Need

Jesus needed to get away from the Pharisees because they were making an issue of the number of disciples being baptized by John vs. Jesus and His disciples, so He left Judea and started towards Galilee. He had to travel through Samaria to get to Galilee. Samaria was about halfway between the two regions.

The Bible says, "He needed to go through Samaria," which was true.
I checked it out on the map.

He needed to go geographically.
He needed to go spiritually as well.

He needed to meet a woman who needed Him.
But first, He needed her.
He asked her for a drink as He waited by the well.
He was weary from His journey so He rested there
while His disciples went into the town to get some food.

You can read the story in the book of John, chapter four.

To make a long story short,
He was spiritually compelled to go
through Samaria to meet this particular woman
and meet her particular need.
No other man ever met her need before
and because of her testimony,
many more believed.

Today,
I needed to go to Walmart, the library, the UPS store, the bookstore, and the feed store. I was thinking about this story because I read it this morning.

Geographically, I needed to go to these places.
Physically, I needed people to do things for me at these places.
But spiritually, I thought about why I needed to go.

Perhaps someone in those places needed a drink of living water.
Perhaps someone needed a discerning word to bring to light
things hidden in darkness.

Everyday,
we need to go through Samaria to get to Galilee.

And every day,
there is a Samaritan woman at the well,
waiting to reap the fruit
of our need to travel through her town.

The wedding

Once upon a time, Jesus and His disciples were invited to a wedding feast. Mary, His mother was also there. They were all having a grand old time, celebrating, dancing, drinking wine and
suddenly, Mary noticed that they had run out of wine.

She nudged Jesus and said, 'They've run out of wine.' Jesus said, 'I can't do anything about it. It's not my time to do anything miraculous.' She disregarded Him and said to the servants, 'Whatever He tells you to do, do it.' Well, that put Him on the spot and perhaps out of respect to His mother and compassion for the family, He said to the servants, 'Fill the water pots with water.' There were six pots sitting there and they could hold 20-30 gallons of liquid a piece. Let's see...20x6=120...30x6=180...120-180 gallons of water! That would take some time to draw that much water from the well and they were in a hurry.

When they had filled the water pots to the brim they came back to Jesus and He said, 'Draw some out of the pots and take it to the master of the feast.' And that they did.

The master of the feast tasted the water that had been turned into wine and said,
'Usually, people give their guests the best wine first and after they have well drunk, they put out the cheaper wine, but you have saved your best wine for last!' And thus the reputation of the bride and groom and their families was saved. (Because 120-180 gallons of good wine is no small thing!)

This was just the beginning of signs with which Jesus manifested His glory and His disciples believed in Him. (John 2:1-11)
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Have you noticed in life that
"business as usual" is no longer working?

Look around you.

What used to work for producing income, doesn't anymore.
What used to work for growing the church, doesn't anymore.
What used to work for unifying your family, doesn't anymore.

It's a disconcerting wake-up call.

Wake up!
Wake up!
The wine's run out!

It is time to fill our lives up to the brim with Living Water.
It is time for Jesus to do something with the water in our vessel.

It is time for the Master of the Feast to take a taste test from the wine of our lives.

Will He say, "You've saved the best for last!"
or will He say, "It's business as usual. The inferior wine is being served."

How do we fill up the water pots of our lives with Living Water?

We read, meditate, and study His Word because we learn
to know Him in it because He is the Word of Life.

We talk to Him and listen to Him and live in the truth that He will never leave us or forsake us.

We keep ourselves in the love of God and stay in fellowship with other believers.

We pray in the Holy Ghost.

We do what Jesus says to do.

Because it's wedding time.
And the wine's run out.

And the Master of the Feast
needs to taste the wine
that Jesus has made
from the Living Water
contained in our vessels.

And regardless if our wine
is inferior or the best,
the guests are in need of our wine.

We who are the vessels
are also the guests
and we drink wine from one another.

What kind of wine will we offer one another?
What kind of wine will we drink?

Sarcasm in the Old Testament

Job's friends were telling him that he must have some awful secret sins or God wouldn't be punishing him the way he was and Job defended his own righteousness and they were horrified and rebuked him even further and then Job says, "No doubt you ARE the people and wisdom will die with you!"

I got a kick out of that. In other words, Job said, "You're the man and when you die, no one else will exist who knows anything at all!" And then he goes on to say that regardless of that 'fact', he's smart too and is not as stupid as they think.

You'll find all this in Job 12:1-3. It really is an amazing book. Job lost so much in 9 months time and then God restored back to him twice as much as he had before, AFTER he prayed for his lousy friends.

I can identify with Job.
I can identify with his lousy friends.
I can identify with the hopelessness of loss.
And I can identify with the surprise of joy.