Seven years ago, seems so far away and a lifetime ago, I preached at a revival in Haiti on a mountain in Bossier village. I spoke to the villagers about 5 people in the Bible. This morning, I was reading through those sermon notes and thought I would share some of my thoughts with you.
The people I told the Haitians about were all people in the Bible ...people who were lost … struggling with life … I told them about a woman who carried water, a man who could not walk and had to beg for everything he got … a man who was very religious, a woman who was found with another woman’s husband, and a man who hated Christians.
All of these people had something in common ... they were all looking for something ... but they didn’t know what it was. Over the next few days, I will share each story with you over the next few days. My hope is more than your merely seeing yourself in the story but you will be mindful that the people you meet every day will share in one or more of the struggles related in these stories. That you will see the people you meet and know in a different light.
The first is the woman at the well.
"Now he [Jesus] 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, and 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?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) 9 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 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, but 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.” - John 4:4-13
Jesus chose to go through Samaria ... the Jews did not like the Samaritans and would travel a long distance, so they did not have to enter that country. Why did Jesus go? Because He had an appointment … he was going to meet someone at a well and change her life. When Jesus arrived at the well in the middle of the day there was a woman drawing water … most people drew water in the morning or evening ... just like they do in Haiti ... but this woman wanted to be alone ... she went to a public place when there was no one else there on purpose ... she was shunned and ashamed. She had been married five times and was living with a man who was not her husband. She was lonely ... without hope ... rejected by the people around here … I think that she had been married each of those five times thinking that maybe she could find happiness and peace with a different man ... but it never worked …
So now she was talking to Jesus ... God knows our hearts ... He knows your heart ... He knows all about you … even those things that you don’t want anybody to know about … God knows … Jesus said to the woman ... you are here to get water that will satisfy your thirst for the moment ... I can give you living water that will satisfy you for eternity. What the woman needed was not another man ... another failed marriage ... what she needed was Jesus Christ to save her and the fill that empty space inside of her … not just for the day ... but for every day ... for eternity.
I don't have any idea who reads these posts. Whether you are saved or not, so I will ask, "What about you?" Or what about someone you know. Is there an emptiness inside that you or they have been trying to fill – but it is never satisfied? The answer is to come to Jesus by faith. In Haiti, the people go to the public well every day to fill their buckets with water … the water they got today will not be enough for tomorrow … The "water" Jesus will give them, perhaps you, and all to who turn to Him is living water. … Water that satisfies the soul … If you haven't already, put your faith in Jesus. And if you already have then encourage someone you know or meet to "drink from the well of living water that never will run dry." When should you tell them about the water? When the Spirit prompts you.
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