Jesus is the Christ, the Savior of the World

John 4:27-42

The Whitened Harvest

27 And at this point His disciples came, and they marveled that He talked with a woman; yet no one said, "What do You seek?" or, "Why are You talking with her?"

28 The woman then left her waterpot, went her way into the city, and said to the men, 29 "Come, see a Man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this be the Christ?" 30 Then they went out of the city and came to Him.

31 In the meantime His disciples urged Him, saying, "Rabbi, eat."
32 But He said to them, "I have food to eat of which you do not know."
33 Therefore the disciples said to one another, "Has anyone brought Him anything to eat?"

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

39 And many of the Samaritans of that city believed in Him because of the word of the woman who testified, "He told me all that I ever did." 40 So when the Samaritans had come to Him, they urged Him to stay with them; and He stayed there two days. 41 And many more believed because of His own word.

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 the Christ, the Savior of the world."

Jesus is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world!  The disciples did not consider this as they came back from thero grocery shopping in town and returned to find their Lord conversing alone with a woman, and a Samaritan one at that.  Both these were socially not acceptable to the Jews for all the wrong reasons.  They dared not ask Jesus how about what she was looking for there or why Jesus was talking with her.  The woman, however, left her water behind that she had come for and hurriedly left to give her testimony about meeting the one who had to be the long expected Messiah, the anointed Christ of God who proved Himself by knowing and telling her things about her life which were impossible for Him to know unless He had lived in her Samaritan town, a highly unlikely possibility for a Jewish man who would shun every conceivable contact with them.  When she had told them all these stories and asked if Jesus by the well offering living water as the scriptures promised could be the Christ, they came to Him to hear for themselves if these things were so (Acts 17:11).  Meanwhile, the disciples urged their Master to eat something after their long journey, but He told them that He had food to eat that they did not know about.  They asked each other if someone had slipped some food to Him that the others may have not seen, but Jesus clarified what He meant by those words.  He made it clear that the food He was talking about was His Father’s work and not physical sustenance.  He was speaking spiritually-minded while they were focusing on the outward needs.  Jesus spoke of the need to be about His Father’s business of the message and work of the kingdom of God and heaven which is the work of the gospel of deliverance from sin’s punishment.  He pointed to the world as a field full of souls ready to be harvested for eternal life and that they should be concerned with that work and consume and be consumed by that instead.  He pointed out that others had cleared a path in the hearts of people (1 Corinthians 3:6-8) and they should harvest that work for those in whom the seed of God’s word had germinated and had grown to the point of bearing fruit at last.  When the Samaritans from town came and heard Jesus speak they also believed and the harvest of the scriptures bore fruit in many of them as they believed in Jesus as the Christ while hearing His word to them.  They did not just believe to salvation by the verbal testimony of the woman but by hearing God’s word themselves and gaining faith by God’s work in them as they listened.  Even now we can give personal testimony to God’s work of saving us but that alone will not lead to the salvation of others apart from hearing the words of the gospel from scripture as well.  We lead and plant seeds but God’s Spirit works to bring the word preached to the hearts and minds to fruition.  We then are appeared to be reaping our harvest but is is God in Christ who saves by His work of His word which we tell them as He harves them and we are seen with the sheaves (Psalm 126:6) He brings in.  Hearing the scripture (Romans 10:16-17) of the Bible leads others prepared to hear to conviction and transformation as they understand in heart, soul, and mind that Jesus is the Son of God come to take away their sin on that cross of sacrifice by His substitutionary suffering and death on their behalf.  This is God’s work of the gospel which we preach with willing feet to tell others (Romans 10:14-15) that they may hear and believe to trust Him to salvation (Romans 10:9-10).  May we be about our Father’s business at every well we stop at to explain that Jesus is the Christ, the Savior of the world to all He calls to harvest.