Our Sermons

Bible Passage: John 7:37-39
Pastor: Pastor Berg
Sermon Date:  May 28, 2023

The streets of Jerusalem were bursting at the seams with people. You can feel the joy and excitement as the Festival of Shelters or Tabernacles draws to a close after a week-long celebration. They’ve reached the high-point of this autumn festival, arguably the most joyous of all the festivals on the calendar. More joyous than the Day of Atonement or the Feast of Weeks; even more joyous than the Passover. It was the last and most important day of the Festival, sometimes called the “Great Hosanna,” the Great “Lord, Save Us!” There was a joyful procession with musicians and singing led by the priest, which started at the fountain of Siloam in the Kidron Valley. There the priest had drawn water from the fountain. He carried it back to the altar where he mixed the water with the wine of the drink offering and poured the water into special perforated bowls, like watering cans. And as the water mixed with wine poured out over the altar the people would be singing from Isaiah 12: “Therefore with joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation.” Who among the people couldn’t help but remember Meribah, when God had caused water to gush from a rock in the desert for the Israelites to drink. 

In the midst of all this excitement, Jesus stood up and called out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink! As the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from deep within the person who believes in me.” 

But would anyone come? 

Consider what has happened right before this monumental event. All throughout John chapter 6, Jesus had been demonstrating that salvation is found in him alone. He fed the 5000. He walked on water. He spoke at length about how he was the true bread from heaven, the Bread of Life and how eternal life was found in him. And what do we hear? “After this, many of his disciples turned back and were not walking with him anymore.” His disciples! Not the Pharisees or the experts in the Law; his disciples had left him. And then we get to John chapter 7 and he’s ridiculed by his own flesh and blood, his brothers. John tells us, “For even his own brothers did not believe in him.” And when he arrives at the festival, the people of Jerusalem couldn’t figure him out. “Some were saying, ‘He’s a good man.’ Others were saying, ‘No, he deceives the people.’” 

You see, Jesus didn’t meet the people’s expectations of what the Messiah should look like or for that matter, even what a Rabbi, a teacher, should look like. They were amazed at his teaching and yet they said, “How does this man know what is written without being instructed?” He didn’t teach in the normal way. He acted like the Prophet, like the Messiah, but he came from the wrong town. “Certainly the rulers have not concluded that he is the Christ, have they? But we know where this man is from. When the Christ comes, no one will know where he is from…Search and you will see that a prophet does not come from Galilee.” He performed miracle upon miracle and yet they tried to arrest him. It just didn’t fit. Jesus didn’t fit the expectations of the people or the leaders, but he met every expectation of Scripture.

Is the same true today? Would anyone come? His teachings haven’t changed. He still is the only Way, Truth, and Life. He still is the Bread of Life that promises eternal life. But what do we hear today? There has to be more than one way. Those teachings were only relevant at that specific time to those specific people. They don’t apply anymore today. Jesus would want me to be happy and live my truth, so that’s what I’m going to do. No, Jesus doesn’t fit the expectations of people today. Can the same be said for us?

But on this last and most important day of the most joyous Jewish festival, Jesus stands up and cries out: “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink!” 

Consider what an enormous thing Meribah had to be: water gushing out of a rock enough to give more than a million people water to drink as well as all their livestock. This was not a slow trickle, a spring seeping slowly down the side of the rock. This was a raging river of water. And this is the kind of river, a raging river of grace, that Jesus offers to you for your salvation. 

As Jesus stands on this last and most important day of the Festival, as the words of Isaiah 12 were sung, “Therefore with joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation.” On this day of Great Hosanna, the Great “God Save Us!” Jesus says: “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink!” He is declaring that he is the fulfillment of that Scripture! “As the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from deep within the person who believes in me.” Jesus is the culmination of the Old Testament. Jesus is the source of salvation and the joy that accompanies it!

Let us not take these words for granted! Martin Luther wrote: “Cherish these words: ‘Come to me.’” Especially to you and me who thirst for relief, for assurance, for mercy, for forgiveness for all of our failures; this invitation is for you! Jesus knows your struggles: how you try so hard to live as he has called you to be only to have Satan try just as hard to lead you astray. And so here it is, at the waters of salvation, that you lay aside the expectations of what it means to be a good Christian. You lay aside all the accusations of Satan that God can’t possibly love you because of what you’ve done. You lay them aside and you cling to Christ. You drink deeply from the waters of salvation that Jesus so graciously offers you hear. His life and death have paid for all your sins. From the cross of Jesus, God’s forgiveness comes pouring out, a stream of grace, an overflow of mercy. 

You see, your salvation does not depend on you–the success of your efforts, the condition of your heart. Your salvation depends on Christ and Christ alone. Time and time and time again, he floods you with his forgiveness as he leads you back to the font, back to your baptism, back to the streams of salvation.

But there’s even more. You see on this Day of Pentecost, Jesus kept his promise. Listen again. “On the last and most important day of the festival, Jesus stood up and called out, ‘If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink! As the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from deep within the person who believes in me.’ By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were going to receive. For the Holy Spirit had not yet come, because Jesus had not yet been glorified.” 

The festival of shelters was the last and most joyous celebration on the Jewish calendar.  It was an autumn festival that signified and celebrated the end of the agricultural year. It was a harvest celebration. Prior to that was a different festival, a different harvest celebration, the Feast of Weeks, which celebrated the first fruits, the first of the harvest. Jesus’ resurrection happened on the first day of that feast of weeks! He is the firstfruits of those who will enjoy eternal life with him in heaven. And on this Day of Pentecost, Jesus fulfilled the other harvest festival. As he poured out his Spirit on his disciples, as they shared the good news in every language and tongue, a new harvest began, a harvest of souls. Jesus lives to pour out his Spirit so that the souls of all believers would be gathered in. And that harvest continues today!

Will anyone come? Not by your power or mine. Not by your will or mine, but only by the power of the Spirit. Only by the power of the living water that flows from deep within each of us. As we share the good news of Jesus, God promises people will come! Doesn’t it amaze you when they do? They could be doing so many other things, and yet here they are by the power of the Spirit drinking deeply from the streams of salvation! May God renew our zeal and our commitment to holding forth the water of life, the streams of salvation, and the invitation of our Savior, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink!” Amen.