Many truths from our Father’s word have impacted me powerfully over the decades I’ve walked with Him. When that happens, I tend to create mantras based on those truths to help me remember them and share them with others.
The one I want to share with you today is ‘God wants to be all that He is to all that we need, in the moment of faith’.
Father’s word has convinced me that He is a giving God, and that He wants to give us far more than we can ever comprehend (Ephesians 3:20). Few passages in scripture demonstrate this more radically than John 4, the account of Jesus meeting the Samaritan woman.
This woman likely occupied the bottom rung of her social ladder. In that day, women were largely considered second class citizens. Things were even worse for those who led sinful lifestyles. They were judged harshly and shunned. Added to that, Jews didn’t associate with Samaritans, refusing even to walk through their land.
So by the time she met Jesus, this dear woman already had multiple strikes against her.
After passing some pleasantries, which certainly caught her off guard – after all, He was a Jew and she a Samaritan – Jesus used their meeting to confront her with Who God wanted to be for her.
JESUS ASKED HER TO DRAW WATER FROM THE WELL AND GIVE HIM A DRINK.
When she reminded Him that she was a Samaritan, He answered her saying, “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 (John 4:10).”
She was intrigued and so continued talking but tried to turn their conversation back to the well and the man Jacob who dug it. Undeterred, Jesus steered her again to His main point, that those who drink of the water He offered would never thirst again.
When she asked for that living water, Jesus responded by asking that she call her husband. She confessed that she had no husband.
Jesus affirmed her words and then added something that certainly must have startled her. He told her that she had been wed multiple times and that the man she was living with wasn’t even her husband.
Certainly, she wondered who this man might be, who knew so many personal details about her. And as their conversation progressed, her understanding of Who He really was began to grow.
More than a rabbi, more than a prophet, she asked hesitatingly if He was the Messiah. He affirmed, I Who speak to you am He (John 4:26). And as Messiah, He offered her what her mind couldn’t even begin to imagine.
He said that she’d never thirst again, because He would place in her a well that would provide her with everlasting life.
We need to pause a moment and think about this word ‘well’. What exactly is a well? It’s simply a hole dug in the ground to access water. How do we access that water? We must work, sometimes very hard, to draw it out of the ground. And a well isn’t permanent. If it dries up or gets filled and covered, it ceases to function as a well. That certainly doesn’t sound like the source of living water that Jesus described, does it?
The word our Savior used was pege, which literally means a bubbling spring, a fountain. I personally prefer the word gusher!
We don’t need to work to draw water from a gushing spring. The water simply fountains up. And if we cover it with soil, it won’t take long before that spring breaks through again. Because a spring can’t be stopped.
Jesus promised this dear woman that, were she willing to receive from Him, He would put a bubbling spring of life inside her. Her thirst would be quenched from the inside out, freeing her from the need to satisfy her thirst through her own efforts. And because it was a perpetual spring, her thirsts would never go unsatisfied.
No wonder she cried out, “Sir, give me this water (John 4:15).” This was a glorious promise that Jesus made to her.
BUT BELOVED, PLEASE UNDERSTAND THAT HE MAKES THAT SAME PROMISE TO US.
Jesus wants to satisfy our thirsts … all our thirsts … perpetually, too.
I know that I’m meddling, but I must ask … what are you thirsting for? Are you thirsting for significance? For peace? For comfort or strength? For intimacy or security? If you’re thirsting for anything, then this good news from John 4 is for you, too. His offer to us is the same as it was to that woman at the well. Jesus wants to bring to us … personally and intimately … all that He is to address all that we need.
How do we experience this bubbling life that’s within us?
It’s simple, really. Simple enough for a child. Just choose to trust Him and set our minds on the bedrock truth that He will do as He promised.
As Paul rightly said in Romans 5:8-10, Jesus not only saved us from our sin by His death, but He also saves us presently in this fallen world with His life. He provides all we need by providing all that He is. This is glory, and it is ours by faith.
As 2022 begins, remember that Jesus is your internal source of life.
The world is filled with many counterfeits that promise to satisfy, but they don’t. Only Jesus can.
And please remember the ministry of Our Resolute Hope in your prayers and with your finances. We seek to herald the good news of our abundantly giving God to all who have ears to hear.
Sincerely in Him,
