Matthew 11:29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. Chapter 4 Jesus asks a Samaritan woman for a drink of water and then explains that he is the one who gives living water to all. Those who drink it will never again become thirsty (4:1-42). The Pharisees heard that Jesus was gaining and baptizing more converts than John (although it was the other disciples and I who were doing the baptizing). When Jesus learned about this he left Judea and started back to Galilee. His route took him through Samaria, and before long he came to a town called Sychar. It was located not far from the plot of land that our ancestor Jacob had given to his son Joseph. That was where Jacob had dug a well. About noon, Jesus was tired from his journey, and sat down beside the well. A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Please give me a drink of water, said Jesus to the woman. (We had gone into town to buy some food.) The woman exclaimed, But youre a Jew! How come youre asking me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink of water? (No Jew would ever drink from a cup used by a Samaritan). Jesus replied, If you only knew the gift of God and who it is that is asking you for a drink of water, you would be the one asking me, and I would give you living water. (Living water is a pun. It can mean flowing water, as in fresh water, or it has a spiritual meaning, which is what Jesus intends.) The woman replied, But sir, you dont have a bucket and the well is deep. Where will you get this living water? Surely you are not greater than our father Jacob, are you? He is the one who gave us this well. He drank from it himself, and so did his sons and his flocks. Jesus replied, Everyone who drinks of this water will get thirsty again, but once a person drinks the water that I will give, he will never be thirsty again. In fact, it will become in him a perpetual spring of water welling up to eternal life. Please, sir, the woman exclaimed, give me some of that water. That way Ill never get thirsty again and wont have to keep coming way out here to draw water. Jesus said, Go, call your husband first, then come back again. I dont have a husband, the woman replied. Thats right, said Jesus, you dont have a husband. Already you have had five, and the one you are now living with is not your husband. You told the truth. The woman said to him, Sir, I can see that you are a prophet! I have a question for you: Should we worship on this mountain where our ancestors worshiped, or should we worship, as you, a Jew, would say, in Jerusalem? Believe me, said Jesus, the time is coming when the place where one worships -- here on this mountain or in Jerusalem -- will no longer matter. You Samaritans know very little about the one you worship; but we Jews know all about him, because salvation comes through our race. A time is coming -- in fact, it is here already -- when true worshipers will be led by the Spirit to worship the Father as he really is. And the Father is looking for people who will worship him like that. God is spirit, and those who worship him must be led by the Spirit to worship him as he really is. The woman said, I know that the Messiah (who is called Christ) will come, and when he comes, he will explain everything to us. I am the Messiah, said Jesus, the very one who is speaking to you now. Just then we returned from the town. We were surprised to find Jesus talking with a woman. However, none of us asked her what she wanted or questioned Jesus as to why he was talking with her. At that point the woman put down her water jar and hurried off to town, where she told everyone, Come and meet the man who told me everything I have ever done! Could this man really be the Messiah? The people left what they were doing and went out to meet Jesus. Meanwhile we kept urging Jesus to take some food and eat. I have a source of nourishment you know nothing about, he answered. We asked one another, Could someone have brought him food to eat? Jesus said, My food is to do what God desires. He is the one who sent me and I must finish the work he gave me to do. You say, There are four months between sowing and harvest; but I say, Open your eyes and look around! The fields are already ripe for harvest. Already the reaper is drawing his pay for having gathered a crop destined for eternal life. Sowers and reapers are rejoicing together. The saying holds true, One sows and another reaps. I am sending you to harvest a crop in a field where others have done all the hard work. You are about to reap the benefits of what they have done. A number of people in that Samaritan village came to believe in Jesus because of the womans testimony, He told me everything I have ever done! They came to him with the urgent request that he remain with them in their town for a time. So for the next two days he stayed there, and many others came to believe when they heard Jesus for themselves. To the woman they said, We no longer believe just because you told us about him. Now that we have heard him for ourselves, we are convinced that he is the Savior of the world. Jesus heals the son of a government official (4:43-54). Two days later Jesus left Samaria and continued on his way to Galilee. (Previously he had noted that a prophet is held in honor everywhere except in his own country!) When he arrived in Galilee he was welcomed by the people, because they too had been at the festival in Jerusalem and seen everything he had done. Traveling through Galilee, Jesus came once again to the village of Cana, where he had turned water into wine. In nearby Capernaum there was an official of the imperial government whose son was ill. When he learned that Jesus had come back from Judea and was in Galilee, he went to him and begged him to come and heal his son, for his son was about to die. Unless you people see miracles and wonders, said Jesus, you will never believe! Please, sir, begged the official. Come before my son dies. Your son is alive and well, replied Jesus. Go back to him. The official believed what Jesus said and set off for home. While he was still on the way home, his servants came to meet him with the good news that his son had recovered. He asked them what time this had taken place, and they said, One oclock yesterday afternoon the fever suddenly disappeared. The father remembered that it was at that very hour when Jesus had said, Your son is alive and well. So the official and everyone in his family became believers. Jesus did this second miracle after leaving Judea and arriving in Galilee. Chapter 5 Jesus goes to Jerusalem where he heals a crippled man. The Jewish authorities become angry because Jesus did this on the Sabbath (5:1-18). Some time later Jesus went up to Jerusalem to take part in one of the Jewish festivals. In the city, near the Sheep Gate, is a pool that in Aramaic is called Bethesda. It has five covered porches where a number of invalids used to lie -- the blind, the lame and those withered by disease. One man beside the pool had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been in that condition for such a long time, he said to the man, Would you like to get well? Sir, the man replied, I dont have anyone to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up. So while I am trying to get to the pool, someone else always gets there before me. Jesus said, Get up! Pick up your mat and walk! Right then and there the man was healed. He picked up his mat and started to walk around. This happened on a Sabbath day, so the Jewish authorities said to the man who had just been healed , You cant do that! Its against the law for a person to carry his mat on the Sabbath. But the man who made me well told me to pick up my mat and walk, he replied. Who told you that? they asked. Who said to you, Pick up your mat and walk? The man did not know who had healed him, and Jesus had slipped away into the crowd. Later on, Jesus found the man in the temple and said to him, Now that you are well again, dont go on sinning or something worse may happen to you. The man went away and told the Jewish authorities that it was Jesus who had healed him. Because Jesus kept doing things like this on the Sabbath, the Jewish authorities began to persecute him. So Jesus said to them, Since my Father continues to do his work, I am free to do my work as well. That made the Jewish authorities try all the harder to kill him. Not only did he continue to break the Sabbath laws, but by referring to God as his Father, he was claiming to be equal with God. Jesus is given authority by the Father to act as judge (5:19-30). I tell you the truth, said Jesus, the Son can do nothing on his own initiative. He can do only what he sees the Father doing. Whatever the Father does, the Son does. The Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing. And greater works than these will he show the Son, so that you may be filled with wonder. Just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also does the Son give life to the ones he chooses. The Father himself passes judgment on no one but has made the Son the judge of all, so that everyone should honor the Son as much as they honor him. To withhold honor from the Son is to dishonor the Father who sent him. I tell you the truth, the one who listens to my message and believes the one who sent me, that person has eternal life already. He is no longer headed toward judgment but has moved from the realm of death into life. I tell you the truth, the time will come -- in fact, it is already here -- when those who are spiritually dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and if they pay attention to it, they will live. The Father himself is the source of all life and has allowed the Son the same privilege of being a source of life. He has given the Son the authority to act as judge because he is the Son of Man. Dont be surprised at this, because the time is coming when every one who has died will hear his voice and come out of their graves. Those who have done what is right will rise to life eternal, but those who have done evil will rise to I can do nothing on my own initiative. I judge only as God tells me, and this judgment is fair because I am seeking the will of the one who sent me, not trying to please myself. There are five witnesses to Jesus: God his Father, John the Baptist, Jesus own miraculous deeds, Scripture, and Moses. The Jewish people who reject him will stand accused by Moses, the very one on whom they have set their hope (5:31-47). If I testify on my own behalf, you have no way of knowing if it is true. There is, however, someone who speaks on my behalf, and I know that what he says about me is true. You sent messengers to John the Baptist, and what he said about me is true. Of course, I dont need someone else to validate my claims, but I say these things so that you may be saved. John was a lamp, shining and giving light. And for a time you were willing to rejoice in his light. But I have greater evidence than the words of John the Baptist-- specifically, the miraculous deeds I am now doing. They were assigned to me by the Father, and they prove conclusively that the Father has sent me. Beyond that, the Father himself, the one who sent me, continues to speak on my behalf. However, you never listen to his voice or are aware of his presence. His word falls upon deaf ears because you refuse to believe in me, the one whom he sent. You keep on searching the Scriptures because you think that in them you will find eternal life. These same Scriptures speak about me, but you refuse to come to me in order to have life. Studying scripture I am not looking for your praise, but I know that you have no love for God in your hearts. I have come as a representative of my Father and you wont accept me. But when others come as their own spokesmen, you will accept them. How can you ever believe if it is the praise of one another that you are seeking rather than the praise that comes from God? Do not think that I will be the one to accuse you before the Father. Moses will be your accuser, the very one on whom you have set your hope. If you really believed Moses, you would believe me, because it was about me that he wrote. But if you dont believe what he wrote about me, how can you believe the claims I make?
Posted on: Sun, 28 Dec 2014 22:09:57 +0000
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