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Welcome to the Daily Blade. The Word of God is described as the sword of the Spirit, the primary spiritual weapon in the Christian's armor against the forces of evil. Your hosts are Joby Martin and Kyle Thompson, and they stand ready to equip men for the fight. Let's sharpen up.

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All right, welcome back to the Daily Blade. We're gonna pick it up in our second day, in John, chapter 4, and one of the beautiful things about the scriptures is that Jesus meets us right where we are. So yesterday we talked about the reality that Jesus had to pass through Samaria, and the reason is because he has this divine appointment. We'll pick it up in chapter 4, verse 7, and the Bible says that a woman from Samaria came to draw water. Now, if you knew a lot about first century culture, especially Jewish culture, you would realize that she already has three strikes against her. So one, she is a woman, and it was not customary at all for a man to hang out with a woman, especially a married woman or a divorced woman, in public like this. That's strike one. Secondly, she is a Gentile. She is not a God lover, she is a Gentile. And third, she is a Samaritan, and so that's not good, like I mentioned yesterday, that the Jews and the Samaritans did not get along. And then even there's something greater than this that she is a sinner. A part of what you'll see is that they are at the well in the middle of the day, and most of the town's women would come early in the morning when it is cool, and late in the evening when it is cool, to fetch their water. But this woman has been ostracized by her own sin that we'll pick up on a little later in the chapter and yet, even though she's got these strikes against her, she's a woman, she's a Samaritan and she's a sinner. Jesus still meets with her and Jesus said to her give me a drink, for the disciples had gone away into the city to buy some food. And the Samaritan woman said to Jesus how is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria? For Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans. And Jesus 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. What I want you to see here is that Jesus is pursuing the heart of this woman for her own salvation. He's going against cultural norms, he's going against what other people would call religious norms, he's going against societal norms, and he is willing to break through all of these barriers that men and tradition have put up in order to pursue the heart of the lost.

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Verse 11,. And the woman said to him sir, you have nothing to draw water with and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, and did his son, as did his sons and his livestock.

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And Jesus says to her now, what Jesus is going to do at this point is he starts off talking about water and now he's going to make a shift, something that she can understand in the natural, to talk about the supernatural. This is Jesus's gospel pitch. He says everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again. Now I don't know if she's putting this together yet, but a part of what Jesus is saying is the reason that you have to come back to this well, over and over and over, is because it will never fully and finally satisfy. And, woman from Samaria, that's like your life. You keep looking for satisfaction in the temporary things of this world, but they were never fully and finally satisfied.

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Verse 14,. But whoever drinks of the water that I 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. And the woman said to him sir, give me this water so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw this water. Now, here's the thing I want you to see. This is Jesus's gospel invitation. You are looking for life in places that don't offer life, and the author of life is sitting right here with you. That's the invitation.

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But what I love about this is that Jesus doesn't wait for her to get to her, act together and then earn his presence. No, no, no, no. You see, nobody is too far gone. No one is outside of the reach of the grace of God, that there is more grace in Jesus than sin in you, and it could be the fact that you're listening to this daily blade right now, wherever you are in the gym, in the car, in your office, wherever it is. This could be empirical evidence that the God of the universe is chasing you down right where you are not telling you get your act together and clean yourself up so that you will be able to stand in front of me.

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Acceptable no, no, no, no, no. He's saying, in spite of your sin, in spite of your rebellion, in spite of you running from me, that Jesus has come to offer us something that none of us, by our own merit, have deserved. That Jesus is offering to us this living water that changes us from the inside out, that Jesus is offering us his grace. You can continue to chase after the things of this world, but they just will never fully and finally satisfy. You can continue to chase after the things of this world, but they just will never fully and finally satisfy. And the ultimate one, the one that made you for him, the one that created you to be in a relationship with him, says no matter who you are or what you've done, if you come to me now through surrender, your sin will be washed away, your name will be changed and even you will be adopted into the family of God. Amen.

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Thank you for listening to today's episode Before you go. If you want to help equip other men for the fight, share this podcast around and leave us a five-star rating and review. Stay sharp.