Is He Seeking Us or Are We Seeking Him - Part 2

Christian exhibiting Jesus as your Savior make such a difference in your life and you were to just come keep the news people so valuable to the point of the David Jeremiah explains why the desire to share Christ with others is so helpful about new believers, as illustrated in the story of the woman at the well listen now is that his message is he seeking house seeking him, we open our Bibles again to John chapter 4 and I were asking this question about the seeking Savior. This question is meant to probe our thoughts and our hearts is he seeking us, or are we seeking him, we seek him because he first sought us just like we love him because he first loved us. Now let's get back into our study. Is he seeking us, or are we seeking him were about to say something Jesus did with the Samaritan woman as he tried to reach her heart. First of all, he identifies with our humanity. First thing Jesus did upon meeting the Samaritan woman at Jacob's well was to ask her for a drink of water were success, he sat down by the well because he was worried for walking such a long way and sent the disciples into sidecar to buy food so Jesus was hungry and thirsty and wary and humanity of Jesus could not have been more plain to see. For that reason, the Samaritan woman identified with him not as God but as a fellow human being who needed some water and some rest, did you know that one God Almighty wanted to send love to us from heaven. He didn't send it in a book he didn't send it in the Holy Spirit, he sent his love to us in a human being. Someone just like we are to live and walked on this earth. And as we learned earlier, he will be forever in his humanity in heaven.

That is the reason God did that he sent someone to share with us his love and he sent the gift in such a way that we would identify with. We identify with Jesus we see him as we see ourselves that he was apart from sin, so Jesus sat down that day at the well and he identified with this woman in his humanity the father sent the son into the world that we might identify with him, did you know if Jesus had arrived in sidecar that day in his total divine majesty, he would've freak that woman out. He would've never had a conversation with her at all. She would've immediately retreated gone back to her city, God appeared to her in a way she could identify with and relate to, which is how he comes to us as well and how we ought to go to others, not in a we are better than you are. We need to tell you how sinful you are so you can become a Christian like we are going anybody to Christ like that you identify with them, as in your humanity. You ask about their need you talk to them about their struggles.

You show interest in their life.

Secondly, he invites our curiosity. Jesus answered and said to her, 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. The woman said to him, sir. You have nothing to draw within the well is deep where then 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. Jesus answered and 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. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life. Can you imagine what that woman thought we got done talking is why when you talk about what you learn so much from observing how Jesus related to people he wasn't looking for a decision as we often do when speaking with a non-Christian. He was patient and he sought to draw that person into the conversation allowing her to see her own need. Jesus didn't ever extend an imitation he waited for the people to invite themselves and he did it masterfully.

In John four 1914, we have the first part of their back-and-forth conversation.

Sally goes she ends up asking Jesus all the right questions why are you willing to asked me for a drink when you get living water. Are you greater than Jacob will drank from this well he didn't have living water duty.

It would be ideal if everyone we talked to didn't know the Lord was so intrigued with our life that they began asking all the right questions to us.

Jesus is in questioning this woman he's drawn her in the conversation in such a way that she's questioning him she's asking him the right questions. She was completely taken by the stranger from Judea who told her about living water. They were having this conversation by a well and Jesus told her about water that would allow her never thirst again and he had her right in the palm of his hand. He was a master at using his surroundings to preach the gospel, she was there at noon because the other women in the community wouldn't associate with her because of her past and Jesus is telling her about water that would quench your thirst forever. She's thinking about physical water and obviously if I get this water I'll have to come back to this well again. But Jesus is patiently bringing her along using physical illustrations to illustrate spiritual truth. He identifies with our humanity and he somehow gets into our curiosity and then thirdly, he insists on our honesty say how do you get people to acknowledge that they need Christ watch Jesus the woman said to him, sir, give me this water that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw. I want to come back again if I don't have to. Jesus said to her go, call your husband and come here all the woman answered and said I have no husband and Jesus said to her, you have well said, I have no husband for you have had five husbands and the one whom you now have is not your husband, and that you have spoken truly and here's the most wonderful sentence in the gospel of John and the woman said to him, sir. I perceive you are a prophet.

No kidding.

I mean this man just told her everything about her life and her comment was no.

I just had a moment of perception.

I perceive your profit.

Jesus has to get this woman to be honest about who she is so she can be honest about her spiritual need. The conversation continues and Jesus reveals that he knows that she has five husbands in the past and the man she lives with now is not her husband that she makes what is perhaps this great understatement in the Scripture, a man she's never met before knows her life story. Jesus wasn't trying to intimidate her. He wasn't trying to embarrass this poor woman. She had obviously lived a very difficult life and he was very sensitive to that. But it was necessary for her to reveal her true thirst, if living water was going to mean anything at all to this woman she needed to be honest about her moral failures & if she was going to be able to appreciate God's forgiveness. She had to be honest about her life. Let me tell you something. Men and women. Anyone who wants to become a Christian must be willing to confess his or her sins before God.

A person who will confess his sin is in effect saying I don't have any sins and a person doesn't have any sins doesn't need any Savior. That's why it's important when you come to Christ that you recognize that your center my father used to tell me as a young boy when he was preaching he said you know be a preacher of a church full of a lot of religious people.

The problem is you gotta get most of them lost before you get them saved what he was saying was a lot of people come to church for like that okay and they will never come to Christ until we understand that if you haven't had a personal relationship with Jesus Christ you don't go to heaven.

No matter how good you may think you are wish to have a program that I use when I started the church in Fort Wayne and we still use it some today it's called evangelism explosion and one of the questions you would ask people when you wish your faith with them. Was this if you should die today and stand before God in heaven, and he would say to you, why should I let you in the my heaven, what would you say I have asked that question so literally hundreds of people in the most often given answer is I was a good husband. I'm a good father. I haven't committed any terrible crimes. I'm probably not the best person I could be, but I'm a lot better than most people that I know and all of this diatribe about one's goodness.

But that's not what you need understand what you need understand is the Bible says that all of our righteousnesses are like filthy rags before God because they have no meaning they have no standing. I don't care how good you are or how much you have done, how much you've given where you go with your life will you touch how sensitive and compassionate you are.

The Bible says that until you come to Christ and acknowledge your emptiness without him.

You cannot be a Christian in the Bible gives us this very important statement for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God say pastor Jeremiah what is it mean to sin, it needs to come short of the glory of God, to miss the absolute standard.

It means that if were going to go to heaven is only two ways that would be possible.

One is to live a perfect life and never ever do one sin and then you could stand before God in heaven and say I have never once send in my whole life either an omission or commission in any possible anyone here want to try that way I don't think you going to make it because I don't care how good you are, there's no one who's like that there is none that do with good no not once is the Scripture. So what's the other option to acknowledge that way number one doesn't work because your flawed human being, and your center and the say Lord God, I can come to heaven by myself because I have sinned, I repent of my sin and receive you as my Savior. What Jesus was doing that day with this woman was any client very powerful way helping her to understand that she was lost and that she needed to be saved and she needed someone to do that in her behalf so he insists on our honesty and then he invalidates our religiosity. Unfortunately, when Jesus brought this woman's past up.

She wasn't immediately eager to talk about it now we can all understand why so she did what we sometimes do. She change the subject. Jesus is talking to her about her sin and she wants to have a little discussion about worship, she decided to bring up her religious heritage as a sort of smokescreen to hide her failing so here we have versus 20 and 24 our fathers worshiped in this mountain. She said Jesus just told her she's a sinner, which is living in sin and her answer to that was our fathers worshiped on this mountain and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one author was. What is it with anything Jesus said to her, woman, believe me the hours coming when you will either on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. Worship the father you worship what you do not know, and we know what we worship for salvation is of the Jews. The hour is coming, he said, and now is when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the father is seeking such to worship him. God's spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit instead of talking about her personal life.

You said hey Jesus, let's have a discussion about worship, but Jesus corrected her and he brought her right back to where she jumped off the trail is common to use religion as a defense against sin is illustrated with my story about what people say when you asked them about going to heaven, but not so with God.

God is seeking those who worship him in truth. Now notice what happens next. He initiates our responsibility in verse 25 the woman says to Jesus after he re-confronts her.

I know that Messiah is coming who is called the Christ.

And when he comes, he will tell us all things. In other words, I'm looking to get into this argument I'm going to wait for the Messiah to come. And when the Messiah comes Hill intervene in this discussion would have an and will know who's right and who's wrong and Jesus look right at her and said to her, woman I who speak to you am he, you talk about a moment in the Bible. This American was about to discover her responsibility was personal and spiritual, nontraditional, and religious and when Jesus challenged her understanding of worship. She thought it had to be done by going to a certain place. She talked about the Messiah and then Jesus dropped his bombshell and he says to her lady. You have to wait for the Messiah.

He's here I speak to you and he can you imagine what you must thought, having lived with the anticipation and the expectation of the Messiah's appearance, which was true of all those who would come through that journalistic tree. She's now being told that the Messiah is the one who just ask her for a drink of water and the ball is in her court converse. Talk about religion and theology. Now it was time for her to make a personal decision, do I reject the Messiah or accept him and it is the same decision. Every individual must make when confronted with the reality of his presence say this to you men and women. There is no middle ground. When it comes to Jesus there isn't either for him or you against me, so I'm not against Jesus was enough for him against Ceylon is going to be kind of in the middle know there's no middle ground.

Jesus himself safe enough for me or density to become a Christian or non-Christian.

You either are forgiven or not forgiven. You either have your guilt or you give up your guilt to Jesus. Jesus brought this woman to a position where the only situation she had in front of her was here is Jesus saying he's the Messiah. She either has to accept it or she has to reject it now. By reading the rest of the story we find out what she did for now we see how Jesus sends us in verses 27 to 30. At this point, his disciples came back Jesus at this while talking to this woman. And because they know the cultural norms they marvel that he talked with the woman that nobody said what do you seek or why are you talking to her.

The woman then left her water pot and she went into the city and said to the man. Come see a man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this be the Christ and they went out of the city and came to him and think that woman, except in the Messiah. She absolutely did you how I know first thing a person doesn't get saved as he wanted to tell somebody. The first thing she did when she realized she had met the Messiah was to go back home and go back and tell these people who she had met the Bible, so she left Jesus present. She went to sidecar violating every cultural norm. She told the men of the town what it happened and who she had met and they believed her and returned with her to see Jesus. She didn't have a very good reputation in sidecar and she had been married to five of the men who probably during the group went back with her to meet Jesus. Yet, in spite of her checkered past. The man sidecar saw something in this woman that was so different than anything they'd ever seen before but they followed her out of the city to see Jesus and then we read. Finally, in verses 39 and 42.

Many of the Samaritans of that city believed in him because of the word of the woman who testified he told me all things that I redid.

So when the Samaritans had come to him, they urged him to stay with them and he stayed there two days and many more believed because of his own word, and then they said to the woman, now we believe not because of what you said. For we ourselves have heard him and we know that this is indeed the Christ the Savior of the world. There's an interesting thing. You may not know about Jesus. The first time the phrase the Savior of the world is used in the Bible it comes from the lips of the despised Samaritan's Samaritans were the first to say Jesus is the Savior of the world.

The outcast Samaritans became the first to call Jesus Christ the Savior of the world and the whole town was changed because of that conversation. Jesus had that day with that woman at the well so where does that leave us when we study the story. I would imagine that if we had time today and you would willing to do it. We could say okay for the rest of the morning there's a pad of paper and a pencil. Tell me how Jesus sought you and you will have a story how down through the ages through the past he sought you. It even begins before your own generation. I think of my own life.

For instance, my father Dr. James to Jeremiah grew up in a home with an ungodly father and a mother who was very religious, but probably not a believer had no possibility of knowing Christ.

If Jesus Christ hadn't sought him but he saw him and you know how he got them lived near a church and they had a basketball league and one day he found out that he could go to that church on Saturday and play basketball, but in order to do it. There was no cost.

He had to go to church on Sunday morning my father when he played in a basketball leak and he went to church. You want to say he found Jesus, but he didn't find Jesus. Jesus found him and he took a lot of that ungodly family. My grandfather ultimately was saved in the last hours before he died and he brought my father out of that imaginary city.

There was a Bible college. Somehow my dad was instructed he should go to Bible college. He went to Bible because there he met my mother and the rest is the story of what happened to the Jeremiah family, but it all started with God seeking out a man who had no way of ever knowing about Jesus. If God hadn't come down, and sought him out and he did it through the strategy of basketball.

I can think of anything. It gives me more joy than thinking about that I want to tell you, Jesus is the Savior of the world and he is still seeking and saving the lost even overcomes the burial own stubbornness and resistance.

And if you don't Jesus Christ let me try some I know about you, Jesus is seeking you and got you here today could be anyplace you could be on the golf course, you could be watching a Little League game you could be anywhere else but you're here for this message about the gospel seeking you know if you want him to keep after you walk out of here without accepting him. But if you want to know the joy of salvation. Listen to your heart and open your heart and receive Jesus Christ as your Savior and loves you and sent his son to seek and save you, he will not force himself upon you. He will not break down the door of your heart.

You have to open it from the inside and say Lord Jesus coming to my heart.

I acknowledge I need to be saved.

I want you to be my Savior had a lot this month.

I can talk about Jesus at all without telling you about him and wanting you to know him telling you how you can knowing to simply inviting him in your life except measure Savior asking him to forgive your sin he doesn't know special formula that you have to have you just have to have an honest seeking order to save the Lord Jesus.

I'm I'm not complete without you I don't want to live my life without you in my heart and my life so please come take up your residence within me. He does that for every single person who asks him he will do that for you. He will change your life okay.

What a lot of us are thinking a lot more deeply during these days than we have in the past and there's never been a better time for you to make the decision that will change the rest of your life in a new and special way. You will never get over what happens during these days, but you get through it and when you get through it at the other end. I hope you determine in your heart that you spend the rest of your life walking with the Lord. I don't how you think things like this, we will have a relationship with him on the reload happen to you again. Make sure Jesus Christ as your Savior today. Let us know if we can help. Thanks for listening listed. You have just originated at Shadow Mountain Community Church with senior pastor Dr. David Jeremiah sheet with us the difference. Turning Point is making me what Turning Point PO Box 3 night San Diego, CA 92163 visit our website David Jeremiah dog/like us for a copy of David's Jesus, you might listen to help you with Christ and rediscover the joy of your salvation and also download the free turning mobile we will fight with smart device suit to the keywords Turning Point ministries instant exits 12 programs and go to David Jeremiah dog/radio join us tomorrow as we continue the series Jesus, you may not know you are on point with David Jeremiah taking time to listen to all