The disciples had just returned from Sychar with food. Earlier Jesus had told the Sarmatian woman at the well that He had living water for her where she would never thirst again. And when she had heard and believed that he was the Messiah, she joyfully ran back to tell others, who came streaming to see him.
Knowing how hungry Jesus must be, the disciples asked Jesus to eat something.
“I have a kind of food you know nothing about,” Jesus told them (John 4:32).
Does Jesus have food for you that you know nothing about? His Word is your bread of life. Do you know and believe the Truth of the Word in your heart?
The disciples asked each other if someone else had brought food to Jesus. They only saw the natural—not the spiritual of which Jesus spoke. How often do we only realize the natural around us and not the spiritual God wishes to reveal to us through the Spirit?
Then Jesus explained, “My nourishment comes from doing the will of God, who sent me, and from finishing His Work” (John 4:34).
Jesus received nourishment from following God’s will and from finishing the work He was sent to do. And what was the work He was sent to finish?
“Yet it was our weaknesses he carried,” Isaiah prophesied. “It was our sorrows that weighed him down. And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God, a punishment for his own sins. But he was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed. All of us, like sheep, have strayed away. We have left God’s paths to follow our own. Yet the Lord laid on him the sins of us all” (Isaiah 53:4-6, NLT).
We were lost in our sins, following our own desires. Yet, God laid upon Jesus the sins of us all. His purpose was you, and it was me. And Jesus accomplished that purpose on Calvary. Jesus, who knew no sin, became sin so that we might become the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21). And that was the work that Jesus finished. When He said on the Cross “it is finished,” He declared that He had accomplished the will of His Father.
Everything Jesus did in earthly ministry was God’s perfect will and carried Jesus toward His purpose. Doing the will of His Father nourished Jesus, and the finished work of the Cross was God’s promise of Resurrection life. When He was crushed for our sins, we were made right with God. When He was beaten, we were made whole. When He was wounded, we were healed. The work that Jesus accomplished was a thorough and complete work. It was not a partial work that lacked anything. It accomplished all the Word says it accomplished. It brought all the promise of new life to us.
If we don’t know the Word, how can we believe the new life He has given us? Do you know that the person you used to be is now righteous in Christ and that you are resurrected in new life in Him? Do you really believe you are a new creation and the old nature has been crucified with Him (2 Corinthians 5:17)? Have you any idea all that Jesus paid for with His precious blood? Do you stay in His Word to grasp His love for you? When you know His Truth, it sets you free. When you believe His finished work in your life, it changes you from within.
Your life in Christ is your greatest purpose. When you are open to the Holy Spirit, you are always being changed by the power of the Word. Jesus was the finished work, and we, being renewed in our minds, are His finished work in progress. When we believe in His finished work of grace within us, the promises of His Truth that we trust for with confidence, are real to us.
“The hour is coming,” Jesus told the woman at the well, “and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:23-24, NKJV).
“How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? Who believes the good report of the Lord? Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God” (Romans 10:14, 16-17, NKJV). “And it is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63, NKJV).
If you persist in His Word, you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free (John 8:32). Faith without action has no life (James 2:17). Believe and act upon the Truth the Holy Spirit reveals in the Word.
The hour has come to worship God in Spirit and Truth.
© 2021 Lynn Lacher
www.lynnlacher.com/2021/12/in-spirit-and-truth_6.html
No comments:
Post a Comment