He Loves Us Completely

Ever had one of those moments during a worship service (for all you church goers) where something hits you and next thing you know tears are running down your face? 

I have had it many times, but man, today it hit me and just would not stop. I was a sobbing mess fumbling through my purse for Kleenex. 

I kind of knew today may be emotional since we were going through the story of the woman at well (John 4:1-25). I can’t remember first time I read this story and it resonated with me. Sadly, it may have been in the last three years while going through a Liz Curtis Higgs’ bible study (that woman is a pro at retelling stories from the bible). 

Yesterday, I made it a point to dig out Bad Girls of the Bible by Liz Curtis Higgs because I really wanted to see what I highlighted and underlined (the benefits of writing in all my books). And again Liz is an amazing l writer - if you want to understand stories about women in the bible she is the author to look for. 

A few years ago, I had underlined: Wise is the woman, who when her sins are revealed, confesses, repents, and rejoices in the knowledge that even though Jesus sees through our smoke screen, he loves us completely. 

He loves us completely. 

Because, seriously, that is what this story is about. (full story below) Before the woman even repented Jesus offered her the living water. Jesus is with us in our sin even before we are awaken from it to repent and ask for forgiveness - He is there. 

With all this in my head (this morning) I stood in my pew to sing Our God Saves and as the chorus came up, The world will see that our God saves There is hope in Your name, my throat tightened and I knew tears were on their way. Now, normally I can do that little waving thing in front of my eyes (ha) to make my tears go back in or I bite the inside of my lip really hard, but today I was meant to let it out and let the tears flow. I tried taking deep breaths, but then we sang Because He Lives and I was a goner. 

I believe I over come by the power of his blood…I’m alive, I’m alive because He lives…I was covered in sin and shame, I heard mercy call my name. 

Full scale balling in-sued. I don’t know about you, but when I cry and someone hugs me I cry harder - ever feel that? So, when Matt wrapped his arm around me I lost it - it was like funeral crying. I cried through the rest of the song, through prayers, through the offering and into the actual message. For the second Sunday in a row I feel like the pastor (who happens to be my father in-law) is talking directly to me. I know that he doesn’t write his sermons for me, but man, some Sundays it feels like he does.  

Tears continued when he said, “The most powerful witness is the place of you deepest shame.” Can I got a “Come on!”? 

It felt good to cry, to get it out, to be vulnerable around others and to praise God in my tears. To be thankful for my saving grace. To know that my sin has been washed away and I am alive because He lives. And He loves me completely, just as he loves you completely.

 6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.

7 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)

9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.[a])

10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”

13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”

16 He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”

17 “I have no husband,” she replied.

Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. 18 The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”

19 “Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”

21 “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

25 The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”

26 Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”

To hear Our God Saves: https://youtu.be/q6um7z4qvY8

To hear Because He Lives (Amen): https://youtu.be/PBvU7arNhQs