Adapted from a Jeffery Anselmi sermon series https://www.sermoncentral.com/sermons/2-jesus-uses-the-word-to-invoke-deeper-thinking-jeffery-anselmi-sermon-on-faith-231821?ref=SermonSeriesDetails

2. The battle of the heart is won by winning the
battle of the mind.
To win the battle of the mind, Jesus worked to
get people to think on a deeper level.
Today we are going to take another look at a
story that is very familiar.
We have talked about this event recently, but
today, we are going to examine the story of,
“The Woman at the Well,” through a different
lens.

3. One of the things that seem to have happened
in our society is that a significant number of
people do not take the time or make an effort to
think at a deeper level.
It is so easy to think at or a little below the
surface.
I am not sure why this has happened, I think it
has a bit to do with our sound-bite driven media
which in turn has spilled over into our society.

4. It seems like if the media says something or
some celebrity says something, many will just
accept it.
If a professor tells something, or a politician
tells us something, many just believe it.
I also think that from a political standpoint the
divisions have grown so deep over the past few
decades that we put barriers up that keeps us
from thinking on a deeper level.

5. Biblical illiteracy on the part of the church has
made it more difficult for folks to engage society
on a deeper level.
To win the battle for the soul, we need to win the
battle for the mind.
The Word of God is a powerful tool in our
arsenal.
The Word can change the destiny of anyone.

6. NIV For though we live in the
world, we do not wage war as the world does.
The weapons we fight with are not the weapons
of the world. On the contrary, they have divine
power to demolish strongholds. We demolish
arguments and every pretension that sets itself
up against the knowledge of God, and we take
captive every thought to make it obedient to
Christ.

7. We are called to take every thought captive to
Jesus!
That requires us to think on a deeper level than
normal or that society is comfortable with us
doing.
As we examine the story of, “The “Woman at the
Well,” we will glean some principles that will
help us to be able to think at a deeper level and
it will help us to invoke a deeper level of
thinking to those whom we seek to share the
gospel with.

8. The encounter Jesus has with the woman at the
well changed her life forever when Jesus was
able to help her to be open to thinking on a
much deeper level.
In we see how Jesus helped invoke a
deeper level on thinking for the woman at the
well.

9. NIV Now Jesus learned that the
Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and
baptizing more disciples than John— although
in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his
disciples. So he left Judea and went back
once more to Galilee. Now he had to go
through Samaria. So he came to a town in
Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground
Jacob had given to his son Joseph.

10. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he
was from the journey, sat down by the well. It
was about noon. When a Samaritan woman
came to draw water, Jesus said to her,
(His disciples had gone into
the town to buy food.) 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.)

11. Barriers are one of the things that keep us from
thinking on a deeper level.
There are so many barriers that will keep us
from questioning what we are told or will
prevent us from challenging the conventional
group-think of the day.

12. Barriers are made to keep things out.
It seems there are always physical barriers in &
around Springfield with all the road
construction that seems to be never ending.
Those barriers are meant to keep drivers out of
the areas where the work is taking place.
When we have barriers of the mind, those
barriers will keep out things and thoughts that
run contrary to what we think we already know.

13. There are a variety of barriers that stifle our
ability to dive deep into the questions we face in
life.
There are political barriers, one is a D & thinks a
certain way, an R another, and I or an L yet
another.
Anything that comes to me that does not match
with what I already believe gets summarily
rejected without a thought given.

14. It seems one the most significant differences in
the education system today, versus the not too
distant history, is back in the day, the process of
thinking was taught.
The art of critical thinking was taught,
today we are taught WHAT to think.
Science used to be one place where scientists
could make a hypothesis, or develop a theory,
then they would spend time trying to prove or
disprove the theory.

15. Today, if you do not subscribe to specific ways
of thinking in things like global warming, I mean
climate change, the scientific community seeks
to ostracize or marginalize you.
Evolution is another area. It amazes me that
despite the odds, despite the lack of fossil
record evidence, among other things, those who
do not fall in line with the groupthink theology
of evolution are made to be crackpots.

16. Barriers will lock our minds into a particular way
of thinking that will keep us from asking the
question and digging deeper into things we
should dig deeper.
God is not afraid for you to dig deep as you
grow your faith.

17. So, Jesus is resting by the well while His
disciples go into town to get some food.
Jesus is going to engage this woman in a
conversation; however, the dialogue is not
going to go in the direction the woman thinks it
will.
Before this woman will even listen to Jesus,
there are a bunch of barriers that need to be
torn down.

18. The fact that Jesus is a Jew, she is a Samaritan.
The fact He is a Jewish man and she is a
woman. In their society, Jewish men would not
even speak to their female family members in
public many times.
There were religious barriers, He was a Jew and
she was a Samaritan, this affected how she saw
the world.
In verse , Jesus makes a simple request, give
me a drink. From that simple request we will see
a life-changing event take place.

19. But before that can happen, barriers had to
dismantled. In verse , the woman throws up the
barriers and Jesus, by virtue of engaging in the
conversation will destroy them.
As you look over the text, Jesus does not
answer her verse question, He gets right to
what He is trying to get her to think about.
Let’s look at our next thought.

20. When we are seeking to help someone think a
little deeper about things, it will require a great
deal of patience.

21. NIV 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." "Sir," the
woman said, "you have nothing to draw with
and the well is deep. Where can you get this
living water? 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?"

22. Now here is an example of surface thinking.
The woman is fixated on the water in the well,
she is fixated on the barrier of her immediate
need for water.
To back her barrier thinking, she goes into the
Samaritan view of the history of the well in
verses , and in verse , she seemingly scoffs
by telling Jesus He did not even have a bucket
that would reach the 100 plus foot deep well.

23. Bible dictionaries say today Jacob’s Well is
often dry, or other times it has a few feet of
water.
In March 1697, when Henry Maundrell visited
Jacob's Well, the depth of the water in the well
measured 15 feet (4.6 m). Based on a
measurement made in 1935, the total depth of
the well is 41 meters (135 ft).

24. Once again, Jesus does not answer the
question about the bucket,
He keeps driving His point home to her.
Jesus answered,

25. He is trying to get her to think outside of the
box.
She needs not to be constrained by barriers and
circumstances, she needs to listen to what He is
saying and think about it.
Jesus could have said, HEY STUPID, QUIT
THINKING ABOUT THIS STUPID WELL AND THE
STUPID WATER AND LISTEN TO WHAT I AM
SAYING AND THINK A LITTLE BIT!

26. Jesus stays patient with her to this point.
So, the woman’s response in verse would
have to drive most of us up the wall.
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.”
Argh! She still is stuck on the well, but now
Jesus will do something to try to shake her
world a little bit.
This is not meant to demean the woman, but to
get her to do something she needed to do.

27. He told her,
“I have no husband,” she replied.
Jesus said to her,
“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see
that you are a prophet.

28. Jesus is trying to get this woman to think on a
spiritual level, to go deeper into her thinking.
So now He tries to get her to shine the light of
truth on her own life.
This was meant to get her thinking on a spiritual
level, to get her to see her spiritual needs were
more significant than her need for the water in
the well.

29. When Jesus asked her to get her husband, she
said she did not have one, and Jesus stated she
had had 5 and the man she now has is not her
husband.
Now that she has to take a look at her life, she
drops the subject of water and tells Jesus that
she perceives He is a prophet.
Do you think?

30. NOW, she goes on to ask Jesus a more
spiritually oriented question concerning
worship.
His patience with her is starting to pay off.
She will ask Jesus a reasonably profound
question concerning worship.
In verses, Jesus gives her an answer to
her question.
He says there will come a day when the place
does not matter.
Worship has always been about the heart.

31. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain,
but you Jews claim that the place where we
must worship is in Jerusalem.”
Jesus replied,

33. Why did the Jews insist worship was to be in
Jerusalem? God commanded it!
NIV Then to the place the
LORD your God will choose as a dwelling for his
Name—there you are to bring everything I
command you: your burnt offerings and
sacrifices, your tithes and special gifts, and all
the choice possessions you have vowed to the
LORD.

34. NIV When Solomon had
finished the temple of the LORD and the royal
palace, and had succeeded in carrying out all he
had in mind to do in the temple of the LORD and
in his own palace, the LORD appeared to him
at night and said: "I have heard your prayer and
have chosen this place for myself as a temple
for sacrifices.

35. Jesus replied,
NIV

36. NIV Many peoples will come and say,
"Come, let us go up to the mountain of the
LORD, to the temple of the God of Jacob. He will
teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his
paths." The law will go out from Zion, the word
of the LORD from Jerusalem.

37. When a person starts to question their own life,
when they begin to examine their life in the light
of truth, this can help them to start thinking a bit
deeper about eternity.
This leads to a final thought.
The woman said, “I know that Messiah”
(called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he
will explain everything to us.” Then Jesus
declared,

38. This woman knows a bit of Scripture, so Jesus
uses her limited understanding to give her
knowledge of prophecy fulfilled.
ESV I will raise up for them
a prophet like you from among their brothers.
And I will put my words in his mouth, and he
shall speak to them all that I command him.

39. Finally!
The right question,
a question about the coming Messiah!
Jesus took her from worrying about water to
talking to her about the living water, to getting
her to think deep enough to ask about the
coming Messiah!

40. This woman's progression of thought
concerning Jesus went from seeing Him as a
Jew, to seeing Him as someone who could make
her life more comfortable, to seeing Him as a
Prophet, then to seeing Him as possibly the
Messiah (v ), then seeing Him as the Savior of
the world (v )!

41. Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went
back to the town and said to the people,
“Come, see a man who told me everything I ever
did. Could this be the Messiah?”
They said to the woman, “We no longer
believe just because of what you said; now we
have heard for ourselves, and we know that this
man really is the Savior of the world.”

42. Why didn’t everyone who heard and saw Jesus
conclude He was the Messiah?
They let too many things keep them from
thinking on a deeper level!
They allowed their barriers and religious ideas
to help close their minds to the concept of
Jesus being the Messiah even though He
provided evidence throughout His ministry!

43. Now, faced with the truth, now that the woman’s
whole worldview has been shattered,
what is she to do?
She has to have the courage to embrace the
truth!

44. This woman could have simply walked away, yet
in verse , this woman left her water jar and
headed into town to share her testimony and to
encourage others to open their minds to ponder
who Jesus was.
As a result, MANY in the city embraced the truth
concerning Jesus!

45. We have a difficult job, to get people to
challenge what the world has taught them, to
get them to think on a deeper level and to be
willing to question what they have been taught!
As Christians, one of the reasons we do not
engage the world to think on a deeper level is
because we do not know the Word well enough
to do the same.

46. We allow things to be said and taught without
challenge because we are afraid that we will not
have the answers.
My challenge for you is to get the answers, to
immerse yourself in the Word so you can think
deeply and challenge others to do the same!
God is not afraid of your questions, ask them,
seek the answers and have the courage to
embrace the truth of God!