Living Water

 

Living Water

Erie City Mission   10/29/2024

Today’s lesson is about Jesus the living water. We are not talking about physical water, but spiritual water. Jesus has told us that the living water he gives is the Holy Spirit. He is the source of abundant life illustrated by a fountain of clear, pure water, coming up as a spring that never runs dry.

 

Holy Spirit, the Living Water provides four benefits to the believer in Jesus Christ:

1). He quenches spiritual thirst forever.

2). He purifies our hearts of sin.

2). He produces spiritual fruit.

4). He produces eternal life.

 

First benefit. Quenching of spiritual thirst. 

In John 4, Jesus meets with a Samaritan woman. The text says Jesus “needed” to go through Samaria. Traveling from Judea to Galilee. Most Jews hated the Samaritans and would avoid Samaria altogether and add many miles to their journey. Jesus decided to go through Samaria. Why?  Was he in a hurry? No, he stayed an extra two days ministering to Samaritans who believed in Him. The reason was that “the fields are ripe unto harvest”. Jesus knew that there would be many Samaritans who would believe in Him.

 

Jesus and his disciples came to a well. Jesus sent the disciples into town to get food while he waited at the well. A Samaritan woman came to draw water in the middle of the day. Jesus asked her for a drink of water. She was surprised that a Jew would talk to her.

 

John 4:10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.”

 

Very key point. “If you knew who was talking to you.” Who is Jesus?  Conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary. The sinless Son of God, gave his life on the cross to pay the penalty for our sins and rose again from the dead to give us eternal life. Only Jesus can give the gift of living water; who is the Holy Spirit.

 

John 4:13 Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

 

The Holy Spirit, our living water, quenches our spiritual thirst forever. The woman had a great thirst. Great unmet needs in her life. She had had five husbands and the man she was living with was not her husband. This was very unusual at that time. Very shameful. She had to come alone to draw water in the heat of the day. The woman was clearly unsatisfied with love.

 

Jeremiah 2: 13 for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water.

A cistern is another name for a container of water. It could be a very large clay pot or a large hole dug into rock to collect rainwater. The children of Israel were said to have forsaken God, the true fountain of living water but also had broken cisterns that could not hold water.

Some modern-day examples of times when people reject the true fountain of living water and build broken cisterns that cannot hold water. Immoral sexual relations. God designed marriage as between one man and one woman for a lifetime. Any other relationships are broken cisterns, and cannot hold water. Can never bring satisfaction. Pornography, partying, drinking, drugs, gambling, never satisfying. 

We all sin in various ways, none of us has the right to judge others. Only God can judge sin, and he has chosen to forgive us. I'm not trying to judge, but to say that like everyone else, my sin does not satisfy me, but only brings more thirst, like drinking salt water.

 

I do not like the word “addiction”. The Biblical word is enslavement. Jesus said people who sin become enslaved to their sin. “If the son shall set you free, you shall be free indeed”. What keeps people enslaved to sin? Lack of satisfaction. It is never enough. Jesus promises living water that will quench any thirst. Not until the next fix. But forever. Do you believe this?

 

Second benefit: Purification of the heart

 

Jesus’ disciples were accused of eating with unwashed hands. But this is not what defiles a person.

 

Matthew 15:18-20 But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, defiling a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, and slander.  These are what defile a person.

 

John 7:37-39 Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’”  Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive.

 

Things that come out of the heart a defile a person. In contrast to the Holy Spirit, who flows out of the heart to bring cleansing. Not only to our own hearts but to others also. Water that comes out of the mouth is vomit. Horrible taste, horrible smell. Living water. Pure, cleansing, life-giving.

 

The third benefit of drinking living water. Holy Spirit produces spiritual fruit:

Psalm 1

1 Blessed is the man, who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,

nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers;

2 but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.

3 He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season,

    and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers.

 

The Holy Spirit teaches us through the word of God. Not only studying God’s word, but believing it, meditating on it, and obeying it. The word of God is contrasted with evil companions. In your struggle to be free from the bondage of drugs and alcohol, you may need to change who you hang out with. If they are not committed to helping you remain sober, if they keep inviting you to a bar or parties where alcohol is served, you may have to stop socializing with them.

 

Then instead of listening to their counsel. We need to seek counsel from the word of God. Personal reading is important. But so is a steady diet in a Bible-preaching church. The word of God and the Holy Spirit are fused together because the Bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit.

 

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things, there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.  Galatians 5:22-24

 

The third benefit of drinking living water is eternal life.

 

Death is all around us. Deaths from wars. Murders. Various diseases, accidents, old age. Many die from random shootings. We all will die, but the suddenness and unexpectedness of death have become more apparent recently. Others are simply ignoring it all. Death will come to all. Do you know where you will go when you die?

Recite John 3:16. Do you believe that Jesus died to pay the penalty for your sins and rose again to give you eternal life. Pray Salvation prayer.

 

Revelation 7:15-17

“Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple;

and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”