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Food For Disciples | David Fisher

Y’all ready to study the scriptures together? Let’s turn to John 4, fourth chapter of John. I hope that you had a blessed week. For those of you who were not here last week, I kind of give you the the real short skinny on what we did is we were we were talking about the Jesus’s first miracle where his mama came to him says they don’t have any wine and Jesus turned water into wine.

He did the impossible thing, the thing that was not expected, completely unexpected, but God showed up and it said there that his disciples believed in him and so his disciples started following him. We’re going to go over here to chapter 4 because this is the next part of the book of John that really speaks about the disciples’ involvement. Y’all want to be a disciple? I want to be a disciple.

You know, we can grow in numbers. It’s always good to grow in numbers, but it’s even more important to grow inside, right, to get those roots that are deep and but part of becoming a disciple is growing. When Jesus called his disciples, they weren’t already pre-packaged, you know, ready to go, ready to hit the road, ready for heaven.

You know, they just one was a tax collector, one was a zealot, I mean kind of a radical guy, and you had a bunch of fishermen. They weren’t religiously trained in the in the ways that the religious leaders were. They’re just regular old folk and Jesus had to do a lot of teaching.

The truth is we’re just regular folk and we come to Jesus and we got a lot of teaching that we need to learn. The disciples, the good thing about a disciple maker is a disciple maker doesn’t just teach you things you need to learn, but he begins to share his life with you and that’s exactly what Jesus did. He began to share his life with these men and it says here in chapter four they’ve been down baptizing.

In fact, his disciples were learning to baptize now, so that disciples are baptizing and it’s time for them now to go from Judea, which is down in the south, down around Jerusalem, and head up toward Galilee. That’s where Jesus was going to do some of his ministries. And it says here in verse four, but he needed to go through Samaria.

Well that’s from one perspective, I guess that’s true because it was that’s how that’s what John wrote, but he didn’t have to go through Samaria. So he could have gone off to the east and gone up the Jordan River like a lot of the good Jews did who didn’t want to have to mess and interact with Samaritans, or he could have gone further to the to the west along the Mediterranean Sea. There are three alternate routes to get you up there.

The one through Samaria was the shortest and it was the closest, but it was also the most dangerous because Samaritans and Jews did not care for each other. Lots of stories in history about the Jews and the Samaritans fighting with one another, especially when Jews were going on a religious pilgrimage and the Samaritans would start some type of scuffle because they had a basic disagreement on where the temple should be. Samaritans believed it should be on Mount Gerizim, which is in Samaria.

Jews believed it should be in Jerusalem. Big difference. They said we should worship here.

Samaritans say you should worship there. Big disagreement. Lots of friction.

Lots of disagreement. And Jesus needed to go through Samaria. And so he’s heading through Samaria and he comes to a town that’s called Sychar.

It’s right here. There’s a well that was apparently dug by Jacob way back when, way, way, way back when. There’s a lot of important things happened in this little valley where this well was all the way back to Exodus.

Lots of things happened. Place of great history. And now Jesus is walking through it and he’s tired.

He’s starting to get a little elevation to it and so he’s tired. He’s still a man and he’s tired. And the scripture said he’s wearied from his trip.

And what he does is it gets around noontime and they get to the well and he says, I’m going to sit here. And his disciples go on because the disciples kind of say the same thing that his mama had said. We don’t have any more wine.

Disciples says we don’t got any food. So they take off and they leave Jesus behind. And so his disciples go into the next village, I guess, to go buy food.

They’re going to bring it back to Jesus. Jesus stays right there. And it says a woman from Samaria, a woman of Samaria.

It never gives her name. A woman of Samaria shows up and Jesus does something that a good Jewish man would never do. He speaks to her.

We don’t think of that so strange in our society, but in that society, that’s just unheard of. Not only was it because she was a woman, but because she was a Samaritan. And he says, give me something to drink.

Maybe she’s going to put some poison in there or something. You’re asking your enemy to give you something to drink. He does something that just would not have been done.

He engages her. He engages with somebody who is not their kind. The sermon today is not going to be the discussion that he has with her.

We’re going to skip through that. But in a nutshell, he really talked to her, not because he wanted something from her, but because he wanted to give her something. He said, man, if you just knew who I was, and you knew I was here, I’d be giving you life eternal.

I’ll give you the spring of living. I said I wasn’t going to talk about that, but I couldn’t help it. He said, I want the spring of living water.

He says, if you had known who I was. See, Jesus didn’t interact with her with a question. He didn’t interact with her trying to do anything other than just say, can you give me a drink? He started the conversation.

It’s kind of like you and Walmart saying something to somebody. How’s the weather? Will you do a price check for me? I don’t know. He just started a discussion.

And before it’s all gone, he’s already told her lots of things about her life that nobody would have known unless he was a prophet. In fact, she’s the very first person, this Samaritan woman is the very first person that we have recorded in scriptures that Jesus actually said, I am the Christ. Isn’t that amazing? He didn’t pick to go tell the chief priest.

He didn’t tell to go tell the high priest. He didn’t go tell the priest or the Pharisees or the Sadducees or any of the religious people in Jerusalem. He told this wonderful proclamation of who he was to a Samaritan woman all by himself.

And that’s a blessing, isn’t it? And so she started believing and she just leaves her water pot there and she goes off to town. Right about that time, his disciples come back from town. I guess they got some bags of food and they’re shocked because he’s sitting there talking to a woman, a Samaritan woman, and they saw it.

I don’t know if you would have been a disciple of Jesus at that time, whether it would have shocked you, but I can tell you it shocked them. And they said, they were really afraid to challenge him because he’s the master, they’re the disciple. The master’s got to have a reason for doing what he’s doing.

He’s starting to teach them something out of the ordinary that they needed to understand if they’re going to be disciple makers. One of our mottos is us changing lives and making disciples through the power of the Holy Spirit. It’s important for us to know how to make disciples.

But before you can make a disciple, you need to be a disciple, don’t you? We need to be disciples. It means we’re growing, we’re growing, we’re learning. Whatever he says we do, we learn and we accept what he says, even when it shatters our conventions, even when it shatters the things that we’ve grown up with, even when it’s contradictory to our home teaching.

Here we are in verse 27. Jesus is talking to this woman, but they don’t even ask him, why are you talking to her? This woman leaves and she goes back to the city. In the meantime, his disciples then say, Rabbi, here, we’ve got some food.

Here, eat. And Jesus says one of the most beautiful things. In verse 32, he said to them, I have food to eat of which you do not know.

Of course, being good disciples, they didn’t have a clue what he was talking about. I have food to eat of which you do not know. And so they said, well, did somebody bring them something to eat? See, the disciples are thinking physical.

Jesus is talking spiritual. They’re thinking about real food. Jesus is talking about spiritual food.

He’s saying, I sent you off to go do something, but you came back and brought me food. That’s not what I don’t need. Did y’all not see me turn water into wine? I don’t need you to go give me food, disciples.

What I need you to do is what I’ve asked you to do. We want to see exactly what Jesus had asked them to do. He sent them on ahead before he got there and they came back with nothing but physical food.

He sent a Samaritan woman to town and she came back with all of her friends. Isn’t that amazing? The Samaritan woman went and did exactly what he wanted his disciples to do is go bring some of the folks around here to me so they can learn from me. And what did they bring? A bag of food, some chips and hot sauce.

I don’t know what they brought. I don’t know. It was probably some matzo bread or some, they’re not anywhere close to the coast because it probably wasn’t fish.

So probably some loaves of bread. I bet they had good hot sauce there too. I don’t know, shawarma.

If you’ve ever been over to the Middle East, maybe shawarma. They brought them something good to eat and Jesus says, that’s not what I need. What I need is for you to do what I asked you to do.

Let’s just see what he did. And so he says, my food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. You don’t like to eat? I know you couldn’t tell, but I like to eat too.

And I like to eat good food. My wife is a good cook. Good cook.

You can tell. The proof is in the pudding. Right? Good cook.

I love to eat. We all gotta eat, right? Y’all gotta eat. We all gotta eat.

And when you eat, there’s something. Do y’all enjoy eating? It’s not just, I gotta eat some food. It’s not the gruel.

You know, you gotta stuff it. Just, I need, I need substance. I just need some food.

No, you enjoy, you enjoy eating. And when it’s something, and when you haven’t eaten in a long time, everything tastes good. Doesn’t it? But everything tastes good.

Doesn’t it? Everything tastes good. And you get some enjoyment out of it. You take, and when you eat it, what do you do? I enjoy eating.

Jesus says, I have food. I have something that I enjoy. I have something that gives me substance.

I have something that gives me strength. And I just don’t have strength, but I enjoy it. What is it, Jesus? He says, well, I just do what my Father tells me to do.

And it makes me feel good, because that’s what He sent me to do. When you’ve gone and done something that somebody sent you to come back, and you’ve done it, and they say, good job, how do you feel? I did what He asked me to do. Especially when it’s somebody you respect, you know.

He said, it’s not just a job, it’s something that you enjoy. And don’t you know the Father is telling Him all the time, Son, you’re doing a good job. Jesus is just filled with this joy, because He’s doing the will of His Father.

He’s sitting at a well at noon, and He’s talking to a Samaritan woman, and His Father is saying, well done, well done, my Son, in whom I’m so pleased. Because there’s still work to be done. We think of creation.

Creation lasted how many days? Six. Six days, and then the seventh, rest, right? No work to be done on the seventh. But there’s still work to be done.

Jesus was sent to this earth because there was work to be done. There was a sacrifice to make. There were people to save.

There were people to redeem. And even though God worked through the Jewish people and the prophecies came through the Jewish people, the intent was not just to save the Jewish people, the intent was to save the entire world. And the Jewish people forgot that.

They’d lost it. They believe that it’s just for them. I’ll tell you what, the Christian church in our nation is off track if we think this message of the Gospel is just for us.

It is not for just us. It is for people in every tribe, in every tongue, in every nation, because you know who’s going to be in heaven? People from every tribe, in every tongue, in every nation. And there’s work to be done.

And if we’re his disciples, he’s calling on us to do that work. Jesus keeps talking to them, says, don’t you not say there’s still four months and then comes the harvest. What he means is a lot of times if you’re going to get a harvest, it takes time, right? It’s going to take in this four months from the time that they sow the seed until it grows and it’s sowing.

You’re not looking for results for until sometime later. Jesus is what he’s telling them is it’s important for us to sow seeds. Y’all have heard probably sermons about sowing seeds all of your Christian life, haven’t you? And that’s a good teaching.

It is a wise teaching. It’s a smart teaching. He asked us to sow the seed.

And so we can get content if sowing a seed every now and then, not expecting there to be a harvest quickly, because we know it takes time. And it’s good that we take time with people. You know, you don’t just beat them over the head.

We know sometimes the Lord and the Holy Spirit works on people for years and years and years before they ever come. But I’m going to tell you what Jesus wanted them to do. He sent them to this next Samaritan town to have open eyes.

He says, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields. Quit looking at yourself. Look at them.

Look at these lost people. And they are white unto harvest. They are already white unto harvest.

If we spend all of our time just trying to sow seeds, but not trying to reap a harvest, all we’re doing is sowing seeds. And there’s got to be somebody sowing, right? Every year there’s got to be somebody sowing. But sometime I think to have the salvation of somebody who’s a friend, I’ve got to be the one to start it.

I’ve got to be the one to tend to them. It all becomes about who? It all becomes about me. It’s my responsibility to plant their seed.

It’s my responsibility to water their seed. It’s my responsibility to weed their garden. It’s my responsibility then to bring them to harvest.

But you know, sometimes the Lord doesn’t have you doing all those processes. That’s the work of the church, not the work necessarily of you. Paul talks about that.

One waters, one plants, one sows, one digs up the soil. It takes all of us to bring a harvest. And Jesus sent all of his disciples all together to a town of Samaria and they came back empty-handed.

But the Samaritan woman brought her friends because she had met Jesus. Well, they had met Jesus. They’d seen Jesus turn water into wine.

I wonder how many Samaritans they talked to about Jesus when they went to the next village. Y’all have a good guess? I bet it was zero. I bet it was zero.

There are Samaritans. We’re Jews. They’re bad.

We’re good. They’re them. We’re us.

And Jesus wants them to look past themselves and look past their kind and bring them to Jesus. The fields are already white into harvest. The person who reaps receives wages and gathers fruit for eternal life.

And this stuff is not just temporary. This stuff is real. This stuff lasts forever.

This is eternal life that we’re dealing with. We are carrying the instruments and the key to eternal life in us as disciples. Y’all know how valuable that is and how often I keep it to myself.

How about you? I’m not trying to put a guilt trip on anybody. I just want us to open our eyes. See, what Jesus did is he challenged his disciples.

And it’s our job to challenge each other to open our eyes and look at the fields. Let’s go about doing the business of the Father. Let’s go about it together as a body of believers.

He said, both he who sows and he who reaps, they rejoice. The one who sows is important. The one who reaps, the one who gathers, the one who gathers the produce, the one who gathers the produce, you don’t have a harvest unless somebody is gathering.

Verse 38, what is it that Jesus sent them to do? I sent you to reap. I sent you to reap that for which you’ve not labored. Others have labored and you have entered into their labors.

This is a radical shift in my change in the way I think about how we treat others as disciples. Because I have heard all of my life the importance of sowing the seed. You have too.

Jesus is saying, I want you to reap. He didn’t say, I sent you to sow. He said, I sent you to reap.

Please don’t misunderstand me. Sowing is important. Sowing is very important.

Somebody is already doing the sowing. But we are coming in contact with people who’ve already had some seeds planted in their lives. We are not dealing with people who are blank slates.

We are dealing with we are not dealing with, with ground that has not been plowed by somebody. The Holy Spirit goes before you and prepares hearts. And there’s times when I have shared something good about God and the person just went, and there’s sometimes I’ve shared the same exact thing.

And that person says, wow, is it because of the way I said it? No, they’re just starting to get ready to be reaped. It’s not about me. I’m just part of the process.

Disciples are part of the process of reaping souls unto Jesus, bringing people to Jesus. It’s my hope. And it’s my prayer that Jesus will teach you this lesson this week.

I sent you to reap because there’s a lot of people that we come in contact with, and they’re not necessarily our friends, and they’re not our kind of folk. You know who Jesus is trying to reach? Somebody more than my kind of folk. He’s doing it.

He said, I want you to reap. I guess you can wonder, well, what the heck does that mean? I want to reap. Well, when they would reap, they would have to get a big sickle, big long harvesting, like a big giant knife with a blade and lay it down.

That’s a decision moment. You’re either still growing or you cut down. I mean, it’s a yes or no.

It’s you start bringing people to decisions, and then you gather them and you bring them to Jesus. You don’t cut them down to wound them. You don’t cut them down to leave them in the field.

We don’t cut them down by beating them over the head with scriptures to tell them how bad they are. They usually know how bad they are. Sinners sin.

That’s what sinners do. And this woman who had just met Jesus, she hadn’t seen a miracle. She hadn’t spent time with him.

The only thing she got was him saying, I know you’ve had five husbands, and the man you live with is not your husband. And she says, I perceive that you are a prophet. That’s all the experience she had with Jesus.

And lo and behold, after Jesus has talked to his disciples, it said many of the Samaritans of that city believed in him because of what that woman went and testified about. How long has it been since you have testified to someone about who Jesus is and what Jesus says about you and done in your life? Let’s be honest. Like that chili commercial, that’s too long.

Is this true? It’s been too long. It’s been too long since we just said, you know what? Jesus did this for me. Jesus knows everything about me.

Jesus took me out of this problem, and he put me on a higher road. Jesus brought me out of this brokenness and has healed me. Jesus has touched my life, and it made a difference for me.

And then you bring him to Jesus. So people believe because of what she said, but then a whole bunch of them came, and they asked Jesus to hang around for two more days, or they asked him to stay. He stayed for two more days and sat there touching them and talking with them, and they began to experience Jesus themselves.

I think that’s a great reason to bring people to church, is you just want to bring them to see Jesus, and you want somebody to speak the words of Jesus to them and to know something about Jesus, because reaping is gathering. It’s what you do. You don’t just cut it.

You don’t just cut it. You gather it, and then you bring it where it’s now going to be used and of value, isn’t it? And Jesus told his disciples, I sent you to reap. And when these people from Samaria said, and many more believed because of Jesus’s word.

And they said to the woman, now we believe not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard him and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world. It’s not just enough just for them to say, I know you believe it, and that’s good for you. It’s to bring them to Jesus so they can hear it from Jesus, so they can have experienced the presence of God, so that they can be around others who will love them and hug them and hold them and to share the love of Jesus.

My hope and my prayer for this church is that we will be disciples. The downside of being a disciple is it’s a full-time gig. And you know what? Jesus wasn’t afraid to tell his disciples when they were wrong.

And he wasn’t afraid to tell his disciples, you missed the boat. I didn’t need the food. I need you to go reap and bring people to me here at the well.

I’m going to tell you what, there was a Samaritan woman who listened. And her name is in the book of life. And there are a lot of her neighbors whose names are in the book of life because she did what the disciples were afraid to do.

Now we’re going to have to reach out to people who don’t look like you, talk like you, or think like you. My question is, are we willing to do it? My hope and my prayer is that as disciples we’ll start growing deeper. I hope that God will, you can just come before the Father.

We’re going to have a time of prayer here in a second. And we’re going to have a time of, I’m going to ask the elders to come up. And I’m going to ask the prayer partners to come up to the other side here in a moment because people need prayer.

And so I’m asking you to do that here in a second. But my hope, and I’ve said this a lot of times, that you will this week ask God to open your eyes to see them not as them, those kind, them, those people that you haven’t, you have no respect for, those people you’ve looked down upon, those people that you may even consider to have been your enemies, and for God to show you that they may be white unto harvest. And for you just to speak something to them that starts the discussion.

Jesus started the discussion just saying, will you give me something to drink? If they think you’re trying to sell them on something, they’ve heard it, been burned before. You just let them know you care, that you’ve got something to give to them, not something to sell to them. I’m going to tell you, the church will grow, not only will you grow deeper, but you know what? When you start doing that, you’re going to have a satisfaction that’s better than eating some of grandma’s chocolate pie.

You’re going to enjoy it. You say, man, this sticks to my ribs. This is something I enjoy.

I can have another helping of that, please. I believe that with all of my heart, that if we will start, if we will start just saying, Father, give me, show me who it is who’s white unto harvest, that God is going to create a harvest that’s beyond our imagination. And it’s going to feel so good.

Because your Father is going to say, well done. You’ve done good, Margaret. You’ve done good, Judy.

You’ve done good. Anthony, you’ve done good. And don’t you want to hear that from your Father? Man, I do.