Philippians 2:14-15: How to Shine Like a Star in a Dark World

INTRODUCTION

Dorotha Bartman was a resident here at Village Ridge. She was in her 90s when we met her here. She departed to be with Jesus a couple of years ago at the age of 99.

Dorotha was totally deaf but she never missed a church service. It was because of her deafness that I began writing out my messages, so that she could have a copy to follow as I spoke. Although Dorotha had lost her hearing, she could still speak. She took part in each of our services by reading an inspirational story or a poem to us at the beginning of each service. She had a good clear voice and we all enjoyed her contributions.

One Sunday she told us this story:

There was a man who was 92 and blind. His wife of 70 years had recently died. A friend agreed to take him to a nursing home.

After waiting some time in the lobby of the nursing home, he smiled brightly as the nurse told his room was ready. As he maneuvered his walker into the elevator, his friend gave him a description of his little room.

“I love it!” he exclaimed, with enthusiasm.

“But you haven’t seen it yet,” his friend protested.

“That doesn’t have anything to do with it,” he replied. “Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. Whether I like my room or not doesn’t depend on how the furniture is arranged—it’s how I arrange my mind. I have decided to love it.”

He explained that this was a decision he made every morning when he woke up. Each day, he said, he could lie in bed, mourning the difficulty he had with the parts of his body that no longer work—or he could get out of bed and be thankful for the parts that do.

Dorotha told us this: Each day is a gift, and we should focus on the happy memories we have stored away—just for this time of life. She said, “Life is like a bank account; you withdraw from what you have put in.”

I. St. Paul wrote his letter to the Christians at Philippi while in prison, chained to a guard. He would have had reason to be downhearted at the time when he wrote that letter.

A. But this is the letter in which he writes: “Rejoice always, and again I say, rejoice” (4:4) And again: “Even if I am to be poured as a libation upon the sacrificial offering of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all. Likewise you also should be glad and rejoice with me” (2:17-18)

Today I would like to talk a few lines of advice St. Paul gave his friends in Philippi.

He wrote, “Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation among whom you shine as lights in the world” (2:14-15).

“Do all things without grumbling or questioning…”

It’s easy to fall into the habit of majoring on the things (and people) that disappoint us.

When we complain about each other, we forget that we irritate other people as much as they irritate us. We’re just much more aware of the faults of others than we are of our own faults.

It’s like the headlights of an approaching car. You remember driving down the highway at night and encountering a driver who neglected to dim his lights. The brightness blinds you.

But if it’s you who forgot to dim your lights, you are unaware of it until the approaching driver flashes his lights at you.

Sometimes we complain about things we really should be thankful for.

We may complain about a disappointing meal. But we should be thankful that we get enough to eat. Remember how, when you were a child and were complaining about your turnips (or whatever), your mother would remind you of the starving children in China who would be thankful just to have something to eat?

Sometimes we complain about things we can’t do anything about. What’s the use of complaining about our health, the weather, the government, or that the younger generation is going to the dogs?

The more we talk about what’s wrong, the worse we feel, and the worse we feel the worse we make everyone around us feel.

Sometimes we complain about God. We’re discontented with the way he’s running his world.

We think he should do something about our troubles. Instead we might ask God to show us the meaning of our afflictions and disappointments.

B. Complaining has less to do with the circumstances of our life—how much trouble we are facing—than it has to do with our attitude toward life.

I remember a friend in a nursing home who said this to another resident who was expressing her discontent about something or other. She said, “We just can’t take that attitude.” Content has more to do with attitude than circumstances.

Remember the man in Dorotha’s story. He said, “Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. Whether I like my room or not doesn’t depend on how the furniture is arranged—it’s how I arrange my mind. I have decided to love it.”

Have you heard this bit of verse?

Some murmur when their sky is clear

And wholly bright to view,

If one small speck of dark appear

In their great heaven of blue:

And some with thankful love are filled,

If but one streak of light,

One ray of God’s good mercy, guild

The darkness of their night.

C. The story is told of a man in Budapest went to his rabbi and complained. He said, “Life is unbearable. There are nine of us living in one room. What can I do?”

The rabbi answered, “Take your goat into the room with you.”

The man was stunned, but the rabbi insisted. “Do as I say, and come back in a week.”

A week later the man came back looking more distraught than ever. “We can’t stand it,” he told the rabbi. “The goat is filthy.”

The rabbi then told him, “Go home and take the goat out, and come back in a week.”

A week the man came back to the rabbi, his face alight with pleasure. “Life is beautiful. We enjoy every minute of it—now that there is no goat.”

When we are feeling sorry for ourselves, it is good to remember that it could be worse. There are those who are less fortunate than we are.

Someone said, “I complained about the shoes I had to wear, until I saw a man with no feet.”

II. Now notice the reason why Paul says we shouldn’t grumble and question.

A. “…so that “you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation.

Children resemble their parents. God’s children should be like God.

Other people should be able to see the family resemblance.

As God’s children we should be the nicest, pleasantest, most considerate people around. Then we are like Jesus. Then we behave like children of God.

B. “...children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation among whom you shine like lights in the world.”

In most translations, “Lights in the world” is translated “stars in the world.”

The stars are lights in the dark sky. Christians are the lights in a dark world.

Sailors find their way over the dark seas by looking at the stars. Christians can show the way to God by shining like stars in our world of sin and darkness.

Nowadays we are so used to electric lights shining everywhere that we can hardly remember that in our youth we could look up at a black sky, in which multitudes of stars shone like diamonds in the sky. Remember the Big and Little Dippers and the Milky Way?

When I was in the army in Korea, we had no electric lights. We were warned never to strike a match at night because the enemy could see that tiny flash that would give our position away—even if he was miles away.

Or the lights could be thought of as the little oil lamps people used in their homes. Do you remember these lines that Portia speaks in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice?

“How far that little candle throws his beams!

So shines a good deed in a naughty world.”

I think Shakespeare had been reading his Bible.

At our last service at Village Ridge we sang this old Sunday school song:

“Jesus bids us shine, with a clear, pure light,

Like a little candle, shining in the night.

In this world of darkness, we must shine,

You in your small corner, and I in mine.”

One way we can shine for Jesus is by our grateful spirit.

If we have a grateful spirit, we will refuse to grumble and complain.

When we are grateful, we make ourselves happier, and we make those around us happier too.

When we are discontented, grumpy and sour, we spread our misery to those around us.

When bad things happen, we may not feel cheerful or grateful, but we can still refuse to grumble and complain.

God doesn’t require that we be always bubbling over with happiness. Jesus said, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”

At one time Paul was so distressed that he wrote, “We were so utterly, unbearably crushed that we despaired of life itself” (2 Corinthians 1:9). Another time he wrote that he was “sorrowful, but always rejoicing” (2 Corinthians 6:10). So even Paul, and even Jesus became discouraged. The important thing is to keep trusting God, and living out our faith.

CONCLUSION

Sometimes when you go to the doctor, the doctor will ask you to stick out your tongue, and put that little wooden paddle on your tongue and ask you to say, “Ahhh.” Evidently a good doctor can tell something about what ails you just by looking at your tongue.

In the same way God looks at our tongues. Many of our sins are sins that we express with our tongues.

We are particular about what we put into our mouths. But Jesus says that it’s a lot more important what comes out of our mouths than what goes in. He says, “The good person out of the good treasure of the heart produces good, and the evil person out of the evil treasure produces evil; for it is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks.”

If someone collected my words or your words and sorted them out, what proportion would be compliments, or words of encouragement, or sympathy, or thankfulness? And what proportion would be words of criticism, faultfinding, discontent, self-pity?

One of the nicest compliments I have ever received was unintended. We were at breakfast and someone was pointing out the faults of another person. I remarked that maybe we didn’t understand that person’s problems—maybe there are reasons why he is so unhappy and disagreeable, reasons that we don’t know.

My friend said, “Oh, you are always making excuses for people.” I was pleased to hear that—even though it wasn’t intended as a compliment.

Jesus even made excuses for the people who drove nails through his hands and hung him on the cross. He said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

A friend of mine likes to quote this saying from Confucius, the ancient Chinese sage: “When we see persons of worth, we should think of equaling them. When we see persons of contrary character, we should turn inwards and examine ourselves.”

So when we see people who are filled with kindness, or wisdom, or thankfulness—let’s try to be like they are.

And when we see people who are bitter, or cross, or crabby, or ungrateful—let’s look within and see what sins we need to repent of. And if we look hard enough, we’ll always find some sin to confess and forsake.

That will help us be humble and helpful and grateful—and to shine for Jesus in our dark world.

John 3:1-8: How Many Birthdays Do You Need?

INTRODUCTION

When I was a child I remember that some of the families we knew had a second verse to the Happy Birthday song. It went like this:

Happy birthday to you;

Only one will not do.

Born again means salvation;

How many have you?

Have you ever been asked, “Have you been born again?”

In many churches the term “born again” is used sparingly.

But in other circles, such as the one I grew up in, preachers very often preached the gospel in terms of being “born again.” I think that some of our preachers didn’t know how to talk about salvation in any other terms.

But some people are disturbed by the question: “Have you been born again?” It creeps them out.

One of my friends has a stock answer to that question. She says, “No, I did it right the first time.” But she doesn’t understand what “born again” means.

Actually, the phrase only occurs a handful of times in the Bible. St. Paul never uses the words in any of his letters, and they never occur in the book of Acts or the first three gospels.

St. Peter mentions the term “born anew” in his first letter, and St. John uses the term “born of God” in his first letter.

But the preachers of my youth would always go to John 3—the story of Jesus and Nicodemus—and preach on the verse 3: “You must be born again!”

I want today to talk about that story and explain what that phrase—“born again”—means—and doesn’t mean.

The story begins this way: “Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him”

I. First of all, let’s go in our imaginations to that scene John describes.

A. Nicodemus was not typical of people who are attracted to Jesus. Nicodemus was an important man, an educated man, a ruler in Israel. He was a Pharisee, and we often read in the gospels of the hostility of the Pharisees to Jesus.

But Nicodemus wasn’t a typical Pharisee. Nicodemus was impressed with Jesus’s miracles and with Jesus’s teaching, and he wanted to know more.

So he came one night for a visit, and Jesus welcomed him.

Many preachers, when they preach about this story, will tell you that Nicodemus came by night because he was afraid for his reputation if he was seen with Jesus. So he came after dark, secretly, so that he wouldn’t be criticized. But from the other things we read about Nicodemus in the Gospel of John, we know that Nicodemus wasn’t a coward.

I think Nicodemus came to Jesus at night because in the daytime, Jesus was typically surrounded by crowds. He came after dark because he wanted to have serious conversation with the Lord Jesus.

Artists picture this scene in various ways. Some picture the two sitting among the olive trees in a garden at night. Others picture the two sitting in a dimly-lit room.

But the picture that I like best shows the two sitting on the low wall that ran around the roof of the house where Jesus was staying. The two men are sitting there, under the stars, deep in conversation.

A typical house of the time had a flat roof with a low wall around it. People often went up to the roof to sleep on hot evenings. An outside stairway led up to the roof. Often a guest room—called an aliyah—was up there on the roof.

Perhaps Jesus was staying in the guest room and studying or praying when Nicodemus arrived. Nicodemus could have come up the stairs to the roof without disturbing the family sleeping below in the house.

B. Nicodemus began his interview with a compliment: “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do, unless God is with him.”

Jesus’s answer seems rude. He replies to Nicodemus’s greeting with: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

Now that rejoinder puzzled me. It seems ungracious for Jesus to judge Nicodemus so quickly as one who will not see—that is, will not experience—the kingdom of God.

The fondest hope of a devout Jew like Nicodemus was to see to be alive to welcome the Kingdom of God.

I think that probably this conversation lasted for some time. The short sketch included in John just hits the highlights of the conversation.

I think that leading up to Jesus’s remark being born again was a lengthy conversation about the kingdom of God. And as the two talked about the coming Kingdom of God, Jesus realized that Nicodemus didn’t realize that he wasn’t ready to enter that Kingdom.

C. So Jesus used this startling metaphor about being “born again.” Actually, the word means literally “born from above.” Jesus no doubt was thinking of both meanings—born again and born from above.

But Nicodemus was puzzled. He didn’t realize that Jesus was speaking symbolically—or as we say “metaphorically.” And he took it literally, and he said, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”

I suspect that it took some time for Jesus to explain to Nicodemus what he meant, and John gives us just a sketch of Jesus’s remarks, which included this:

“Truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know whence it comes or whither it goes; so it is with every one who is born of the Spirit” (vv5-8).

II. Now let’s look at how the idea of a new birth occurs elsewhere in the New Testament.

A. In the first chapter, John writes that Jesus came to his own people, the Jews, but they did not—as a nation—receive him. “But,” he writes, “those who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God; who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:12-13).

Here John is contrasting natural birth with a new kind of life, given by God.

In John’s first letter—near the end of your Bible—John writes this: “If you know that he is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who does right has been born of him” (2:29), and “Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God” (4:7), and again, “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God (5:1).

Peter also uses the idea in the first chapter of his letter. He writes, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy we have been born anew to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (verse 3), and, “You have been born anew, not of perishable but of imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God” (v23).

B. St. Paul uses different language to express the idea of the new life that God gives to the believer in Christ.

In 2 Corinthians 5 Paul writes, “If any one is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, behold the new has come.”

In Ephesians, Paul writes that by nature we were dead to God, but by faith in Christ, we have been raised with him to share the life of God. He writes, “You he made alive, when you were dead through the trespasses and sins in which you once walked. …But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.” (2.1, 4-5).

And in Colossians 3, Paul writes, “So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above…for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (verses 1 and 3).

So Paul expresses the same idea of new life in Christ but uses different words.

C. So you see, “born again” is not a formula, or some kind of hoop one must jump through to become a child of God It is simply a picturesque way of expressing the idea that when a sinner invites Christ into his or her life, it is a radical change in the believer’s character, like having a new life, or being born again.

Jesus told Nicodemus: “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit” (verse 8).

Maybe as Jesus and Nicodemus conversed outdoors under the stars, a breeze came up which gave Jesus a way of illustrating the spiritual awakening that occurs when the Holy Spirit of God enters into or lives.

The Spirit gives us a new way a new way of thinking. Like the wind, which comes from we know not where, what has happened to us when we meet Jesus seems mysterious and unexplainable—we can’t see it; we can’t touch it, but it is real and life changing—like being “born again.”

III. Now I want to talk about what “born again” doesn’t mean.

A. It doesn’t mean that if you haven’t had an earth-shaking experience that happened on a certain day and in a certain hour, you are not a child of God. And it doesn’t mean that if you haven't got a story about how you “got saved,” you are on your way to hell.

Some people have wonderful stories. But most of us don’t. We came to understanding gradually, often as children. But even as adults, sometimes God works slowly, and we gradually come to the realization of what it means to have Jesus in our lives.

Some people pass through a period of doubt—a lack of assurance—they want to believe but aren’t sure their faith is good enough.

One way to determine the reality of faith in your life is to look at the change Jesus is making in you. We are not saved by our good works, but real faith makes a difference in our lives.

If your faith is real, you may not feel much different, but you will notice that you are becoming more generous, less critical of others, more forgiving, more serious about your faith. You will be looking for ways to serve others.

You will probably feel a peace and joy and contentment in your heart. You will not be so afraid to think about death, because you can believe that death is the doorway to wonderful eternal life with Jesus and all God’s family, and with the saints and angels.

CONCLUSION

I have known people who had such an earth-shaking experience of meeting Jesus that they are eager to tell you how they were “born again.”

I remember my cousin Duncan. He was the genius of the family. When he met Jesus he was such a changed person that one friend who had known him before and after said, “If the new Duncan wasn’t wearing the same skin as the old Duncan, I wouldn’t have known he was the same person.”

I think of Linda, who worked with us at the mental hospital. After Linda met Jesus one of her friends said, “Linda’s changed so much, it’s scary!”

I think of my friend Jim, who I met when he was an inmate in the state prison in Mt. Pleasant. Jim was a hard-core, violent criminal, in his thirties, who was serving his ninth sentence. You wouldn’t have wanted to know Jim in his unregenerate state. He was outstandingly wicked. But while in prison Jim had met Jesus and he was a transformed man. He was mellow. The counselors loved to have him in their classes because he was so helpful and such a good example to the other inmates.

Jim has been out of prison now for more than 30 years and he has been a faithful husband and father. He has been active in his union, in his neighborhood association, and in his church. For years he conducted weekly Bible studies in a prison—separate sessions for men and women. He and his wife have given hospitality to released offenders who needed a place to stay while they got on their feet.

Jim has no doubt in his mind about at what day and hour he gave himself to Jesus and was born again.

I don’t have a salvation story, but I don’t need one. I didn’t see the sun rise this morning, but I know it is up there.

Jesus said that those who believe in Jesus have “passed from death into life” (John 5:24). The natural state of humankind is to be spiritually dead, but when Christ comes into a life we are alive with the life of God. That’s what Jesus meant when he told Nicodemus, “You must be born again.”

So if you love Jesus, and you are living your life for him, and someone asks you if you have been born again, say, “Yes indeed, I have been born again. I belong to Jesus. He’s my Savior and Lord.”

One of the best definitions of a Christian is a person who has met God in Jesus Christ and is trusting him as Savior and obeying him as Lord.

John 4:1-30: Living Water for a Thirsty Soul

INTRODUCTION

In my hometown in Kansas, one of our nursing homes is called “Samaritan Lodge.”

“Samaritans” is an organization for helping people in distress. The Samaritans maintain hotlines for would-be suicides. They work in prisons. They serve in many countries around the world. Their advertisements say they are not a religious organization, but they are doing God’s work.

Our church donates to Samaritan’s Purse, a Christian organization that does charitable work around the world in the name of Jesus.

“Samaritan” seems to be a favorite way of identifying an organization that seeks to serve people.

The name, of course, comes from Jesus’s parable of The Good Samaritan, the story of the man who fell among robbers who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead.

After two Jewish religious leaders passed him by, a Samaritan came and bandaged his wounds, took him to an innkeeper and paid for his care. The self-sacrificing compassion of this unnamed man in Jesus’s story has inspired countless works of kindness during the past 2000 years since Jesus told the story.

The story I want to talk about today also involves a Samaritan. It is the story about the woman Jesus met at a well in Samaria. It comes from John, chapter 4.

I. Jesus was on his way from Judea to Galilee.

A. His route from Judea to Galilee led him through the province of Samaria.

Jesus and his disciples came to a city called Sychar.

While Jesus’s disciples went into the city to buy food, Jesus, wearied by his journey, sat down beside a well outside the city.

The well is still there. It is a tourist attraction.

B. While Jesus was resting, a Samaritan woman came with her water jar, and Jesus asked her for a drink.

The woman was surprised. She asked him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask drink of me, a woman of Samaria?”

She was taken aback because it was so inappropriate for a Jewish man to address a Samaritan woman in this way. Maybe she was teasing or taunting him. “You must really be thirsty to ask me for a drink!"

Proper Jewish men weren’t supposed to talk to women in public. I have read that Jewish men even refrained from talking to their wives in public. It just wasn’t good taste.

And especially, they didn’t address women they didn’t know in public.

And especially, especially, they didn’t talk to Samaritan women in public—and ask them for favors!

By entering into conversation with her, Jesus was showing unusual respect for her. It was not beneath him to ask her for a favor.

Do you know that it is often a kindness to ask someone for a favor?

To ask a small favor of someone—something you really need—allows that other person the pleasure of being helpful.

This story shows us how truly human Jesus was. He was tired; he was thirsty. He was sympathetic. He liked people, especially people who were looked down upon by other people.

And Samaritans were despised by Jews. The Jews considered them half-breed heretics. They weren’t as bad as heathen Gentiles, but they weren’t full-blooded Jews either.

Because of history that I won’t explain now, there was bad blood between the Jews and Samaritans—hatred and grudges and often violence. That is why the parable of the Good Samaritan is such a powerful illustration of self-giving compassion.

II. Now we come to the important part of the story.

A. When the woman said, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?” Jesus answered, “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.”

This aroused the woman’s curiosity. She replied, “Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep; where do you get that living water?”

(“Living water” is running water—from a spring—as contrasted with stagnant water from a cistern.)

B. Jesus said, “Every one who drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst; the water that I shall give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (vv13-14).

The woman was really wondering now, but this living water seemed like a good deal. She said, “Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, or come here to draw” (v15).

Then Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here” (v16).

Some people think Jesus was trying to confront this woman with her sinful life, but I think Jesus just wanted to have her husband there to share the good news he was going to tell her.

But she said, “I have no husband” (v17).

Then Jesus, calling on his prophetic powers, said, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; for you have had five husbands, and he whom you now have is not your husband; this you said truly” (vv17-18).

Jesus has put his finger on great sorrow in this woman’s life. She had had a tragic past. Perhaps some of these husbands had died. Perhaps some of them had dumped her. Whatever, she had experienced tragedy. Jesus’s heart went out to her.

And she sensed his compassion: “Sir, I perceive you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain; and you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship” (vv19-20).

Some preachers will tell you that the woman was embarrassed by the revelation of her failed marriages and was trying to change the subject. I don’t think so. What more would we want her to add about her unfortunate past?

The issue of where worship should be offered was a big question that divided the Jews from the Samaritans. She realized that Jesus was a prophet; here is the opportunity to find out the truth about something she had wondered about for a long time.

Jesus really loved this woman, and he sensed that she was hungering for God. She knew her need, and she, on her part, saw this kind, caring prophet as someone who knew her heart. She was ready to learn from him.

Have you ever noticed as you read the gospels how often Jesus sidestepped questions to talk about what was really important?

Jesus didn’t want to talk about where was the proper place for worship.

He said, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for such the Father seeks to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth” (vv21-24).

The woman said, “I know that the Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ); when he comes, he will show us all things.”

And Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am he” (vv25-26).

C. The saying about worship in spirit and in truth is one of Jesus’s deepest teachings.

Let’s consider what Jesus is saying. When Jesus says that God is to be worshiped in spirit and truth, he doesn’t mean that we don’t need to go to church—that true worship is something we do only inside our heads.

In spirit means that real worship is worship with heart and will. Worship is not an activity we engage in periodically. True worship is the giving of oneself to God in faith, love, and obedience.

In truth means with sincerity, according to the truth of who God is—our heavenly Father who loves us and gives himself to us in his love. True worship for Christians is molded by all that the Father has done for us in Jesus Christ who died for us and rose again.

We worship God in spirit and truth in our daily life when we pray and meditate on God’s Word and open our lives to God.

We worship God in spirit and truth at church with our fellow-believers, when we praise God, listen to his word, pray, and receive the Lord’s Supper together.

We worship God in spirit and in truth when we serve God as we go about our daily tasks with God always in mind.

And we worship God in spirit and truth when we serve God by serving others in humble, self-giving ways.

The conversation between Jesus and the woman must have gone on for some time to let these truths sink into her heart and excite her faith and love and a desire to share her good news. Always remember when you read the gospels that they provide only a sketch of what went on. We have to use our imaginations to fill in the details.

III. The woman was so fired up by what Jesus told her that she became a missionary, an apostle to the people of her town of Sychar.

A. She left her water jar at the well and ran back to the city to tell everyone the good news. “Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?” This tells me that the conversation at the well was a long conversation.

She had opened her heart to Jesus, and he had opened his heart to her. And it thrilled her to know that Jesus knew all about her—her craving for wholeness—and her broken past—and yet he loved her. And she felt that “living water” bubbling up inside her and peace and joy filled her heart.

She was a credible witness to her friends in town, and they streamed out of the town to meet Jesus. And Jesus stayed in that town for two days, and many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of your words that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world” (vv39-42).

B. That is all scripture tells us about the woman at the well. But tradition finishes the story.

The Eastern Orthodox churches celebrate the feast day of St. Photini on March 20. According to this tradition, Photini is the name the apostles gave her when they baptized her. She is the woman who left her water jar at the well to go tell her townspeople about Jesus.

Photini means “the enlightened one.”

She led her five sisters and two sons to faith in Jesus, and they all became tireless evangelists.

Many years later she died a martyr in Rome. The emperor Nero ordered her to renounce her faith. When she refused, she was tortured and thrown down a dry well, where she died for her faith in Jesus.

According to the story told in the Orthodox churches, her witness is said to have brought so many to the faith that she was called “equal to the apostles.”

CONCLUSION

Jesus told the woman, “Every one who drinks of this water will thirst again, but those who drink of the water that I will give will give never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life” (v14).

Water cleanses.

Water refreshes.

Water is necessary for life. A person can live for only about three days without water. A year ago Charlotte fell and was taken to the hospital in an ambulance. What had happened is that she had become dehydrated. It is important to drink plenty of water.

Water is often used as a metaphor in the Bible.

The prophet Jeremiah, speaking for God, laments:

“My people have committed two evils:

they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters,

and hewed out cisterns for themselves,

broken cisterns, that can hold no water” (Jeremiah 2:13).

In Psalm 36 we read these words:

How precious is thy steadfast love, O God!

The children of men take refuge in the shadow of they wings.

They feast on the abundance of thy house,

and thou givest them drink from the river of thy delights.

We used to sing this hymn:

I heard the voice of Jesus say,

“Behold I freely give

The living water; thirsty one,

Stoop down and drink and live.”

I came to Jesus and I drank

Of that life-giving stream;

My thirst was quenched, my soul revived,

And now I live in him.

Are you thirsty for God?

Have you found the water of life that is in Jesus?

Do you have in your life that well of water that bubbles up to eternal life?

Tell Jesus about it. Ask him to come into your life—to forgive you, cleanse you, and cheer you with salvation—the assurance that he will be your Savior and Friend for ever.

Mark 5:21-43: “Do Not Fear, Only Believe”

INTRODUCTION

It happened at Capernaum, a city on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee. Capernaum was the hometown of Peter and Andrew, two of Jesus’s first disciples.

Jesus also spent time there and had become somewhat of a celebrity because of the miracles of healing that he performed there.

On the day I’m going to tell you about, Jesus was surrounded by a great crowd. They were following him, watching him to see what he would do next.

We don’t know what his plans were for that day, but whatever they were, they were interrupted when an important man in the city, Jairus by name, ran up to Jesus, fell at his feet and told him that his little daughter was at the point of death and begged him to come lay his hands on her, so that she might be made well.

So Jesus followed, surrounded by the crowd of curiosity seekers.

But there was an interruption. That is the story we talked about at our last meeting—the story of the woman with the flow of blood who was healed by touching the hem of Jesus’s garment.

While Jesus was speaking to the now healed woman, explaining to her that it was her own faith that had allowed God’s healing power to flow into her body, people came from the ruler’s house with the terrible news that Jesus was too late: the ruler’s little girl had died.

Jairus’s friends thought they were being helpful when they said, “Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the Teacher any further?”

But Jesus, ignoring what they said, told Jairus, “Do not fear, only believe.”

I want to talk about that saying, “Do not fear, only believe,” but first let’s watch what happened when Jesus got to Jairus’s house.

Mark 5:37-43

And Jesus allowed no one to follow him except Peter and James and John the brother of James. When they came to the house of the ruler of the synagogue, Jesus saw a tumult, and people weeping and wailing loudly.

And when he had entered, he said to them, “Why do you make a tumult and weep? The child is not dead but sleeping.” And they laughed at him.

But he put them all outside and took the child’s father and mother and those who were with him, and went in where the child was.

Taking her by the hand he said to her, “Talitha cumi”; which means, “Little girl, I say to you arise.” And immediately the girl got up and walked; for she was twelve years old. And immediately they were overcome with amazement. And he strictly charged them that no one should know this, and told them to give her something to eat.

I. Let’s take ourselves in our imagination to the house of Jairus, his wife, and his little girl.

A. Evidently, the girl had been so gravely ill that the family had prepared for her impending death and had already hired mourners to help them express their grief.

In that country people didn’t believe in holding their grief in when a loved one died. They wept and wailed; they let their feelings take over.

And they hired professional mourners to come to help them let out their grief.

These were the people who laughed when Jesus solemnly announced, “The child is not dead but sleeping.”

B. So Jesus then put all of these outsiders out of the house, and taking only the child’s father and mother and the three disciples went into the bedroom where the child was lying.

I think Jesus limited the witnesses to those five because the bedroom was small, and when the little girl woke up she didn’t need to see a room packed with gawkers.

Also, Jesus didn’t crave the publicity that spectacular miracles brought him. It was more important that people listen to his words than that they would marvel at his deeds.

C. Jesus healed people in many different ways—sometimes with a word, sometimes with a touch, sometimes at a distance, sometimes by giving them something to do.

But this time Jesus—with great tenderness—took the little girl’s hand and said these words, “Talitha Cumi”: which means—in the Aramaic language Jesus spoke—“Little girl, get up.”

At that, the girl got up and walked around the room. She was really well and strong—no convalescing needed.

D. Then we read, “They were overcome with amazement!” I can imagine the astonishment of the three disciples and the tears of joy of mother and dad as the child got up and began to take steps around the room. She was as astonished as anyone.

But Jesus told them not to make a big deal of this event. “Don’t talk about it. Just give her something to eat.”

Of course the next day the child would be outside with her friends. People would know that she was the one who had died. But Jesus wanted to keep the excitement down. He had other important work to do besides healing the sick.

His miracles were signs for those who believe, not spectacles to amaze the unbelievers. Jesus had learned by sad experience that people could even watch miracles with their own eyes, and find some other explanation for what they saw. Miracles didn’t so much inspire faith as confirm faith in those who were ready to believe.

II. I want to pause here and talk about the part of the story that puzzles me. Jesus said to the distraught Jairus: “Do not be afraid, only believe.”

A. Now that saying works for Jairus, because Jesus says it. And Jesus knew what he was going to do. Jairus could rest his faith in Jesus, without fear of disappointment because the Miracle Worker was standing beside him.

But those words are often used to assure suffering people that they don’t need to be afraid—because if they just believe hard enough everything will just turn out just fine.

But you know and I know that faith is a struggle. Things don’t always turn out just fine. We have no guarantees. No matter how long we have walked with God, we always run the risk being disappointed.

I pray every day for friends with dire problems in their lives—grave illnesses…failing marriages…joblessness…relationship problems.

I pray with as much faith as I can muster, but I still fear—because experience teaches me that we don’t always see happy endings.

Sometimes the remarkable answers to prayer—miraculous healings and such—actually make it harder to accept the tragedies that happen to our loved ones. We wonder: Why does God work a miracle with this one and not with that one?

Several weeks ago at church we had a testimony from a man who had had terminal cancer, but God had healed him. It was an impressive miracle he told us about. But as I listened I wondered: How are people taking this who have lost loved ones they also prayed for—but no miracle?

If prayer works, why doesn’t it always work?

Why is that sometimes people with strong faith still experience tragedies?

B. Let’s talk about faith and its opposites. Faith has three opposites:

1. The first opposite of faith is unbelief. Sometimes people don’t want to believe. When Jesus came to his hometown of Nazareth, we read, “He did not do many mighty works there, because of their unbelief” (Matthew 13:58).

2. Another opposite of faith is doubt. Sometimes people want desperately to believe, but can’t. When they told Thomas, “Christ has risen,” he said, “Unless I see in his hands the print of the nails, and place my finger in the mark of the nails, and place my hand in his side, I will not believe” (John 2:25). Thomas desperately wanted to believe, but he couldn’t.

3. The third opposite of faith is fear. Jesus said to Jairus, “Do not fear, only believe” (verse 36).

III. I will tell you my experience with fear.

A. I was in Korea during the war when one night the Chinese broke through our front lines and overran our position. I was lying on a hillside watching the shooting in the valley below. I thought there was a good possibility that that would be my last night on earth. But I wasn’t overcome with fear, because I knew the God was with me.

B. But many years later I had an experience that frightened me so much that I wondered if I could keep believing that God was real

It happened in 1972; I was 42 years old. Susan and Peter were in junior high school and John had begun high school. I had taken Charlotte to the hospital for some fairly routine surgery, but it had gone wrong—not one thing, but several things.

Just after the surgery, she was near death. It was a trying experience, but I felt strong in my faith—for the first week.

But the ordeal went on and on—week after week. She was in intensive care for a month. Day after day, I could visit her for five minutes every hour.

As I watched her grow weaker and weaker, I was sure she would die. One night I came home from a visit and was so sure that she would die during the night that I sat down and wrote out an obituary. I thought, At least I can get that out of the way.

I even prayed that she would die, since I knew she couldn’t get well.

Added to the anxiety about her sickness, were the mounting hospital and doctor bills. In those days teachers didn’t get health insurance from their employer, and we had no insurance. Our medical bills had always been manageable.

But I could only imagine the thousands and thousands of dollars this was going to cost.

I remember well the day when I was called to the hospital business office. An accountant opened a big book and showed me all the numbers. She asked, “What are you going to about this?”

The bills were approaching my yearly wage from teaching. And for all I knew Charlotte could be in the hospital for years and years. I could never make enough money to pay for all of this.

My faith was growing weaker by the day. I began to wonder whether there was a God or not. I had thought I was a mature Christian. I had taught Sunday school. I had preached sermons. But now I was having strong doubts.

If someone had told me, “Don’t fear, only believe,” I would have told them they just didn’t understand. How could I help being afraid? I was terrified.

I felt my faith ebbing away.

I thought to myself: Maybe there’s not a God. Probably there’s not a God. I’ve built my life on something that isn’t real!

But I also thought, Even if there’s probably not a God, there’s still the possibility that God is real. I’ll hang onto that.

We belonged to a loving, faith-filled Free Methodist church. Our friends were praying every day. They even made a schedule for praying, and some of them were rising in the night to pray for Charlotte.

They brought supper every evening for two months.

I was hanging on, more to their faith than I was to my own.

Sometimes I couldn’t pray, so I just repeated The Lord’s Prayer over and over.

I kept teaching my Sunday school class. I kept up my tithing. I acted like I had faith. I kept telling myself, “Maybe it’s true. I’ll hang onto that.”

After that month in intensive care, they moved Charlotte to the regular part of the hospital. The children were allowed to visit her for the first time since her admission.

And after two months she was well enough to come home.

We thought she would have a permanent disability. But we were rejoicing. Our friends from church were talking about a miracle.

And my faith came back.

In fact, I treasure that experience because I have come to believe that of all time times in my life, that was the time when God was most near.

I know that all of you have experienced troubles as fearful as mine. And many of you have not had happy ending I experienced. But my experience taught me a bit of what it’s like to almost lose my faith.

CONCLUSION

So let me tell you how I take Jesus’s saying, “Do not be afraid, only believe.”

Experience teaches me that no matter how much I pray and try to believe, sometimes the thing I pray for doesn’t happen. And I can’t always understand why.

I pray for my sick friends, and I always pray that they will be healed. I’ve had some remarkable answers to prayer, but sometimes I don’t get what I ask for.

But here are some other ways to pray with faith—even with no guarantees.

1. Whenever I pray, I pray I believe that God hears me, that he loves me, and that he will do what is best for me—and for the one I am praying for. Just to know that God is near helps to banish fear.

2. Whenever I pray a desperate prayer, I can take heart in knowing that God can make it come right in the end. God has all eternity to make things right. I have enough faith to believe that.

3. When I am afraid, I try to act on the faith I have. When I thought my faith was almost gone, I still tried to live as if I had faith. I kept going to church—giving and serving. In my doubting I kept trying to live for God.

4. One thing I learned from my trouble is that I’m not as strong as I thought I was. Knowing how weak I am, I try, by all means possible, to live as close to God as I can, so that when trouble comes again I will cling to God.

Margaret Hayes was a missionary nurse who was in the Congo during the terrible war of 1964-65. She was captured by the rebel Simbas and saw dozens of her fellow missionaries tortured and killed. She was in captivity for seven months. Every day she lived thinking, This may be the day I will be killed.

But one day the Lord gave her this verse, Mark 5:36: “Do not be afraid, only believe.” She said, “I knew that whether I lived or died, the Lord had everything in hand.” Those words made the difference.

Finally, United States and Congo forces rescued Nurse Hayes and the surviving captives. But even if she had had to die for her faith, she would have known that God was with her.

Let’s take those words with us as we face the troubles that await us. “Do not fear, only believe.” They don’t promise answers to all our prayers. They don’t promise that we won’t feel overwhelmed sometimes.

They don’t promise that we’ll have all happy endings as far as this life is concerned. But they promise that God is always with us—that when we walk through the dark valley, he will be at our side. And we can prepare for those times by walking through every day just as close to Jesus as we can.

(Another message on this text was posted 1-18-2010)