Food to Eat

Joh 4:27-42

Key Verse 34

"My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work."

Food is something we all enjoy. But here in America, food is an obsession. And to combat the effects of that obsession, we spend $40 billion a year on weight-loss books, powders, shakes, and programs. In today’s Bible passage, we discover that Jesus has his own obsession with food – food for the soul. And this food – this zero calorie diet food which he found to be deeply satisfying, delicious, healthy and refreshing – is something he’s going to recommend that we try. Let’s pray that, as we listen to him, we may be persuaded to try out this heavenly food and acquire a real love and hunger for it. 

Part I: The woman’s testimony (vv 27-30)

In yesterday’s message, “I Am He,” Jesus had a private Bible study with a woman by the well. She had married and divorced again and again, seeking to get from these men that which only God could give her. At the last moment of the conversation, Jesus revealed his identity to the woman. He revealed himself as the long awaited Messiah and the true King of her heart.

This is the moment at which today’s passage begins. Jesus’ disciples, who had gone into the town to buy lunch (v 8), now returned and they were shocked to find Jesus there at the well talking “with a woman.” For a man to speak with a woman in public was considered scandalous in Jewish society. A man was not so much as to greet a woman in the street even if she was his wife or sister or daughter. Naturally, the disciples wanted to ask what was going on, but yet, out of respect for him and because they could trust that he spoke with her for some good reason, they kept quiet about it.

Then, in verse 28, the woman hurried off to the town to spread the news about Jesus, leaving her water jar behind. There was a mighty work of the Holy Spirit in her heart through those last words Jesus spoke to her, “I who speak to you am he.” She could now see the greatness and glory of who Jesus is. Before the face of her great Messiah – this holy, gentle King from whose eyes nothing could be hidden and who knew her darkest secrets – she found herself forgiven and loved as a precious daughter of God. And so she was filled with excitement and joy like a person who had just won a multi-million dollar lottery jackpot. She was so enraptured that she left her water jar behind. And this detail is very important. The fact that she left her water jar signified that she was no longer thirsty and in want. It signified that all those things which had been so important to her and to which she had been attached were now as nothing to her and that she was freed from them. Jesus had become her everything, a refreshing fountain from which she drank deep satisfaction, love and happiness. 

And she could not keep this marvelous discovery about Jesus to herself. So she rushed into town and started sharing about it with others, amazingly oblivious to the fact that she was a social outcast. She had come out to the well in the heat of the day to avoid these people, and these were the people who for years had shunned her and condemned her as the vilest sinner. But now, having met Jesus, it was forgotten.

She told the people in verse 29, “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did.” She spoke here of her amazement that Jesus knew everything about her and told her exactly what her sins were. But what was more amazing about it to her and filled her with thanks and joy was the grace with which he told her about her sins and worked a miracle in her heart, setting her free from her sins – from that which had been the great burden and misery of her life. 

So, she excitedly called the people to come with her and meet this amazing person to whom she was so thankful, saying, “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did.” She said just these few brief words and then added, “Could this be the Christ?” She merely suggested – merely hinted – to them that this could be the Christ. And yet the results were so remarkable. On the spot, many believed in Jesus just through having heard her testimony and without need of any further evidence (vv 39, 41). And then, in verse 30, we see how practically the whole town accepted her invitation and came out with her to meet Jesus (v 30). As a result of this, an even larger number of people came to believe. Again, all this was the result of her little testimony in verse 29. The magnitude of her success, the immediateness of her success and the ease with which she reaped that success is enviously amazing to us and so mysterious. How did she do it? Well, we have to wait until part 2 of this message for Jesus to give us an answer to that.

But for now, let’s think about the kind of person God used here. This woman whom God used so mightily was not a respectable person whom others might admire and listen to and be influenced by. Rather, she was a disrespectable and disrespected lady. Nor was she a trained minister or speaker. In fact, she had only just become a believer and knew nothing about Jesus’ teachings. Instead, this woman’s only real merit was her newfound love relationship with Jesus and her profound thankfulness to him who opened her eyes to his glory and lifted her out of her sins. So, we learn here that this is the kind of person God is pleased to use as his instrument to bring many to Jesus. 

 Part II: Jesus’ food (vv 31-38)

The narrative now switches back to the scene at the well after the woman had left. In the aftermath of having seen Jesus talk with the woman, the disciples felt awkward, not knowing what to say. So there was a long silence. But yet, it was lunchtime and they were all very hungry and tired from the long journey that day on foot. Irrepressible desires and imaginations arose in them of eating the delicious food they had just bought. So, finally they blurted out, “Rabbi, eat something” (v 31). The literal translation is two words: “Rabbi, eat!” It was a short way of saying, “Hurry up and pray for the food so we can all eat!” 

But unexpectedly, Jesus said to them, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about” (v 32). Saving one Samaritan woman brought Jesus such great delight and refreshment that his tiredness and hunger was gone. For him, it was like eating an energy bar. But he knew that a lot more food was on the way: A great multitude of people were coming to meet him from the town, and he now greatly hungered to bring them into God’s kingdom. And he was not just telling his disciples in reference to that food, “I have food to eat [for myself] that you know nothing about” but he was even saying, “I have food to eat [for you] that you know nothing about.” In other words, he was sort of announcing that he had a surprise for them: A fantastic meal for him and his disciples was on the way. It was as though he had called a fine food restaurant in Sychar –  a really high-classed place – and had ordered for delivery this mega-sized meal of delicacies like lobster tails, filet mignon, gourmet pasta, and so forth, all which was now on the way even as Jesus was speaking. 

Jesus’ disciples were puzzled. They said to each other, “Could someone have brought him food?” (v 33). They figured that, while they were in town, someone may have given him a bite to eat, and that this was why he wasn’t hungry any more.

So Jesus needed to explain to them what he meant. In the verses that follow, Jesus is going to define for them what his food is, he is going to tell them that there is a specific spiritual meal headed their way, and he is going to tell them, in a sense, how to eat this meal.

Look at verse 34. “"My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work."” This is the key verse, so let’s all read it aloud, meditating on its meaning. Jesus was sent by his Father into this world to serve his Father’s will -- to do his Father’s work -- which is to save souls. He called this his “food” because he hungered so greatly for each soul to be saved -- because he loved each of us so greatly and did not wish for anyone to perish. So great was his hunger that he was resolved to finish his work of saving us even by suffering and dying on a cross. And because that desire for the salvation of each soul was so passionate – because his hunger for this food was so big – eating this food through saving one soul was his greatest joy. Saving the Samaritan woman from her sins which burdened her and brought her misery and seeing her enter into the freedom and love and joy of the kingdom of God brought him such pleasure and strength and refreshment. 

This is what fed his spirit so that he could continue his messianic mission. That mission was not easy. Isaiah said, “He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering” (Isa 53:3a). The vast majority of the people Jesus came to save rejected him and hated him (Joh 1:10-11, 7:7). Throughout his ministry, he was slandered and persecuted by the religious authorities. But in the midst of these sorrows and sufferings, there were joyful mealtimes for him in which his Father sent him prepared souls like these Samaritans who were ready to be saved. These harvest times transported him with such satisfaction, joy and pleasure that he would forget his weariness and sorrows and find encouragement and refreshment to carry on his messianic work. 

Again, verse 34 reads, “"My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work."” Ask yourself, “What is my food, my obsession and my delight?” Jesus wants his food to be our food.  He wants us to put our heart and soul into the work of saving others in order that we might grow to resemble him and grow to have a hunger as big as his hunger, a heart as big as his heart. He wants to give us a spiritual eating pleasure, a surpassing delight and gratification in his work that will make our spirit soar with joy. 

Jesus wanted to open his disciples’ eyes to the delicious spiritual meal that was headed their way in order that they might eagerly join in the feast. Jacob’s well, the place where they now stood, was at the foot of Mount Gerizim and it overlooked these vast fertile fields. And so Jesus directed his disciple’s attention to these fields, telling them in a dramatic fashion, “Do you not say, `Four months more and then the harvest'? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. Even now the reaper draws his wages, even now he harvests the crop for eternal life…” (vv 35-36b). Jesus was kind of pointing to the fields and saying, “Wow, these fields are ripe for harvest NOW(!) even though it’s four months before harvest time.” What he meant here was that the fields were ripe with respect, not to the grain in the fields of course, but to the Samaritans who were now in the fields. The people of Sychar were now perhaps within eyesight, making their way toward him through these open fields. And they were giving the fields an appearance of being “ripe,” literally. You see, the word from which “ripe” is translated is a word which literally means “white” and, in the KJV, that word is translated “white”. White is the color of very ripe grain. But it was also the general color of the clothing of the poor people in those days (dyes being so expensive that only the rich used them). And so, in glare of the noonday sun, the white clothing of this vast multitude of Samaritans out there were giving the fields a dazzling white appearance – the appearance of being very ripe for harvest. Thus, before the eyes of the disciples, these people were displayed as ripened sheaves of grain. This was a beautiful visual display of that which was invisible – the real condition of these people’s souls. 

This was necessary in order to correct the disciples’ pessimistic view of these people. Unfortunately, we cannot judge just by people’s outward appearance what is going on spiritually inside them -- how the Spirit of God is working in them, or how spiritually ready there are, or how long it will be before they can be harvested. In fact, appearances can be misleading. So, back when the disciples went into Sychar to buy food, there was no indication that the townspeople were ripe for harvest. Rather, to the disciples, the people looked just like ordinary Samaritans – that historic enemy of their nation, a wicked and ignorant people who held to heretical ideas and who were little likely to even listen to the gospel. When the disciples returned from town and saw the Samaritan woman, their impression of her was not favorable either.

So, the deal here is that the disciples underestimated the power of God to work in anybody, anywhere, anytime and they let themselves be deceived by the outward appearances of people – in particular, the people of Sychar. So Jesus had to open their eyes with respect to what God can do and was, in fact, doing. He unveiled before their eyes the miraculous, beautiful work God was doing inside these seemingly no-good Samaritans through this picture of them as being a precious field of ripened grain. This was a preview of what God would do among the Gentiles. Let us learn from this to look at others with eyes of hope and love, believing that God is so mighty and can change anybody, anywhere, anytime.

Jesus was about to send his disciples out as reapers into the fields. And so he told them how they should view the great success he knew they were about to have – how they should enjoy the meal. He said, “Thus the saying `One sows and another reaps' is true. I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor” (vv 37-38).  Those who reap many into the kingdom of God have a danger of becoming proud, of crediting the success to themselves. So Jesus told his disciples who would deserve the real credit for their success. The sowers who had labored hard in Samaria in that generation and in past ones to plow the heart soil of the people and plant the word of God – John the Baptist or the prophets or whomever – who taught the people that they must repent because the Messiah was coming – these people deserved the real credit.

Now, back to the question I left you with in part 1. How did the Samaritan woman reap such immediate and tremendous success in Sychar with such ease? She said this ten word blurb about what Jesus did for her and then merely hinted that this could be the Christ, and then, boom, tons of people believed on the spot and many more were attracted to come to Jesus. How did she do that? Well, Jesus tells us that she reaped so much so easily due to the extreme spiritual ripeness of the people which was the result of other’s hard work of sowing. It had little to do with her. Those invisible servants who may have preached and prayed in tears many years, maybe all their lives, and who maybe received persecution in return – they get like 99% of the credit here for her success. And they would get that same credit for the success Jesus and disciples were about to have. 

The harvest is the Lord’s. According to his will and time he makes people ready for harvest (Joh 3:8; 1Co 3:6). So, often, due to no fault of our own, we end up as sowers instead of reapers. We teach the word of God in many Bible studies with mountain-moving faith, vision, passion, with gentle care, prayer, and tears in order to reap just one soul into God’s kingdom and then he quits Bible study. This is really heartbreaking and discouraging, but our labor is not in vain in the sense that God is using us as sowers in his grand plan for other’s lives and will reward us accordingly.

This perspective helps also to combat the feelings of competition or jealousy when God blesses others with much success in reaping. That success is given by grace to unworthy sinners and it is not necessarily a reflection of a person’s merit or deservedness. Look at the Samaritan woman. She reaped a great harvest but she wasn’t spiritually mature or able or even hard working. The point here is that role of being a sower is at least as important and valuable as that of being a reaper and so we can rejoice with reapers in their success with no ill feeling.

Part III: Harvest in Samaria (vv 39-42)

The whole town practically came out with the woman to see Jesus. Verses 40-41 explain the marvelous thing that then happened: “So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words many more became believers”. This was maybe the greatest harvest ever in Jesus’ public ministry and it happened through this intensive two day Bible conference in the city of Sychar. It was not through Jesus’ presence or his miracles, but through his words, his teachings, that all these people were harvested. This shows the sufficiency of the word of Christ and its power to reveal who he is and bring people into a saving acquaintance and loving relationship with him. The harvesting by his words was on two levels: Not only did the numbers of believers increase, but the faith of those who believed was increased. Look at verse 42: “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.” 

I’d like to conclude here with this thought: Years from now when we look back on the seasons of our life and reflect on what we accomplished, the labor of love we did for God in his fields to give life to others, those will be the sweetest and most gratifying memories. And God will remember it all and crown us with everlasting reward in his kingdom. May the Lord give us a hunger for souls to be harvested. May the Lord use our talents, whatever they are, as we work together for this grand purpose.

One Word: My food is to do his will.

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