Living on mission requires that we lovingly engage those who are far from God and far from us...

This week, we have been looking at a most unlikely encounter that Jesus had with a Samaritan woman who was far from God and others that is recorded for us in an account of Jesus life in the Bible called the gospel of John. Wednesday, we saw the Samaritan woman, exposed by Jesus for attempting to satisfy her deepest thirst from the wrong well, change the subject to a theological debate on worship. The Samaritan woman basically says “You seem to be a man who knows God and God’s will, so I have a theological question for you: my ancestors believed that true worship occurred on that mountain over there, but you people burned down our temple and told us that Jerusalem is where true worship occurs. So who is right?”

Now today, as we jump back into this event from history, imagine yourself as Jesus. Place yourselves in His shoes. How would you respond to this woman’s attempt to change the subject? Would you call her out: “hey don’t try to change the subject! Let’s talk about your life that’s off the rails. Let’s talk about your sin that has ostracized and isolated you from everyone else”. Would you let her change the subject or would you keep the spotlight focused on her? We see how Jesus responded in John 4:21:

 Jesus said to her, "Woman, believe Me, an hour is coming when neither in 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 an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. "God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth."

Now Jesus response, if communicated in the language we use in our culture today, would have sounded something like this: That is a great question and what I am about to tell you is 100% true and worthy of trust. You see, a time is coming where location will not matter when it comes to worship. The reason that your worship is wrong is because you really do not know the object of your worship. Since you have rejected most of what the Old Testament says about God you really do not know who God is so that you can worship Him. Jewish people, on the other hand, know who the object of their worship is supposed to be, because they have accepted what the Old Testament say about God. And because the Jewish people have accepted all of the Old Testament, they know that God has promised a rescuer, a deliver, a Messiah, who God had promised would bring them back to God. But, here is the thing; the time has come where those who worship God will do so because the Spirit of God has awakened their spirit to the truth of who God is. Those are the worshippers that God truly seeks. God is Spirit; and those who truly worship Him must do so by the power of the Holy Spirit awakening their spirit to the truth of who He is”.

You see, instead of rebuking the Samaritan woman for attempting to change the subject, Jesus graciously and lovingly answered her question. You see, so often as followers of Jesus we unlovingly provide answers to questions that those who are far from God are not asking instead of lovingly answering the questions that those who are far from God are asking. Throughout the accounts of Jesus life, we see Jesus be incredibly patient, gracious, and loving with those who were far from God.

What Jesus did not have patience for and repeatedly confronted was the self righteous religious people who did not see their need for forgiveness. I mean, do you think that the Samaritan woman did not know that her life was off the rails? Do you think that the Samaritan women needed to be repeatedly reminded of her past selfishness and rebellion? There seemed to be plenty of other people around her who were more than willing to do that. John records for us how the Samaritan woman responded to Jesus answer in verse 25:

 The woman said to Him, "I know that Messiah is coming (He who is called Christ); when that One comes, He will declare all things to us."

The Samaritan woman basically says to Jesus “Well one thing about theology that I do know is that God promised a rescuer and a deliverer and when He comes, He will be able to proclaim and teach us what the right answers are when it comes to the worship of God.  And when He comes, we will find out whether I am right or you are right”. What the Samaritan women was not prepared for, however is what happened next, which John records for us in verse 26:

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

Now this morning, can you imagine what must have been running through the mind of the Samaritan woman at this point? Can you imagine the look on her face? After all, she had already acknowledged that there was something different about Jesus. Jesus seemed to know her life story, even though he had just met her. Jesus seemed to be a person that was inspired by God and knew a lot about God. And Jesus engaged her in a way that was so different than what she was used to by religious people, or irreligious people for that matter. While Jesus called her on her sin, Jesus did not judge her. Instead Jesus seemed to be calling her to something else. We then see John shift the focus of this story in verse 27:

  At this point His disciples came, and they were amazed that He had been speaking with a woman, yet no one said, "What do You seek?" or, "Why do You speak with her?"

John tells us that the disciples, upon returning from their shopping trip in town, were amazing to find Jesus engaging in this conversation with the Samaritan women. You see, the disciples were disturbed that Jesus was taking the time to talk with a woman, let alone this half breed Samaritan. After all, in the culture of the day, no self respecting rabbi would do such a thing. In the culture of the day, a rabbi would view a woman as a distraction; and a Samaritan woman was not even worth the effort. However, the disciples kept their questions and feelings to themselves. John then reveals the impact that Jesus conversation had on the Samaritan woman in verse 28:

So the woman left her waterpot, and went into the city and said to the men, "Come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done; this is not the Christ, is it?" They went out of the city, and were coming to Him.

The Samaritan woman left her empty waterpot, the very thing that brought her to the well in the first place, and headed back into town. Arriving back in town, John tells us that the Samaritan woman proceeded to engage the men of the city. The Samaritan woman chose to engage the very men who had ostracized her and isolated her as a home wrecking sinner.

You see, despite of what these men thought of her, there was no way that she could not share what happened to her with them. The Samaritan women overcame the hatred and animosity that those around her felt toward her to invite them to experience what she had experienced with Jesus. Meanwhile, outside of town, John gives a front row seat into a conversation that Jesus was having with His disturbed disciples in verse 31:

 Meanwhile the disciples were urging Him, saying, "Rabbi, eat." But He said to them, "I have food to eat that you do not know about." So the disciples were saying to one another, "No one brought Him anything to eat, did he?" Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to accomplish His work.

Here we see John and the other disciples basically say to Jesus “Jesus you really need to eat. I know you were exhausted and hungry when we went into town for food, and that was a while ago. So eat some food to satisfy the hunger you must be feeling”. Jesus, however, basically says to them “My hunger has already been satisfied”. The disciples, as is so often the case in the accounts of Jesus life, find themselves trying to explain what seemed to them to be unexplainable. “Who brought Him food”, they asked one another. Jesus, sensing their confusion, responded by saying “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to accomplish His work”, to which the disciples were probably saying to themselves “why does He always have to talk like that”.

You see, just like the Samaritan woman, the disciples were focused on their immediate physical hunger. Jesus, however, was focused on what satisfied what is the deepest hunger that one can experience. Jesus deepest hunger was for people to come to know Him and experience forgiveness and the relationship with Him that they were created for.

Jesus then responds to His disciple’s faulty focus by engaging them in a teachable moment that reveals for us a timeless truth when it comes to living on mission. So let’s look at this teachable moment together beginning in verse 35:

"Do you not say, 'There are yet four months, and then comes the harvest '? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, that they are white for harvest. "Already he who reaps is receiving wages and is gathering fruit for life eternal; so that he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. "For in this case the saying is true, 'One sows and another reaps.' "I sent you to reap that for which you have not labored; others have labored and you have entered into their labor."

Now to fully understand what is happening here, let’s take a minute and imagine that this is a scene from a DVD movie and you are in the scene as one of the disciples. As you are standing next to Jesus on the outskirts of town having this conversation, you see the residents of the town approaching you, being led by the Samaritan woman. As is common in the culture of the Middle East, many of those coming towards you have white turbans on their heads to protect from the dessert sun. And as the residents of the town approach where you are Jesus turns to you and says “lift up your eyes and look on the fields, that they are white for harvest.”

Now can you picture what that must have looked like? You see, Jesus had sown, or invested in the life of the Samaritan woman, who was an outsider who was far from God and others and who would have been viewed with animosity and hatred, by lovingly engaging her with the truth of who He was. The Samaritan woman then sown, or invested in the life of those in her town that had viewed her as an ostracized outsider by lovingly engaging them with the claims of Christ. And now, as the residents of the city came out to meet Jesus and His disciples, His disciples would have the opportunity to reap the results of all that had been produced as a result of their investment.

And it is here that we see God reveal for us a timeless truth when it comes to living on mission. And that timeless truth is this: Living on mission requires that we lovingly engage those who are far from God and far from us. In order to embrace and engage in the mission that we have been given by God to be the vehicle that He uses to reveal and reflect Christ to others, we must lovingly engage those who are far from God and far from us.

Living on mission requires that we lovingly engage those who are far from God and may have hostility or animosity towards us. Living on mission requires that we lovingly engage those who are far from God and may be ostracized outsiders in the eyes of others. Living on mission requires that we lovingly engage those who are far from God by graciously and lovingly answering the questions that they have instead of unlovingly providing answers to questions that they are not asking. And living on mission requires that we lovingly engage others who are far from God in a way that helps them see that Jesus is the only One who can satisfy their deepest hunger and thirst.

So here is a question to consider. Are you willing to lovingly engage those who are far from God and far from you?