The Living Water

This is the Truth Network. The resurrection power of Jesus Christ is absolute, transforming and restoring lives, healing hurt, and making all things new. This power set Michael Bowen free from the captivity, darkness, and hell of addiction, and delivered him back to God. This is Jesus Breaks the Chains. Hello and thank you for tuning into this podcast, which is part of the Jesus Breaks the Chains series on Truth Network. I'm evangelist Michael Bowen and I pray that the Lord blesses you greatly and you receive this word in love and in truth.

This podcast is titled Living Water. I'm going to start in the scriptures in John 4 and I'm going to read through verses 1 through 42. And it's the story about the woman at the well who had an encounter with Jesus Christ, the living water. I'm going to start in verse 1, then I'm going to have some commentary, and then I'm going to move on through the entire scripture. So starting in verse 1 of John 4. Therefore, when the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John, though Jesus himself did not baptize but his disciples, he left Judea and departed again to Galilee, but he needed to go through Samaria. Now Samaria is where the Samaritans lived, and in Jewish culture, the Jews had no dealings with Samaritans and thought they were the lowest of the human race. Jews detested Samaritans. They hated them, and they were not even allowed to touch them because it was believed that it would make them unclean. Can anybody out there that's listening to this podcast relate to feeling like that?

I know I can. To feeling unclean, hated, detested, unworthy, unloved, pushed away and put down by others, by society, because of the things you've done in your past, maybe how you dress or what you're doing in your life. Just put down, cast away, and I felt like that too in my past when I was addicted to drugs and was lost in this world and lost in drug addiction, and I just felt like everybody hated me and thought I was a loser, and I can relate to that type of feeling. So he came to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near the pot of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Now Jacob's well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied from his journey, sat thus by the well.

It was about the sixth hour. Now the sixth hour by Hebrew time, that was about noon at day or midnight at night, and people used to draw water once in the day and once in the night during those times. Starting again in verse 7, a woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, give me a drink, for his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. Then the woman of Samaria said to him, how is it that you, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman, for Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. Verse 10, Jesus answered and said to her, if you knew the gift of God and who it was who says to you, give me a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water. Verse 11, the woman said to him, sir, you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep.

Where then do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob who gave us this well and drank of 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 again. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.

Now, when I read this, there are certain thoughts that that go through my mind. And I'm just wondering about this woman. What was she doing there and how did she get there and why was she there and how did she have that encounter with Jesus Christ at that time at that well? Because it was often the task of women and even teenage women to get the water for the whole household. Women would go to the well together, not just for companionship, but also for reasons of safety. So I'm just I ask myself in my mind, why was this woman alone drawing from the well when women did not go to the well alone?

Verse 15, the woman said to him, sir, give me this water that I may not thirst nor come here to draw. Jesus said to her, go call your husband and come here. The woman answered and said, I have no husband. Jesus said to her, you have said, well, I have no husband for you have had five husbands.

And the one whom you now have is not your husband in that you spoke truly. So I start to think about this. Think about that woman who was alone. And and I and I understand that the woman, she was alone because she lived in a culture that followed strict laws concerning sexual purity. So it seems she is an outcast among her own people, considering the Samaritans were rejected by the Jews and also considered outcast. This woman was an outcast among outcast. She was the lowest of the lows in in that time, in that society, in that culture. Those of you who are listening to this podcast right now, can you relate to feeling like an outcast and the lowest of the lows?

I know I can. As I said before, I was addicted to drugs for so many years. And which led me into drug rehabilitation programs, led me to jail and even being locked up in prison. And I was locked up in prison for being a drug addict and a street criminal. Nobody wanted to be around me. And society locked me up because I could not be trusted. They looked down upon me and thought I was a good for nothing drug addicted thief.

And I really was. I was a loser them. I was an outcast as an outcast. I always thirsted for acceptance. I thirsted for change. I thirsted for someone to understand what I was going through.

And that never came. And I just continued to use drugs and slip further and further into the misery of guilt and shame and disconnectedness, disconnectedness from myself, disconnectedness from my family members and my loved ones and disconnected from the world around me. Why could I not fit in to this world? I was like a square peg trying to fit into a round hole.

I just couldn't do it. And and the way that I dealt with that disconnectedness and the feelings of guilt and shame was I went in to drugs and alcohol to to try to escape from that, which caused more guilt, shame and disconnectedness was a never ending cycle. And the further the more I use drugs and alcohol, the further down that pit I went. And I mean, I can just imagine this is how the woman felt at the well.

I can just imagine she was feeling those same feelings that I'd felt. And maybe some of you are feeling right now as you listen to this story and and the Lord ministers to your spirit. Let him minister. There's a message for you right now in the in this story of the woman at the well picking up again in verse 19. The woman said to him, Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshipped on this mountain. And you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship.

Jesus said to her woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You, Jerusalem, worship the father. You worship what you do not know.

We know what we worship for the salvation is of the Jews. But the hour is coming and now is when the true worshippers 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. The woman said to him, I know that Messiah is coming who is called Christ. When he comes, he will tell us all things. Jesus said to her, I who speak to you am he.

This is amazing scripture. He's declaring that he is the Christ, that he is the Messiah. He's telling her, you are sitting looking right now at the Messiah. The woman knew that there was a Messiah to come. And Jesus had just told her that he was the Messiah, that he was the Christ, that he was the savior of the world. Verse 27. And at this point, his disciples came and they marveled that he talked with the woman.

Yet no one said, what do you seek or why are you talking with her? The woman then left her water pot, went her way into the city and said to them, come see a man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this be the Christ? Then they went out of the city and came to him. In this part of the scripture, the woman had just had an encounter with Jesus Christ, the Messiah. And she went out from him as a witness to tell others what she had seen, heard and experienced there at the well. Now, those who she told have come to see Jesus and to listen to his words for themselves.

They marveled at what the woman said. And they went to see about the one, this man, the Messiah, that she's claiming to be the Messiah that spoke to her. Verse 31. In the meantime, his disciples urged him, saying, Rabbi, eat. But he said to them, I have food to eat of which you do not know. Therefore, the disciples said to one another, has anyone brought him anything to eat?

Jesus said to them, my food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. Do you not say there are still four months and then comes the harvest? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already ripe for harvest. And he who reaps receive wages and gathers fruit for eternal life, that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. For in this saying is true, one sows and another reaps. I sent you to reap that which you have not labored.

Others have labored and you have entered into their labors. And many of the Samaritans of that city believed in him because of the word of the woman who testified. He told me all that I ever did. So when the Samaritans had come to him, they urged him just to stay with them.

And he stayed there for two days. And many more believe because of his own word. Then they said to the woman, now we believe not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard him.

And we know that this is indeed the Christ, the savior of the world. Now in the scripture, I really love this part. Jesus is speaking here of spiritual food when he says, my food is due to the will of him who sent me. He's speaking of spiritual food, which is doing the will of God. The will of God is for you to have an encounter with him in Jesus Christ, for you to be redeemed by hearing his word washed and cleansed and believing on that word and receiving him as your savior and being reborn and filled with the Holy Spirit.

That is the perfect will of God. A water well is a very welcome, vital source of water in a dry and thirsty land. Are you thirsty today? The Holy Spirit is the living water that Jesus is offering the woman at the well. And he's also offering it to you and me. Jesus is offering himself to us to be our savior and to rescue us from this fallen, wicked world, to rescue us from the guilt and shame and the disconnectedness and the feelings of sadness and hurt. And he just wants to be that soothing water, that comfort, like when you take a nice drink of ice cold water, a tall glass of ice cold water on a hot summer day.

When that goes down, that feeling you get when you're so thirsty and parched and hot, and then you take that really cool glass of water on a hot summer day. That's Jesus filling your soul. Hallelujah. I'd like to share with you some other scriptures that relate to this story of the woman at the well. John 7 38 through 39. He who believes in me, as the scriptures has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. But this he spoke concerning the spirit whom those believing him would receive.

Hallelujah. Ephesians 3 17. That Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, that you being rooted and grounded in love.

Second Timothy 2 7 for God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of sound mind. I'm here to tell you, brothers and sisters, friends of mine, that Jesus Christ is the well of our salvation. He has in him the living water of the Holy Spirit that comes to dwell. And all those who cry out to him believe in him and his name and who receive him as the Lord and Savior. They shall receive the living water and never thirst again.

Once you have Jesus, you will never need anything else. I found this out when I surrendered my life to Jesus Christ on a prison chapel floor. I was thirsty for righteousness. I was thirsty for salvation. And Jesus met me there.

That prison chapel floor. That was my well when I had an encounter with Jesus Christ. Once I surrendered my life to Jesus Christ and tasted the goodness of his living water for myself.

I never thirsted for drugs again. My desire for alcohol and drugs was removed and all I ever wanted from that day on was more of Jesus. And he gave himself to me and overflow.

And that's all I want today is more him. That's why I'm here speaking on this podcast is I want to share Jesus with you. I want to share the living water with you.

And I know I feel the Holy Spirit moving now. And I know that you are receiving of this living water taste for the Lord and see that he is good and desire that living water. And ask him, Lord, I want your living water and cry out to him. Go to him in prayer and just say, Lord, fill me with your living water.

And he will. He is faithful. Acts two thirty eight to thirty nine. Then Peter said to them, repent and let everyone be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the mission of your sins. And you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and your children and to all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God will call. God is calling you now.

You that are listening to this podcast, you are those who are far off if you've not given your life to Jesus Christ. If you've not made him your Lord and Savior, you can do that now. And I just encourage you get on your knees and pray to him and say, Lord, I believe that you are the son of God. I believe you died for my sins. And I just ask you right now to come into my life and save me, Lord. And I give my life to you and just surrender your life to him. Then find yourself another Christian and find a spiritual chart and tap into that and start reading your word.

Pick up the Bible and reading your word. The word is what changed me when I gave my life to Jesus Christ. John 4 14 says, But whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst again. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life. This living water has in it the power to overcome all that has destroyed you your whole life. All the lies, all the hurt, all the bad relationships, the sexual abuse, the beatings, the humiliation, the drug addiction, the depression.

Being abandoned or treated as an outcast and the hurt and the anger that comes with that. All this can be overcome by the love of the living water, which is the Holy Spirit of God being offered to you today, every day. God is calling you. Jesus is reaching his hand out at the well to you.

Hallelujah. Won't you come now to the well and have a drink? The water is so good.

This living water is hope and love. Jesus is here. He is calling to you right now. Say yes to him and receive all that he has for you. Eight years ago on that prison chapel floor, I came to the well of Jesus and I drank his living water and it changed my life forever.

It will change yours, too. We're going to end this podcast with a beautiful song that the Lord moved on me and I'm going to share it with you. And it was a living water. We want to drink you in. Yes, Jesus. Me. You. Here. Yes. Only you. Jesus. We can't get.

You know, I might. You know this already, but you have a great call. Preach the word. That's what I was just getting evangelism. Yeah, evangelism. Yeah.

That's right. And I think just an increased bonus that God is going to put on you. And God says that your ladder will be greater. And God says that he thanks you for responding to the call of God on your life. And God just says, continue to you, to the Holy Spirit, continue to you, to the Holy Spirit, continue to you, to the Holy Spirit. You.

You. I love you all, and I pray that you, too, can find the freedom that I have found in Jesus Christ at the well. Jesus breaks the chains. He is my Lord and savior and the living water that filled me up. So I never have to thirst again. This is the greatest life I've ever lived.

Living my life in Jesus Christ. God bless you all. In Jesus name, I pray. Amen. Thank you for listening. For more information on Michael Bowen's ministry, Sons and Daughters of Thunder, visit sonsanddaughtersoffunder.org. And remember, there is no addiction in Jesus Christ. Jesus breaks the chains. This is the Truth Network.