You can't convince a new convert not to be excited. From here, the woman at the well began to publish widely what Jesus did for her (John 4:29-30). The Good News of Jesus turned the woman into an evangelist. Here is another point about outreach. Those who put themselves in the place for God to use them (going on an outreach, volunteering for a new ministry, missions) WILL be used by God and those converts turn into evangelists! They have networks that we don't have and they can reach people that we will never reach. The Church must stay focused on outreach to be healthy. It is not a coincidence that John gives the discourse of Jesus at this point (John 4:35) on the fields being white unto harvest (John 4:34-38). God has not made a mistake! He has entrusted this good news to His Church. We are the ones who must be faithful to the Gospel mandate. He has provided all the resources that we need (Acts 2:4, 10:44-46) to do His work. What follows in this discourse is absolutely amazing. The Samaritan convert told what God had done for her….the people she told believed it! (John 4:39) and then they began to follow Jesus themselves. Consider THEIR TESTIMONY…. Not the words of Jesus…. Not the words of the Samaritan convert…. The words of those who believed the report of the Samaritan… So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. 41 And many more believed because of his word. 42 They said to the woman, "It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world." The hearers had moved from confession, to belief, to true knowledge (Romans 8:16). If we dare to do the hard work of outreach we WILL SEE RESULTS. Those results will produce more results. The good news is, those results will be long-lasting. Jesus told Peter "I will build My Church" (Matthew 16:18) There is a Church to build! There is a Gospel to preach! The harvest is white, the laborers ARE few….pray for the Lord of the Harvest to thrust workers into His harvest field.(Luke 10:2). Intentional outreach that brings life and hope to those who have no hope, enable the believer to enjoy what Isaiah could only dream about (Isaiah 12:3) Praise God! var refTagger = { settings: { bibleVersion: "ESV" } }; (function(d, t) { var g = d.createElement(t), s = d.getElementsByTagName(t)[0]; g.src = '//api.reftagger.com/v2/RefTagger.js'; s.parentNode.insertBefore(g, s); }(document, 'script'));
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Dr. DanProfessor, Bible Enthusiast, Bible Software Powered Archives
April 2022
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