Live Free with Josh Howerton - Redeemed to Go Share | Ep. 410 | Friday, August 30, 2024

Episode Date: August 30, 2024

Jesus has the power to redeem any life. Following her redemption, the woman at the well found the confidence and joy to openly share her story with a community that had previously shamed her. Redemption, often considered a “churchy” term, can be understood in four distinct facets: making someone acceptable, restoring reputation, atonement, or reclaiming what was lost. For more information, visit lakepointe.church/dailydrive

Thanks for tuning in to today's Daily Drive with Lake Point Church, a daily dose of God's word for your morning drive. When the word, not the world, becomes the majority of your week, your life will start to change. For that reason, our prayer is that God will speak to you through today's devotional. For more digital content to feed your faith, visit lakepoint.comit. Church slash daily drive. And now let's dive in to today's devotional. Well, it is Friday on the Daily Drive, and I hope you've had a great week and that you find yourself in a local church this weekend, get into a place where you can learn and find community and use your gifts and serving other people and express your worship and draw close to God. So we've been living in a story found in John Chapter 4. It's an encounter between Jesus and an ostracized woman. They meet by a well because Jesus had purposely gone there. And he tells her that he can give her living water, the kind that doesn't come from a well. the kind that never runs dry can quench the real thirst in everybody's soul. And we left off yesterday with Jesus, this total stranger,

telling her all about her past. Now, you know how great movies and TV series have like an A plot and a B plot going on? I mean, Sondfeld was great at that, so was the office. But verse 27 is kind of the B plot of this story. Do you remember when we first started where Jesus guys are while he's having this one-on-one encounter with a woman? Yeah, they had gone into the town to buy food from like a Samaritan drive, through. It says this in verse 27.

Just then, his disciples returned, and were surprised to find him talking with a woman. But no one asked, what do you want? Or why are you talking with her? I love this. So they're coming up the road that they can see them talking at the well, and they start whispering to each

other. Who's she? I don't know. What's he doing? I don't know. You ask him. I'm not going to ask him. You ask him. Just ignore and act like everything's cool. Okay, okay. I think that they knew this barrier-breaking Jesus all too well by now. Back to the A plot. 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? They came out of the town and made their way toward him. Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him. Because of the woman's testimony, he told me everything I ever did. So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days.

And because of his words, many more became believers. And they said to the woman, We no longer believe just because of what you said. Now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world. Man, what a cool picture. When this woman realizes just who it is that has touched her in the deepest place,

she leaves her bucket, she leaves her past, she leaves her shame, and she goes running back to tell the very people she was trying to avoid, you've got to come see this. I'm telling you, hope. Hope is sitting by the well. You see, not only will Jesus never refuse you, not only does He know our deepest thirst, but you need to know this. Jesus can redeem any life.

Now, I know that redeem can sound like such a churchy word, so I looked it up in the English dictionary. And check out the four definitions that popped up. Redeemed, number one, to make something acceptable. Number two, to restore reputation. Number three, to atone for human sin. Number four, to buy something back. And I thought that is so cool.

Jesus can redeem any life. He went to a cross to atone for human sin to purchase our freedom, to buy back our wasted years. Through his blood, our reputations are restored, and we have been made into something acceptable. He can redeem anybody. A woman who did not want to be seen in public at all, now running back into her town,

telling everybody what just happened to her? Gang, that's redemption. In a town called Sycar, which literally means falsehood, God chooses this woman to declare his truth. That's redemption. People used to huddle and talk about her as the woman who had five previous husbands. When people saw her now, they would say, you see that woman right there? And you ought to hear her story.

She's the one. She's the one that led me to Jesus. That's redemption. Psalm 130, verse 7 says, put your hope in the Lord, for with the Lord is unfailing love, and with him is full redemption. Don't let that escape you. Full redemption. Not partial, not just halfway, not 80%, not just enough to make you feel a little better or a little less guilty, full redemption.

Jesus is in the business of redeeming us. He recycles our mistakes and our pain, our failure, even uses them for his good purposes. This woman's story can be your story too. If you're listening to and you're thinking you're so far off from ever having a relationship with God, you've got to know that Jesus doesn't refuse anyone. will meet you right where you are no matter what. If you're tired of digging cisterns that can't hold water, if you're tired of going back to the same old broken well over and over again for a temporary

fix for the deeper thirst within you, begin to trust that he knows your deepest thirst. And he is the only one who can fill it. You might be thinking about broken vows and broken families and broken promises. If shame, regret, and all those wasted years are consuming your mind, you need to know that Jesus can redeem any life. Whatever is in you that is shattered. He wants to buy it back, atone for it, make you new.

He can restore your reputation and allow you to live every day in the awareness that in spite of your past, you are accepted by a holy God. So maybe in this moment you need to be courageous enough to come out of hiding and find Jesus waiting for an encounter with you.

He's here right now. Meet with him. acknowledge what those deep thirst are in your life and invite him to fill you up and begin to trust that whatever you bring before him, it can be redeemed. You know, I pray for you all every single day. And I hope that you have a great weekend.

And I'll catch you back here on Monday. Thanks for tuning in today. For more biblical teaching and worship, join us for our church online live weekend services on Saturdays and Sundays. For more information about all the digital ministries of Lake Point, visit lakepoint.compt.combe. slash daily drive.

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