Lesson 5

As I was writing these lessons, I would sit around at night, searching for the right words to say, talking to myself, writing page after page only to delete most of what I had written and then five minutes later ask myself why I had done that. Let me tell you that, that is one big negative of the computer when it comes to the art of writing.

Once upon a time an author would wad up a page covered in handwritten script or play hoops with typed pages from an old manual typewriter, always able to retrieve the thoughts that at one moment seemed ridiculous when sanity returned. But when you select all and hit delete, well there is no retrieval, just the desire to pound your head against the keyboard. And it was at the head pounding stage that I began to realize I was in some deep trouble.

I stopped solemnly praying and just started talking to God. Father, what do you want me to say, I don’t know how to say that, what do you mean here, I have no idea how to convey this…you are going to have to talk through me because I’ve got nothing. Father we are in some serious trouble…we’ve got a week to go, and all this stuff I have written is really bad, what are we going to do….

One night as I was talking to Him, this guy popped into my head from Braveheart. He’s the one who ends up protecting William Wallice, but everyone thinks he’s nuts, because no one else prays like he does, like God was actually their Father, nobody but him. I realized as I was thinking of that movie, that that is how I should have been praying as I was writing.

But Mel Gibbson wasn’t the one who taught mankind about the Father. No, the one who did that was the only one who really knew Him up to that point, and He is the one who introduced the Father to the world. “I Am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” Jesus taught us to pray to the Father. He is the one who led us into a love relationship with the Father and He is more than enough to meet our every need, even when we doubt that He is.

Father, as we seek to know Jesus as our everything, teach us through Your Word and this lesson what it means that Jesus is the Way, what it means that Jesus is the Truth, what it means that Jesus is the Life. In His name we pray, amen.

John 14:8-12; John 11:38-43

In John 14, we find Jesus in the upper room sharing the heart of His message as well as His own heart with the men He lived with for three years. He shared things with them He could never have shared with the crowds, and He teaches them how to love one another in the process.
In John 13, they were all together in the upper room. I picture it as a large enough room to handle thirteen men comfortably. They are all sitting around a large table.

No not like the image we have in our heads of DaVinci’s last supper, more the Roman style, called the triclinium.

In the tradition of the day, three men were usually on one large couch, with the highest ranking reclining at the top. Then the next ranking person angled in front of him with his head about at the chest of the first person. It was said that that person lay in the bosom of the first. So John and Peter were on the couch with Jesus, then the other disciples filled up the rest of the couches around the table making a rectangle.

I say all of this so you can get a mental picture of the level of intimacy, these men shared, and why they did some of the things they did. From this picture, it is really clear why they needed to have their feet washed. They were all sitting around with their feet in each other’s face trying to eat, so it was necessary to make sure those feet were clean.

In addition, on this night, Jesus did not just want everyone to have clean feet; He wanted to teach them that they needed to serve one another. He wanted them to know that none of them were any better than anyone else, and in so doing He was teaching them how to love each other.

Just as they finish up breaking bread together, Jesus told them some things that rocked their world. You see, they, just like the crowd who wanted to eat, thought that Jesus was a political leader. The disciples had been with Him a long time, but they still did not understand the reason He had come to earth. So, Jesus started to tell them some stuff that is extremely hard for them to grasp. He pointed things out to them about themselves that they just did not want to believe.

Read John 13:2, “I tell you the truth, one of you is going to betray Me.” Now check out the disciples response. They all start looking at each other. The fishermen were probably looking at Matthew the tax collector thinking, “I knew it, you can’t trust those people. He never worked hard a day in his life, and he wasn’t one of us from the beginning.”

Whatever they were thinking, I am sure they all started to doubt each other.

The disciples starting to feel threatened from within when Jesus hits them with this:
My children, I will be with you only a little longer. You will look for Me, and just as I said to the Jews, so I tell you now: Where I am going, you cannot come.

So, not only is Jesus going to be betrayed by one of them, now He is telling them that He is leaving them and they can’t even go with Him.

You need to know that they all thought that they would die for Him. Thomas said at one point when He knew the leaders in Judea were planning on killing Jesus that he would go back to Judea with Jesus and be killed with Him. Now Peter says the same thing, “Why can’t I follow you now? I will lay down my life for You?” None of them think that they will run in fear, none of them doubt that they will fight for Him, none of them ever dreamed they would abandon Him, but their unbelief on this night sets the stage for exactly that to happen.

Philip said, “Just show us the Father and that will be enough.”

Really, Philip, will that finally be enough for you? I mean I can understand, you want to meet the Father face to face, I get that, but you don’t seem to get that when I say I AM, that is exactly what I mean. You have been sitting with the Father for three years now, you get to talk to God face to face…you are talking to the great I AM right now, but I understand…you thought the Father would be a little more impressive. Well Philip, I don’t think that if the Father came down right here next to you that you would believe any more than you already do.

Just a few weeks before Philip asked Jesus to show them the Father, Lazarus, a very close friend of Jesus, died. He was in the tomb four days before Jesus arrived in Bethany, and He had told His disciples even before they left to see Lazarus that the sickness that had over taken him wasn’t one that would end in death, but that it was for God’s glory.

When they reached Bethany everyone was wailing, and crying. Martha and Mary were mad at Jesus for not getting there sooner, and when Jesus told Martha to have the stone rolled away from the tomb that held Lazarus’ body, she freaked out. She was not to0 overwhelmed with grief to remind Jesus that a dead body smelled pretty bad by the fourth day.

Jesus cried for the hurt Mary and Martha felt, but He did not cry for Lazarus. He told those mourning that day that if they believed they would see the glory of God. Then Jesus prayed, “Father, I thank You that You have heard Me. I know that You always hear Me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe You sent Me.” Jesus didn’t pray publically because HE needed to, He prayed in front of all of those gathered there that day so that they would understand that He and the Father were one. At that point, Jesus called Lazarus back from the dead.

If that event wasn’t enough to prove to Philip and all the other disciples that Jesus was one with the Father, then nothing Jesus did on earth ever would. Belief is a choice; it isn’t based on signs, logic or anything other than a decision to trust.

How many of you are cynics and proud of it?

The cynics among us are not the most easy to teach. We tend to be the ones with our arms crossed, face serious as we listen intently to every word to make sure that no false teaching is taking place. We uncross our arms only to look through scripture to find the portion of the word that is being read. We take notes so we can read them later on, and test the truth of what the pastor or teacher or speaker said.

Now, I am thankful for the ones who hold those of us who teach accountable for the words we speak, especially since we say we are teaching the word of God. The only problem is that we skeptics tend to not know when to stop analyzing and start trusting.

From what Philip said to Jesus, I am pretty sure that Philip is one of us. He is a good guy, but not easily persuaded, and sometimes the cynic’s heart can keep them from a deep and fulfilling relationship because they are always looking for the worst in people…they are always looking for something better, and they end up missing the good that is standing right in front of them, because it didn’t meet their standard. Philip was looking for his idea of God and missed three years of knowing God instead of just thinking about Him.

It is because Jesus knows that they don’t yet understand who He is or what He has come for that He shares all He does with them from chapter 13-17. He does not want to leave them unprepared or afraid so He tells them, “Do not let your hearts be troubled, trust in God, trust also in Me. In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going to prepare it for you, and if I go and prepare it, then I will come back and take you with me so that you are where I am. You know the way.”

Thomas, also a cynic, chimes in with Philip and says, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”

Have you ever tried to explain to someone something you know, but they have never experienced so there is a disconnect between the two of you? This happens a lot when I am trying to explain something to my kids. I know what I am talking about, and assume that they can grasp what I am saying simply because they know me, but they instead look at me with a blank stare.

This is usually the moment I start get upset with them, because usually the blank stare comes along with a request for them to do something. But they end up not being able to do what I want because they don’t have the life experience to know what I mean. That is where the disciples are at. They hear what Jesus is saying, but they don’t have the depth of knowledge or faith to understand.

This fact plays out most clearly over the next twenty four to forty-eight hours of Jesus’ life. It is not until after Jesus ascends into heaven, after His resurrection, that they start to grasp what He came to do, and not until the Holy Spirit filled them did they have the life experience (the Spirit of God within them) to fully understand that Jesus had come to die all along. That is why He told them in John 16, that the Holy Spirit would come when He left and that the Spirit would comfort them and lead them into all truth.

Jesus was trying to prepare them for the devastation of the cross, but more than that, because He knew they would fail Him, He was preparing them to come back to Him after the cross.
Don’t be afraid, even though you are going to know terror like you have never known it before. I have to leave you for a little while, but I will be back. “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.”
He was telling them: you do know the way…I am the way…trust me, because I am not just a way of life, but I am the truth of all life, I am life.

And in our day, the idea of one way, one truth that leads to eternal life is something that we no longer accept. We like the crowd that followed Jesus and like the disciples have a hard time grasping that Jesus could be the answer to all of our questions, to the source of all of our beliefs and the ending place of all of our lives.

Many in the Christian community are moving away from teaching that Jesus is the answer, the source and the ending of life. They believe that that teaching is too hard for those in our culture seeking God. Instead there is a movement that says that John 14:6 should not be read to say that Jesus is the only way to God, but instead if you live the way of Jesus then you will find God. Now that might sound like the same thing, but it is not.

What they mean is that if you live as a peasant with nothing, helping the poor, then you will find God, even if it is through another “faith tradition”.

By this interpretation of John 14;6, Gandhi and Buddha, by the things they did are with the Father, even though they did not go through Jesus. But if it is enough to live with no earthly possessions, meet the needs of the sick and needy, then Jesus never needed to go to the cross, he could have simply continued to live as He was, showing His disciples to live that same way.

We should be doing all that Jesus did, but it should not be to get to the Father, it should instead be a by-product of knowing the Way to the Father.

Funny, it was Martha who understood this; she seemed to get it even before the disciples. She was crying, wailing, mourning her brother’s death, as Jesus sauntered in four days late. She walked up to Him and said, “Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died. But I know that even now God will give You whatever you ask.”

Jesus told her, “Your brother will rise again.”

“I know he will rise again one day,” Martha responded.

But Jesus didn’t leave it at that. He said, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me will live even though he dies; whoever lives and believes in Me will never die. Martha, do you believe this?”

And Martha, the one we in the church dog all the time for not being as spiritual as her sister Mary, the same Martha who was too busy to sit at the feet of Jesus and be still, this Martha has more understanding, more faith than the twelve who walked with Him daily for three years. Martha said, “Yes Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God who was to come into the world.”

Martha, a cynic if I ever saw one, at the moment of her deepest need believed that Jesus would raise Lazarus from the dead, even before He did it…it was enough for her to simply hear Him say that He would do it, even if it wasn’t enough yet for Philip to see Lazarus raised from the dead.

Martha chose to believe that Jesus was who He said He was, she knew that He was the only way to the Father, that He was and is the Way, the Truth and the Life.

Lesson 4

Bread of Life

Read John 6

Now, I can't imagine what it must have been like for Jesus to teach that many people. I mean I led a small women's Bible study for four years, with an average of 8-12 women in attendance. Most of the women were young moms with kids ranging from infant to ten. We had childcare provided, but most women weren't real comfortable with putting their babies into childcare until they were a bit older, and there are times when little ones of 2 or 3 just want their moms.

You see, at the time I led the class, our church had no building, so we were meeting in homes, the facilities weren't perfect to say the least. So, there were times I was trying to teach on the Second Coming of Christ, drawing all kinds of time lines on the board, while a little one was crying, well I guess I should say screaming in the next room, or a baby was sitting on the floor having a wonderful time playing and talking his or her own language, and every woman in the room was looking at the baby instead of answering the questions I was asking.

There was one week when we had most of the women in class, so the living room was full, our hostess had just gotten a new puppy she was trying to train, we had a couple of little ones on the floor with their moms and the room for the kids was packed.

I was going over the seven seals that the Lamb of Revelation opens (I sound impressive don't I…well let me tell you as I was writing this I had a hard time remembering what any of the stuff I was teaching back then meant…so really I was just regurgitating information I got from Kay Arthur, so don't be too impressed) anyway, I was trying to explain a significant part of the overall picture of Revelation, when the puppy decided to walk under my easel and twist his leash around one of its legs.

It was not the most sturdy of easels either…it was one of those that has really skinny black legs, and barely enough room to support a small dry erase board. So, just as the dog is about to run toward it's toy, I grab the easel, lean it toward me, freeing the lease from the leg just in time to prevent the board from being thrown into the lap of the lady sitting a couple of feet away from me.

At around the same time, one of the babies started crying, and the kids came out of their play room to go outside and loudly called to their moms (my three calling to me as well) as they marched out in single file lines. I turned toward the board, kept talking and writing, assuming that someone might still be paying attention, all the while lifting up the easel on one side or another the keep the dog leash free for the rest of the class.

I remember thinking after that day that that must have been what the early church was like. Paul was preaching one night and as he was talking a boy feel asleep sitting on a window seal, and feel out of the open window.

He actually died, and Paul brought him back to life. Can you imagine, Paul's teaching them that the law cannot save them, that the law is a guide that points them to Jesus, and then all of a sudden there is a mother's scream, a dull thud and then more shouts from below? Paul startled from his messages gets up, goes out and lays hands on the boy, they bring him back in, and then they break for pie, praising the Lord all the while.

Well, when I thought of Jesus trying to minister to over 5,000 men, not including their families, I remembered my own time of teaching in a less than sterile environment. I thought of the difficulties of speaking to that many people, and the fact that there was no microphone, no sound system, no band to warm the people up, no chairs for them to be comfortable, no spot light on Jesus so they could easily see him, no donuts in the lobby and no order of service so everyone knew when they could go home to eat. It was Jesus living in the real with people, and having a heart to love them.

Can you see any television preacher standing on a hill trying to talk over the crying babies, playing kids, yelling moms and hungry dads? I think our entertainment methods of today would leave us totally uncertain on how to relate with people at the same level Jesus related to them. He knew them, because He did not simple preach to them, He lived with them, He was one of them, and He knew that their souls were hungry. Jesus is the bread of life.

Father, thank You for Jesus. He loved, and continues to love people, not for show or for His own purpose, but simply because of real love. Create in us that kind of love for You and for others. Build in us a desire to love You with our whole heart, mind, soul and strength. In Jesus Name, Amen.

Jesus had compassion on the masses of people He was teaching. He realized they were hungry and met their physical need for food. The next morning the same people He fed the day before came to find Him.

Jesus tells them, “You are looking for Me, not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the loaves and had your fill.”

Do we come to Jesus to follow Him so that He can meet our needs, or because we love Him? I had never considered that there was a difference until I started to study this section of John.
At one point Jesus tells a crowd of 5,000 that they are only following Him because they want their stomachs filled again. He said they weren't even following because of all the signs He had preformed, but instead for the free bread they thought they could get from Him.

I was struck when He said, "You are looking for Me, not because you saw miraculous signs, but because you ate the loaves and had your fill." The day before He provided dinner for all of them from two fish and five loaves of bread….they thought they had a free lunch ticket if they kept following. Jesus had a different plan in mind. He basically told them, I'm not here to feed you physical appetite, but instead your hungry souls.

So take a minute and think about the question. Why do you want a relationship with Jesus? If you already have one, think about how you see the Lord. If you don't have a relationship with Him, what are you looking for?

When I first considered the question, I was shocked at my answer. I thought back to the beginning of my walk with Christ. In the beginning I followed out of a deep need to be loved. I came to Him for the same reason the Samaritan woman did, to be safe and valued.

But once I was in Christ, well I think it started to be more about me and how it made me feel. I felt special, and in and of its self there is nothing wrong with that, but when that feeling becomes the focus, then there is a problem. Jesus said to me, you are looking for me because I make you feel good, don't work to feel special because there will be trials that will knock you down, instead keep your eyes on things that are eternal and lasting.

He knows that we will get hungry and need to eat; he knows that we need to feel safe and loved and He will meet those needs for us. What He asks of us is to keep our eyes on Him and to make His will more important than our own needs.

After Jesus tells them to stop working for food that spoils, they ask Him, "What must we do to do the works God requires?"

Jesus points them in a direction they just don't understand. And I am not sure we get most of the time either. He says, "the WORK of God is this: to believe in the One He has sent." That is a hard one for us. We tend to say ya, but….I want to do this or that for you Lord. Here I am Lord send me. Is this it God? Didn't you make me for something bigger than this? In the end, it is not what we do for Him that brings Jesus pleasure. He wants us to believe in Him, He wants us to know Him.

The crowd heard what He said, but they wanted more from Jesus if they were going to believe in Him. They said, "What miraculous sign then will you give that we may see it and believe in you. What will You do?"

They wanted a sign, they wanted Jesus to prove Himself to them…now mind you, they started to follow Him because of the miraculous signs He was performing (Jh 6:2). He fed all of them from the meager lunch a little boy had of 2 fish and 5 loaves of bread the day before, but that wasn't quite enough for them, and sadly it isn't usually enough for us either.

I can't really count the number of times the Lord has shown Himself to me in a tangible and real way and I end up saying, "Was that really You Lord? How can I know it was You working in my life? Can You show me something else." I end up missing Him, not because He isn't working, but because I choose to close my eyes to what He is doing.

In First Corinthians, Paul says that Jews look for miraculous signs and Greeks for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Greeks. The cross is a stumbling block to the Jew because they thought the Messiah or the Christ would come as a conquering King and defeat Rome.

Instead He came as a humble peasant to die for the sins of the world and was killed by the ones He was suppose to set free and the ones He was suppose to defeat. The cross is foolishness to the Greek because why would anyone follow someone who was so easily defeated, and whose message was sacrifice. Jesus came to the uneducated and the weak, why would a great leader do that?

So if Paul were writing to us today, what would He say?

Jews demand miraculous signs, Greeks look for wisdom, and Americans what do we look for? (MONEY, MONEY, MONEY).

I would say we would call Christ crucified foolishness because

He held no property

He had no wealth

He wasn't famous

He died teaching that we should die to self. What proof do we as American's want in order that we may believe Jesus is who He says He is?

We want success.

So they are looking for a political leader, who will not just set them free from Rome, but who will also provide them with an endless supply of bread.

For many years, I wasn't very different from the crowd. I thought that government could bring about the kingdom of God on earth, so I worked in the political realm to help and try to bring that about. I work for an organization much like Center for Arizona Policy here. My organization brought issues important to the stability of families and others to the forefront of the political debate.

There was and continues to be great value in this type of work. God placed us in a democratic system, where each one of us is held responsible for the direction our laws head.
The problem that arose for me was that I placed so much value on making sure that Government was headed in the right direction that I forgot that Jesus didn't come to make sure that any certain party held political sway, but instead that people were reached with the gospel.
Thankfully God reminded me of this through the example of the man I worked for at the time. I found that he stood for what he believed while at the same time loving his "enemies" along the way. I on the other hand, was a young twenty something, just graduated from college with a fire inside and assumed they were our enemies. I was shown by this man's example that it is possible to stand up for things and still care for those who don't agree with you.

It was just before I started working for this Family Council that I found myself in a poli-sci class with a woman who worked in the political realm on the other side of the isle.

We had a civil relationship and talked on and off about different subjects. She told me that she had worked for a certain cause for a time and when she had to confront a problem in her own organization she was shunned and rejected.

She then told me that man on the other side had shown her kindness and concern during that time. After working at Family Council for a few months, I realized she had been talking about my boss. He lived out Christ to this woman and to everyone else around Him. He cared about good laws, but his greatest calling was to love others. He knew Jesus had not come to establish His kingdom on earth, but instead to feed their hungry souls.

I learned that my focus should never be on a cause, or on what I think Jesus came for. His ways are not my ways, and all I need to do is believe in Him.

So, the crowd asked Jesus for a sign. It wasn't just any old sign. They wanted a sign like the ones God did through Moses when He led the Israelites out of Egypt. The crowd was beginning to compare Jesus with the greatest of prophets; they were beginning to compare Him to Moses. So they said to Him, "What will you do? Our forefathers ate the manna in the desert; as it is written; 'He gave them bread from heaven to eat.'"

Jesus had given them bread to eat out of pretty much nothing, so would He now use signs to convince the Romans to leave just like Moses had had used against Pharaoh?

Jesus' response to their request for a sign is to tell them, "The bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world."

But just like the woman at the well, they were taking His words literally. They say, "Sir, from now on give us this bread."

"I am the Bread of Life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty." You have seen me, and still you do not believe. I have come down from heaven not to do My will, but the will of Him who sent Me. And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that I shall lose none of all He has given me…..My Father's will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in Him shall have eternal life and I will raise him up at the last day."
Jesus tells them you want a sign, I am the sign. He says, here it is, I am the Bread of Life, and all you have to do to have it is to come to me, and believe then you will never be hungry or thirsty again, but you have chosen not to believe so you will be hungry and thirsty forever.

The next few verses are the ones that really reveal that the crowd was not following Him because they wanted to know God, but instead because of who they thought Jesus was. Once He did not fit into what they wanted, when He said something that was too hard for them to accept, they were gone.

Those who refused to believe started to (read Jh. 6:38) grumble among themselves, Who does this guy think he is?

“How can He give us His flesh to eat?”

And when they heard all of His teaching, many of his disciples (not the 12) said, "This is hard teaching, who can accept it... From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed Him."Jh 6:60;66

The crowd fell away because they came to Jesus not to follow Him because they wanted a relationship with Him, based on denying themselves, but instead because they wanted Him to meet their preconceived notions of what the Messiah would do and be for them. When the teaching got too hard, they left.

In the end, Jesus said the hard things, because He was not concerned about impressing people. He told them they would need to eat of His flesh and drink of His blood in order to meet the hunger in their lives. What He meant was they needed to share in His suffering.

Let's go back to the question I asked earlier. Why do you follow Jesus? Is it to meet your need, or your own ideas of who Jesus is, or do you follow Him because you love Him? "Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you." (Jh 6:27) He is the only one who can meet the hunger in our hearts, because Jesus is more than enough.

Study Guide

1. You are looking for Me, not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. Why do you want a relationship with Jesus?

2. What must we do to do the works God requires?



3. What signs do we now demand of God? What signs do we demand of government?

4. Our nation is in an economic crisis, our own church family as well as the families within our church are hurting, in such times do we look to Jesus for strength, wisdom and guidance, or are we looking to a false savior?

5. Some people place their trust in money, power, possessions, relationships, where do you place your trust?

6. The teaching of Jesus is not easy. He said that we needed to take up our cross daily and follow Him. Are you willing to give up your own needs, your own ideas of how God should meet your needs, and follow after Jesus?

7. Too often, we make knowing the will of God into a mystery. We want to hear a special word from the Lord, or have a “new” revelation. What we end up missing when we are searching for the new is the One who is the will of God. All we have to do to know that will is to BELIEVE in the One that He sent, Jesus.

Lesson 3

Thirsty Soul

Each one of us has a thirst that we are trying to satisfy with something. Often times we attempt to meet that need with food, alcohol, the internet, relationships, and work, but none of these things ever quenches it. The woman at the well tried to meet the thirst in her heart with men, and then one man came along and radically changed her world. She found out that only He could satisfy her parched soul. She discovered that Jesus is the Living Water.

As she walked to the well, her heart hurt. She had to get water at noon, so that the other women in the village would not be there. However, she did not want to have to go when all the other women were gone. She was lonely. She was thirsty for friendship, for someone to reach out to her and accept her. How long had it been since she felt accepted? Had she ever really known what acceptance felt like? Would she ever know what it meant to be loved?

When she got closer to the well, she saw someone sitting on its edge. She breathed a sigh of relief. Well, at least it was a man. They were not as catty or as cold as women were, and she knew how to please them. She slowed down her step, hoping he would go away when he saw her coming, but He did not. She noticed that He was not from Samaria. He was a Jew. Why was He here in Sychar, a city in Samaria?

These might have been the thoughts of the Samaritan woman as she walked toward Jesus one afternoon. After meeting Him, she would finally know what it meant to be accepted and to be loved.

Around

John 4 begins by explaining that Jesus was drawing large numbers of followers, people baptized by His disciples, not just curious onlookers. The Pharisees were starting to get nervous. At first, they thought John the Baptist was going to be the one to challenge their authority, but it was becoming clearer to them that Jesus was actually the rising star.

The Jewish leaders decided to send someone over to try to stir up things between John the Baptist and Jesus. John’s disciples were agitated and they came to John along with a “certain” Jew. They asked John, “What’s up with this guy Jesus. Aren't you bothered that He is baptizing more people than you are?” (See John 3:22-36)

I picture John the Baptist as a hippie type, surfer dude. He might have responded to the leader like this, "No worries dudes. I am down with Jesus. He is righteous. I’m not here to get dudes to follow me. Jesus is going to become epic and I'm canned. That's gnarly. I came to make the way glassy for Him and then I'm out." In other words, “He must increase and I must decrease” (John 3:30).

John’s reply was simple and clearly revealed his deep faith. The Pharisees effort to cause conflict between John and Jesus failed. That said, when Jesus learned about the attention He was drawing among the religious leaders, He decided to go up to Galilee for a while. He left Judea and headed north, toward Samaria.

Most Jews traveled around Samaria. They believed that by going through the Samaritan region they would become unclean. Jews saw Samaritans as half-breeds, not worthy of God's love. The Samaritans had once been part of Israel, but after the Assyrian invasion of the Northern Kingdom of Israel in 722 B.C., they were forced to intermarry with Assyrians, thereby losing their position as Jews.

The gospel writer says that Jesus had to go through Samaria to get to Galilee. Now He did not have to go physically around Samaria. Religious Jews went east, across the Jordan, then north until they passed the Samaritan region, and finally went back west, across the Jordan, to enter Galilee. Jesus chose to go right through Samaria to get to His destination. Jesus did not live by the same standards as the religious. He did not have the same prejudices that the Jewish leaders of the day held. He was concerned about people, and about carrying out the Father’s will. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His One and Only Son that whoever believed in Him should not perish, but have eternal life” (John. 3:16).

Jesus did not go around Samaria. He knew that the shortest way between two points is a straight line. He also knew that if He went around, He would miss something He needed to do. He would miss the Father’s will.

Thirsty

Jesus arrived in Sychar, a city in Samaria, around lunchtime. He was thirsty and hungry after His six-hour journey. He took a seat by the town well. His throat was parched and covered in dust. He determined to ask a woman carrying a jug for a drink of water. Read the interaction that took place:

When a Samaritan Woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give Me a drink?” (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.) (John 4:7-9)

Jesus was not concerned with whom she was, what He was concerned about was the state of her heart. He told her, “If you knew the gift of God and who is saying this to you, ‘Give Me a drink’ you would ask Him and He would give you living water" (Jh 4:13-14).

The woman did not know what to do with Jesus. I can picture her standing there looking at Him wondering if He was all there.

Imagine some guy coming up to you at the gas station, wearing an Armani suit and driving a BMW, asking you to fill up his gas can. You might look at what He is wearing and driving and think to yourself, “Why is He asking me to fill up His gas can?”

He realizes what you are thinking and offers you gas for life. You look at Him like He is crazy and He proceeds to promise you that if you listen to Him he can make sure you are filled up for good, and all the time you are wondering how a guy who cannot pay for his own gas, can promise to give you fuel for the rest of your life.

That might have been what the woman at the well was thinking. What kind of water can this man have, if He does not even have a bucket to draw water out of the well right in front of Him.
She said, "Sir, 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 flocks and herds?” (John 4:11).

She knew that there was something different about Jesus. He had something she wanted, but she could not put her finger on it.

Jesus said, "Everyone who drinks this water will get thirsty again, but whoever drinks from the water I give him will never get thirsty. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:13-14).

Jesus finally had her full attention. She was thirsty, thirstier than she even knew. The woman finally realized what she was thirsting for all those years. She said, "Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water” (John 4:15).

Go

Look closely at Jesus’ response. He does not give her three easy steps to salvation. Instead, He told her to admit to her own state of need. He instructed her to do something that would reveal the state of her heart, and her willingness to receive the gift He was offering her. Jesus said, “Go call your husband and come back” (16).

The Samaritan woman could have answered Jesus in several ways. She could have reacted in anger, telling Jesus to mind His own business. She could have lied about the men in her life. She could have even taken the cynical route and asked which one, but she chose to be honest with Jesus. She replied, "I have no husband” (17).

Jesus was impressed by her openness, "You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband” (18).

This was the reason that the woman was coming to the well by herself, in the middle of the day. She was a woman of loose morals, one any "God fearing" woman would shun.

Jesus saw her differently. He did not come to call the righteous, but sinners (Matt. 9:13). Thankfully, that is still true today. The following is the story of a modern day woman at the well:

I can say that I accepted Christ in 1982 at the tender age of 19, but I only believed in Him with my mind. I began attending church and a Bible study with my sister and some friends, but I had to move away from the area shortly after being saved. That's when my trouble began.

I settled into my different life in a new city and at the age of 20, I met and married a man who essentially did not believe in God. I fell into the same way of thinking. I was very lonely in my marriage, trying to get a college education and make lots of money. I had an emptiness inside that nothing would fill; not my husband, money, or my career. My husband and I were both proud, selfish, and demanding people, and eventually our marriage ended after seven years.

I fell into a very demoralized way of living during the year following my divorce. I began to go out and party with friends, I neglected my responsibilities at home as well as taking care of my dog. My language was foul. I slept with several men thinking that would ease the pain and emptiness I felt inside. It didn't. Working too much didn’t help either. Looking back, my life felt like it was as filthy as a toilet.

Following that year, I was working as an MRI/Nuclear medicine technologist, and I met my current husband. We married in 1993, and moved to Seattle, WA in February 1997, so that my husband could take a job promotion. We had two small children. Jesus literally began this time to pound on the door of my heart.

In Seattle, I began working weekends as an MRI technologist in one of the local hospitals. I was often very stressed and tired at those times because of the workload, but I truly enjoyed my job, my coworkers, the doctors, and patients. It was there that Jesus paid me a visit.

I remember the day clearly. On Saturday, December 7, 1998, I was scanning a patient for back pain, and as I looked at her, I could tell she was ill in other ways. The whites of her eyes were yellow and her color wasn't good at all. I felt she had hepatitis at the very least. I began to scan her for her back pain. At a point during her exam, the scan protocol called for an injection of a contrast agent into a vein in her arm. I came into the scan room to give her the injection. I was in a great hurry as I injected her. Just as I pulled the needle out of her arm, I stuck myself with her contaminated needle in my left palm, just below the left index finger.

I had been a technologist for 15 years and I had never stuck myself with any one's needle before but that is exactly what had just happened! I was so scared and bewildered and, not wanting to add to this patient's considerable level of pain, I did not tell her what had just happened. I finished her exam and she went home without knowing what had occurred.

I tried to carry on the rest of the day, thinking that I was a healthy person and that nothing could happen to me because of the needle stick. I went into the bathroom about two hours later, and as I looked into the mirror, I heard my heart's voice saying to me, "You are going to die and leave your kids without a mother." My future somehow flashed before my eyes and I knew that what this voice was saying was true. Right there, beside a toilet, I fell to my knees and begged God, "God, if You can make this situation alright, if You can heal this woman, then I won't be sick either! Please heal her and me! I know who You are and I know You can do this. I believe in You! I'll be Yours!"

I got up from beside the toilet and immediately called my unit manager and the patient, telling them what had happened. A flurry of activity ensued. I went to the ER for therapy, the patient came back, and had her blood drawn for lab work. Things were crazy in the ER but so many miracles happened that evening that it would take too much time to recount them all. One thing's for sure, I saw God mightily working right away for my good.

The next day, which was Sunday, I returned to my regular work shift, not knowing what the patient's lab results would show. I went to the computer terminal to check her blood results. Well, God worked two miracles, because first the patient did not have one thing wrong with her blood! In fact, her blood work was better than mine was! Secondly, God cured her, and through her being cured, I was never infected with anything. She was completely free of any problems yet I saw her with my own eyes and knew she was sick!

Well, I really heard Jesus calling me because I had just turned my life over to him the prior day in a radiology bathroom next to a toilet. I had faced my own future and found it lacked eternity! It lacked Jesus Christ!

Now, looking back over that time, I cannot thank Jesus enough for all He has done for me, even when I didn't care at all about Him. He showed me my horrible spiritual condition that day, being filthy like that toilet was. But He flushed away that toilet full of all my sin and now, I am free to live as Jesus' friend and disciple. I am deeply grateful to Him for all He has done and is doing in this world. Most of all, I am so very thankful for His presence in my life. I am no longer alone and Jesus gives me the ability to live powerfully for Him. He is with me always!

As for me, I am redeemed of the Lord and I will say so!

"For God demonstrates His own love towards us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." Romans 5:8

Jesus took the woman at the well to the same place he took the woman in this story. He showed them, their “horrible spiritual condition,” revealing their thirst for Him.

The Lord exposed the Samaritan woman’s need. He did this by going to the place she had gone to for years to try to satisfy her thirst. He went to her comforter to get to her heart. He asked her about the men in her life, because He wanted her to understand that nothing she had tried before could make her whole, make her stop thirsting. In this way, Jesus gave her a chance to be real, and through her honesty, the knowledge that she was not righteous, He was able to show her who He was.

Jesus went to the center of her problem. He went to the idol in her life; that thing she thought would save her and never could. She ran to men to try and slake her thirst, but they failed her every time. They just made her thirstier.

How many of us in this room still endeavor at times to refresh our parched soul with people, things, and/or activities? We might even have a relationship with Christ, but still fall back into old patterns or new ones that are just as devastating. Too often, we desire to meet our own needs. Sadly, when we do this, it is like drinking a cup of coffee when we are dehydrated. Our attempt only dries us out more.

I am not immune from this type of spiritual dehydration. Within two years of surrendering my life to Christ, an eating disorder ensnared me. This disorder manifested itself in relationship to the insecurity I was feeling in my marriage. My insecurity was not related to my husband, but to my past. My father left my mother just two years prior to my own marriage. I projected the fear of loss and abandonment onto my own relationship, and felt sure that if I kept my body trim that my husband would not leave me.

The interesting thing about eating disorders is that they might start with a desire for a healthy body, but they quickly move into obsession. Any disorder is more about emotional issues and control than anything else. By controlling my food intake and body image, I believed I could control my husband and my fears of abandonment.

All I really achieved was bondage to those fears. Instead of resting in Christ, I chose to try to manipulate things I thought were under my control to make me feel safe and secure. It was not until I realized I could never make myself truly safe, and allowed Jesus to have control over my life and well being that I finally had the security I was trying to achieve. He was the only one who could satisfy that thirst in my life.

ANYTHING can become our idol. Walking can change from a healthy everyday activity into a compulsive behavior, eating can move from a physical need to a self-comforting tool, Bible study can start out as a time of deep connection with the Lord and move into a guilt ridden activity. God created us for worship. If Christ is not at the center of our worship, then we will worship something or someone else.

The woman at the well chose men, what have you chosen? Is it your husband, your kids, your career? What would Jesus ask you to go and get if you asked Him today to give you living water? What do you need to confess to Him even now, because He is always sitting at the well waiting for you to drink of the water only He can offer?

Sidetrack

Pay attention to how the Samaritan woman dealt with Jesus’ focus on her comforter.
"Sir, the woman said, "I can see that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem." (John 4:19-24)

She was uncomfortable. Things were getting a little too personal. Just as Jesus was getting to the deep issues of this woman’s life, she tried to change the subject. She tried to divert attention from her use of men to something that was not as close to home.

She tried to sidetrack Jesus from the main issue in order to inquire about a “spiritual” matter. Since she had this man, that was no doubt a prophet standing in front of her, she thought she should ask Him something important.

We are no different in our desire to shift the focus from those sins that are comfortable to us to peripheral issues. I do this. It is easier to have a theological discussion than to confess our sins. It is more comfortable to study the Bible than to allow the Holy Spirit to use it to convict our heart. It appears more “godly” to quote passages of Scripture than to deal with the things that have taken control of our lives.

Jesus did not get sidetracked. He came to satisfy her thirst, not have a debate with her. He told her that the Jews worship God and that salvation is for them, but there would be a time when believers would worship God not in a central location but in spirit and truth. God is spirit and He wants to be worshiped in the spirit. Jesus invited the woman at the well to worship Him in this way.

Jesus invites us to worship Him in exactly that same way today. He wants us to stop trying to sidetrack things, and surrender our wills to His. When we do this, we discover a life overflowing with true worship: “Present yourselves as a living sacrifice wholly acceptable to God, which is your reasonable act of service” (Rom. 12:1).

Messiah

Jesus surprised the Samaritan woman. She quickly began to realize that He would satisfy her thirst. When she came to that point, the Lord did something very special for her. He did for her what He did for the woman in the hospital bathroom; He revealed His true nature, His secret identity. When the woman said, “I know that Messiah is coming. When He comes, He will explain everything to us,” Jesus declared, “‘I who speak to you am He’” (John 4:25-26).

Can you imagine what those words did to her heart? Even as I share this with you, my heart is racing. I am the one you have been waiting for, I am the Christ, the chosen One of God.

I am the Messiah

At that moment, the woman received the Living Water. She did not need to debate any longer. Jesus did not have to prove Himself to her. She believed. The evidence for this is found in verse 28: “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 Christ?’”

Drink

Once she grabbed hold of Jesus, she introduced Him to everyone. She did not care if someone was unkind, she was not worried about who might reject her, and she was not concerned about what people would say. The Samaritan woman received the acceptance she had thirsted for all of her life, and she was going to share the water of life with everyone she met. “Many of the Samaritans from the town believed in Him because of the woman’s testimony, ‘He told me everything I ever did’” (39).

After drinking the living water, she was never the same. “Her many sins have been forgiven for she loved much; but he who has been forgiven little loves little,” Jesus said this of another woman, but it applies to the woman at the well. (See Luke 7:48, 50).

If you have ever come across someone freed from the bonds of sin, someone who has been greatly forgiven, you know this woman. You understand what Jesus meant when He said that they loved much.

I had the honor of meeting such a woman several years ago. This woman loved Jesus more than anyone I had ever known. She never stopped talking about Jesus. She never stopped talking about what He did for her.

The story of her salvation freely flowed from her lips. Her sin and her past did not come out as freely. They were things she knew Jesus had already dealt with, and they no longer needed to be remembered, let alone talked about.

When I first met her, she reminded me of a schoolgirl in love for the first time, who wanted everyone to meet the one person the sun and moon circled around. She was never ashamed to say the name of Jesus. She introduced everyone to her best friend.

If anyone rejected Him or His love, she was devastated. She did not hurt for Him, or for herself. She hurt for them, because she knew that their souls were parched and if they just drank the water that liberally surged from Jesus’ heart, they would never be thirsty again. Jesus so saturated her that she could not help pouring out His love on everyone she encountered. Even when rejected, ridiculed or rebuked, she never faltered in her devotion to her Savior. Set free from so much, this woman loved Jesus in ways only she could understand and for reasons only she fully knew.

The woman at the well was just like this woman. She arrived at the point in her life where she realized that Jesus was the only one who saw into her heart, knew all there ever was to know about her, accepted her for who she really was, and still loved her. He loved her the way she longed to be loved.

The Samaritan woman discovered that Jesus was the only one who could satisfy her thirsty soul. He is the only one who can satisfy yours. Jesus is more than enough.

Study Guide

1. Read John 4, and play close attention to the attitude the woman at the well displays toward Jesus, as well as the attitude Jesus shows to the woman. What did you discover?

2. If Jesus had lived by the prejudices of His day, He would never have walked into Sychar. He would never have offered living water to the Samaritan woman. It is easy to look down on the religious Jews of Jesus’ day, but is there a certain group of people that are looked at as less than in your community, in your church? Is there some place you would go around rather than go through because you would have to interact with certain people? Why is this? What attitudes do you need to address, do you need to change?

3. Read John 4. Underline ever reference to water, living water, and water of life. Who is the living water? What does He offer?

4. Have you met Jesus at the well? If you have, write down your “well” encounter. How does your experience compare with that of the woman at the well?

5. Why do we try to sidetrack the issues that are most important to our walk with Jesus? What ways do you divert attention from your own sin? Is there a sin that you need to deal with? Are you being honest about it like the woman, or are you arguing with the Lord trying to pretend it is not an issue that needs to be addressed?

6. Read Matthew 16:13-28. Who is Jesus? What truth did Peter declare, that Jesus then revealed freely to the woman at the well?

7. What reaction did the woman have to Jesus’ proclamation; “I am He”?

8. Study Luke 7:36-50. What did the Pharisee say about Jesus? Why did He doubt Jesus?

9. How did the woman in this passage show her love for Jesus? What saved her?

10. Are you like the women who wept broken tears over Jesus’ feet, or are you like the Pharisee that doubted the Lord and rejected those who were less religious?

11. Why do those who have been forgiven much love much? Do you know anyone like this? What have you been forgiven?

12. Do you love much? If you were forgiven a great deal, but that was years ago, do you still have the same level of love that you had when you first believed? Read Revelation 2:2-7. Have you left your first love?

13. Have you been trying to slake your thirsty soul by drinking spiritual “coffee”, only parching it further, while your soul is screaming for water? What are some of your comforters.

14. The Messiah is waiting at the well even now for you. Will you drink the Living Water He freely offers? Will you share that water with everyone else around you?

Lesson 2

Romantic Adultery

In Matthew 5:27-28 Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery’; but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

Jesus was clearly addressing men in this portion of the Sermon on the Mount. He said that mentally taking a woman in a lustful way is no different than actually sleeping with her.

It is easy for us as women to AMEN the pastor who preaches Jesus’ words from Matthew 5. We shake our heads in agreement; as the men are told that they are sinning when they take that second look at the woman jogging down the street or consciously linger over the woman in a bikini at the pool, looking at her through their sunglasses. Our security, as women and wives, is stolen every time our husband stares at a magazine covered with the cleavage of some actress, while we stand next to him in line at the grocery store. When we hear the words of Jesus spoken to our men by the pastor on a Sunday morning, we feel protected. We are thankful someone is defending us against the sadness that arises in our hearts when we realize that we are not attractive enough to hold the gaze of the man we gave our lives to on the day we said, “I do.”

However, ladies, the message Jesus conveyed is not just for men. Sadly, when we hear it preached we rarely think of ourselves, our own moments of indiscretion, and our own thoughts of infidelity. We listen, all the while sitting next to our husbands in a “holier than thou” position, elbowing them in the ribs, giving them a sidelong glance, making sure they are taking in every word, all the while not hearing the Spirit move in our own hearts because we think we don’t have any issues in this area.

Every act of sin begins with a decision, so if a man takes that second look, he made a decision to take it, and at that moment, he chose to remove his wife from the center of his desire and put that other woman in her place. In like manner, any time a woman romanticizes about a man other than her husband, she is choosing to replace her husband with a figment of her imagination. If she then allows that figment to live at the center of her affection, she will become more and more discontented with her own husband, and will either continue to live in the false romance of her mind or actually decide to seek out her dream man elsewhere.

To women, Jesus could have just as easily been saying, “You have heard it said, ‘You shall not commit adultery; but I say to you that every woman who willfully causes a man to look upon her with lust has already committed adultery in her heart; whoever talks about how hot the guy in the movie she just watched with her girlfriends has already committed adultery in her heart; whoever dreams she is married to the character in the novel she is reading instead of to her husband has already committed adultery in her heart; whoever flirts with any man who comes along in order to feel good about herself, has already committed adultery in her heart….”

Mental adultery is just as real for woman as it is for their male counter-parts, but it does not always manifest itself in the same way.

Don’t get me wrong, we notice attractive men, and in our modern day world, of visual stimulation and coed living, we women have become predators in our own right. Equality does not simply mean equal pay for equal work anymore. No, it means catcalls, crude comments, hitting on men, and making a big deal about the hot guy who walked by the window at work. Women now watch television or movies and notice the physique of the male lead just as much as his caring demeanor. Once men like Humphrey Bogart, Spencer Tracy, and Jimmy Stewart captured the hearts of female audiences, but now being sincere, strong and caring is not enough. Leading men have to be as “beautiful” as their female costars.

Women also know that their physical appearance draws attention. We like to be looked at, and when that desire to be noticed becomes the focus, well anything goes. This is where we cause men to stumble the most. If we understood how much of a draw we are to them, how God created them to be stimulated through sight, we would make different choices in how we dress and how we act. Instead of just the tank top, we would put a jacket on over it. Instead of a bikini, we would wear a one-piece suit. Instead of the low cut blouse, we would wear a crewneck top.

When we draw the knowing look, the lingering stare, we have achieved our goal of being worshipped, but in so doing, we have caused a man to commit adultery. When looked at in those terms, we might just decide to dress for our husbands and please them, leaving all the other men to be pleased by their own wives.

Add to this heightened sense of sight and physical awareness, a woman’s desire for romance, and the door for adulterous thoughts is thrown wide open. Romance for a woman is not simply candy, flowers and romantic midnight strolls. It is a man who loves her unconditionally, provides for her physically and emotionally, protects her heart as well as her life, and willingly lays down his life for her on a daily basis. The problem is that this romantic hero does not exist, well he does exist, he is just not human, so what tends to happen to most women with this fictional version of their dream man is disappointment. Too often we, as women, allow fictional characters to place an unrealistic version of the real thing into our minds and hearts. So, when our husbands come home from work, throw their clothes on the floor, sprawl out in the recliner, turn on ultimate fighting, and ask us what’s for dinner, our romantic and real worlds collide, and if we aren’t careful, the romantic version will win out and replace the real thing.

One woman I was well acquainted with fell down this romance trap. She stopped seeing the value of her husband and replaced their relationship with one of her own creation. She began fantasizing about one of her friend’s husbands. She saw how this man lavished gifts on his wife and kids, how softly he spoke to his wife, how he romanced her, and provided for her every need. Mentally she began to rearrange marriages. She took the place of her friend, and began to live out her friend’s life in her romantic imaginings. The illusion of this “perfect” husband filled not only her waking thoughts, but also her unconscious dreams.

Within a couple months, this woman began to pursue the man of her dreams, and for his part, had he heeded the words of Jesus, that to look upon a woman lustfully is to commit adultery, he would have saved himself, his family, this woman, her family and their church family a great deal of pain. Instead, he allowed her physical beauty, as well as her desire for him to overwhelm his judgment. They walked into an adulterous relationship, and made plans to abandon their families so that they could be with “the one person, they were meant to be with”.

When I confronted this woman, I pointed out something she had seemed to miss. I said, “If this man is so good, and loving, and utterly perfect as a husband, how can he do what he is doing to his wife? If he can take this most selfish of acts, leaving his wife for you, what makes you think he won’t leave you for someone else?”

It was not his physical appearance that caused her to abandon her children and husband. No, she had so built this man up in her mind that she was willing to destroy everyone’s lives in order to have her fantasy. Once the Lord revealed her sin to her, and she rejected the course she had set for herself, she began to realize that this man was not what she had made him out to be in her own world of perfection. She found that her husband was the greatest romantic in the world. He forgave her infidelity, her claim on another man, and accepted her back as his wife.

The act of adultery begins in the mind, but the spark arises in the heart. It is the location of our romantic sensibilities, and out of it flows the issues of life. Whatever we have been holding onto, meditating on, allowing to enter into our feelings, will flow from our hearts into our minds. Once we have given into our own selfish desires, there is little to stop us moving forward with something we never thought we were capable of doing. No matter how discrete we believe ourselves to be, we are still hurting our spouse, ourselves and the heart of God, when we choose to allow another person to come between us and our mate, no matter how real that other person may or may not be.

Jesus finished up his warning on lustful thoughts by saying, “If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.”

So, if Jack Bauer (24), Jack Shephard (Lost), Tom Wells (Smallville), Hugh Jackman, or Christian Bale is causing you to lust, cut them off. If the gym makes you look at other men, stop going. If you are fantasizing about your kid’s teacher or your friend’s husband, then stop spending time with them. If Facebook connected you with an old boyfriend, whose marriage just fell apart, do not accept his friend request. If the book series you are reading causes you to create a fake man to be in love with, throw it away. It is better to lose some money, experience rejection, miss some entertainment, or gain some weight after quitting the gym than to suffer the consequence for your lustful decision. Our husbands aren’t stupid. They are one with us, so even if we are simply daydreaming about another man, they will know and there will be pain in our marriages.

In the end, mental adultery is not about our husbands, it does affect them, but it is not about them. No, when we are lusting for other men, the real problem is our relationship with Jesus. Romantic or visual lust is sin, and all sin is rebellion against God, so, when we struggle with impure thoughts, we know our heart is not right. We have taken our focus off our Savior and placed in onto ourselves. Self-focus leads to self-gratification, but there is no such thing as self-gratification, we always want more.

Truly, what we are looking for cannot be found nor met by a man. The desire to be loved unconditionally, provided for physically and emotionally, to have our hearts as well as our lives protected and cared for by someone who willingly laid down his life for us can only be found in Jesus. He is the only one who can meet our every need, and satisfy our hearts desire.

Study Guide

Read the following three passages, and compare and contrast the way each woman handled herself as she related to David. Look at her heart attitude, her discretion, her wisdom, her devotion to her husband, and decide based on your observations, where her focus was.

Michal - 2 Samuel: 6



Abigail - 1 Samuel: 25



Bathsheba – 2 Samuel: 11-12



Which woman, if any did you relate to in your study and why?


Have you or are you now struggling with discontent in your marriage, in your personal life, in your attitude toward God and others?


Has that discontent led you into romantic or emotional sin? If so, pray and ask God to bring spiritual healing to your heart, as well as to your life and marriage.



Father, I pray that You would move in each one of our lives, causing us to understand that Jesus is the only one who can satisfy our deepest desires and needs. If there is sin in the area of lust in our lives, forgive and take it from us. Allow us to place our eyes as well as our hopes on Jesus, and give us an undying passion for our husbands. For those of us who are not married, keep our hearts pure and holy and set apart for You. Do not let us justify looking at or fantasizing about men whom You have not given to us. Be the center of our hearts. In Jesus name, Amen.

Lesson 1

Building Relationship

I do not want the gathering of information or facts to be the focus of this course. The overall goal of the next several weeks together will be to share with you how you might build a deeper relationship with God, and through that relationship understand that Jesus is more than enough to meet every need in your life.

What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ--the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death. Phil 3:8-10

Conversation of Relationship: Prayer

Jesus set the standard for knowing God. His example shows us how to sustain our relationship with the Father.

Read the following passages of Scripture. Write down what you learn and observe from them.

Matt. 26:36-46



Matt. 14:13-23



Luke 5:15-16




Luke 6:12-16



Jesus talked to the Father about everything. After a day of ministry He did not sit around with His disciples and talk about what went right that day, how they could have done this or that better or what the next day held. No, He went to His Father and shared everything with Him. Jesus was able to with stand the cross because He stayed in His Father’s love. The Father and I are One.


Foundation of Relationship: Surrender

Read Psalm 51 written below:

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your
great compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and
cleanse me from my sin. For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always
before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your
sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.
Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost
place. Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be
whiter than snow. Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed
rejoice. Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity. Create in me
a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from
your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your
salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me. Then I will teach
transgressors your ways, and sinners will turn back to you. Save me from
bloodguilt, O God, the God who saves me, and my tongue will sing of your
righteousness. O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise. You
do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in
burnt offerings. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and
contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. In your good pleasure make Zion
prosper; build up the walls of Jerusalem. Then there will be righteous
sacrifices, whole burnt offerings to delight you; then bulls will be offered on
your altar.

Who is crying out to God in Psalm 51?


Why is he crying out to God in this Psalm?



What does his prayer reveal about his relationship with God?



How was he able to be so transparent in his prayer?



How do we get to the point that we can totally share our heart with God?




Our heart seeks relationship. That is how we are made…even more so since we are women. We hunger and thirst for someone to know us and love us for who we are. We want to be known as we know. Another person can NEVER fully meet that need. No matter how hard we work at any earthly relationship, it will always leave us wanting.

God did that. He does not want anyone to fill up that emptiness. It is left there for Him, so why do we avoid the deep conversations with Him? Why do we only fall on our knees when we are hurting? If we could talk to our God like we talk to our husband, best friend or even our counselor, we wouldn’t feel so empty. We would not try to fill that emptiness with things that only hurt us, because we would not feel alone.

God did this so that men would seek Him and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us. For in Him we live and move and have our being. Acts 17: 27-28



Revelation of Relationship: The Word

Every relationship is built on two way communication. It is not enough to talk to your friend. You have to listen to them in order for them to feel valued and loved. God is no different. He speaks to us in many different ways: trials, other people, circumstances, His Spirit, but one of the key ways is through His Word.


In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.
Hebrews 1:1-3

Consider the following portions of Scripture, and write out what you believe them to be saying. How important is the Bible to the overall well-being of a Christian?

Psalm 1:1-6; specific emphasis on verse 2





Psalm 119:11





Psalm 119:97-104





Does it sound odd to think of loving the law? The word law for us means something very different than it did for the writer of Psalm 119. For us it is this thing to obey so we don’t get a fine, or have to go to jail. We know it protects us, but I don’t think we would say that we love it. The law being spoken of in Psalm 119 is not the law as we see law, although that type of law was included. The Torah or the Pentateuch is the law being spoken of here. The Five Books of Moses make up the Pentateuch: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy.

Based on this understanding of the law, what was the psalmist saying in Psalm 119? What did he love?




Why should we meditate on the Word of God?





Look up the definition of meditation in the dictionary. What is the definition? What kind of meditation do you think is being spoken of in the Psalms?




Psalm 19:14





Psalm 104:34





Philippians 4:8 tells us to think about whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy. What could be more praiseworthy or excellent than the Word of God.

The only way we will ever know the heart of our God is by seeking Him. How blessed we are that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Our Creator gave us the Bible to reveal Himself to all of mankind.

Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and heed the things which are written in it. Rev. 1:3

These words are specific to the book of Revelation, but I believe that if we read the Bible, meditate on it, and then apply it to our lives we too will be blessed.


Father, relationships are hard to build and to maintain. They take time, which is a commodity that we seem to always be short on. As we seek You, give us the wisdom to know what things are taking time away from our relationship with You. Be it service to the church, work, other friendships, books, or a multitude of so many other good things. Help us to let go of the good for what is the best, so that we might know You more fully. It is in the blessed name of Jesus we pray. Amen.