Welcome to the daily disciple podcast, where we seek daily to be with and to become like Jesus, our teacher. Good morning everyone and welcome to the daily podcast. We're friends that are friends of Jesus podcast. And we just get up in the morning and we start a conversation with Jesus because that's what friends that are friends of Jesus do.
And so I'm going to read a passage from the famous John chapter four in just a moment that we're going to chat, pray, meditate, talk with Jesus and then continue to talk with Jesus throughout the day. So good morning and I do need to get rolling. Not only are we in chapter four of the Gospel of John, the famous Samaritan woman at the well, which I could talk about forever, but we're also going to talk about a topic that I could talk about forever. So let's get going.
Turn to John chapter four. The title of the podcast this morning is Breaking the Rules. And Jesus broke the rules. He did lots of them.
And that may shock us because our understanding of Christianity and Jesus in particular has been, you know, keep the rules. Keep all the rules. Keep the rules. And Jesus didn't break all of the rules.
And hopefully we're going to come back to this toward the end of the podcast, but Jesus knew which rules to break and which rules to keep. And there was, I think, a litmus test that Jesus used to decide which was which, but he broke plenty of rules. And honestly, some of you may not like this podcast. Some of you may say, well, you know, it's already an unhealthy title.
This is unhealthy. It gives license. It gives permission to be bad. You know, this isn't safe.
This is not a good topic. But honestly, without permission, we can't truly be good. Honestly, without permission, we can't truly be free. Without permission, we will be either in legalism or license.
And both of those are a place where we die, a soul death. So here's the question. Do we know what rules to keep and which rules to break? And it's easy to go all the way one direction or all the way the other direction as in any area of life, right?
It's easy to just break all the rules and enter into license and anything goes and then we're just going to blow up our life. And honestly, it's easy to break none of the rules and live by rules and try to be able to live by rules and that's legalism and that's death as well and that's going to blow up our life in a totally different way. And I think, you know, as we're just going through the gospels, I think it's important for full understanding of Jesus to know that all of the religious leaders of his day were angry with him because of how fast and loose he played with the rules. His family even took him to task on a few occasions for playing fast and loose with family rules and family norms.
His disciples often took him to task, even in this chapter, for talking with a woman, for breaking some of those societal norms, those rules. So John chapter 4 is the classic passage and it's a passage about evangelism, but more particularly, it's a passage about Jesus breaking some pretty significant rules in order to share who he knew as father with this young Samaritan woman. And so I just want to begin reading in John chapter 4 verse 4, now Jesus had to go through Samaria and he came to a town in Samaria called Saikar near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there and Jesus tired as he was from his journey, sat down by the well.
It was about noon. Now Jesus is already, you know, breaking a rule because Jews didn't go through Samaria. They went the long way around Samaria in order to get to Jerusalem or in order to get back to Galilee. And Jesus codes not only through Jerusalem, but he stops.
I'm sorry, Jesus not only goes through Samaria, he stops and he sits down in Samaria by the well. It was about noon because he was tired. He's already breaking some entrenched rules in his religious and societal culture. Verse 7, when a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, well, you give me a drink and his disciples have gone into the town to buy food.
The Samaritan woman said to him, you're a Jew and I'm a Samaritan. See, she knows he's breaking rules. How can you ask me for a drink? For Jews, do not associate with Samaritan.
So Jesus continues to break societal norms and religious rules and rules about clean and unclean. He begins to talk with this woman, not only a Samaritan, but a woman. He's breaking all kinds of rules. And in the church today, there are so many rules.
Pray for them, but not them. Do this. But don't do that. Those people are on our side, but those people, they're the enemy.
Agree with them, but don't agree with them. Or don't touch. And often it's don't. And we really need to be careful with some of these assumed rules because Christianity was started by a rule-breaker.
Now, again, Jesus knew what rules to break and what rules to keep, but Jesus started this wonderful movement called Christianity, and he was a rule-breaker. In fact, he was accused of being a glutton and a drunkard and a friend of all the wrong people. And, you know, I just thought of this as I was looking at this passage, but another rule he breaks is he asks a Samaritan woman for a drink. Now, she's unclean.
We're going to find out a little bit later. I don't think we're going to get to this part of the text, but she is living with a man that's not her husband. She's not a number of husbands. This woman has a checkered past.
She's unclean, religiously. And that was a rule in the first century. And if you touched something that this woman touched, then you would contract uncleanness as well, which is probably why she's drawing water from this well at noon and high noon when it's super hot because nobody would want to interface with her because she's unclean. And instead of Jesus being like, don't touch.
Don't touch. Don't touch. He touches the, you know, whatever it is that she drew the water out with and he took a drink. He's breaking more rules.
And I mean, we could go on in the story. Later on, he says to her, you know, you say you worship at Mount Gerizem, but we worship in Jerusalem, but there's coming a time where the true worshipers are going to worship the Father in spirit and truth. That's another rule that's being broken. There was a specific place where worship happened.
And so for Jesus to say that, you know, worship is not going to be a location. It's going to be a heart posture. It's going to be anywhere in every prayer. It's going to be in spirit and truth.
I mean, the Pharisees are going to freak out. They did freak out later. And there's so many rules right now about how to worship and where to worship and what to wear when you worship and how to be your actor do or what not to do when you worship. There are so many man-made regulations, you know, and rules.
And I think part of this passage is saying, if we truly want to experience life, we must keep the rules that matter and break the rules that don't. And we've been given the New Testament. We've been given the spirit. We've been given community.
And honestly, I don't know exactly how to say this. I think it's important to learn the rules early on so that later on when it's time, we know which ones to break and how to break them. I think that's what we see in Jesus. And there's freedom in Christ to break some of the rules that don't matter.
And there's forgiveness in Christ when we break the rules that do matter. I mean, it's a really good deal. And I think I mentioned earlier, and I got to land this plan. I told you that this passage and this topic was going to take me a long time.
Jesus seemed to have a guiding light. And it's what he's showing this woman at the well, and his guiding light was love. For Jesus, it wasn't about rules. It was about love.
It was about life. It was about evangelism. It was reaching out. It was about love, not rules.
And it seems like Jesus kept the rules that express love and broke the rules that had nothing to do with loving God, loving self or loving another. And the very end of the passage, verse 25, the woman said, I know the Messiah called the Christ is coming, and when he comes, he's going to explain everything to us. And Jesus says, I, the one that is speaking to you, I am he. And so Jesus is here by the power of the Spirit to guide you and I to know what rules are breaking and know what rules to keep.
Not to get caught up in legalism, right, keeping all the rules, not to get caught up in license, breaking all the rules, because those are two different ways to blow up our life. But to live by this principle of love, to break some rules, to keep some rules, but it's not about rules for God. It's not about rules for Jesus. It's about love.
And so this passage invites us to follow, not a rule book, but a person, an incredible person, a loving person, and just enjoy him for this morning and throughout the day. And we'll talk tomorrow. Thanks for listening to the daily disciple podcast. We truly hope that you were encouraged by it today.
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