 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
Two Steps to Truth
By William R. Cunningham
For Sunday February 24, 2008
Introduction
I have found that one of the most frustrating things about ministry is when I have to convince someone of what the bible says over their belief in their accepted religious dogma. People become so indoctrinated with religious teachings that they fail to discover what the bible says. Many professed Christians in my experience would rather cling to the words of their pastor or religious leader instead of clinging to the word of God. This is primary because many do not know the word of God based on my experiences.
It is evident to me from the people that I have talked to over the years that many people only know what the pastor says or whoever the person is that indoctrinates them. Christians are not taught to be critical thinkers. We are for the most part not taught to question the things we hear from others. We are instead compelled to blindly accept what the religious leader tells us.
How can we break out of this pattern of ignorance? How can a new Christian truly hear from God and protect himself against the dogma that awaits him in churches? I believe that we can break out of this pattern of ignorance and indoctrination by following a two step path towards truth. I believe that the two step path to truth is as follows.
- Share the truth to others in the way that God has made you to do so.
- Teach others to pursue God for themselves so that they can acquire truth from the word of God personally.
Scripture Lesson
John 4:39-42 (NKJV) -- {39} 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." {40} So when the Samaritans had come to Him, they urged Him to stay with them; and He stayed there two days. {41} And many more believed because of His own word. {42} 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."
Read John 4:1-42.
Here was an interesting situation between Jesus and the Samaritan woman and between him and his disciples. First we find Jesus ministering to the Samaritan woman. Now this was odd because of the tensions between the Samaritans and the Jews.
John 4:9 (NKJV) -- {9} 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.
Both groups for the most part accused the other of apostasy. The Jews hated the Samaritans because they abandoned the way of God to mingle with the religions of other nations during the Assyrian captivity. The Samaritans accused the Jews of idolatry and that their worship had only a small part of what it should have been. The end result is that the Jews hated the Samaritans and didn’t want to have anything to do with them.
As a matter of fact, there were two roads from Galilee down to Judea. Samaria was in the middle of those two regions. The Jews typically took the longer route down to Judea because they didn’t want to go through Samaria, which was the shorter route. See the map below.
From the Bible Knowledge Commentary
One thing that I found interesting about the conversation between Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well was that it was a normal conversation. He wasn’t preaching at her or quoting scripture. He just talked to her.
Another very interesting thing here is that Jesus did not adhere to Jewish piety with regard to Samaritans or with respect to women in general. First of all we note that this woman came to the well alone instead of with a group of other women. This suggests that she was ostracized or that she was not well liked by other women. This was probably because of her sexual activities (See v18).
We also note that the Jews considered Samaritan women unclean from birth, which is another reason that Jesus would have been expected to avoid her based on Jewish piety.
Another thing that was very unusual about this conversation is that Jesus plainly declared to her that he was the Messiah.
John 4:25-26 (NKJV) -- {25} The woman said to Him, "I know that Messiah is coming" (who is called Christ). "When He comes, He will tell us all things." {26} Jesus said to her, "I who speak to you am He."
Normally Jesus would not have identified himself as the Christ, but rather as the "Son of man." However, it is evident here that there was no danger of a backlash from the religious leaders as was the case with the Jews. The Jewish religious leaders would have been greatly agitated if Jesus came right out and called himself the Christ.
Now at this point the disciples returned from the city to purchase food. They actually marveled that Jesus, a Jew, was talking to a woman (especially a Samaritan woman). Jewish piety warned men not to talk much with women because of the temptation and/or because of how it might look. Some even took this as far as limiting interaction with their own wives . So the disciples would have thought it was odd that Jesus was talking to a woman alone the way he was. However, they didn’t challenge him about it most likely because of trust and respect for him. It was also not considered proper to challenge one’s teacher.
John 4:27-28 (NKJV) -- {27} And at this point His disciples came, and they marveled that He talked with a woman; yet no one said, "What do You seek?" or, "Why are You talking with her?" {28} The woman then left her waterpot, went her way into the city, and said to the men,
The woman was evidently very excited after talking with Jesus. She headed back to her town and even left her water pot. She declared what had happened to her to the men. These men then came to where Jesus was and then heard the word from Jesus himself.
They compelled Jesus to come back to town and stay with them. Evidently they wanted to here more.
John 4:39-40 (NKJV) -- {39} 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." {40} So when the Samaritans had come to Him, they urged Him to stay with them; and He stayed there two days.
Jesus stayed with them for two days and they heard the word of God from him. Many believed in Jesus because of what they heard straight from Jesus. However, we should note that they heard Jesus because of the testimony and evangelism of the woman.
John 4:41 (NKJV) -- {41} And many more believed because of His own word.
Then one of the most significant thing happened. They believed that Jesus was indeed the Christ (Messiah), the savior of the world.
John 4:42 (NKJV) -- {42} 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."
Many people in town were saved because of the testimony of the woman that led to a personal interaction with Jesus Christ. There are actually three things I see happening here.
- Jesus reached out to the Samaritans. God has made salvation available to everyone. He has reached out and it is up to us to receive him and believe in Jesus Christ
- The Samaritan woman’s encounter with Jesus Christ caused her to believe and that led her to "preach" to the men in her city. This caused them to believe and to want more.
- The men of the city had a personal encounter with Jesus, which caused their faith to be anchored—not merely based on the words of the woman, but the words of Christ himself.
Lesson Learned
We see a two step process here. Note that I am not suggesting that this is the path that must be taken for anyone to be saved. However, it is identified as a path that can be taken and we should therefore take note of it.
- We share our faith with others
- We lead others to Christ
The most important thing that we should do when sharing our faith is to promote Jesus Christ. Jesus said that he is the way to the Father (See John 14:6). Therefore, it is not enough for us to save anyone since we can’t do that anyway. We need people to come to Jesus, which will put them into a direct relationship with God. We are the path to Jesus and Jesus is the way to God.
We should always remember that. We are not the authority in a person’s life even if we were the vessel used to lead that person to salvation. The best we can do is sharing our faith and knowledge of the truth with others and hope that they will receive the gospel favorably and put their faith in Jesus Christ.
God uses us to spread the gospel. However, it is important to remember that we are not the goal. The goal is the relationship with God for eternity. Therefore, people need to come to Jesus Christ. We may be the first step, but Jesus has to be the next step in all cases. We can’t save people—only through Jesus Christ can we be saved. So he must be lifted up. Amen