It is a wonderful thing to think of the reality of the intimacy with which the Lord carried on His intercourse with people in this world—His ways and manners with them—and who He is. In truth it changes all our thought of God. He has visited men before the day of judgment, and we find Him giving, and not judging—dealing with them in quite another way. He who is to be the Judge had to come beforehand to be the Saviour had come in grace seeking worshippers; come to visit the hearts of men where they were naughty hearts; coming to such, not to judge at all but to deal with our souls about the very sins for which; He would have to judge us. He has dealt with the sins already in a totally different way. It confirms the judgment, of course puts the seal of God’s testimony on it in the strongest way; but at the same time it gives us to know and understand that the whole thing is decided in a totally opposite manner... Instead of coming to claim the debt, He comes to pay it; both ways prove the debt was there, but the dealing with sinners is in a totally different way—dealing effectually, and that is the Gospel! “The Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world.” It is a Saviour we have to tell of, and I could not thus speak. if He were not a Saviour who had wrought an effectual salvation. Then comes exercises of heart, and the discovery of what we are, to bring us to repentance; but it tells us we are saved. “Thy faith path saved thee, go in peace.” It was at all cost to Himself, but He did not recall it, or deceive her. Can we go in peace? We go out of this room with the consciousness that we go on the Lord’s own warrant, in perfect peace, and with nothing to fear as to the consequences of sin, if He has said, “Go in peace.”
Beloved friends, have you peace? Have you got what He announced and sent out to be preached? It is no good telling me you cannot have peace. There it is. Was it to be preached and not believed? God would have us happy with Himself, and therefore sends peace. It is no light thing, for He has made peace through the blood of His. cross; being justified is a real thing, an effectual thing, a divine thing, founded on what has been perfectly done. If I believe, I come to enjoy it; if I reject it I am guilty. It is that God has visited us to bring us peace. “In the world ye shall have tribulation; in me, peace.” Hence God gives Himself over and over again, the name— “God of peace.” It is the name of predilection which He gives Himself. He never calls Himself the God of joy; that may change, but peace is eternally settled.
We will see how He dealt with this woman. It was thorough grace. “Salvation is of the Jews.” They had the Law, the Temple, everything that belonged to God, like the elder brother. But the Jews cast Him out, and He must needs go through Samaria. This was the beginning of His ministry. The Pharisees were jealous of Him, so He goes out and leaves this place of salvation according to promise. It is the terrible condition of the world that the Son of God has been in it, and they cast Him out. He came there and has been rejected, and the testimony is, that the whole world lieth in wickedness. The world not only sinned, but rejected Him who came into it when man had sinned, the world that had grown up since God cast man out of Eden. God came into it, and they cast Him out. If I call myself a Christian I profess that the world has crucified the Son of God. Still the grace goes on. God took that as the means and occasion to bring it out. That is what is so glorious in the Cross; that which was the perfect expression of man’s enmity, was the perfect expression of God’s love. There was the meeting-place of man’s hatred against God, and God’s sovereign love to man. He was not at it yet, but was walking in the grace and spirit of it. Here, rejected out of Judea, he must needs go through Samaria, and we get the blessed truth that God is above all sin, because Samaria was most hateful. He can exercise love in the scene of the thing He abhors. “God commendeth his love towards us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.” He gave His blessed Son, one with Himself, to death, and to drink the cup of wrath for those who were nothing but sinners. “God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself.”
Now mark another thing we have here. We find Him thoroughly a man come down to this world, having made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a servant, made in the likeness of man. O that some hearts could get bold of that! I speak now of the way that He came—of His death I will speak again. When He was rich, for our sakes He became poor. It brought out in the circumstances of this history. In the heat of the day, wearied with His journey, He comes to the well and sits down where He can find a seat. Do our hearts really believe that this was the Lord? Why was He in a condition to be weary? Why there? It was perfect love He comes down to take this place. He passes through the world—the Holy One that could not be contaminated, and uses this to go through a world of sinners to bring them the love they wanted. Holiness, undefiled and undefinable, carries to sinners the love they need!
He sits weary, and the disciples go away to find meat. To think of the Lord Himself, whom none of the princes of this world knew, but who was the Lord of glory, sitting weary on this well, thirsty and having nothing to drink, dependent upon this world for a drink of water—the world that was made by Him, and knew Him not! He asked this woman to give Him to drink, dependent on her for water. In this very fact she finds out that there was something remarkable in the Man. It was extraordinary that a Jew should speak to her, and her mind is attracted by it.
Let me say a word of this woman, full of blessed interest, as drawing out into exercise the heart of the Lord. She was a poor, vile creature alone there. We read of the time when women came to draw water, talking together of all that was passing; but she does not come when the other women came. Hers was an isolated heart; she had isolated herself, and had got nothing. An energetic woman, who had been seeking happiness by the energy of nature, and found wretchedness and ruin. She was all alone at that unusual time of day, with a heart full of cares-totally alone, because of her shame; but she found One more lonely than herself, and that One was the Lord! She could go to the “men in the city,” but He was totally alone, had not one to go to, though Himself the most affable and accessible of men. There was never a circumstance in which He was found where power, love, goodness, and truth would not flow forth. There was no weariness if a poor, desolate sinner came. No matter what company He was in, He was accessible to their hearts; but there was no sympathy for Him. He met no love and goodness going through this world; His heart was utterly a stranger in it; it was all sympathy for others. If He had to answer for Himself before the chief priests, who were hunting Him to death, the moment the cock crew His eye was upon Peter—never wearied. No circumstance He was in could ever touch the spring of grace and goodness that was in His heart.
Here was the Judge of quick and dead—not as judge, of course, but the Person who is to be judge—meeting with the poor sinner in grace—sitting with the very person that deserved to be judged! In that sense in the communion of His grace He is sitting with us. It is just what is going on through the gospel. “We are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech by us.” She says, “How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria?” Mark the answer of the Lord. It has two distinct points in it. “If thou knewest the gift of God”; that is, what God is doing to you. It is the ground He takes with you: “The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ.” The next thing is “And who it is that saith to thee give me to drink.” That is, if you knew not, who I am, but who it is that has come down so low as to ask a drink of water, you would be in perfect confidence before Him. If your eye were opened to see God giving eternal life—come to require nothing, and who would not get it if He did—how it would change all your thoughts of God!
He once came looking for fruit and found wild grapes. Under the law He sought for fruit and had His servants killed. He said, I have yet one son, but when they saw Him, they said, “This is the heir, come let us kill him.” The result was not fruit, but hatred to Him and His Father. Now He does not come (I do not say producing fruit—He does that—but) looking for it. He has come to sow, dealing with the sinner personally in the gospel, and where there is grace, and the sense of need, there will be the fruit of the Spirit, and He will look for it.
Human nature judges God, but God’s nature comes out entirely superior to that. He gives! Then we get these two blessed principles, that God is giving, and that the Lord has come down to such poverty as to be dependent upon this woman for a drink of water; has come to put Himself down under the wants of those that had nothing but wants, so as to meet them. She is attracted—there is power in His word; and He begins speaking of spiritual things to her.
We see here the way in which the woman is absorbed with her cares. Verse 15 is a remarkable expression of her confidence in His word; but mark the state of her heart—entirely occupied with her waterpot and her wants. Do you know nobody like that people who own the word of God to be the word of God; who own its authority, but are completely occupied with the things of this life. As a natural person she received not the things of the Spirit of God. Her mind was awakened to respect for His word, so that she could believe what He said, but she could not grasp spiritual things; they had not the smallest entrance into her heart, so full was it of temporal things. What was to be done? Pouring out words of grace, all had flown over her head—passed over a heart that is absorbed with the things of the world.
Now He takes the other side, not the gift of God, but the state of man! “Go call thy husband and come hither.” The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.” Quite true. She tells the truth to hide the truth-as often in this poor world. The conscience is awakened now; and there it is where the word enters always. It is quite right the love should attract the heart, but the conscience must be reached. Everything must be out in the light that has come into this world: conscience must be brought into the presence of God.
It is wonderful how quick memory even becomes under this action of the light. Sins are recalled which have long been forgotten. Light has come in; she has understanding now, though she had not understood a word before (she was completely buried in her cares). “Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet.” The word of God had reached her conscience, and wherever it does it has authority, and it is the only way. When I find a book that tells me all things that ever I did, I know what it is. It does not require to be proved by man for there is no book in the world with authority till it reaches the conscience. Then it is its own witness to the folly of attacks made upon it, and proves the folly of unbelief. It is the “word” itself—its own witness. I do not take a candle to see if the sun shines. Do you not see the sun shines? No. Then you are blind. The only thing that brings authority is the word of God coming into the conscience. “Here is a man that told me all things that ever I did. Is not this the Christ? “God is love, and His blessed Son, a poor man speaking to the woman; but He is also light come in. These always go together. You never find when the gospel is received, that it does not get in as light to the conscience—there is no fruit without it. Where it gets in it will be light exposing all, and if not there is no root. The point where intelligence is brought into the heart of this poor woman, is where her conscience is reached. How would you like Him to tell you everything? Does He not know every wicked thing I have done? It should come up in judgment; but my comfort is, that it was all out before Him when He was dealing with me in grace. Now I can bear the eye of God searching everything through His word. In dealing with the soul, love has brought the light here.
Love attracted Peter. Why does he not run away? Why go up to Him, and say, depart from me! (Luke 5) He was drawn by the love and grace, and convicted by the light that the love has brought in. Light, which manifests to myself what I am in the light of God, brings me there. We are in the light as He is in the light. There must be truth in the inward parts. But did that hinder the Lord, saying, “If thou knewest the gift of God”? New, instead of trying to make things straight with God, I have found Him (knowing everything I did) in perfect grace. There is then no hiding sin, but all is brought into the light by God.
Mark another thing. God is bringing in something new. Was He going to trust the heart of this poor woman? No. He was going to get her to trust His heart. People say, ‘May not my heart deceive me?’ To be sure it may! Will His deceive me? The grace of God brings the salvation to us—brings us everything we want. So He brought strength at the pool of Bethesda— “Take up thy bed and walk.” He is not requiring from us anything, but brings the thing we want—brings Himself—and there is nothing we want like it. He brings us to repentance—to the conviction of what we are; as here. But He comes saying, “If thou knewest the gift of God.” God has something to give—eternal life through Jesus Christ. But I shrink from coming to God. Quite right, to a certain extent, ‘But with whom am I that is bringing in this light?’ With the very Man that asked for a drink of water. “If thou knewest who it is that saith to thee, give me to drink”—a poor man with nothing but words of grace—you would have trusted Him. Do you think I could trust God in the day of judgment? But can I trust the poor man sitting on the well-side? It is when my eyes open upon the Person and work, that I find I have been talking with the Lord Himself, and He had not a word against me, and knew all that ever I did. My heart has the blessed consciousness that it has met God.
There are poor infidels beating out their brains to find out about God, but I have met Him. He had nothing but kind and gracious words, though He knew all my sins. His whole ways and words and works are perfect love, and come to seek me as a sinner. The Father seeketh worshippers. You have not to go to this mountain or that; He sent the Saviour seeking. How many does He find? Does He find hearts here that would pass by the Lord Jesus—that have read hundreds of passages in which His grace was manifested, and gone away untouched, unmoved, though God was spending His heart on you? See how even the heart of the Lord rejoices over this one poor sinner. “I have meat to eat that ye know not of.” Do you believe that of Christ? Come to open her eyes-that was the Lord’s meat. It is lovely to see the Lord’s heart in that way. Just see how it opened out to all the rest. He has actually been rejected out of Judea, ‘but the case of this woman has so comforted Him now, that it opened His heart to say, “The fields are white to harvest.”
Then we have to go on to see that sins having been perfectly manifested, and the love; then comes the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ—because there can be no allowance of sin-nothing but love, that comes for the sinner, and gives Himself. The heart was won, the conscience was reached. But what about these things that she had done? The very Lord who was speaking to her goes under them and puts them away. We do need something else than that which reaches the conscience—we need that which purges it. We are made white as snow, and are bound to believe it, the Lord having borne our sins in His own body on the tree. He has charged Himself with them. I was convicted, and then bumbled about them. But before the day of judgment comes, Christ was bearing the sins He would have had to judge. The cross was God dealing with Him about them. In the day of judgment I say, That is the Man who put away my sins. Before the time comes for judgment, the person who is coming to judge has Himself borne the sins He would have had to judge me for. The question is not whether I deserve condemnation, but what has God wrought?
I dare not doubt it. There is no place where I see sin so terrible as on the cross. If your sins are not all perfectly put away forever, they never can be, for Christ cannot die again. (Heb. 10) He will rise up for judgment, but He is sitting down now, for the work is completely done; if not as to the work, not as to your feelings), it never can be. That being so, therefore, when the soul is exercised, I look at the cross and say, He has borne my sins. I hate them the more. That is all right; it is the work of the Spirit in us; but I speak of the work done for us. Do not speak of past, present, and future sins; it is a foolish confusion of the time my heart thinks of it, and of the work that put them away. As to future sins, I ought never to think of sinning again. As to past sins, how many were past when Christ died? The work was done when they were all future. It is confounding the work done with the effect in me and when He did that work. He was raised in glory; is there then any question whether I am to be glorified?
There is another thing as to the cross. It all passed between God and Christ perfectly alone—of which the outward darkness was the sign—according to the exigency and righteousness of God, where it must be according to the absolute perfectness of those who wrought it. Men had nothing to do with it; all we had to do with it was our sins and the hatred that killed Christ, you may add. It was a divine work about my sins.
Now as to the effect of this. We saw the poor woman so absolutely absorbed with her water-pot; but the moment her conscience was thoroughly reached, she goes off to testify to others. If you only get Christ, He will tell you all things. She leaves her water-pot. The Holy Ghost has not recorded for nothing that the thing that absorbed her was gone. The word and power of Jesus, that gave her conviction of sin, also substituted Christ for the things that had power over her heart. Christ for my righteousness; Christ instead of my sins; Christ as the object for the heart instead of its cares.
I add a word for the comfort of any soul that is convicted of sin, but has not peace. Supposing a person has received the word of Christ, but cannot say he has got Him—but, if only I could find Christ! I find so much sin in me I would give anything have Christ. What put that desire into the heart? You have got Him as a great Prophet; His word has reached the heart, you are convicted of sin, but do not know if you have Christ as Saviour. He has spoken to you about eternal life, and you have received a word that has made Christ precious to you and your conscience bad. Then you have got Him. His word has had the authority of the word of God in your conscience. If that be so, the Christ that has visited you is the Christ that has borne your sins. The Christ who thus speaks to us to bring these thoughts to our hearts is the One that through grace has borne the wrath before the day of judgment comes.
How is it with you? Has your heart given up your water-pot for Christ? do not mean that there will be no conflict. But has your heart so heard His word that it has penetrated into your conscience? Do you think you are going with your sins into heaven? How many sins had Eve committed when God turned her out? One! Have you not committed morel Are your hearts expecting to get into heaven with your sins or without them? Are they all put away? How can you rest a moment until you know they are? What madness and folly! The One who deals with our conscience is the One who came where we are, and is now beseeching us to be reconciled to God. It would be a terrible thing in the day of judgment to, have had the heart closed against the voice of the Charmed. Has not He charmed wisely? Were —ever words like Hiswords of grace, unutterable grace, with which He has sought to win us? It is a blessed truth, before the day of judgment comes, the Judge has come Himself to deliver. How solemn to think that you will have to be judged then if you do not accept the deliverance now!
“Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet in Jerusalem, worship the Father.... The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. The woman saith unto him, I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ. When he is come he will tell us all things. Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am he.... The woman then left her water-pot, and went her way into the city, and saith to the men, Come, see a man which told me all things that ever I did: is not this the Christ?”