, but really by what?

Worshiping in spirit and truth.

How do you receive that?

That's that living water.

In that union, you are knighted to him and from there flow out into a broken and dry world.

The woman says, I know these things.

The Messiah is going to come.

He's going to share these things with us.

And Jesus says, I am He.

I am the Messiah, the anointed one.

Come and receive life.

It is right now, right in front of you.

Behold me.

The things that are holding you captive, I'm here to set you free.

In receiving this proposal, this living you water, you're united to me, partnering me and advancing the kingdom of God.

As she hears this, she drops everything.

She runs to tell the city.

Like this woman, though.

A lot of us were drinking from the wrong water source.

This isn't something new.

In Jeremiah 2.13, there God declares, For my people have committed two evils.

They have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out as cisterns for themselves, broken sisters that cannot hold waters.

This is nothing new.

For years, from the beginning in the garden, people have been chasing after these wells to fill their cup, but they are left empty.

2005, Tom Brady, an NFL quarterback.

He had won at that point three Super Bowls.

He was married at the time to a supermodel.

He had much wealth and fame.

And he was sitting down in a 60 minutes interview, and the question was asked, Tom, you've got all these things, you've done all of this stuff.

What's next?

And he said, what he says is astounding.

He says, there has to be something to more than life than this.

Right?

Chasing at, we are chasing after all of these wells that we think we'll fill.

And here a man who has seemingly everything that the world wants is still feeling the whole of not being satisfied.

We've rejected the fresh spring of waters that God has offered for stagnant, stale cisterns that can't hold nothing.

We face ourselves chasing well after well.

But in reality, it's just our unbelief in the gospel that will satisfy our thirst.

Some of us go back to our father's well, right?

We go back to our what we know, what we're comfortable with, tradition.

Holding on to our morals and our values as something that, uh in our works that will save.

We know that we hold on to our conservatism, you know, that we believe that that's going to, the certain political power or place or laws, that's good.

That is, that is our gospel.

But that conservatism without Christ means nothing.

All of these things, if you're chasing after wells or you're holding on to your father's well, will leave you thirsty.

A holy God isn't going to put up with a defiled bride.

A holy God is not going to put up with the defiled bride.

We are in a tough space.

But Christ drinks the cup of wrath so that you and I can drink the living water.

Christ drinks the cup of wrath so that you and I can drink the water.

We see Jesus travels from a faraway land to be present with us.

He meets you at the well, offering you living water in your brokenness, in your shame, your guilt, your lust, your pride.

As enemies of God, he invites you.

On the cross, we see, we talked about in Ezekiel 47, the temple of God, where God dwells, where atonement was made, sacrifice, covering of sins.

John 2, Jesus is told, being, we're told, He is the true temple.

On the cross, his blood pours out and flows like the river that was prophesied in Ezekiel 47 to give life for those, for sinners like you and me, for those who put their trust in him.

There's an invitation to receive this hospitality, forgiveness, reconciliation, all our mistakes and shame.

It's caught, it is a free gift, but it's costly.

It'll cost you everything, but the benefits are eternal.

He pours out his spirit without measure on those who trust in him.

Living water, eternal life, overflowing.

This once dry land that you're experiencing, this thirst, can be quenched by the blood of Christ.

And in that there is power.

He didn't just stay dead, he rose again and gives us his spirit.

In receiving that, you are united with him, tasting, experiencing, not a one-time drink, but regularly, being filled and flowing out.

So this morning, if you're drinking from the water, this morning, you should drink from the living water.

You may be drinking still from the well that's leaving you thirsty.

Stop.

Stop.

You can try a different well.

It's not gonna work.

Receive its refreshment.

This woman found nothing in her companionship and intimacy.

She finds everything in Christ.

You can chase all day long.

This morning we'll have a team in the back.

They would love to hear this broken sister that you're carrying.

They would love to pray with you and over you of receiving this living water.

It'll never leave you empty.

It'll always be a satisfied.

Worshiping in spirit and truth.

You see, we talked about this water is not a one-time drink.

You have access to it regularly.

It is overflowing from his people.

When I got a new job, I got a new insurance plan.

And it's a high deductible plan, meaning I pay X amount of money, and after that, everything is then covered.

It's free.

And uh it took me a year or two to really look into my plan, and then as I dug into it more, I'm like, man, look at all these benefits.

I got chiropractor and like massages and all of these things I totally missed out, have been missing out on.

Isn't that our Christian life sometimes, though?

Christ has met our deductible in his death, burial, and resurrection.

We have all of these spiritual blessings, but we don't access them and use them.

We neglect them.

The woman rejected 32 of the other Old Testament books.

For those who call ourselves Christians, worshiping in spirit and truth means understanding and knowing the truth, experiencing that living water.

We have to be a people of God's word to know that, to use that in community with one another.

And then lastly, we need to pick up our head.

The woman runs off.

She says, Come and see what the Messiah has revealed.

The disciples come back and they're like, Hey, what why are you engaging with this woman?

Uh this is kind of weird.

Are you hungry?

And Jesus corrects them, like he does, is this teachable moment.

And he says, Do you not say that there are four months?

Then comes the harvest.

Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes and see, the fields are white for harvest.

I sent you to reap for which you did not labor.

This woman leaves to come and tell the city to come and see, and I love how this passage ends.

Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the word's testimony.

We know this is indeed the Savior of the world.

In his intentionality from the beginning, his grand plan to bring him in his name glory.

It's sobering to realize that every one of us here, there is no one who is near just mere mortal.

All of us will live eternally as glorious beings or dreadfully lost souls.

John Piper, a present-day theologian, says missions exist because worship does not.

Missions exist because worship does not.

You and I, we are designed as worshipers.

What we worship, God is trying to draw our affections and our hearts back to him.

And our aim as Christians should be to draw all of their affections from the wells back upward vertically to him.

We have a job to do.

We've received this living water.

Now we get to go out and let others get to experience the life that Christ has to offer.

And some of you in your early conversion may have felt this zeal, but since then it's been quenched.

This living water is not a one-time drink.

It should be overflowing and eternal.

It should move us to overflow in all the spheres of our life.

The church, we are not saved to sit.

We're not saved to sit.

We need to lift up our eyes.

Is this zeal missing?

What's quenching that?

Where are your eyes fixed?

Where are they not looking?

That they need to be looking to the harvest.

As I wrap up, Ezekiel 47, we saw the living water moving out from the temple and bringing life.

On the cross in the place of atonement, we see the blood of Christ washing sinners like you and me for those who put their trust in him.

And here in Revelation 22, when all things will be restored, heaven and earth, and God will dwell with his people.

We see the angel showed me a river of the water of life, bright as crystals, flowing from the throne of God and the Lamb.

Church, Christ seeks us at the well and proposes life, calls us to repentance and to drink the living water, pick up our heads, that in our union with him we can worship in spirit and truth and lead others to that too.

That moment is now.

Let's pray.