The woman left her water jar beside the well and
ran back to the village, telling everyone, “Come and see a man who told me
everything I ever did! Could he possibly
be the Messiah?” So the people came streaming from the village to see
him.
Many Samaritans from the village believed in
Jesus because the woman had said, “He told me everything I ever did!” When
they came out to see him, they begged him to stay in their village. So he stayed for two days, long enough
for many more to hear his message and believe.
Then they said to the woman, “Now we believe, not just because of what
you told us, but because we have heard him ourselves. Now we know that he is indeed the Savior of
the world.” John 4:28-30, 39-42(NLT)
Christianity is not a religion;
it’s a relationship.
Before the townspeople came out to see, hear, and believe in Jesus,
they only had the possibility of religion.
Brother Loose stands as the singular example. It was the first day of revival services at
the Big Red Brick Baptist. Everyone was
surprised when Brother Loose, the church’s most backslidden member showed
up. They were even more astonished when
he stood up, just before the second hymn.
He raised his hand, Brother Pastor, kin I give a word o’
testimony? The Pastor took a deep breath and said OK…nervously.
Now, folks, began Brother Loose, y’all know me here. You know I ain’t been inside this here church
for thirty years. You know I done some
pretty mean things to most o’ ye, an’ I done my share o’ drinkin’ an’ fightin’
and all sorts-a sand raising. But I want
ye t’ know, one thing I ain’t never lost my religion.
It would be a wonderful thing for people to lose their religion, and, in the process, find
relationship with Jesus.
I would like this morning for us to note what that was like for the
Samaritan woman Jesus met at the well that day.
She walked away from the encounter with Jesus covered with the “wet” of
baptism’s faith and transformation.
She was a changed woman for three reasons:
1. She
found out you can have a Personal Relationship with god
(You must not settle for someone else’s
experience)
The Bible is very clear that we are personally
responsible for our own souls.
Because we have been so blessed in this country with affluence and
ingenuity, there is a general feeling always that things will work out. We don’t have to get too concerned about
things like the future...it’ll all work out.
That may be appropriate optimism about your high school football team’s
record, or a math test; but when it comes to your soul, there’s too much at
stake to leave to chance.
Notice what the Bible says about our personal responsibility to take
care of our souls:
All people will die for their own sins—those who eat the sour grapes
will be the ones whose mouths will pucker.
Jeremiah 31:30(NLT)
The Bible is also quick to tell us how to take care of our personal
responsibility for our sins:
If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that
God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is by believing in your heart that you
are made right with God, and it is by openly declaring your faith that you are
saved. Romans 10:9-10(NLT)
Being saved is like being revived from the dead. A man once asked the 19th century
evangelist Gipsy Smith how to have a revival.
The evangelist asked him: Do
you have a place where you can pray?
The man answered that he did.
Tell you what you do, Smith said. You
go to that place, and take a piece of chalk along. Kneel down there, and with the chalk, draw a
complete circle all around you. Then
pray for God to send a revival to everything inside of the circle. Stay there until He answers... and you will
have revival.
Revival begins in an
individual soul. Churches don’t get
revived; Cities don’t get revived; Nations don’t get revived – PEOPLE GET REVIVED!
So it is with salvation.
If you are counting on an experience someone else had, or your family,
or your church, or being born in a so-called Christian nation – remember, it is
only a personal relationship with Jesus that saves.
Like the Samaritan woman who met Jesus personally and discovered God,
you also must not settle for someone else’s experience. Also,
2.
She discovered god wants a Perpetual or growing
Relationship
(You must grow beyond the initial experience)
When the woman got back to town she didn’t waste any time telling her
neighbors. And when they heard about
Jesus they pleaded with Him to stay around awhile; they wanted to know
more. They had a hunger for what He was
sharing.
It is a dangerous thing to get saved and think that
everything’s set. Billy Graham once
compared this to immunization shots. An
immunization is a small dose of the virus, just enough to protect
against the real thing. We call this cheap
grace – salvation without anything further. You
don’t have to pray, read your Bible, witness, give, or even go to church;
you’ve got your ticket to heaven and that is all you’re after.
What does the Bible say about getting saved, then treating your
Christianity as if it is a cherished treasure, locked away in some Swiss bank
account?
Rather you must grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ. 2 Peter 3:18a(NLT)
We are to grow up in the Lord.
When you’re first saved, it is like being an infant, a spiritual
baby. Without nourishment, discipline
and encouragement a person can be a Christian for many years yet remain
spiritually immature.
Did you know it's entirely possible for a new believer to be far more
grown up in the Lord than someone who has been saved for 40 years? A good example of this is found in an
incident described by Ethel Barrett in her book It Only Hurts When I Laugh. She said that when D.L. Moody became a
Christian, he developed such a hunger for God's Word, spent so much time
reading it, and was so quick to obey it that he became a menace to some believers. His
rapid spiritual growth was an embarrassment to certain people who, though they
had been saved for years, never grew up in Christ. Week after week in the church Moody attended,
he would share a new experience he had with the Lord. Finally, some of the older saints who just
couldn't stand feeling humiliated by his exemplary life went to Moody's uncle
and urged him to quiet down his nephew.
Ethel Barrett drew this conclusion about D.L. Moody:
His
robust spiritual health and bounding energy disturbed their napping; he was
just too much. So, while they were
sucking their thumbs, he was growing until he left them far behind; he grew
more in a few years than they did in thirty.
It’s a personal relationship, not settling for someone else’s
experience, and a perpetual relationship, growing beyond the initial
experience, and...
3.
She also came to understand god wants a Productive
Relationship....
(God wants YOU to lead others into the
experience of knowing Him)
The woman told her town. There is a personal responsibility that we
each bear to not settle for someone else’s experience – to confess
our own sins, and be saved. There is
also a personal responsibility to grow in grace, go beyond the initial
experience of salvation.
But there is something that applies far more to the crowd gathered here
today. Most of you are believers, having
given your life to Christ. You didn’t
settle, you repented of sin, asked for salvation, and were born again into the
kingdom of God. And that is a good
thing!
Many of you have grown in grace, and are mature in the Word of
God. And that is a very good thing!
But one other thing that many of you probably share: most of you have never led a single other
human soul to Jesus Christ. And you are
in the majority among Christians.
Estimates are that 95% of all Christians have never even tried
to witness. The question begs to be
asked:
Is this the majority to which you WANT to belong? Or do you
really desire deep down to be used of God to bring others into the kingdom?
It is my belief that the primary reason most believers don’t witness can
be found in a misplaced sense of priority.
Notice the excuses:
·
I just
don’t know how. With proper priority you would ask to be
trained.
·
I let
the way I live my life be my witness. With all due respect to your holy lifestyle, nobody was ever won into
the kingdom without somebody telling them how to be born again.
A backslidden lifestyle on the part of a
professing Christian may keep someone OUT
of heaven, but if you don’t tell them how to be saved, how will they know to
confess their sins, repent and receive Jesus?
·
I’m just
not made that way. Beloved, when you say, I just can’t do that, it reveals a basic
problem with your relationship to Jesus.
He may be Savior, but you’ve never made Him Lord over your life. When the Lord speaks, a servant must
move. And the servant’s comfort level
has little to do with it.
Scripture is unbending about our need to tell others:
Come and listen, all you who fear God, and I will tell you what he did
for me. Psalms 66:16(NLT)
Instead, you must worship Christ as Lord of your life. And if someone
asks about your hope as a believer, always be ready to explain it. 1 Peter 3.15(NLT)
Can a person truly be saved, yet never witness? Never even try? Probably so, but I think that’s the wrong
question.
When Jesus Christ was beaten, scourged, mocked and hung on a cross for
me, so I could spend eternity with God, why would I be asking how little I can
do for Him and still retain my membership?
I ought to be asking, Master, what more can I do?
What is missing in so many Christian lives that we never even attempt
to lead someone to the Lord? Is it motivation? I don’t know why some people have to be
highly motivated before we will stretch beyond our comfort zone and witness.
Doug Green had all the motivation he needed to make a difference when
he got saved. Doug was fifteen, his
younger brother only twelve, when Doug got saved. Doug came home and led his little brother to
know Jesus. Only a few weeks later
Doug’s little brother drowned. Had it
not been for the instinctive sharing of his new faith, Doug Green’s brother
would have spent eternity in Hell.
A number of years later at the First Baptist Church of Bellview, Florida,
Doug Green was being ordained as a minister of the Gospel. Doug’s father took part in the service and he
talked about how Doug witnessed to his younger son only hours after becoming a
Christian.
He ended by saying:
We’re
ordaining Doug here today – but God ordained him the day he got saved to
witness of the love of Jesus to a boy who only had a few days left on this
earth.
People,
look around you with a keen eye – people are drowning everywhere! Tell them how to be saved.
Some people settle for someone else’s experience, they have no personal
relationship – and are lost.
They don’t know Him.
Some people are saved and fail to go beyond the initial experience;
theirs is not a perpetual relationship.
They do not grow in Him.
Some people are saved and growing, but never attempt to lead others
into faith in Christ, they do not have a productive relationship.
They do not go for Him.
We are to know Him, grow in Him,
and go for Him.
Do you know Him?
Are you growing in Him?
Will you go for Him?
Good questions!
In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit…Amen!
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Notes
