Expand Your Heart
John 4:39-42 Many of the Samaritan people in that town believed in Jesus. They believed because of what the woman had told them about him. She had told them, “He told me everything I have ever done.” The Samaritans went to Jesus. They begged him to stay with them. So he stayed there two days. Many more people became believers because of the things he said. The people said to the woman, “First we believed in Jesus because of what you told us. But now we believe because we heard him ourselves. We know now that he really is the one who will save the world.”
Over the last few days, we’ve been chatting about the willingness of a tired, hungry Jesus to reach across the cultural divide between Jews and Samaritans, to share God’s love with this woman at the well.
I don’t know about you, but I find it all too easy to dislike people who disagree with me, meaning that there’s a huge temptation to withdraw, both physically and emotionally, from objectionable people like that. Far safer to cocoon ourselves in our own space, surrounded by those who agree with us, than to reach out and love those sinners out there, wouldn’t you agree?
And yet Jesus’ preparedness to cross multiple cultural boundaries in order to reach out to the woman at the well had ramifications that rippled well beyond that one encounter.
John 4:39-42 Many of the Samaritan people in that town believed in Jesus. They believed because of what the woman had told them about him. She had told them, “He told me everything I have ever done.” The Samaritans went to Jesus. They begged him to stay with them. So he stayed there two days. Many more people became believers because of the things he said. The people said to the woman, “First we believed in Jesus because of what you told us. But now we believe because we heard him ourselves. We know now that he really is the one who will save the world.”
Sure, we can play things safe and stick to our own, but never know the huge – huge – impact that God would have in this world through us. Or we can become vulnerable, expand our hearts, reach across divides while we’re tired, thirsty and hungry – and see the Spirit of God move in ways that we could never have imagined.
#NoteToSelf: expand your heart.
That’s God’s Word. Fresh … for you … today.
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