Encountering the one who desires to encounter us… HABAKKUK 2:1- I WILL STAND MY WATCH AND SET MYSELF ON THE RAMPART, AND WATCH TO SEE WHAT HE WILL SAY TO ME, AND WHAT I WILL ANSWER WHEN I AM CORRECTED. THEN THE LORD ANSWERED ME AND SAID: “WRITE THE VISION AND MAKE IT PLAIN ON TABLETS, THAT HE MAY RUN WHO READS IT. FOR THE VISION IS YET FOR AN APPOINTED TIME; BUT AT THE END IT WILL SPEAK, AND IT WILL NOT LIE. THOUGH IT TARRIES, WAIT FOR IT; BECAUSE IT WILL SURELY COME, IT WILL NOT TARRY – WE BELIEVE THAT THAT TIME IS NOW! NOW IS THE TIME TO LAUNCH IT AND PREPARE OUR BODY AND PEOPLE FOR WHAT GOD WILL DO IN US AND THROUGH US – HERE ARE THE NEXT STEPS: ENCOUNTER DISCOVER CONNECT MAKE A DIFFERENCE TODAY I AM GOING TO BE TALKING ABOUT THE FIRST STEP – IF YOU HAVE YOUR BIBLES, TURN WITH ME TO JOHN 4:1-26 A Samaritan Woman Meets Her Messiah 4 Therefore, when the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John 2 (though Jesus Himself did not baptize, but His disciples), 3 He left Judea and departed again to Galilee. 4 But He needed to go through Samaria. 5 So He came to a city of Samaria which is called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. 6 Now Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied from His journey, sat thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour. 7 A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.” 8 For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. 9 Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. 10 Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.” 11 The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water? 12 Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?” 13 Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.” 15 The woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw.” 16 Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” 21 Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews.23 But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him.24 God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” 34 Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work. 35 Do you not say, ‘There are still four months and then comes the harvest’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest! 36 And he who reaps receives wages, and gathers fruit for eternal life, that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. 37 For in this the saying is true: ‘One sows and another reaps.’38 I sent you to reap that for which you have not labored; others have labored, and you have entered into their labors.” The Savior of the World 42 Then they said to the woman, “Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard Him and we know that this is indeed [a]the Christ, the Savior of the world.” POINT 1. INTENTIONAL ENCOUNTER USUALLY, WHEN SPEAKING ABOUT THIS SUBJECT, YOU POINT OUT THE FACT THAT WE NEED TO BE INTENTIONAL ABOUT ENCOUNTERING JESUS – GOD HAS ALWAYS BEEN INTENTIONAL ABOUT ENCOUNTERING YOU/US. HE HAS ALWAYS BEEN IN HOT PERSUIT OF YOU – GOD HAS BEEN INTENTIONAL ABOUT ENCOUNTERING YOU – THAT’S WHY I HAVE ALWAYS BEEN LEARY OF SOMEONE SAYING “I FOUND THE LORD” HOW DO YOU FIND SOMEONE WHO WAS NEVER LOST? WE WERE LOST IN OUR TRESPASSES AND SINS – WHILE WE WERE YET SINNERS, CHRIST DIED FOR US – POINT 2. UNCONVENTIONAL ENCOUNTER – THE WOMAN AT THE WELL: WAS GOING ABOUT HER DAY GOING ABOUT HER ROUTINE THE ENCOUNTER SHE HAD WITH JESUS WAS OUT OF THE BOX AND NOT NORMAL. JESUS DEALT WITH DURING THAT ENCOUNTER: RACISM SEXISM ELITISM SIN THE WHOLE SHE-BANG WHEN YOU HAVE AN ENCOUNTER WITH JESUS, IT SHOULD ENCOMPASS ALL THE ISSUES POINT 3. INCOMPREHENSIBLE ENCOUNTER – 1CORINTHIANS 2:9 BUT AS IT IS WRITTEN: “EYE HAS NOT SEEN, NOR EAR HEARD, NOR HAVE ENTERED INTO THE HEART OF MAN THE THINGS WHICH GOD HAS PREPARED FOR THOSE WHO LOVE HIM” #FindingJesus#MeetingGod
