Meeting Jesus: when you think you’re worse than others
a list of all the problems (balogna) going on for the woman who thought she was worse than everyone else…
Jesus cuts through all of it to reach her heart with his redemption.
Kids literally threw baloney at the baloney wall after naming the problem they hate the most! Jesus cut through it for them.
As we continue our series on “Meeting the Real Jesus” from our recent teen retreat, today we meet Jesus through a woman who thought she was worse than everyone else.
In each case in this series, Jesus disarms their questions. What do I need to do to get into heaven? Have I already blown it? I’m a good person, God is pleased with me because of the good stuff I do, right? No. God is pleased with you because of who you believe in. Do you believe in yourself? Or in Jesus and His forgiveness for you?
In each case, Jesus cuts through the baloney (or bologna for you non-phonetic spellers out there).
He makes us honest about who we are.
He shows who he is.
He shows that God is for us in all the stuff we hide from others.
He opens our ears to hear him say, I know you, I love you, I forgive you, I will lead you.
When you hear him – when you believe what he says about himself and about you is true then you belong to him. He is yours. All of heaven is yours. In this blog, you will hear about: The baloney; Who he is; Who we are; and How He hits home to our heart.
First, the baloney.
Jesus is on his way to the countryside. He cuts through enemy territory, called Samaria. Samaritans and Jews hated each other. It went way back to kindergarten when on the playground Billy pushed Sam down the slide… Seriously, it went back to 2 Kings 17! With the 10 northern tribes of Israel who lived in a region called Samaria. Those tribes turned away from the Lord. The Lord let the Assyrian army overtake them. They inter-married with the Assyrians. Those northern 10 tribes lost their Jewish bloodline by marrying foreigners. They became the Samaritans.
The tribes of Judah and Benjamin in the south remained faithful to God (kind of) and that is where the Temple was. However, the tribe of Judah turned from the Lord too. They thought they had a lucky charm by having the Temple and Jerusalem. They looked down on the Samaritans. However, God let the Jews in Judah be overtaken too. They got carried away to a foreign land. However, they got to return. They got to rebuild the Temple and the city of Jerusalem.
2 Kings 17:24-41 shows how God was jealous for the Samaritans and they still feared God and worshipped him through a priest at Bethel. Ezra 4:1-6 The Jews refused their help to rebuild the Temple in Ezra and Nehemiah. The Samaritans were jealous and made it hard for the Jews.
What resentments do you have that go way back? Resentments in society where you have felt less than others? The color of your skin? The rich/poor? Native-born/immigrant? North/south? The prejudice you experience is BALONEY! The resentment that keeps you stuck is baloney too. Jesus cuts through all of it.
Jesus is tired and thirsty. He asks for a drink from a woman. Any resentments from guy/girl divisions? I can think of a few songs that have to do with rivalries between guys and girls. Most pop singers sing about this: I want to get him back by Olivia Rodrigo; Manchild by Sabrina Carpenter; in the Barbie movie, I want to push you around by Matchbox Twenty. Guys hating girls and girls hating guys… it’s all baloney. This is why Jesus has come to heal, to forgive, to redeem.
She is out in midday… because she is ashamed to hang around the others. They gossip about her. They know her past. She doesn’t want to deal. So she hides. Have you ever had people gossip about you? Have you ever gossiped about someone else? How does it feel? Does it make you want to go to a well extra far away in the hottest part of the day just to avoid the gossipers?
What is gossip? BALONEY!!!!!!
Jesus cuts through the baloney!
Jesus sees the secrets that make people gossip. He is going after your secrets. But he will never gossip about them. That’s what we do to each other because we are sinners. He goes after your secrets because he is going to love you there.
kids were eager to throw baloney at the problem they relate to the most
Jesus cuts through the boloney!
He goes into Samaria on purpose.
He speaks to a Samaritan on purpose… because he is cutting through the tribal rivalry
He goes to a well in midday on purpose… beause he is cutting through the pain of gossip
He speaks to a woman on purpose… because men and women are equal in His family
He speaks to a woman others gossip about on purpose… because he can redeem her bad decisions and give her a reason to live and Someone worthwhile to belong to.
He asks her for a drink. She knows he is cutting through the baloney. She remarks, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman? You know Jews have no dealings with either Samaritans or women!”
Jesus starts to reveal who she is: She is ashamed of something; she is trying to avoid other people; she is dealing with a lot of bologna – her gender, her ethnicity, gossip, her bad decisions, her bad reputation; she is thirsty.
Jesus starts to show her who he is. He answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” (John 4:10). “Gift” in Greek is “dorea.” It means the kind of gift that gets nothing in return. Jesus is God’s gift to us. He is giving himself freely to someone who is a rival enemy of his who has shameful secrets. He has something that she needs. Jesus is the SOURCE of supernatural water. Jesus is greater than her ancestor Jacob.
Jesus said to her,
“Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” 15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.” (John 4:13-15)
She thought he had literal magic water! He had something better. Water to clean her soul. Water that makes her belong to someone who loves her. Who doesn’t gossip about her. Ever.
Then Jesus really cuts through the baloney. Not the social baloney. Her baloney.
Jesus said to her,
“Go, call your husband, and come here.” 17 The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.” 19 The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet.
She is quick on her feet. She is not letting him get into her heart yet! But he sees into her. She knows he can see right into her soul, right into her past, right into her secrets today. She does a ninja move to dodge out of the way: “Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.” She’s saying, Ok wise guy, we’re not talking about my bologna yet. I’m still on the social bologna. Your people have been looking down on my people for centuries. Our ancestors tried to worship God in this place. Your people said that’s not the right place. It’s got to be in their place. We do this kind of church. You do that kind of church. Who is right? Who has the cell phone number of God?
Jesus meets her where she is. God isn’t any one place. The location doesn’t matter. God is everywhere! In your neighborhood and in mine; in your home country and in mine. The format also doesn’t matter.
WHO you are worshipping does matter. Are you worshipping your own ability to make good choices? Are you worshipping your friends’ opinions of you? Are you worshipping your parents’ approval? Are you worshipping money? Are you worshipping a god you’ve put together by borrowing from everything? If so, then you are really worshipping yourself, your own creation. You are really god then.
Jesus is saying, I am the real deal. The God who sent me (who is also me) is the real deal—omnipresent, all powerful. He sees into people’s hearts. He cuts through the bologna. But he does so in order to wash what he shows. He does so to quench your real thirst. To say, I know you are so thirsty to belong to someone safe who loves you who won’t leave you who won’t let you down who is bigger than your problems who can wash your shame away.
When you have met Jesus and his forgiveness, you worship him in SPIRIT and in TRUTH. In Spirit – anywhere from the deepest part of your soul meets God who is also Spirit. “Deep calls to deep.” Psalm 42:7 In Truth – the real God and Father of Jesus who sees the honest you and is for you with grace and mercy.
So far, Jesus has been talking about the good news. Now he gives himself to her. Jesus said to her,
“Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” 25 The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming (he 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.” (John 4:21-25)
MIC DROP! Jesus has come for her. The Messiah is God’s Chosen savior. The One who would keep all God’s promises to save his people from their secrets, from the baloney, from death. She believed Jesus was who he said he was. She experienced him cut through her baloney. He saw into her soul and loved her. She knew he had come for her. Suddenly, her secret shame lost its power. Jesus knew her there. Jesus loved her there. Jesus forgave her there. He was the 7th man in her life, the number of perfection. He was the perfect man. He could quench her thirst for belonging to someone safe who forgave her. He transformed her shame into her testimony. She wasn’t trying to hide her secrets anymore. They weren’t secrets to God anyway. Now she knew God was for her in them.
She ran off, leaving her water jar. Her real thirst had been quenched. She was very bold to her gossipy neighbors. “Come see a man who told me all I ever did! Can this be the Christ?” she was no longer ashamed or intimidated. She was bold. She was forgiven. She belonged to him. Many Samaritans believed in Jesus because of her testimony.
Fun fact: Jesus never gets a drink in this story! What do you think he did with the water jar she left?
Jesus cuts through the baloney. He shows you where you are hiding stuff. He forgives you there. He loves you where you need it most. It makes your heart flow with life again. Instead of ashamed, or victimized, Jesus makes you bold. When you think: “I don’t belong to anybody.” Remember Jesus says to you: “You belong to me.”
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