PASTOR'S CORNER

  John 4:27-45   We are so often blinded to the people around us.  I am referring to their spiritual needs and to their readiness and openness to Jesus.  We see their lifestyle choices and sometimes hard attitudes , and we forget that God is able to work powerfully in them when the time is right according to God’s will.  But we tend to right them off , and show little, to no compassion , because they are not like you and me.  This puts us into a place where we are no different than the nation of Israel as it pertains to those outside their camp, or outside the church today.  This encounter that Jesus has with this woman, tears down the barriers of Jew and Gentile .  This encounter is evident to the profession, and confession, that the worst of sinners can be saved; and this also reveals that the nation of Israel is a nation of Jonah’s. Why didn’t Jonah go to Nineveh? Because he knew that God was full of compassion and grace.  Jonah, like the Jews, hated the Gentile nations, b

  John 4:19-26   Conviction of sin will always lead you to repentance, which proceeds worship.  This is what the gospel produces, this is what a holy God is looking for in those who are His, as Jesus called on her to get her husband.  Shaken by Jesus’ amazing exact knowledge of her past, and present lifestyle choices, she says, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet.”   This response gives evidence to His divine knowledge of her , and this statement revealed that she couldn’t hide from her sin any longer.  Her eyes were beginning to open ; and she is discovering that she is standing before some Mysterious Somebody , whom she declares to be a spokesman for God .  It was through her conscience that the True Light of Living Water was being made manifest in her heart to see her fallen state and lack of Biblical knowledge.  We know this true, because she is seeking in her own strength to find this eternal joy and peace, but its only lip service, and not from the heart that has b