“IF YOU KNEW THE GIFT OF GOD…”?
By J. Farrell Fisher, May 29, 2017
There’s an interesting verse in John 4:4 about Jesus “needing to go through Samaria.” He came to Sychar, a city in Samaria, and came to “Jacob’s well.” Jesus, because of His journey was tired and thirsty. He sat down by a well – physical necessity or an eternal appointment? Verse 7 then tells us that “a woman of Samaria came to draw water” and Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.”
The woman of Samaria was shocked! She said, Verse 9, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. In Verse 10 Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.”
The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get this living water? Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?”
Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.”
Jesus asked the woman at the well to “believe Me,” saying in John 4:23, “But the hour is coming, AND NOW IS, when the true worshipper will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” NO WONDER JESUS SAID TO THE ‘RELIGIOUS’ NICODEMUS: “YOU MUST BE BORN AGAIN!”
“If you knew the gift of God…”! Do YOU? Sadly, many have determined for themselves that to earn a gift from God one must work for it, slave for it, earn it by one’s best effort and positive attitude of ‘self-determination’, but I love what Elizabeth Barrett Browning said in her writing long ago entitled “Sonnets From the Portuguese”, (no.26), “God’s gifts puts man’s best dreams to shame.” So true!
I remember a few years ago recording a publicized statement by an ‘active’ homosexual sick man named Mitchell Gold who publicized a diatribe against the Word of God and churches, pastors, and faithful disciples who stand on the Word of God in opposing homosexuality who said: “[They} must be made to take homosexuality off the sin list,” with a New York Time’s writer, Frank Bruni, affirming Gold’s obscene opposition to Holy God’s declaration of the Holy Word, saying, “His commandment is worthy – and warranted.” Gold and Bruni’s ‘word’ or Holy God’s unchanging, eternal declarations in Holy Scripture?
I’m sure you remember when Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. You’ll remember , in Matthew 4:3, when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.” But in Verse 4, Jesus answered the devil, “It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” The devil today still wants men believing the ‘stone of sexual immorality, yes, even homosexuality’, can, and is for them “living bread”, when in reality it is the ‘stone of suffocation and self-annihilation’!!
Muddy ‘creek-water’ of men’s fleshly indulgences is not the same as “LIVING WATER” out of the very throne and heart of God! In Matthew 7:13-14 the Lord Jesus said: “Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.”
Difficult is the way which leads to life? The word ‘difficult’ comes from a word meaning, “pressed or crushed” like a grape, but is that the way only for modern-day believers or ‘church-folk’, or have they ignored, even denied, dying to the old man that resurrected life in Christ may be manifested in mortal flesh to the glory of God, not to please ‘flesh’ but to live honoring the King of kings and Lord of lords in obedience to His Word? Don’t you find it strange that much of ‘church life’ today ignores “Take up your cross and Follow Me”?
Didn’t Paul, in 2 Corinthians 1:9, tell us about taking the sentence of death to the old man? It says, “Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead…”?
“If you knew the gift of God…”? That’s words out of the mouth of King Jesus! I find it so illuminating, convicting, and convincing when I read the Word and hear John say in 1 John 2:28-29, “And now, little children, abide in Him, that when He appears, we may have confidence and not be ashamed before Him at His coming. If you know that He is righteous, you know that everyone who practices righteousness is born of Him.”
Is there ‘confidence’ and ‘unashamedness’ in the life of one who ‘compromises’ His Word and leads a life of, yes, scriptural shame, living without the sentence of death in one’s old flesh, but allowing it to exist in daily allegiance to that ‘flesh’ rather than allegiance to the Indwelling Christ?
“If you knew the gift of God…?” Do YOU? In 1 John 3:1-3 the beloved John highlights truth like a former Babe Ruth hitting one home run after another! He said: “Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God! Therefore the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.”
Are YOU called as a child of God, or is it that you ‘just try to be’? Is that ‘trying to be worthy of His gift’ or is it one resting in thanksgiving for His blessed gifts? ‘Trying to be worthy’ is so foreign to one living in thanksgiving because God has blessed him/her beyond measure! The ‘trying-to-be-ers’ are like Martin Luther’s statement: “Therefore God commonly gives riches to foolish people, to whom He gives nothing else.”
“If you knew the gift of God…!” The gift of God? Has the need of divine forgiveness ever surfaced in your spiritual journey? If one is alienated from God because of his/her sin, has there been birthed within that one the awareness of the need of being reconciled to God? In 1 John 1:8-2:2 we read: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us. 2:1-2, My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.”
“If they knew the gift of God…”! The penalty for the sins of all of mankind was paid for by the shed blood of Christ on Calvary’s Cross – forgiven is an eternal, divine reality, but reconciliation to Holy God still remains for men and women everywhere to exercise! Forgiveness has cleansed the dark side of fallen mankind, but ‘opening the door for His entrance into the hearts of the forgiven’ still remains for every man to act upon! Revelation 3:20-22 says, Jesus speaking, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”
What was it James said in James 1:17-18? “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning. Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures,” adding in Verses 21-22, “Therefore lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. Be DOERS of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.” One doesn’t keep the Word of God in order to be saved, but he/she keeps the Word because he/she has been saved!!
“If they knew the gift of God…”! In Acts 3:19-20 Peter declared: “Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that He may send Jesus Christ who was preached to you before…”, and if God promises on the basis of one’s repentance that He will send Jesus Christ, dare I tell you that the times of ‘refreshing’ is His Holy Presence living within the repentant, re-born life? “Christ in you the hope of glory!”
I would ask you: Have YOU been convicted of your sin, convinced of your old sin nature, horrified that that has produced alienation and separation from God, and also you’ve been made fully aware that without Christ, YOU ARE HOPELESS, related to His eternal purpose of a vessel, temple, tabernacle of Holy Presence? I’d say it’s time to look at God’s offer of repentance toward God and the gift of faith in the finished work of Christ! Maybe Paul’s declaration in 2 Corinthians 9:15 could be your confession and celebration: “Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift!” I find Acts 11:16-18 so powerful as Peter declared: Then I remembered the word of the Lord, how He said, “John indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit.” If therefore God gave them the same gift as He gave us when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God?’ When they heard these things they became silent; and they glorified God, saying, “The God has also granted to the Gentiles REPENTANCE TO LIFE.” Do YOU know “repentance to life”?
“If they knew the gift of God…”! Yes, praise God, there Is reconciliation through Christ with God the Father, sins washed away by the blood of Christ! But in our journeys of faith there must be THE AWARENESS THAT WE ARE TO BE FILLED WITH ALL THE FULLNESS OF GOD!
In Ephesians 3:14-19 Paul illuminates our understanding in our journey of faith! He said: “For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; [Does the Lord Jesus feel at home in you?]; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height – to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”
Is the Lord Jesus, in you, able to do exceedingly abundantly above all you ask or think, according to the resident power of the Holy Spirit that lives in you? Did Paul just tell us that you are “to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man”?
Oswald Chambers wrote in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” (P.151), “When the Holy Spirit comes in, He brings into the center of my personal life the very Spirit that was manifested in the life of Jesus Christ, viz., HOLY Spirit, which is unsullied purity.” What was it Jesus said in Matthew 5:8? “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”
I tell you, my heart breaks when I hear ‘professing Christians’ talking about their, yes, self-willed journeys as professing disciples! I want to remind them, as I’ve done many times: “The true faith is all because of the gift and grace of God! We don’t achieve, we receive, we don’t merit – we’re MERCIED, we don’t earn – we have credited to our account ALL that Jesus is and desires to do through us, we aren’t primed or pumped up but are those who through repentance toward God and faith in Christ’s finished work have divine life, divine presence, and divine power poured into us, not a purchase we make but a price paid for our freedom through His shed blood, not a talent we’ve mustered, but His presence that MASTERS through us, not entering man-made doors but allowing the Door to be opened by Christ Himself, not personal initiative but the Prince of Peace’s divine intervention!”
There is a powerful, awakening, enlightening verse in Proverbs 22:11 that says: “He who loves purity of heart and has grace on his lips, the king will be his friend.” And, of course, the Lord Jesus takes us up into heavenly places when He said in John 15:11-16, “These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down his life for his friends. You are My friends IF YOU DO WHATEVER I COMMAND YOU. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you.”
In the old “The American Hymnal” published in 1933, I came across an old hymn entitled “Friendship With Jesus” authored by Major Ludgate. It says: “A friend of Jesus, O what bliss, That one so vile As I should ever have a friend like this To lead me to the sky . A friend when other friendships cease, A friend when others fall, A friend who gives me joy and peace, A friend when foes assail.
A friend when sickness lays me low, A friend when death draws near, A friend as through the vale I go, A friend to help and cheer.
A friend when life’s short race is o’er, A friend when earth is past, A friend to meet on heaven’s shore, A friend when home at last.
Friendship with Jesus, Fellowship divine, O what blessed, sweet communion, Jesus is a friend of mine.”
Thomas Gray, in “Elegy in a Country Churchyard, The Epitaph”, (st.20), wrote “Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere, Heaven did a recompense as largely send: He gave to misery (all he had) a tear, He gained from Heaven (‘twas all he wished) a friend.” Aren’t you thankful, and don’t you rejoice, that you have a Friend in Spirit-Land though you still dwell on earth, content that your Friend is also your Lord, Savior, Protector, Guardian, and the Lover of your soul?