Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:06] Speaker B: Church family.
Y' all ready to worship this morning?
[00:00:11] Speaker C: Let's do it.
[00:00:12] Speaker B: Would you stand and join us?
[00:00:28] Speaker D: I saw Satan fall like lightning I saw darkness front for cover.
But the miracle that I just can't get over?
My name is registered in heaven.
Yes, I believe in signs and wonders.
I have resurrection power still the miracle that I just can't get over?
My name is registered in heaven.
My praise belongs to you forever.
This is my testimony.
From death to life.
Cause Grace rewrote my story.
I'll testify by Jesus Christ the righteous I'm justified.
This is my testimony.
This is my testimony.
We come together, sons and daughters.
[00:01:47] Speaker E: Bo.
[00:01:48] Speaker D: With blood and washed in water.
Sing the praises of the spirit, son and father. Our God will finish what he started.
Yes, our God will finish what he started.
Oh, this is my testimony.
From death to life.
Cause Grace rewrote my story?
I'm testified by Jesus Christ the righteous. I'm justified.
This is my testimony.
This is my testimony.
[00:02:29] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:02:42] Speaker D: If I'm not dead, you're not done.
Greater things are still to come.
Oh, I believe if I'm not dead, you're not done.
Greater things are still to come.
Oh, I believe if I'm not dead, you're not done. You're not done.
Greater things are still to come Oh, I believe if I'm not dead, you're not done.
Greater things are still to come Oh, I believe My best days are up ahead of me.
This is my testimony.
From death to life.
Cause Grace rewrote my story.
I testify by Jesus Christ the righteous I'm justified.
This is my testimony. Testimony.
Oh, I'm alive.
This is my testimony.
[00:03:49] Speaker A: From death to life.
[00:03:51] Speaker D: Cause Grace rewrote my story.
I'm testified by Jesus Christ the righteous I'm justified.
This is my testimony.
[00:04:04] Speaker A: This is my testimony.
[00:04:35] Speaker B: Well, good morning, Westgate. I almost forgot that I'm supposed to do announcements. I turned around and walk away.
Good morning. We are glad you are here to join us both in services here and online.
We welcome you. We are glad to have this church family together. Amen.
We can worship together. We can pray together. We can serve one another.
So this morning we would love to get connected with you and there's multiple ways to do that. You have connection cards in the pews in front of you as well as this handy dandy Westgate Chapel Toledo app you can find on the app stores. Great ways to stay connected. We would love to hear from you. We would love to connect with you, help you get connected. If you're new with us, we have Guest services right outside these doors.
We would love to meet you, to talk to you, to pray for you, whatever you need.
There's so many ways to get connected within this church. We are a large church body, we are a large church family, and we love to have you be a part of it.
Also, your worship guides this morning, your sermon notes, every one of the tables outside as you're coming in, we have those worship guides out there. Our ushers also have some of those. You can also find that on the Westgate Chapel Toledo app itself.
All right.
Outside of that, we got a couple announcements for you coming up. September 28th. If you are one of those new people, we'd love to meet you. Anyway, there's a new people party that we have in the refinery over on this side here. September 28th, after the second service, we have lunch together. You get to see the faces of the staff and a few of the elders and people that lead the worship and things like that. So it's great to get to know you guys and connect with you guys and get to meet face to face of how we do ministry in this church, how we can connect. There's so many different things you can be.
Yeah, the words are escaping me.
So get connected. New people party. September 28th. Second thing, missions emphasis week. God is doing great things across this globe, not just here in Toledo. And this is a great time. We get to highlight the ways that he is connecting Westgate Chapel to people all across this globe and the things that he is doing and the way he is reaching hearts and minds. It is incredible. It's an incredible week to get those updates, to get to interact with some of the people that are involved in it and see how you can get involved in it. So that's coming up. There is an insert in your worship guide this morning. And on that note, I'm going to hand it over to this handsome gentleman over here.
[00:06:53] Speaker F: Thank you, Sean.
[00:06:54] Speaker B: Pastor Randy Fall.
[00:06:55] Speaker E: Yep.
[00:06:56] Speaker F: Thank you guys. Good morning.
All right, I need your help. I have a project.
October 25th, Saturday, three short hours, nine to noon. Would you join me and help care for this facility? There's cards with information on there.
It shows what to bring, what to do. I'm gonna do my part, invite you. How would they know if you don't invite? So I'm inviting you to come join me. October 25th at 9:00 in the morning. We're gonna meet out here at the east entrance and we're gonna care for the facility. This is a very large campus. Wouldn't you agree?
Just the inside. I believe I said 18,000 earlier. It's like I shortchanged us. It's 86,000 square feet somewhere right around there. That's just the inside of the building. We got three times that on the outside with weeds. We're going to winterize this facility. We want to take care of it very well. Many hands make light work. Right around noon, we pretty much clean it out. You get the right people in here, and I'm inviting the right people to come join me.
And we can get a lot of work done. All right. It's fun. It's from families. I got little rakes for the little ones. And for the seniors, I got rakes that have big handles on them so you can fit your hands, too.
So it's for everybody. Would you join me on Saturday, October 25?
Don't leave me hanging. Don't leave me do this by myself.
So again, you're invited. All right. How fun was that?
We get a chance to greet one another right now, and I'm gonna challenge you to testify that song we just heard. Testify. Testify how you shared your time at Campus Care Day. Let's go ahead and meet and greet each other.
[00:08:58] Speaker D: With just one word you calm the storm that surrounds me with just one word the darkness has to retreat Just one touch I feel the presence of.
[00:09:21] Speaker A: Heaven.
[00:09:25] Speaker D: With just one touch my eyes are open to see My heart can't help but believe there's nothing that I got can't do Not a mountain that he can move oh, praise the name that makes a way there's nothing that our God can do Just one word you hear what's broken inside me.
[00:10:02] Speaker E: With.
[00:10:02] Speaker D: Just one word and you revive every.
[00:10:07] Speaker E: Dream.
[00:10:11] Speaker D: With just one touch I feel the power of heaven with just one touch my eyes were open to see My heart can't help but believe there's nothing that our God can do there's not a mountain that he can move oh, praise the name that makes a way there's nothing that our God can do no, there's nothing that our God can do there's not a prison wall we can't break through oh, praise the name that makes a way there's nothing that our God can do no.
[00:11:11] Speaker E: I.
[00:11:11] Speaker B: Believe there's more to.
[00:11:16] Speaker D: I will believe for greater things there's no power like the power of Jesus so let faith arise Let all agree there's no power like the power of Jesus I will believe for greater things there's no power like the power of Jesus Let faith arise they all agree that there's no power like the power of Jesus how will we leave for greater things?
There's no power like the power of Jesus Let faith arise Let all agree there's no power like his power there's nothing that our God can do there's not a mountain that he can move oh, praise the name that makes a way there's nothing that our God can do no, there's nothing that our God can do there's not a prison wall he can't break through we'll praise the name that makes a way there's nothing that our God can do no, we sing.
[00:12:49] Speaker A: O.
[00:12:59] Speaker D: There'S nothing that I got can't do Come on.
There's nothing that Jesus can do.
[00:13:28] Speaker E: Amen.
[00:13:28] Speaker G: Do you believe that?
Do you believe that that is true?
That there is nothing that God can't do?
This summer I had the privilege of going to the Life Conference with our students and. And just spending time, even in worship and just all weekend and leading up to it, just praying in that room of 6,000 students, praying that we would see a move of God.
And I went with expectation that God would move. But you guys, he blew the lid off of the box that I put him in.
Like, I think I had, like, a limited expectation based on my own experience, based on me making God human size. And he's so much bigger than that. I want to read some verses for you.
Ephesians, chapter 3, verses 14 through 21.
For this reason I bow my knees before the Father from Whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory, he may grant you to be strengthened with all power through his spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your heart through faith, that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.
That you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
To be filled with the fullness. To be filled with the fullness of God.
That's our prayer.
That's our prayer. There are prayers in our life that we might pray and we might feel like he's saying no or not yet, but he will always answer yes to surrender.
That's the one prayer he'll always. He'll always say yes to that. He'll always say yes to less of me. God, empty me, none of me and only you.
He will always say yes to us being a vessel for him to move through. Those are prayers he will always say yes to. And those are the prayers that I hope we will be emboldened to pray.
Bold expectation. Hopeful expectation.
Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be the glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.
As we we continue to worship this morning, believe with boldness that God can do what he promises to do in our lives and in the lives that we have around us.
[00:16:44] Speaker A: Here as we wait seek your face come and make your throne upon our praise Here in this place have your way the moment that we see you we are changed show us your glory show us your glory in wonder and surrender we fall down show us your glory show us your glory Let every burning heart be holy ground Holy ground Here not by power not by but only by the cross we come alive Here we're undone Overcome by heaven's love Revealed before our eyes.
[00:18:19] Speaker D: Show us your.
[00:18:21] Speaker A: Glory show us your glory in wonder and surrender we fall down ground.
[00:18:33] Speaker D: Show.
[00:18:33] Speaker A: Us your glory show us your glory Let every burning heart be holy ground show us show us your glory show us your glory in wonder and surrender we fall down show us your glory show us your glory Let every burning heart be holy ground oh have your way please have your way Jesus us Jesus fall fear bound here now Jesus you change everything Lives healed hope found here now bow Jesus you change everything Change fall fear bow here now Jesus you change everything Lives he hope found here now Jesus you change everything Name you change everything Chains they will fall and fear is going to bow at the name of Jesus Jesus chase for fear here now Jesus you change everything Lives heal Hope found here now Jesus.
[00:21:22] Speaker D: You change everything.
[00:21:29] Speaker A: Hallelujah.
[00:21:32] Speaker G: Lord Jesus, we praise you this morning. We thank you God, that you change everything.
Lord, if we find ourself in a.
[00:21:42] Speaker H: Space.
[00:21:44] Speaker G: Where we're wondering if that's true today, let us stand on the truth that it is your nature, it is your character, you are faithful, you are good, you are loving.
God, let us rehearse truth in our minds. Lord, I pray today that you will move in an incredible way and that we will have the expectation that you're going to do something amazing.
And I can't wait to see what happens. God and I pray that it's our prayer, that we want to be part of it, that we want to be part of the work you're doing.
We give you all praise and glory, God, in your name we pray. Amen.
We're Going to continue. You can have a seat. We're going to continue in worship now through the act of offering, through taking our offering this morning.
So if you're a regular attender here, we would love it if you could participate in that sacrificial giving. There's offering buckets in the middle aisle. Those can go out towards the end and up in the balcony. They're on the outside edges, and you can pass those towards the middle. Thank you.
[00:22:52] Speaker A: Sam Sa.
[00:24:13] Speaker C: It's a beautiful day in this neighborhood what a beautiful day for a neighbor Would you be mine?
Could you be mine?
It's a neighborly day in this beauty wood A neighborly day for beauty Would you be mine?
Could you be mine?
I have always wanted to have a neighbor just like you.
I've always wanted to live in a neighborhood with all together, let's make the most of this beautiful day since we're together we might as well say Would you be mine? Would you be mine? Won't you be my neighbor?
Won't you please?
Won't you please, please Won't you be my neighbor?
My neighbor I'm glad we're together again.
[00:25:11] Speaker E: Oh, look at that. All the nostalgia.
Listen to you guys sing that song. I figured it was far better to listen to him do it than me. So, you know, Mr. Rogers was definitely one of my favorite shows to watch when I was young and growing up, especially all of the reruns for years watching. There's something so great and wholesome about his show, and I can remember one of my favorite episodes that he ever showed is actually one that has become rather iconic and actually was very, very meaningful in our culture of that day. It was a very specific episode that included a scene between Mr. Rogers and Officer Clemens. And it was back in 1969 that this episode aired. First, it was filmed actually during a time of intense racial segregation in America. It was a time where that segregation was because of laws and taboos that were actually keeping public pools racially divided. And in the midst of that, Mr. Rogers, Fred Rogers, made the decision that he wanted to make a very bold statement through his show about what was taking on in America. And so in one particular scene, Fred Rogers invites Officer Clements, a black character who was played by Francis Clemens, to cool his feet in a very small kiddie pool with him.
And as they sat together side by side, Mr. Rogers washed his feet while they talked. And they showed the entire world that a black man and a white man could coexist not only in the same space, but equally be friends.
This was one of the incredible things about Fred Rogers and several quiet and yet very powerful ways he broke down barriers that brought division within our world and within our culture.
Whether in the way he challenged racial barriers or even barriers against those who had disabilities, or simply every show as he would remind young children of their worth and value that they had, he was consistently breaking down barriers, not with harsh confrontation or getting up in someone's face, but he did so with direct truth that was intentionally seasoned in consistency, compassion, courage, and ultimately love.
And in that, Fred Rogers had an incredible impact in reshaping how generations of people would perceive humanity.
We've been in a series together, our Vision series, entitled Won't yout Be My Neighbor?
And with it we carry this understanding of the way that as we look at Mr. Rogers neighborhood, the way in which he welcomed anyone and everyone into his life was consistently displaying love and kindness and sharing truth with others.
We understand that this is the same call that Christ places on our lives as followers of Jesus, to be those who would welcome our neighbors, anyone and everyone that he places into our lives, to share the truth of God's word with them and the hopeful message that they are loved by God. In our first week together in our Vision series, we shared a lot of stories of what God is doing and has been doing in our church, looking with our eyes focused on this year to come on the call that God has placed for us to share his love with our neighbors, saying that we want to be intentional in sharing God's love with our neighbors.
Last week we had a message that we shared together entitled the greatest testimony that we have is Love.
It was a message that was planned and it took a little bit of a detour because of the things that were going on in our world world. But it was a very firm reminder to us from Scripture that especially in the hard seasons and moments where we may be facing persecution or hardship or people that oppose us, that God still calls us to display his love because it is a representation of Himself to the world. And today I want us to dig a little bit deeper into this truth as we look together at a world that experiences many barriers to the gospel. There are many barriers in our world today that have been erected to the gospel. And I want us to think about how it is as followers of Christ that we are called to be those like Fred Rogers in his time, those who would break down barriers to the gospel and help reshape how people see and know and experience God, that they might find and follow him. And the best part is we don't have to make this up. We don't have to do it on our own. Jesus actually gives us a model to follow as we seek to intentionally share his love with the world around us. But I want you to see these three truths that will emanate from our passage this morning.
Is the model that Jesus gives us broke through all human barriers.
And it did so because it was grounded in truth. Truth, but delivered with grace, in love.
If you have your Bibles, you can turn with me to John, chapter four. We're going to be taking a look at the passage of Scripture that gives us the account of Jesus and the woman at the well. We'll be beginning in verse three. And as you came in, if you grab sermon notes, you can pull those out, you can use those as well to follow along this morning.
But as we begin to look, look at this passage, the very first thing that we're going to see is this, is that Jesus broke through the incredible barriers that were happening in his day and age. He broke through them with a very simple yet profound question.
John, chapter four, verses three through nine. Let's begin together. You can read it here on the screen as well, says that Jesus left Judea and departed again for Galilee. And he had to pass through Samaria.
So he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph.
Jacob's well was there.
And so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well.
Now, it was about the sixth hour of the day, and a woman from Samaria came to draw water.
And Jesus said to her, can you give me a drink?
For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.
And the Samaritan woman said to him, how is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman from Samaria?
And then we get this parenthetical note for Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.
It's an interesting encounter that takes place. It begins here, you'll see with this map that is on the screen, that Jesus is traveling. It says from Judea to Galilee in this map. That orange section in the south of Israel is what we would call Judea, Jerusalem, being kind of right in the middle of that. And then he is traveling up to the Galilee region, which is in the very north, up by the very small Sea of Galilee that you see there kind of in the middle of the screen.
But in order to get there, Jesus passes through this area in the middle called Samaria. Now, I'll talk about this more in just a moment. But it's interesting to note that for many Jews, they would not travel through Samaria. They would often travel over by Jericho and move out over across the Jordan river and go up through the area of Perea and the Decapolis in order to get to Galileo Galilee, avoiding Samaria. They didn't want anything to do with traveling through that area. Well, what we see is that Jesus himself is traveling directly through with his disciples to the Galilee region.
And it tells us that as he does that, weary from his journey, he stops at Jacob's well in the area of Sychar, right there in the middle, and he pauses at a well in order to try to get water. And as he does this, it sets that his disciples go into a town. They're looking for food for their journey. So Jesus sits by himself and this woman comes out from a town. And as she comes out from the town, she comes to the well. And Jesus asks her a very simple question, one that could easily pass us by, but that held great significance.
He says, will you give me a drink?
No doubt. The woman here says to him, how is it that you, a Jew would ask me, a woman nonetheless, but a woman from Samaria, to give you a drink?
And then what she says reveals what actually was this deep hatred that existed between Samaritans and Jews. And I want you to think about a little bit of the historical issue that existed and why Jews and Samaritan disliked each other so much. First is this, if you're following along in your notes, letter A. There were religious barriers that existed between Jews and Samaritans.
Some of the core and deep rooted complex issues that they wrestled with stemmed from their religious differences.
One of the primary being that Jews believed the place where you should worship resided at Mount Zion. If we go back to that map, you'll see here kind of that yellow area that is circled on the map in the bottom, that's Jerusalem, where the Jews would worship. But the Samaritans believed that the proper place to worship was at Mount Gerizim, a place where they had had their own place of worship that was built and developed. And because of this warring of ideas on how one should worship, there was a great tension that existed between them. You see, the Samaritans built their own temple there in that place on Mount Gerizim. They would not worship in Jerusalem with the Jews at the temple. And there was this heavy, heavy tension. It's interesting that years ago, when I traveled to Israel, back In oh, gosh 1999, with Biola University, when I was in college, spent three weeks, weeks there. And I got to experience a little of what that tension might have been like in a rather interesting way.
Obviously, the Israeli Palestinian conflict has been something that has been going on for years and years and years and years, and of course, is reaching a fever pitch today.
But one of the things that we experienced back in 99, it was a. It was kind of a relative time of peace. And so because of that, our. Our teacher, who was leading the trip, wanted to take us to the place of Mount Gerizim and where Mount Ebal were, where the Samaritans had their central place of worship. Now, generally, you would not go there because this is a very heavy Palestinian area, not necessarily considered to be safe, but because of the time that it was in, he talked with our bus driver, who was a Palestinian, and he said, I think it'll be okay. I'll just go into the town. I'll talk to the elders that are there and get them to just kind of hold things back and allow us to get off the bus and to go experience this. So we drove there. We get off after he had talked to the elders, and he says, you got 10 minutes. And after 10 minutes, you got to get back on the bus. So we went out into this field and we looked, and we stood there looking at Mount Gerizim on one side, Mount Ebal, reading the Scriptures together. It was really cool, trying to understand a little bit more of the cosmos conflict that was going on between Jews and Samaritans. And when 10 minutes was arriving, probably about a minute out, our bus driver comes back and says, guys, I think it's time to get on the bus.
And so we move quickly, and we move quickly, and we get on this bus. And no sooner had those doors closed than people began picking up very large rocks and throwing them at the bus. And I remember as we drove away, there was this feeling of fear, but I got this rock real taste of the hatred that actually exists between Palestinians and Jewish people.
And it made me have even this clear picture of the hatred that existed between Jews and Samaritans in this day.
You see, not only did they hate each other because of the places of worship, the Jews also believed that the Hebrew Bible, the Tanakh, which included the Torah, the prophets, the writings, that that was the Bible that was to be read. But the Samaritans recognized only the Torah, and they used their own version of it, which included Mount Gerizim instead of Mount Zion. In many Key passages. And this just fueled a religious barrier and hatred between them. But it was even more than just the religious barriers, letter B. There were political barriers as well. And this really helps us to understand the foundation of how. How this conflict found its beginning. In order to do that, you actually have to go back to the Old Testament. You'll remember that the nation of Israel in the Old Testament, in its inception, when they began having kings, was a unified nation. It was one nation. And you had Saul as the first king. You had David who followed him, and Solomon. But after Solomon's death, there was a fracture within Israel. And it became what we commonly call in the Old Testament, the divided kingdom of Israel. A period where the northern part of Israel broke off from the southern. Northern was called Israel. The southern kingdom was Judah. And here, these two sections had their own kings, they had their own political systems, they had their own priesthood. And it caused incredible friction. One of the. The things to note during this time in the Old Testament as well is that not only were they separated north and south, which eventually is where the Samaritans would be and where the Jews would be in Jesus day, but also there was this incredible hatred for each other because they could not find places of common respect as they realized that the northern kingdom, especially for Jews, the northern kingdom largely had kings that led the people away from God. They would introduce all sorts of foreign idol worship into the nation. And you know the history and the story behind this, right in the Old Testament, God's people continue to reject him. They follow bad kings. And eventually we see that God allows Assyria, this incredibly great nation, to come into the northern kingdom of Israel and to conquer them and drag most of their people off into exile back to Assyria, integrating them into their culture and way of life. But there was a remnant of people and Israelites that were left in the land. But Assyria also brought in foreigners from outside and integrated them into that northern kingdom. You see, this was, in their minds, a way to make sure that Israel would not rise again, assimilating all of the cultures together. Well, in the process, there was intermarrying that happened between the Israelites that were left and between these foreigners that came in. And this is one of the key things that caused such friction, because not only were there political barriers, but now there were also letter C ethnic barriers that existed.
The Samaritans emerged from this with a population mixed of what would the Jews would have considered to be Samaritans, who were half breeds. They were seen as collaborators with imperial powers. And Enemies of Jewish nationalism.
Intermarriage was actually forbidden, as Jews feared it corrupted religious identity, but also community cohesion. And so hatred was high, even to the point that when the Jews in the southern kingdom returned from exile after Babylon had taken Judah away, when they returned to rebuild the temple, the Samaritans offered to help, but the Jews completely rejected their offer.
And after being rejected, the Samaritans actively opposed the rebuilding efforts, leading to even more religious, political, and ethnic tensions. Thus, that ethnic hatred had fueled centuries of hostility. And it was passed down from generation to generation, resulting in a long standing social animosity between each other. Because letter D, it brought also very heavy social barriers. In Jesus day, Jews would avoid traveling through Samaritan territory. As I mentioned, they would kind of go around the Samaritan area, cross the river through Primary into the Decapolis in order to get there. Because they believed that staying with or eating with or drinking or sharing water with a Samaritan was something that would cause you to become unclean. And they did not want to be defiled by these Samaritan half breeds. Samaritans were barred from worshiping at the temple in Jerusalem. And not only that, we have this Samaritan woman who encounters Jesus, who signifies from the very beginning, I am a woman from Samaria. Recognizing that one of the social barriers was that she was a woman and Jesus was a man. Why are you even talking to me? That would not be normal. But the most important barrier was that she was a Samaritan and this should not be happening. There were centuries of precedent that led to them being enemies.
And yet with that very simple question, can you give me a drink?
Jesus broke through centuries of barriers that were marked and framed by hatred.
Doesn't that sound strangely familiar when you think about the culture of what was happening?
When you think of the religious, the political, the ethnic and the social barriers that exist in our own culture today, each of them bringing hatred and division, at times dividing households, dividing families, dividing our friendships, our neighbors, often even closing off many people from the gospel.
I can't even begin to tell you how many people I've talked to over the last many months that have shared stories of how relationships with family and friends, long standing friends and neighbors, have been completely eroded to the point that they refuse to even talk to each other because of the tensions that we're feeling and the disagreements that we have in our culture.
It boggles my mind that a neighbor would look at another neighbor and say, I can have nothing to do with you.
Because you think Differently from me.
It causes us to think that somehow we're living in a world today where people are just closed, closed to the gospel.
But how is it in the midst of a culture like this that we can share the good news of God's love that can seem so closed? You see, Jesus experienced the same thing with this woman.
Jews and Samaritans, centuries of hatred.
And yet it didn't hold him back from pushing in to share the gospel.
On the other side of those barriers, as Jesus begins to push through. What Jesus found was a woman who was searching for answers.
She was searching for answers to many, many things in her life, whether they were immediately vocalized or came later in the conversation.
In John, chapter 4, verses 10 through 15, it says this that Jesus answered her. If you knew the gift of God and who is saying to you, give me a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.
And the woman said to him, sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep.
Where do you get that living water?
Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock. And Jesus said to her, everyone who drinks of this water in the well will be thirsty again.
But whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never thirst again.
The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.
And the woman said to him, sir, give me this water so that I will not be thirsty, thirsty or have to come here to draw water again.
What I want you to see is this. As this woman comes to this well searching for answers.
Letter A. She came to the well, seeking the answer immediately, urgently for her earthly needs. Day in and day out, she would come to this well in order to draw water from it. This was would provide for many of her felt earthly needs.
Needs for drinking water, water for cooking, maybe for watering a garden that would provide food for her, maybe water for the livestock that she cared for and oversaw.
But there are some while she felt these pressures of, like what I would call normal life pressures and earthly needs.
What ends up happening is that we also see that there were likely some other very significant things sitting under, under the surface.
It's strange that at the sixth hour of the day, this woman comes alone.
This woman comes alone. Normally women would travel in groups together for protection.
And yet here she comes alone. But not just alone. At the sixth hour of the day, the hottest part of the day, by herself. A time when no One would go to do this type of work.
And what it reveals subtly is that there are likely other very heavy burdens in her life that are causing these things to take shape.
What's interesting is that I see in the same exact way, in some way, shape or form. It seems over these past many years, many of us are carrying heavy burdens in our own lives.
And this world is carrying heavy burdens.
Not just from the normal things of needing to provide or wanting to have good health or kind of some of the trivial pressures that we feel every day, but this world is feeling heavy foundational burdens that shake the very foundations of our lives.
I tend to wonder how much of this started a few years ago back at Covid, a time where everything was shut down and we weren't sure what was going to happen. And one of the things that we saw today place during that season. Whether you, you agree with what happened or not, and you say we'll never go back to that or not does not matter. Don't miss the point. One of the things I saw is that during COVID it shook the reality for many people of the unpredictability or reliability of life.
People became very aware very quickly how human they were and that life, life is not promised as well. Over the past few years, we have seen our own government face constant toxic infighting, fighting that spills over into our everyday culture as people take up sides. And truly, it's shaking our trust in leaders, causing at times for us to even wonder, are they truly for us or just for themselves?
And then the senseless evil that we see happening all around us every single day causes us to wonder what is happening to the moral foundation of the world that we live in. It felt like just years ago, while things were bad that happened, it didn't feel to be at such a fever pitch.
And a lot of this is causing hatred, hatred amongst men that separates us, that divides us and causes many, many people to wonder, is there something better?
There must be something better than what this world is offering to us.
You see, it seems for many people in this world that these heavy burdens that we feel are causing many people to question a lot of things and even creating an openness to the gospel as they search for those answers.
And we will see that the same is true of this Samaritan woman and her interactions with Jesus is. He gives us an example to follow.
What does Jesus do? Let her be. Jesus uses their common moment here, a need for water, to share the good news of the gospel, which ultimately would reveal A woman who was searching for answers to many of the deeper questions of life, of things that were going on in her own life. But even that existed between the barriers between Jews and Samaritans and God.
I'm sure that as Jesus began this question with her, many people, his disciples looking on would have thought, what in the world is he doing?
There's no way that a Samaritan is going to be open to a Jew.
And I'll be honest with you, it feels like for years we have been told that people in our own world that are far from God are closed to the gospel.
We've been told statistics that tell us that people are leaving churches in droves. We've been told that many people in our culture, which is true, identifies what you would call religious nuns. Where back just a few years ago, it seemed like we were, quote, a Christian nation and most people had a moral fabric and some belief in God. Many people today identify as those who have no religion or no faith at all.
And one of the things that comes out of that is, is there are some people who are saying that soon America is going to become much like post war Europe, devoid of Christian influence and with churches that are largely sitting empty. I literally read an article that said in five to 10 years this will become true of who we are.
Yet it was just earlier this year that our staff and elders were reading a book together that was entitled you Found me by Rick Richardson. And he challenged greatly these ideals and what he calls false and unfounded narratives that are being shared. And he challenged them for this reason, because what he realized is that Christians, as Christians are being fed this idea that people are leaving the church in droves, that people want nothing to do with God and that they are closed off to the gospel. We stop sharing our faith because we start believing they want nothing to do with me. So I, I will keep my faith private.
But the challenge that came is this is that he says, that is the danger that this false narrative has largely discouraged Christians from sharing their faith. But statistics actually show something that is very different.
Far be it that people are fully rejecting God, but today people are actually far more open to the gospel than we might possibly imagine.
Actually, what we see happening in our country today is that revival is taking place in many, many different places, especially on our college campuses with young people. As Gen Z and others are seeing the unstable and unpredictable foundations of our world crumbling around them. They're searching for deeper purpose in life, looking for meaning and something stable to sink their lives into. And in the Process.
Many people are finding faith in Jesus Christ this morning. I've invited Maggie George to come and just to share a little bit of a testimony with you today. If you don't know Maggie, welcome her as she comes this morning.
Maggie and her husband Sean, serve with crew at the University of Toledo and have been longtime partners of Westgate Chapel. We love what they are doing in sharing Jesus on campus at the University of Toledo. But as we've talked numerous times about this, Maggie, in what ways have you actually seen in our culture a growing general openness to the gospel in the last couple of years?
[00:54:11] Speaker H: Yeah, thanks for asking that question in crew. You know, sharing the gospel with college students as often as possible is really at the core of what we're about. And I've been part of the team at the University of Toledo for the past 17 years.
And so over those 17 years, I've seen varying degrees of responsiveness to the gospel.
I think that there was a time I would never say that the University of Toledo is hostile towards the gospel. That's never been my experience there. But there were times where maybe we had cordial and polite conversations, but you could tell that students would rather not talk about it.
And then there was a season where I would say it was defined by openness with skepticism and eventually curiosity, where we got the opportunity to journey with students as they asked really good questions about faith.
Today, though, right now, like this particular school year, I would have to say that something is changing the conversations that I have been having with students. You know, I see that not only are they open, it's not just that they're open, but they are actively looking for something to believe in. And they're telling me, I've seen what doesn't work.
I want something with hope. I want something that is sturdy, that I can stand on. And this want and this longing is actually drawing them to want to be connected to God.
[00:55:33] Speaker E: Well, the reason, Maggie, that I asked you to come and share is you had a conversation with my wife Rochelle this week at Mom Life and shared some really, really cool stuff with her, which is that Maggie had the opportunity to be a part of what God was doing in seven people coming to faith in. In him just this week at the University of Toledo. Yeah.
[00:55:51] Speaker H: In the last two weeks.
[00:55:52] Speaker E: Isn't that incredible?
[00:55:53] Speaker H: Two weeks? Yeah.
[00:55:54] Speaker E: So incredible.
Because what we're seeing is that God is moving in the hearts, especially of young people. And, Maggie, as you think about that, in each of those instances, what we talked about is there's kind of this common thread. Share a little bit of that with us.
[00:56:11] Speaker H: Yeah. The last couple of weeks have been really beautifully overwhelming.
And the students that I'm interacting with are people who have maybe filled out a survey that we did early in the year, or they came to an event, or they filled out a form in some way letting us know that we could reach out to them. And as I've sat down with these women and had conversations with them, I asked them a little bit about their faith background and the story that they're sharing. I've just been saying it's like they're sharing the same story with different words. Words each time. And what they're saying is for the past. And then it varies from for the past few months to the past few years. There's something in me that has wanted to know about God. And then they tell me what resources they're looking to. And most commonly I'm hearing. So I've been on YouTube and I've been on TikTok, and I've been trying to figure this out. And I have been waiting for someone to tell me if I'm on the right track, or I'm waiting for someone to tell me how to connect with God. God.
And then. So I'll go through a little gospel presentation with them using a conversation guide. And in this conversation guide, it invites them to kind of consider whether they're living a life where they have Jesus on the outside of their lives or if he's at the center of their lives and invite them to consider that.
I've never seen so many students say Jesus is on the outside of my life, but I want him to be at the center of my life. Life.
One story in particular that was pretty, I think, just mind blowing to me is three young women who grew up in the Toledo area. They're best friends. They've known each other for a long time. This past summer, they took a girls trip together to Traverse City, Michigan. And while they were there, they met a friend of mine named Rana, who's on staff with CREW at Grand Valley State University.
And Rana was in Traverse City because she was helping lead a summer mission with crew where she was part of helping college students from all over the country learn how to share their faith. And so out on the beach, Rana runs into these three student women from the University of Toledo, shares the gospel with them, and they each said, oh, I'm the person without Jesus, but I want to consider. I'm not ready to make that decision today, but I want to be open to a life with Jesus.
A few weeks go by, a couple months go by, actually, and four weeks ago, classes started up at the University of Toledo.
And these three women that had been in Traverse City and met Rana, they find their way to our weekly worship gathering, where they met one of our student leaders, Colette, who I happened to be discipling. And the five of us made a plan to have another conversation. And I knew the backstory about what these women had heard in Traverse City and where they were at.
And so Colette and I walked through the Gospel with them again, and they each shared.
Yeah, in Traverse City. I said that I was the person that has Jesus on the outside of their lives, but I wanted to be open to having a life with Jesus. And so I asked them, you know, it's been a couple of months. You've been thinking about this. You guys have been talking to each other about this. What do you want today?
And together in unison, they all said, I want Jesus.
[00:59:17] Speaker E: It's awesome.
[00:59:18] Speaker H: And so right there in the library, they prayed with Colette and me to invite Christ into their lives.
Yeah.
But what was remarkable to me about this experience, I asked them, what stood out to you about that conversation with Rana? Why was that so significant?
And they all said, it changed our friendship because despite knowing each other for most of their lives, they had never actually talked about deep and spiritual things. They didn't know that their other friends were asking the same questions that they were. And now that it was out in the open, they could talk about God and they could learn about God together. And so I think, like, the last few weeks have just really. It's been such a reminder to me to not assume anything, to not assume that. Because something. Somebody says something that sounds like they know Christ, like they could still be searching, and they're looking for somebody to help them clarify and begin a relationship with Christ.
And also to not assume that people are not interested, because I actually think people are far more interested than we give them credit for. They're just looking to be invited into that conversation.
[01:00:19] Speaker E: That's awesome. Would you thank Maggie for coming and sharing with us this morning that incredible seven people in this last week given their life to Jesus. So encouraging. And I'm telling you, there are stories that I am hearing constantly where people are open to the Gospel. We've got to stop believing the lie that people aren't interested. Even with the hostility that's happening in our culture today, there are so many people far from God that are searching for answers because they're recognizing that the foundations of this world are crumbling and that it's not providing the hope that they want and need in their life. Many are finding and turning to Jesus. But here's the other thing that struck me is Maggie and I talked that so many of them are turning to YouTube and TikTok and part of me goes that's so cool. And on the other side I'm like er, cause there's so much junk out there, there. And miss truth.
They need the church to come to them and say let me tell you about the most incredible news of who Jesus is. Amen.
There is such a need for that Jesus, what he does is that he pushes into the man made barriers, the barriers of fear, the barriers of religious barriers, the political barriers, the ethnic barriers, the social barriers, the fear of they won't listen or they won't care or I'll be rejected. Jesus pushed into man made barriers in your notes and what he did was he surfaced her greatest need so that she could understand the full truth of the gospel.
I find that we don't like to get too personal though like Jesus, we have this fear of offending people or that we'll be rejected. But Jesus gives us an example here of pushing in and look how he does this. Jesus has a way of being rather direct. John 4, 16, 19. Jesus said to her, go call your husband and come here. And the woman answered him, I have no husband. And Jesus said to her, what you are saying is right, you have no husband for you have had five husbands and the one you have now is not your husband.
Awkward, right?
All of a sudden he just surfaces her whole life for her.
And then she says what I think is the understatement of the entire Bible. She says, sir, I perceive you're a prophet.
How in the world would you ever know that Jesus grabs her attention. Notice what Jesus does let her.
Jesus exposed significant sin in her life that no doubt led to many things that she was wrestling with and questions that she had.
I love this about Jesus because Jesus always cut to the truth. We have examples throughout the Bible. Jesus encounters people that need to be healed and have different needs and he meets those needs. But he never let a moment pass by where he didn't say, your sins are forgiven, now go and leave your life of sin. He made the most important thing, the most important thing, that the greatest healing that an individual needed wasn't their physical healing. It was the healing of their heart and their soul so that they would not spend eternity separated from God. Why did Jesus do this? For this truth alone and I want you to hear it carefully this morning. The message of the Gospel is dead and it is flat if people don't understand the that the Gospel is the answer to a much deeper problem than they might even realize that they have.
It is dead and flat if they don't understand the truth of what Paul taught in Romans 3:23, which is all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. That we have rejected God. And because we have rejected him in our sin, we are separate from Him. And Paul goes on in Romans 6:23 to to tell us that the wages of that sin, that the outcome of our rejection of God is death. Death, which is not only physical death in this life, but eternal separation from God in a place of eternal torment.
Jesus always came and shared the full truth. Because without the truth the Gospel means nothing.
If all you ever do is share that the good news of Jesus is that Jesus loves you. Without sharing why that's so important, then it's meaningless and it does not give a person any reason to give their heart to God. We must always point out in our sharing of the truth of God's word, the sin that separates us from Him. Why letter B? Because it reveals all of our need for a Savior.
Jesus cuts straight to the truth.
But I also find two things to be true when it comes to this. In our own lives of truth sharing, generally we're either too afraid to address it because we don't want to offend, or number two, we are too harsh in our sharing of it.
I have watched too many people be turned off to the message of the Gospel because Christians err on the side of what I would call unloving condemnation.
Here's the thing about people who love the truth but lack grace. They are easy to admire.
They have deep convictions and principles. They believe in right and wrong, which is so good. They set standards and they speak out against injustice, oppression and evil, which is great. And they are often very articulate and very well spoken. But without grace, telling the truth truth quickly becomes an excuse for unloving condemnation of others. And the result is this is that when that happens in our own lives, when we are speakers of truth without any grace, we carry a God is with us but not with them mentality.
And we refuse to understand that not only is God with us, but even amongst people that are far from God, God is present and he is working and using their life situations to to draw them to faith in Him.
Not only that, we no longer see people that are far from God as image bearers. Of God created in his image. We don't see them as people to be engaged. We see them as threats to be eliminated. And as well, we believe that we are fighting for truth so our hatred and contempt is justified.
And this is not the heart of God. So rather than breaking down barriers, what actually happens when we preach all truth with no grace is that rather than breaking down those barriers, we build them up and we build them high to heaven and we bar people from actually knowing God. I want you to think about what Paul says in First Corinthians, chapter 13.
He says some really valuable and important words for us to remember, especially as we think about sharing the truth of God's love. He says, if I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, wow, that's powerful. But I don't have love.
I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. Any of you ever had a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal in your ear?
Some of you are really terrified right now.
Isn't it great?
Doesn't it sound good? Hillary, you love this, don't you?
Right? Feels good, doesn't it?
You want nothing more than to get away from that.
My friends, if you have not love, you are nothing but a noisy gong and a clanging cymbal.
Something that people want to run from because they do not experience the love of God.
I want you to see this truth that Jesus response, the model that he gives us was full of truth and grace, not truth or grace. Not a little bit of truth and a little bit of grace.
Full 100% of truth and full 100% of grace. Working together.
John, chapter 4, verse 20 through 26 say these words, our fathers worshiped on this mountain. The woman says, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.
And Jesus said to her, woman, believe me, the hour is come coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father.
You worship what you do not know. We worship what we do know. For salvation is from the Jews.
But the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. For the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.
And the woman says, I know that Messiah is coming. He who is called to Christ. And when he comes, he will tell us all things.
And Jesus said to her, I who speak to you am He.
For centuries, the argument between Samaritan and Jew was who the true worshipers were and what Defined who the true worshipers were was an argument over location.
You were a true worshiper if you worshiped in Jerusalem or a true worshiper if you worshiped on Mount Gerizim. But now Jesus says the hour has come where true worship is not based on your location.
True worship will be those who worship in spirit and truth. What God is looking for is those whose hearts are fully surrendered to him.
The woman, seeing a cataclysmic shift taking place as Jesus speaks, suggests that she understands that one day the Messiah will come and he's going to reveal all things to them. And what does Jesus say? I am He.
And in that moment, he allowed her to experience a grace that would overflow in her life.
She had been confronted with the truth.
But the message that Jesus gave her is that even in spite of the truth, you are. Aren't excluded from God's family. You are invited in, invited into a relationship with a God who loves you in spite of your sin and yet who calls you to leave your life of sin and to worship him in the truth. And this message transformed this woman's life. We read that as the disciples come back, they come back, they're with their food. They want to feed Jesus because he's hungry. But it says that they don't really say anything. They see him with the Samaritan woman. They're not quite sure how to process this because this isn't allowed. And yet then this woman gets up and she leaves, and she goes back into her town, and she begins to tell everybody he knew who I was without me even telling him. Like, he's speaking these words, these incredible words. This is the Messiah. And she tells everyone that she can possibly think her life was transformed. And yet, as Jesus stays there with his disciples, I want you to hear this powerful message that he gives to them.
Jesus urges his disciples to open their eyes and to see.
Jesus said to them, my food, the food you bring me, not worried about that, because my food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.
Do you not say that there are yet four months, and then comes the harvest.
Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes and see that the fields are white for harvest.
Jesus says, will you see with my eyes, not your own? Can you move past the barriers of racial hatred, of religious hatred, of ethnic, of social, of political?
And rather than seeing these people as your enemy, can you see them as a. I see them. People created in the image of God, who. I have come to give my life so that they could be restored in a right relationship with God. See them with my eyes. Because if you do, the fields are white with harvest.
These people are just waiting for someone to come and to share the good news of the gospel and church. I would tell you that I believe that God is saying the same thing to his church today. Day.
Rather than keeping our eyes on the barriers and the things that our world is flashing in front of us every single day, would we look at this world through spiritual eyes, not looking at what offends us or what hurts us, but seeing how Jesus sees people as people that are lost without a shepherd, that need the good news of the gospel of Jesus, that he came because of our sin and separation from God, that will eternally separate us from him with eternal punishment, that he loved us so much that he came into this world to die on a cross to pay the penalty for our sin, that if we would receive that beautiful gift from him and place our faith in him, that we would live with him forever. There is no greater picture of full truth and full grace and love working together. And Jesus says, will you see it as I see it?
And that there is a world that is asking hard questions. And if given the truth, the fields are white for harvest.
I believe Jesus is saying us today, lift up your eyes and see that while there are those that will always reject God and that will push division, there are many who are searching and they're waiting for you to come and to tell them the word that will bring them life.
Why was this so important to Jesus? Why is it so important for us? Because of the impact and power of a transformed life.
John, chapter 4, verses 38 through 42.
Jesus says, I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor.
Others have labored and you have entered into their labor. And then it tells us, many Samaritans from that town believed in Jesus because of the woman's testimony.
She said, he told me all that I ever did.
And so when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them. And he stayed there two days, barriers busted through, staying in their homes, eating their food, drinking with them, sharing the good news of Jesus.
And it says many more believed because of his word.
And they said to the woman, it's no longer because of what you said that we believe.
For we have heard ourselves.
And we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world.
Her life was transformed. And because of her testimony, others experience the goodness and the grace of God, recognizing because of the truth their total human depravity and their need for a savior.
But because they were showered with the love of God, they received that gift and gave their hearts to him. And this is the ministry church that you are called to and I just close with these words before we close in worship.
When people tell you that this world is closed to the God gospel, don't believe the lie.
Some are, but there are very many people just waiting for you to have the boldness to ask a simple question.
Have you heard about my Savior?
And if you will ask that question, you may just find that God has been doing all of the work and is just simply allowing you to come into all that he has labored for to be a part of the gloriousness of their coming to faith in him.
Lord, give us courage and faith and eyes to see to see the world as you see it for those who are far from God, even those who are hostile, that we would not see them as our enemies.
That we would not see them with hatred in our hearts.
That we would see with your eyes that they were created in your image and they have worth and they have value to you.
And your desire is that they would know you. But how will they know if we do not share?
So help us God, to move past the barriers, the religious barriers, political barriers, the ethnic barriers, the social barriers, the fear and give us a boldness to share the goodness of what you have done in our life so that more people will come to know you as their Lord and Savior. In Jesus name, amen.
[01:17:45] Speaker A: Sat down every burden every crown this is my surrender this is my surrender Here is where I lay it down Every lie and every doubt this is my surrender and I I will make room for you to do whatever you want to?
To do whatever you want to And I will make room for you to do whatever you want to?
To do whatever you want to Here.
[01:19:10] Speaker D: Is where I lay it down?
Every burden every crown this is my.
[01:19:18] Speaker A: Surrender this is my surrender Here is where I lay in down every line every doubt this is my surrender And I will make room for you.
[01:19:45] Speaker B: To.
[01:19:45] Speaker D: Do whatever you want to?
[01:19:49] Speaker A: To do whatever you want to and I will make room for you Jesus.
[01:20:01] Speaker D: To do whatever you want to?
[01:20:04] Speaker A: To do whatever you want to And I will make room for you.
[01:20:16] Speaker E: To.
[01:20:16] Speaker A: Do whatever you want to? To to do whatever you want to Jesus I will make room for you to do whatever you want to?
To do whatever you want to J SA Shake up the ground of all my tradition Break down the walls of all my religion? Your way is better?
Your way is better.
[01:21:28] Speaker D: Shake up the.
[01:21:29] Speaker A: Ground of all my tradition? Break down the walls of all my religion? And your way is better?
Your way is better?
Shake up the ground of all my tradition?
[01:21:47] Speaker D: Break down the walls of all my religion?
[01:21:51] Speaker A: Your way is better?
Your way is better?
[01:21:59] Speaker D: Shake up the ground I've only all my tradition?
[01:22:02] Speaker A: Break down the walls all my religion? Your way is better?
Your way?
And I will make room for you to do whatever you want to?
To do whatever you want to?
And I will make room for you to do whatever you want to?
To do whatever you want to?
[01:22:46] Speaker D: Here is where I lay it down?
You all I chasing now?
This is my surrender?
This is my surrender?
Here is where I land?
You are all I'm chasing now?
This is my surrender?
This is my surrender?
[01:23:21] Speaker E: Let's give God glory together this morning. He's good.
As we close our service this morning, our prayer team's here and if you have any needs, they would love that opportunity to pray with you this morning. I'd invite you to come as our service closes. But I want to just say you may be that person sitting here today who has been asking questions and you have sensed a need for God and you've been wrestling with what do I do and who is he? And I want more and I need more information.
And maybe you've come to the point today where you know that you want to give your heart and your life to him. If that is true, I'd invite you to come forward at the close of our service. Our prayer team would love to talk with you, answer questions that you might have, pray with you. And as well you may say, I'm not ready yet, I'm not quite there, but I got lots of questions myself. Our prayer team, our staff, we would love to help you in that journey of finding and understanding God and his purpose for your life. And so we would love to talk with you. Please come and share with us. Because as God moves on your heart, I believe he is trying to open up your eyes to see how this world will always fail you. But he never will.
But there is a sin problem that resides in each of us, that separates us from him.
But Jesus and his death and resurrection is the answer. He paid the price for your sin so that you could be made right with a holy God and experience the incredible gift of salvation. And so today, if he is moving on your heart, we'd invite you to and we would love to talk to you about having a relationship with him and church family. As you go out today, remember that he is giving you every single day, every single moment opportunities to be a light and to speak truth.
You can never leave the truth out to speak it with grace, not a little of each, full of each so that the world would truly know know Him. Take advantage of those opportunities with courage and let's give glory to God for what he is already doing and will continue to do. God bless you and have a great week as you serve Him.
[01:25:52] Speaker A: Sa.
