[AI translation] We have already covered the story of the Samaritan woman on two occasions. We have seen how this soul met Jesus without seeking this meeting, how she recognized in him the Saviour, how she was convinced that the One who stood before her, the One who spoke to her, was the Messiah who was to come! And here, the story does not end like a beautiful short story, a narrative that ends with a reassuring happy ending, but continues, as a sign that the encounter with Christ is not the end and the completion of a person's spiritual life, but rather the starting point, the beginning of it: then comes the real life, the life that now has value and meaning! For what was before had no meaning even if it was a life as varied and adventurous as the life of this Samaritan woman. We see in this Word something of this woman's life after the encounter. One could give this sermon the straightforward title, After the Encounter. Let us see what happens, because something must happen to a life after an encounter with Christ! And while we are examining this: can you measure whether you are already after an encounter with Christ, and if so, what you should do now?"So the woman left the water..." (Jn 4,28a) It is not an insignificant detail, but a very telling statement that the woman left the water (her pitcher). A typical sign that she had really met Jesus! Her heart was so full of the joy of the encounter that she forgot why she had come. He was so overwhelmed by the presence of Jesus that everything that had been important and necessary to him before suddenly lost its significance! And yet he was not there at the well doing something useless, but was going to do something very necessary for the household, and yet this important matter was suddenly relegated to the background, because there was something more important than everything else. He puts everything aside because he has suddenly got something that cannot wait! In a way, I would say that in this woman's life, Christ came first!
Yes, when one has truly met Jesus as Saviour, this is always the way it happens: Christ comes first! It is not only uselessness and worthless things that Christ comes first, but also the most serious and useful matters of life, such as household matters, family problems, breadwinning matters. Do you know the happy, self-congratulatory feeling expressed in this passage, that the woman has left her pitcher, that Christ comes before her child, or before her bread?!
Do you know how much sometimes depends on a man not being able to leave his pitcher? Imagine if this woman had been bothered about her pitcher, if that had been her priority: she would have missed the opportunity, she would have been late in inviting a lot of people, things would have taken a different turn, Jesus would not have been found at the well later by all the people who had come out of the city to meet her at her invitation. Oh, those jars! Can we leave our pitchers there when Jesus calls or sends, when the Lord wants to use us? Are you free from the jar? Not just the water pitcher, but maybe the wine or beer pitcher too! Could you leave it for Jesus, for your brothers and sisters, for the strangers or people you know, whom you need to invite to Jesus?! Is Jesus Christ truly first for you?!
"And he went into the city and said to the people, 'Come, see a man who will tell me everything I have done. Is not this the Christ?"(Jn 4,28b-29) Another undeniable sign of an encounter with Christ is that this woman goes to the people! To those who hid from her before, who despised and scorned her! Now this is not important, this is not important either, for she goes to them with a cause so great that all social conventions, prejudices, barriers, old shame cover-ups, are nothing compared to it. So he goes to the people and tells them about Christ and what Jesus did for them! She doesn't need to be sent to testify about Christ and invite people, as we used to invite people: go and invite your friends to the evangelisation in the afternoon (and nobody goes and nobody invites), but this woman cannot be held back! I can almost hear her, panting with running, crying out to the people in a run: 'Come, see a man who will tell me all that I have done. Is not this the Christ?"(Jn 4,29) And his simple words have such a power of conviction that many people went out of the city and came to Jesus.
If anyone has truly met Jesus, his joy cannot be contained in his heart! Such a joy cannot fit in a heart: it overflows, it overflows, it has to be told to people, it has to be shared with others, otherwise it would break the heart. You have to take it to others. You know this "must"? Have you ever had people come to your call, have you ever been able to speak in very simple words about what Jesus has done for you? Have you ever been able to tell how the Lord Jesus has uncovered your sins, and have there been those who believe in Jesus Christ because of your words? So unheard of is the richness of just this one verse about how that woman gave up covering her own shame, went to the people, told them the joy of her encounter with Jesus, and called them to the Lord too!
And many came, and many believed in Jesus: He told me all things that I have done." (Jn 4,39) All these are undeniable signs that the woman met Jesus, found her Savior! And from these same signs you can tell whether you have already met Jesus, whether you have already found your Saviour in him? After the encounter, such is the joy and such are the works of a redeemed man, such are his ways (his ways to others)! If this is missing in you: either you have not yet met Him, or you have become unfaithful to the Saviour you have met! Both cases can be equally fatal for you. Both conditions must be equally repented of until it is too late.
What is here written of the woman, that Christ and His cause became the centre of her interest and of her actions: it is not only the first flame of love after the encounter, not only a momentary excitement, a momentary enthusiasm, but the constant attitude of the soul that has met Christ. This is clear from the words of Jesus to his disciples when they returned from the city with the food, and Jesus already refused to eat, saying that he had food of which the disciples were unaware. So Jesus says, "My food is to do the will of him who sent me, and to do his work." (Jn 4,34) So for Jesus, to be occupied with the things of God, to do the will of God, to do the will of God: food. Let us take literally what Jesus says. What is food (in the physical sense)? Something that nourishes, refreshes, gives strength. Spiritually, it is the same. So you know what it is that nourishes the soul, refreshes the spirit, gives strength to life? It is the action of the will of God! So it is not only reading the Bible that nourishes the soul, but doing the will of God, doing the things of God. Not just knowing the things of the Lord, not just talking about them, but doing them. It is personally entering into the things of the Lord and doing all the work that arises there.
"My delight is to do the will of him that sent me, and to do his work." (Jn 4,34) So this was Jesus' food. This is what made him alive! He found in it such spiritual strengthening and refreshment that even his physical weariness and hunger disappeared. "Meanwhile the disciples asked him, saying, 'Master, eat! And he said to them: 'I have food to eat which you do not know.'" (Jn 4:31-32) The joy of finding a poor man who was lost was so great that it made him forget his hunger. Spiritual occupation with the woman would not have exhausted Him, but would have nourished and strengthened Him. He literally fed on the bread of heaven.
This is as true for us as it was for Jesus. It is the doing of God's will that truly nourishes, strengthens and refreshes the soul. To be actively engaged in the things of God: this is the true nourishment, which also affects bodily weariness and discouragement! You may be tired and weary all day long from morning till night at work, and you may feel that when you are so tired you have no desire to come to an evening Bible study, no strength to take out your Bible at home, much less the strength and desire to do any more service in the Lord's work. Well: believe Jesus that doing the Lord's will, being busy in His work, is food for you too! All other kinds of work exhaust a man's strength of body and soul; but this enriches the soul, refreshes and renews it, and is refreshing to the body! So come to an evening Bible study! That is why you should do something for the glory of the Lord every day, so that you may not be weary, or even if you are weary, you may be renewed by it! If you have met Jesus, then your food is to do the will of Him who sent you and to do His work (cf. Jn 4:34).
(Jn 4,35) The soul that has met Christ sees the landscapes, the world, the whole human world, differently than it saw it before. He sees with the eyes of faith, he sees it as a field of wheat ripening for harvest, where there is much to do, work is urgent, there is no time to wait, for the crop may be ruined. So he does not see the world as if it were a desert, nor as if it were full of worthless weeds and rubbish, but as a field to be harvested. "See," says Jesus, "and much depends on how I see! How do you see? Can you see a man by faith, a stranger or a familiar man? Someone whom God is ripening for the harvest? Someone for whom your duty is to seek to gather him too, to harvest him too into God's granary, so that he does not perish, that he does not fall away, because he is a precious treasure, a seedling watered with the blood of Christ? "See the fields white for the harvest!" How understandable, is it not, that one should see the fields in this way: he is in such a hurry to the harvest that he leaves the jar behind, forgetting it! And so it is after the meeting! Now the only question is: have you ever had such an encounter?!
There is a big warning at the very end of the story, we read. (Jn 4,43) So, Jesus went to Galilee, he left Samaria. In other words: time has expired. The opportunity to meet Christ. Those who thought in that city that we would go out to Him tomorrow, that tomorrow we would look for the Messiah of whom the woman spoke, could no longer meet Him!
If you miss the tram, another one will come. If you miss the train: you leave on the one tomorrow. If you miss a joy: you resign yourself to one less joy in your life. If you miss happiness: you've missed 30-40 years - But, if you miss meeting Him: you've missed real life, all eternal life! And what is waiting for you then, if not eternal life?! So hurry up, time is running out! But real life begins after the meeting! Let it begin for you too, as soon as possible!
Amen
Date: 19 November 1950.
Lesson
Jn 4,26-43