Today on Bold Steps with Mark Jobe. We're learning not to judge books and people by their appearance.

Today on Bold Steps with Mark Jobe. We're learning not to judge books and people by their appearance.

Maybe your life's bucket is sort of empty, but your story has made you defensive. It's made you angry. It's made you say, no one's going to hurt me again. People around you think you're tough. You're hard, but inside, you know, really, you're guarded and defensive because you're broken.

Maybe your life's bucket is sort of empty, but your story has made you defensive. It's made you angry. It's made you say, no one's going to hurt me again. People around you think you're tough. You're hard, but inside, you know, really, you're guarded and defensive because you're broken.

Welcome to Bold Steps with Mark Jobe, senior pastor of New Life Community Church and president of Moody Bible Institute in Chicago. I'm Wayne Shepherd. Now, Mark, we move ahead in our series today, making all things new or looking at the story of the woman at the well, where Jesus was able to see the unseen root problems of this woman, and ultimately, he was able to rewrite her story. And that's what he wants to do in each of us, doesn't he?

Welcome to Bold Steps with Mark Jobe, senior pastor of New Life Community Church and president of Moody Bible Institute in Chicago. I'm Wayne Shepherd. Now, Mark, we move ahead in our series today, making all things new or looking at the story of the woman at the well, where Jesus was able to see the unseen root problems of this woman, and ultimately, he was able to rewrite her story. And that's what he wants to do in each of us, doesn't he?

I love this story, Wayne, because this hard, calloused woman that has a tough exterior inside, she's really desiring what Jesus can give her. And Jesus in this conversation sort of just peels back the defensiveness and gets to the heart of the issue. And I love the way that Jesus does that even in our lives, through the power of the Word of God. And so as you listen to this message, maybe God will be pulling back some layers of hardness that you have had and getting to the root issues that only the Holy Spirit can expose.

I love this story, Wayne, because this hard, calloused woman that has a tough exterior inside, she's really desiring what Jesus can give her. And Jesus in this conversation sort of just peels back the defensiveness and gets to the heart of the issue. And I love the way that Jesus does that even in our lives, through the power of the Word of God. And so as you listen to this message, maybe God will be pulling back some layers of hardness that you have had and getting to the root issues that only the Holy Spirit can expose.

This is such a rich passage. The woman at the. Well, let's turn to Mark's message now. How full is your bucket? Here's Mark Jobe.

This is such a rich passage. The woman at the. Well, let's turn to Mark's message now. How full is your bucket? Here's Mark Jobe.

How many of you know that when you meet someone in the beginning, you really can't tell what their story is, right? I mean, you can meet someone and judge someone right away, but when you dig into your story, their story, you realize, hey, there's a background to their story, and a lot of us are the way we are, because there's a story that's made us the way we are. I was visiting a friend of mine a few months back, and he was in a rehabilitation center. He had had a very severe accident. And so I just dropped by to see him, and he was in pretty bad shape. But he had a when I walked in his room, there was a roommate there that was lying there, an older fella. And as I as soon as I walked in the room, I said hi to my friend and I was about to walk over there and the guy in the first bed says to me. Hi, who are you? I said, well, my name's Mark. I said, who are you? He said, my name is Bob with one o. I said, okay, I said, hi, Bob with one o. And he says, come here a second. I'm like, well, okay. So I walk a little closer. He says, let me tell you something. He kind of whispers a little bit and he said, I was in the Marines. They taught me to snap a person's neck with one move of my hand, so I could snap your neck right now with one move of my hand. I'm like, well, thank you, Bob with one zero for letting me know you could snap my neck that quickly. I think I'm going to go see my friend over here. And then he says, come here a second. And I said, okay. So I start walking over there a little bit and he, he, he had his hands under the blanket. I wasn't sure what he was doing there. And he says, can you help me? I said, uh, I'm not. I'm looking around for a nurse. And then he I walk a little closer and he pulls out from under his covers a urinal halfway filled, and he says, could you empty this for me? I'm like, uh, where's the nurse? Here. And so, you know, I'm Jesus. Give me a spirit of servanthood. I said, sure, Bob, with one o, I will empty it for you. So I went and emptied it for him. And so it wasn't the first great impression. But after I talked to him a little bit, I discovered that Bob was a Vietnam vet and actually had taught high school history for about 20 years and was a pretty solid guy. Meeting him, I did not know his story. At first I thought he was a little crazy, but when you get to know someone's story, you realize, hey, everybody has a story behind the facade or your first impression of them. I think people some. How many of you know you can't judge a book by its cover? Some people look like they have it all together, but really they don't. There's a story and we all have issues. I was talking to a pastor, a friend of mine, and he says he's got young men that come to him all the time telling him who they want to marry. He said, I had a conversation with a guy a couple weeks ago that said, man, pastor, I really want to date that girl. And he said, that girl? Why? And he said, well, she's hot. He's like. And the pastor said, yeah, but she. Isn't she a little bit like crazy? And he said, yeah, but she's hot. That's how I want to date her. And he says, yeah, but she's crazy, she's hot and she's crazy. And he said he looked at the guy and he said, in 30 years, all you'll be left with is crazy. So. You can't judge someone right away. And the story that I'm about to jump into in John chapter four is a story in which Jesus encounters a woman, and this woman is probably a fairly good looking woman. She had been able to attract five different guys, but she'd been through five marriages, and now the guy she was living with, she wasn't even married to him. She was a woman that had issues. She's defensive. She's been hurt. She's been disappointed. There's disillusion in her life. She's got a chip on her shoulder against men, and we don't know her story. You just think, well, maybe she's just a woman with a bad attitude. But as you get into her story, you realize that here's a woman that has a story. I think the symbol of her story is what she's doing. She's on her way. And back in those days, you had to actually take a bucket to go to the well to get water. You couldn't just go to your kitchen faucet and turn it on. So women, primarily in those days would take a bucket, would walk down to the well, they would have to lower their bucket into a well, get out the water, bring the bucket out of the well, and then make their way back to their home. And they would use that water for drinking, washing and so forth. This woman we call her the Samaritan woman, happened to be at the well at a time when people don't go to the well. And so we learn from this story that she's at the well at noon, the hottest part of the day. The well was a place where people ran into each other, and we realized that this woman was avoiding people. I believe that this woman's bucket was empty. Her bucket symbolizes her life, and she was at the well because her life was empty. Avoiding people. Feeling like a failure. Probably having a lot of rejection. We see from her conversation that she's got a lot of issues. I don't know who I'm talking to in this congregation here in this auditorium, or who I'm talking to online or who I'm talking to on the radio on a podcast. But I believe that there are some people that are listening to this message, and you feel somewhat related to the woman at the. Well, maybe your life's bucket is sort of empty and you have a chip on your shoulder. You have issues that people don't know about. You have a story that if people really knew your story, there would be a bit of compassion there. But your story has made you defensive. It's made you angry. It's made you distrust people. It's made you say, no one's going to hurt me again. I'm not going to let anybody into this inner circle because, hey, I've been hurt, I've been abused, I've been disappointed, and I'm going to make sure it never happens again. People around you think you're tough, you're hard, but inside, you know, really, you're guarded and defensive because you're broken. I'm going to begin reading in verse three of John chapter four. It says speaking of Jesus. So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee. Now he had to go through Samaria. So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon. When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, Will you give me a drink? His disciples, parenthetically, had gone to town to buy food. I want to give you today four steps to change the fullness of your bucket. If you're taking notes, I want you to write this down. Number one, you need to recognize the perfect timing for dramatic change. What strikes me about this story is that this woman had gone to the well at a time when she thought, no one else will be at this. Well, I've been to Israel, to the Middle East, and I'm going to tell you at noon it's blazing hot. I mean, it can get 110 degrees or more. It's like being at noon in the desert. No one wants to sweat while they're carrying a big bucket of water. And in those days, people would go to the well in the morning before the sun had come up. Some of them would go out in the evening time when the sun went down, but no one in their right mind would ever go to the well in the middle of the day, Except if you're avoiding people. I believe that this woman thought to herself, I'm going to go to the well because it's empty. I'm not going to run into those gossiping women that are looking at me, pointing their fingers and talking about me. I think this woman probably suffered with rejection, shame and shunning. I think she probably thought everybody talks about me and my failure, and I don't want to be around people. I don't want to hear their gossip. I'm just going to go and do my thing. And it just so happens, wow. It happens like this because God is the God of divine timing. It just so happened that Jesus, because the Pharisees were complaining about him making more disciples, had made his way and he was going through Samaria, on his way, on a journey, but going through Samaria. Now, what's interesting about this is that the Jews did not like to go through a neighborhood that was Samaritan. Most Jews would walk around that neighborhood because the Jews and the Samaritans, the Samaritans were half Jews, and they had a battle going for a couple hundred years before about where you should worship. The Jews viewed Samaritans as half breeds. There was racial prejudice there. There was religious differences there. So if you were a Jew, you would go around that neighborhood. Some of you grew up in Chicago. To get from point A to point B, you avoid certain neighborhoods for whatever reasons. I'm not going through that neighborhood. Jesus went right through the neighborhood in the middle of the day, at the right timing, and sat down at the well at the exact moment that the woman would come to draw water. I call that a kairos moment. I call that divine timing. I believe that God was preparing this woman for an encounter with him. And you may think that life is just a series of coincidences. You may just think that you happen to be at the right place at the right time. But I want to tell you that God is sovereign, and I happen to believe that there are some of you that are here in this auditorium on this day, sitting in this service, because God has so orchestrated in advance that this was the message that you needed to hear. You may be sitting asking yourself, why in the world am I here this morning? How did I let my cousin talk me into coming today? I feel uncomfortable in a church. Maybe you haven't been to a church in a long time. Maybe you're wondering what you're doing on a Sunday morning instead of sleeping in in this place. I happen to believe that God is not the God of coincidences. But I believe that God has brought you here for this time, at this moment, for this message. So I want you to listen because I believe that God.

How many of you know that when you meet someone in the beginning, you really can't tell what their story is, right? I mean, you can meet someone and judge someone right away, but when you dig into your story, their story, you realize, hey, there's a background to their story, and a lot of us are the way we are, because there's a story that's made us the way we are. I was visiting a friend of mine a few months back, and he was in a rehabilitation center. He had had a very severe accident. And so I just dropped by to see him, and he was in pretty bad shape. But he had a when I walked in his room, there was a roommate there that was lying there, an older fella. And as I as soon as I walked in the room, I said hi to my friend and I was about to walk over there and the guy in the first bed says to me. Hi, who are you? I said, well, my name's Mark. I said, who are you? He said, my name is Bob with one o. I said, okay, I said, hi, Bob with one o. And he says, come here a second. I'm like, well, okay. So I walk a little closer. He says, let me tell you something. He kind of whispers a little bit and he said, I was in the Marines. They taught me to snap a person's neck with one move of my hand, so I could snap your neck right now with one move of my hand. I'm like, well, thank you, Bob with one zero for letting me know you could snap my neck that quickly. I think I'm going to go see my friend over here. And then he says, come here a second. And I said, okay. So I start walking over there a little bit and he, he, he had his hands under the blanket. I wasn't sure what he was doing there. And he says, can you help me? I said, uh, I'm not. I'm looking around for a nurse. And then he I walk a little closer and he pulls out from under his covers a urinal halfway filled, and he says, could you empty this for me? I'm like, uh, where's the nurse? Here. And so, you know, I'm Jesus. Give me a spirit of servanthood. I said, sure, Bob, with one o, I will empty it for you. So I went and emptied it for him. And so it wasn't the first great impression. But after I talked to him a little bit, I discovered that Bob was a Vietnam vet and actually had taught high school history for about 20 years and was a pretty solid guy. Meeting him, I did not know his story. At first I thought he was a little crazy, but when you get to know someone's story, you realize, hey, everybody has a story behind the facade or your first impression of them. I think people some. How many of you know you can't judge a book by its cover? Some people look like they have it all together, but really they don't. There's a story and we all have issues. I was talking to a pastor, a friend of mine, and he says he's got young men that come to him all the time telling him who they want to marry. He said, I had a conversation with a guy a couple weeks ago that said, man, pastor, I really want to date that girl. And he said, that girl? Why? And he said, well, she's hot. He's like. And the pastor said, yeah, but she. Isn't she a little bit like crazy? And he said, yeah, but she's hot. That's how I want to date her. And he says, yeah, but she's crazy, she's hot and she's crazy. And he said he looked at the guy and he said, in 30 years, all you'll be left with is crazy. So. You can't judge someone right away. And the story that I'm about to jump into in John chapter four is a story in which Jesus encounters a woman, and this woman is probably a fairly good looking woman. She had been able to attract five different guys, but she'd been through five marriages, and now the guy she was living with, she wasn't even married to him. She was a woman that had issues. She's defensive. She's been hurt. She's been disappointed. There's disillusion in her life. She's got a chip on her shoulder against men, and we don't know her story. You just think, well, maybe she's just a woman with a bad attitude. But as you get into her story, you realize that here's a woman that has a story. I think the symbol of her story is what she's doing. She's on her way. And back in those days, you had to actually take a bucket to go to the well to get water. You couldn't just go to your kitchen faucet and turn it on. So women, primarily in those days would take a bucket, would walk down to the well, they would have to lower their bucket into a well, get out the water, bring the bucket out of the well, and then make their way back to their home. And they would use that water for drinking, washing and so forth. This woman we call her the Samaritan woman, happened to be at the well at a time when people don't go to the well. And so we learn from this story that she's at the well at noon, the hottest part of the day. The well was a place where people ran into each other, and we realized that this woman was avoiding people. I believe that this woman's bucket was empty. Her bucket symbolizes her life, and she was at the well because her life was empty. Avoiding people. Feeling like a failure. Probably having a lot of rejection. We see from her conversation that she's got a lot of issues. I don't know who I'm talking to in this congregation here in this auditorium, or who I'm talking to online or who I'm talking to on the radio on a podcast. But I believe that there are some people that are listening to this message, and you feel somewhat related to the woman at the. Well, maybe your life's bucket is sort of empty and you have a chip on your shoulder. You have issues that people don't know about. You have a story that if people really knew your story, there would be a bit of compassion there. But your story has made you defensive. It's made you angry. It's made you distrust people. It's made you say, no one's going to hurt me again. I'm not going to let anybody into this inner circle because, hey, I've been hurt, I've been abused, I've been disappointed, and I'm going to make sure it never happens again. People around you think you're tough, you're hard, but inside, you know, really, you're guarded and defensive because you're broken. I'm going to begin reading in verse three of John chapter four. It says speaking of Jesus. So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee. Now he had to go through Samaria. So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon. When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, Will you give me a drink? His disciples, parenthetically, had gone to town to buy food. I want to give you today four steps to change the fullness of your bucket. If you're taking notes, I want you to write this down. Number one, you need to recognize the perfect timing for dramatic change. What strikes me about this story is that this woman had gone to the well at a time when she thought, no one else will be at this. Well, I've been to Israel, to the Middle East, and I'm going to tell you at noon it's blazing hot. I mean, it can get 110 degrees or more. It's like being at noon in the desert. No one wants to sweat while they're carrying a big bucket of water. And in those days, people would go to the well in the morning before the sun had come up. Some of them would go out in the evening time when the sun went down, but no one in their right mind would ever go to the well in the middle of the day, Except if you're avoiding people. I believe that this woman thought to herself, I'm going to go to the well because it's empty. I'm not going to run into those gossiping women that are looking at me, pointing their fingers and talking about me. I think this woman probably suffered with rejection, shame and shunning. I think she probably thought everybody talks about me and my failure, and I don't want to be around people. I don't want to hear their gossip. I'm just going to go and do my thing. And it just so happens, wow. It happens like this because God is the God of divine timing. It just so happened that Jesus, because the Pharisees were complaining about him making more disciples, had made his way and he was going through Samaria, on his way, on a journey, but going through Samaria. Now, what's interesting about this is that the Jews did not like to go through a neighborhood that was Samaritan. Most Jews would walk around that neighborhood because the Jews and the Samaritans, the Samaritans were half Jews, and they had a battle going for a couple hundred years before about where you should worship. The Jews viewed Samaritans as half breeds. There was racial prejudice there. There was religious differences there. So if you were a Jew, you would go around that neighborhood. Some of you grew up in Chicago. To get from point A to point B, you avoid certain neighborhoods for whatever reasons. I'm not going through that neighborhood. Jesus went right through the neighborhood in the middle of the day, at the right timing, and sat down at the well at the exact moment that the woman would come to draw water. I call that a kairos moment. I call that divine timing. I believe that God was preparing this woman for an encounter with him. And you may think that life is just a series of coincidences. You may just think that you happen to be at the right place at the right time. But I want to tell you that God is sovereign, and I happen to believe that there are some of you that are here in this auditorium on this day, sitting in this service, because God has so orchestrated in advance that this was the message that you needed to hear. You may be sitting asking yourself, why in the world am I here this morning? How did I let my cousin talk me into coming today? I feel uncomfortable in a church. Maybe you haven't been to a church in a long time. Maybe you're wondering what you're doing on a Sunday morning instead of sleeping in in this place. I happen to believe that God is not the God of coincidences. But I believe that God has brought you here for this time, at this moment, for this message. So I want you to listen because I believe that God.

Has a word for you.

Has a word for you.

You're listening to Bold Steps with Mark Jobe. Today's message how full is your bucket? Now, if you're looking for a little bit of a shift in your perspective each week, be sure to sign up for our email feature called The Bold Step or Weekly Mark. For the astute listener who noticed this in the bold Step or weekly, you have a resource called Teach Us to Pray. We want to learn about.

You're listening to Bold Steps with Mark Jobe. Today's message how full is your bucket? Now, if you're looking for a little bit of a shift in your perspective each week, be sure to sign up for our email feature called The Bold Step or Weekly Mark. For the astute listener who noticed this in the bold Step or weekly, you have a resource called Teach Us to Pray. We want to learn about.

And Wayne, what a great time to get this resource, because before the beginning of the year, we're almost done with this year.

And Wayne, what a great time to get this resource, because before the beginning of the year, we're almost done with this year.

Just about there.

Just about there.

And some of you are setting sort of your new goals, your resetting your sort of New Year's resolution. One of those that many people that are followers of Jesus want to do is just hone in on just more intentional prayer, knowing how to pray, what to pray, a pattern of prayer. So this resource comes at a great time, Jesus disciples said, Jesus, teach us to pray. And Jesus taught them a template to pray. We call it the Lord's Prayer. Not a prayer to pray, but a template, a pattern of prayer. So I go over what are the key elements? Six key elements to pray the way that Jesus did. And we want to give this to anybody that's out there. And so for a gift of any kind, we want to put this in your hand. I think it's a great time.

And some of you are setting sort of your new goals, your resetting your sort of New Year's resolution. One of those that many people that are followers of Jesus want to do is just hone in on just more intentional prayer, knowing how to pray, what to pray, a pattern of prayer. So this resource comes at a great time, Jesus disciples said, Jesus, teach us to pray. And Jesus taught them a template to pray. We call it the Lord's Prayer. Not a prayer to pray, but a template, a pattern of prayer. So I go over what are the key elements? Six key elements to pray the way that Jesus did. And we want to give this to anybody that's out there. And so for a gift of any kind, we want to put this in your hand. I think it's a great time.

It's just a wonderful way to start the new year, isn't it? It's called teach us to Pray the six P's of the Lord's Prayer. It's on our website at Bold Steps. Org, you'll find it there. And as Mark said, it's available for gift of any size. So call us at 800. D.L. Moody (800) 356-6639. Or give your gift online at Bold steps.org. Now let's jump back into the second half of today's message. Once again here's Mark.

It's just a wonderful way to start the new year, isn't it? It's called teach us to Pray the six P's of the Lord's Prayer. It's on our website at Bold Steps. Org, you'll find it there. And as Mark said, it's available for gift of any size. So call us at 800. D.L. Moody (800) 356-6639. Or give your gift online at Bold steps.org. Now let's jump back into the second half of today's message. Once again here's Mark.

So she went to the well in the middle of the day, driven by her failures and her challenging circumstances. And I believe that sometimes it's our failure and our circumstances that lead us to the place where we're finally ready to change. Many of us would not be ready for change, would not be ready for God to do a work in our life if it were not for a a history of failure or disappointment. If everything were going well in our life, many of us would not be at the well where Jesus shows up. The very things that you look in the past at your life and say, these are the things that I feel like I wish would have never happened. These are the things that I'm most disappointed about, the things that I'm most angry about, the things that I wish I could erase, some of those very things that you feel are your greatest disappointments may be exactly what God has used to bring you to an encounter at the well, to experience and encounter his presence in a way that you would never have experienced it without your failures. Number two, if you want to change the emptiness of your bucket, I want you not only to recognize that there's a divine timing for dramatic change, but you need to stop avoiding and start looking honestly at your root issues. So this woman finally responds to Jesus request that he asked her for something to drink. And so it says in verse nine, the Samaritan woman said to him, You're a Jew and I'm a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink? For the Jews do not associate with Samaritans. Jesus answered her, if you knew the gift of God and who it was that asked you for a drink, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water. Sir, the woman said, 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 this well and drank from it himself, as it also his sons and his livestock? Jesus answered, everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water that I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life. Now, what I want you to notice about this conversation is that Jesus changes a conversation about water into a conversation about the soul. I love how he does that. This woman is just talking about water, and Jesus turns this conversation into a conversation about the meaning of life. But I want you to notice also that this woman does what a lot of us do when God starts getting close to our life. She starts to deflect and be defensive. She starts to redirect because if you have hurts and issues in your life, if you have shame and a spirit of rejection in your life, you really don't want anybody to get too close to you because you feel if they really saw who you were, they may reject you again and you don't want to be hurt again. So Jesus starts talking to this woman, and you can tell that she's got a chip on her shoulder right away. She's defensive right away. Jesus says, can I get a drink of water? She's defensive and says, you shouldn't be asking me. Jesus says, hey, if you knew who I was, you'd ask me. And she's defensive and says, I doubt it very much. Jesus says, I can fill your. I can fill your bucket with water that will never run dry. And she's defensive and says, yeah, right. Magic water. Jesus says, go tell your husband to come and and and and join you. And she says, she redirects it and says, I don't have a husband. And what I love about this is that Jesus goes right to the root of her issue. The deep root of this woman's issue was that she was unable to stay in a committed relationship. She had gotten married one time, and another and another, and another and another and finally given up. And she was just living with the guy because she no longer felt like I can trust or be in a marriage. Jesus was pulling back the layers of her defensiveness and getting at the root of her issue. I'm just wondering here today if you've been coming to church for a while or you're sitting in this auditorium today, if God is trying to peel back some of the issues in your life and get to the root of what really, really is bothering you and keeps you empty, the closer Jesus got to the root, the more this woman started to get defensive. The closer Jesus got to the key issue, the more this woman started to deflect. The truth of it is that we all have legitimate needs. This woman, I'm sure that the need that she had in her life is. I just want to be happy. I just want to be loved. I just don't want to be angry anymore. I don't want to be hurt anymore. Hey, that's a legitimate need. The problem is, we have legitimate needs that oftentimes we try to fill in illegitimate ways. And when we try to fill our needs in illegitimate ways, we always end up more empty than when we were in the beginning. And so Jesus peels back the roots and finally tells her, go talk to your husband. Bring your husband. She says to him, I don't have a husband. And he says to her, he said, you're right. You've had five husbands, and the man that you are now with is not your husband. You have just said what is quite true. That's a shock. Number three, you need to refuse to let excuses hold you back from major change.

So she went to the well in the middle of the day, driven by her failures and her challenging circumstances. And I believe that sometimes it's our failure and our circumstances that lead us to the place where we're finally ready to change. Many of us would not be ready for change, would not be ready for God to do a work in our life if it were not for a a history of failure or disappointment. If everything were going well in our life, many of us would not be at the well where Jesus shows up. The very things that you look in the past at your life and say, these are the things that I feel like I wish would have never happened. These are the things that I'm most disappointed about, the things that I'm most angry about, the things that I wish I could erase, some of those very things that you feel are your greatest disappointments may be exactly what God has used to bring you to an encounter at the well, to experience and encounter his presence in a way that you would never have experienced it without your failures. Number two, if you want to change the emptiness of your bucket, I want you not only to recognize that there's a divine timing for dramatic change, but you need to stop avoiding and start looking honestly at your root issues. So this woman finally responds to Jesus request that he asked her for something to drink. And so it says in verse nine, the Samaritan woman said to him, You're a Jew and I'm a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink? For the Jews do not associate with Samaritans. Jesus answered her, if you knew the gift of God and who it was that asked you for a drink, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water. Sir, the woman said, 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 this well and drank from it himself, as it also his sons and his livestock? Jesus answered, everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water that I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life. Now, what I want you to notice about this conversation is that Jesus changes a conversation about water into a conversation about the soul. I love how he does that. This woman is just talking about water, and Jesus turns this conversation into a conversation about the meaning of life. But I want you to notice also that this woman does what a lot of us do when God starts getting close to our life. She starts to deflect and be defensive. She starts to redirect because if you have hurts and issues in your life, if you have shame and a spirit of rejection in your life, you really don't want anybody to get too close to you because you feel if they really saw who you were, they may reject you again and you don't want to be hurt again. So Jesus starts talking to this woman, and you can tell that she's got a chip on her shoulder right away. She's defensive right away. Jesus says, can I get a drink of water? She's defensive and says, you shouldn't be asking me. Jesus says, hey, if you knew who I was, you'd ask me. And she's defensive and says, I doubt it very much. Jesus says, I can fill your. I can fill your bucket with water that will never run dry. And she's defensive and says, yeah, right. Magic water. Jesus says, go tell your husband to come and and and and join you. And she says, she redirects it and says, I don't have a husband. And what I love about this is that Jesus goes right to the root of her issue. The deep root of this woman's issue was that she was unable to stay in a committed relationship. She had gotten married one time, and another and another, and another and another and finally given up. And she was just living with the guy because she no longer felt like I can trust or be in a marriage. Jesus was pulling back the layers of her defensiveness and getting at the root of her issue. I'm just wondering here today if you've been coming to church for a while or you're sitting in this auditorium today, if God is trying to peel back some of the issues in your life and get to the root of what really, really is bothering you and keeps you empty, the closer Jesus got to the root, the more this woman started to get defensive. The closer Jesus got to the key issue, the more this woman started to deflect. The truth of it is that we all have legitimate needs. This woman, I'm sure that the need that she had in her life is. I just want to be happy. I just want to be loved. I just don't want to be angry anymore. I don't want to be hurt anymore. Hey, that's a legitimate need. The problem is, we have legitimate needs that oftentimes we try to fill in illegitimate ways. And when we try to fill our needs in illegitimate ways, we always end up more empty than when we were in the beginning. And so Jesus peels back the roots and finally tells her, go talk to your husband. Bring your husband. She says to him, I don't have a husband. And he says to her, he said, you're right. You've had five husbands, and the man that you are now with is not your husband. You have just said what is quite true. That's a shock. Number three, you need to refuse to let excuses hold you back from major change.

Taking an honest assessment of your struggles and issues. That's the topic of today's message from pastor, author and Bible teacher Mark Jobe. And this is Bold Steps. You'll find us each weekday right here on your local radio station. Or catch us online at Bold Steps. Org. You can also follow us on social media. It's a great way to share your thoughts and connect with other listeners around the world. Best of all, you can easily share Mark's teaching with your friends and family in your network. Just log in to your Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, or TikTok account and search for bold steps.

Taking an honest assessment of your struggles and issues. That's the topic of today's message from pastor, author and Bible teacher Mark Jobe. And this is Bold Steps. You'll find us each weekday right here on your local radio station. Or catch us online at Bold Steps. Org. You can also follow us on social media. It's a great way to share your thoughts and connect with other listeners around the world. Best of all, you can easily share Mark's teaching with your friends and family in your network. Just log in to your Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, or TikTok account and search for bold steps.

Wayne. Right now we have an exciting, bold step gift that I want to tell everybody about. You've probably heard about it, read about it, seen it, but you get a chance to actually experience it for yourself. And this is the New York Times best selling book, The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel.

Wayne. Right now we have an exciting, bold step gift that I want to tell everybody about. You've probably heard about it, read about it, seen it, but you get a chance to actually experience it for yourself. And this is the New York Times best selling book, The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel.

None other. Right?

None other. Right?

None other. Lee, so good to have you with us here today. Uh, this book has made such an impact with literally hundreds of thousands of people. And I know that your background is as an investigative reporter, journalist. So tell me how that impacted the writing of this book.

None other. Lee, so good to have you with us here today. Uh, this book has made such an impact with literally hundreds of thousands of people. And I know that your background is as an investigative reporter, journalist. So tell me how that impacted the writing of this book.

Yeah, great to be with you, Mark, and I'm thrilled that you're making use of this book. You know, I was a skeptic, as you know, an atheist for much of my life. My background is in journalism and law. I was legal editor of the Chicago Tribune newspaper, and I'm involved with many investigative projects at the paper. And my wife became a Christian, which really ticked me off and, and set me off and made me mad. And I wanted to rescue her from this cult that she got involved in. So I decided to take my journalism and legal training and systematically investigate, you know, is there any credibility to Christianity, figuring I could disprove it in a long weekend? And it took me almost two years to come to the conclusion that in light of the evidence that points so powerfully to where the truth of Christianity. It would have taken more faith to maintain my atheism than to become a Christian.

Yeah, great to be with you, Mark, and I'm thrilled that you're making use of this book. You know, I was a skeptic, as you know, an atheist for much of my life. My background is in journalism and law. I was legal editor of the Chicago Tribune newspaper, and I'm involved with many investigative projects at the paper. And my wife became a Christian, which really ticked me off and, and set me off and made me mad. And I wanted to rescue her from this cult that she got involved in. So I decided to take my journalism and legal training and systematically investigate, you know, is there any credibility to Christianity, figuring I could disprove it in a long weekend? And it took me almost two years to come to the conclusion that in light of the evidence that points so powerfully to where the truth of Christianity. It would have taken more faith to maintain my atheism than to become a Christian.

I love that we want to put this book in your hands, and Wayne will tell you how to do that.

I love that we want to put this book in your hands, and Wayne will tell you how to do that.

Sure. The book is called The Case for Christ, and you can request your copy when you give a financial gift of any amount to support bold steps. Just pick up the phone and give us a call at 800. D.L. Moody. Again, that's (800) 356-6639. Or give online and request the book by going to Bold Steps. Org or send your donation in the mail to Bold Steps. 820 North LaSalle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 606 ten. Now, as we reflect on the past year and look ahead to 2025, many of our listeners are choosing to become bold partners, those faithful supporters who give monthly to sustain this daily program. Help us continue bringing you meaningful content in the New Year by becoming a bold partner today at Bold Steps. Org. When you commit to a monthly gift of $30 or more, you'll receive special access to 50% off resources at the Moody Publishers website, including books, media and Bible studies. Once again, you'll find us online at Bold steps.org. And hey, if you've got travel plans for the new Year, feel free to take these Bible teachings with you and listen right from your phone with the Bold Steps app. You'll find compelling messages centered on biblical truths right at your fingertips wherever you go. Just search your app store for the Bold Steps app and click Download Today. Also, you can subscribe to the Bold Steps podcast available with your podcast app. I'm Wayne Shepherd inviting you to join us again tomorrow when we'll look at the second part of today's message called How Full is Your bucket? That's Tuesday right here on Bold Steps with Mark Jobe. Bold steps is a production of Moody Radio, a ministry of Moody Bible Institute.

Sure. The book is called The Case for Christ, and you can request your copy when you give a financial gift of any amount to support bold steps. Just pick up the phone and give us a call at 800. D.L. Moody. Again, that's (800) 356-6639. Or give online and request the book by going to Bold Steps. Org or send your donation in the mail to Bold Steps. 820 North LaSalle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 606 ten. Now, as we reflect on the past year and look ahead to 2025, many of our listeners are choosing to become bold partners, those faithful supporters who give monthly to sustain this daily program. Help us continue bringing you meaningful content in the New Year by becoming a bold partner today at Bold Steps. Org. When you commit to a monthly gift of $30 or more, you'll receive special access to 50% off resources at the Moody Publishers website, including books, media and Bible studies. Once again, you'll find us online at Bold steps.org. And hey, if you've got travel plans for the new Year, feel free to take these Bible teachings with you and listen right from your phone with the Bold Steps app. You'll find compelling messages centered on biblical truths right at your fingertips wherever you go. Just search your app store for the Bold Steps app and click Download Today. Also, you can subscribe to the Bold Steps podcast available with your podcast app. I'm Wayne Shepherd inviting you to join us again tomorrow when we'll look at the second part of today's message called How Full is Your bucket? That's Tuesday right here on Bold Steps with Mark Jobe. Bold steps is a production of Moody Radio, a ministry of Moody Bible Institute.