Come See A Man...! - Part Five

When I was a boy from fifteen to seventeen years of age in my little hometown in California, I had a job after school hours that took me up and down the business streets collecting money for an agency. Among the places I visited were about forty saloons. Some of the first lessons I learned about the sordid side of life were from the conversations of hangers-on of these places as they freely spoke of the women of the town.

 

Here on the hillside of Samaria some two thousand years ago human nature was no different. As the woman had come up the path toward the group, they had talked about her and her escapades. Into this group she came with the wonderful words of witness, "Come and see a man which told me all things that ever I did!'

 

The minute she said that, a lot of those men were convicted of sin. They started down the hill, the younger men going straight down and the older men going down the zig-zagging path. Someone went back into the town and called the other people who were there. Then the younger girls began to come, followed by the older women. Pretty soon the whole hillside was alive with town people coming down to see Jesus.

 

Meanwhile, the disciples besought Him saying,

"Rabbi, eat." But He said to them, "I have food to eat that you know not of."

"Hmm!" said the disciples, "Did anyone bring Him food? Who brought Him lunch?"

 

Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of Him who sent me and to accomplish His work. Do not say that there are yet four months and then comes the harvest. I tell you, lift up your eyes and see how the fields are already white for the harvest." (See vv. 31-35.)

 

One day I was at the very spot where this conversation took place. I was sitting by a small tree and had this passage open in front of me and was reading it. I could not understand why Jesus had chosen this setting to say these significant words about the "fields being white unto harvest." So I started reconstructing the sequence of events that took place that afternoon.

John 4:6 says that Jesus arrived at the well at about the sixth hour, that is, noon. While He waited at the well, His disciples started up the hill to the village. If it took them at least 45 minutes to get there, they were in the village about 12:45. Give them 15 minutes to find and buy food and they are starting back down the hill at 1:00. At 1:45 they get back to the well just in time to see the woman leave Jesus. That's when they wondered about His talking with a woman. Between 1:45 and 2:30, while the disciples were eating, the woman was climbing up the hill. At about 2:30, she reached the village and proclaimed her good news. Then the whole town started pouring down the hillside to find out if what she said was true.

 

If Jesus was sitting looking up at the hill, the disciples probably had their backs to His view. When He noticed the moving mass of people coming out of the village, He said, "Don't say there are four months to the harvest." (Now seasonally speaking, there were four more months until the harvest.) "Lift up your eyes and look at the fields." They turned around and looking up, saw the townspeople coming down the hill. This was the harvest.

 

Then the Lord said this tremendous thing. "He who reaps receives wages and gathers fruit for eternal life"-that is to say, the man who witnesses for Christ "so that the sower and the reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, `One sows and another reaps.' I sent you to reap." (See vv. 36-38.) Jesus is telling His disciples, "You just went up there because I had chosen this town before the foundation of the world." God sent the disciples up and all they did was bring back lunch. So Jesus saved the harlot and sent her up and she brought back the town.

 

I am glad we have the record of the woman's testimony and of the men that believed because of it. If you should go into a hospital at the moment when a new baby is entering this world you would see that all the attention of the doctors and the nurses is normally concentrated upon the baby until they can hear him cry. At times it is necessary for the nurse to give the infant a sharp slap to bring that cry which lets all know that the baby is alive.

 

So when I hear this woman's testimony concerning Christ I know she is alive. There are thousands of church members that have never opened their lips for Christ. We have no outward means of knowing whether or not they have been born again. If you are a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ as your own Saviour, go to others with that cry, "Come and see a man who revealed my inner nature and who revealed His own power and love. This is the Saviour."

 

You will find a new joy that you have never known before as a Christian. The flow of the living spring from within you will bring life to thirsty souls in the desert through which we travel.

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