Demonstrating Authority

 

I am going to stumble through this one a bit…

John 4: 7 A woman from Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.”

We know the scene.  Jesus came with His disciples, passing through Samaria.  The disciples went away to buy food; Jesus asked this woman for a drink from the well.  It was mid-day.  How is it that a Jew is asking a drink from a Samaritan?  Jews have nothing to do with them.  Jesus replied with His living water.

15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.”

Jesus said to her to have her husband come.  She said she had no husband.

17(b): Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.” 19 The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet.”

Now it is clear as to why the woman was at the well mid-day.  Water is drawn in the morning and in the evening, and there would be several women at the well at these times.  She was there mid-day, and alone.  She was an outcast, having gone through many husbands – and now, with one not her husband.

The disciples, having returned, marveled that Jesus was talking to a woman, although no one asked Him why He was doing so.

28 So the woman left her water jar and went away into town and said to the people, 29 “Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?” 30 They went out of the town and were coming to him.

Then, something truly amazing:

39 Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony, “He told me all that I ever did.”

Why would they believe anything this woman said? A woman with such poor standing that she would go to the well when no one else was there?  She was an outcast, a woman of poor reputation.  Especially, why would men believe her?  Yet, they did.

40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. 41 And many more believed because of his word. 42 They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world.”

They did believe because of her, but now they believe because of Him.

What do I take from this episode?  A demonstration of God’s power and authority to work even through corruption.  I will try to explain.  In this town, this woman presented as the lowest of the low, the most corrupt, the outcast.  Violating every norm and custom, breaking tradition and law.  We wouldn’t think twice about these men in the town believing if Jesus just walked into the town council and spoke.

But He didn’t do this; He spoke though this woman.  He demonstrated that He had the power and authority to even overcome her reputation, that even one like her – who no one ever would have reason to believe – would be believed.

Who are the Wolves?

Matthew 7: 15 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. 16 Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?

 Forgive the mixed metaphor.... There is a new book out: “Shepherds for Sale,” by Megan Basham, a journalist for the Daily Wire.  From what I gather, it is a book dedicated to exposing those Christian shepherds who are dedicated to or otherwise advancing leftist political agendas as opposed to focusing on what might be considered a traditional, or conservative, or even a “true” understanding of the gospel.

Normally, a book like this and on this topic would be right down my alley.  I have written occasionally about this issue and how it strikes me that we may be living through a time of testing in the Church – separating the wheat from the chaff when it comes to Christian leaders and Christians in general.

Apparently, this book has been much anticipated.  I, not being on X-twitter or any social media, knew nothing of it until Gavin Ortlund did a video about it.  Then a second.  Each is at thirty minutes or a bit less.  He did the videos because he found himself right in the opening chapter – a prominent shepherd for sale apparently.

The topic of the opening chapter is global warming and man’s effect (if any) on climate change.  In some earlier video some time ago, Ortlund said he has studied the issues and basically agrees with the scientific consensus (although, in truth, there isn’t a consensus – but that isn’t really important here). 

However, Ortlund does not make this a faith issue or anything of the sort.  He does say Christians should be concerned about the environment, and this is quite correct.  God put this responsibility there, right in the beginning of His book:

Genesis 1: 26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

Genesis 2: 15 Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it.

For Ortlund, his main point was that we should study the issue of climate change before pushing any strong opinion. 

Basham has included Ortlund in the book – in the first chapter – because of this.  Not via a steelman of his argument, but a strawman.  Ortlund addresses this in the two videos – the second of which was prompted by the social media commentary that followed his first video.

There is a very thorough article that walks through just how careless Basham is in her work on Ortlund and this topic.  The author (it appears anonymously) isn’t shy about his conclusion: “In Defense of Gavin Ortlund.”  His summary, which he defends very well (emphasis in original):

I think [Ortlund] is correct in his complaint that Basham badly misrepresented and mischaracterized his original video on climate change and, given the highly controversial nature of the book in which it appears, I think he has a right to be upset about it. 

The book is entitled Shepherds FOR SALE.  It is not a soft charge to be included in a book with such a title.  One should be quite careful about who is included in such a book, and that the charges are accurate.  In any case, if it is meaningful to you, take a quick read of this author’s defense of Ortlund.

Now, why am I going through all of this?  As noted, it is a subject important to me and one that I have written about occasionally.  Most recently here.  Looking at just the last decade or so: the embrace of pride, the reaction to covid, and now the genocide in Palestine.  In each case, many Christian leaders have failed.  In many cases, those who were strong on the first two failed and continue to fail at the third.

And this comes to my point.  When one wants to write about shepherds for sale in the Christian church, I would expect that the first several chapters are dedicated to those well-known Christian Zionists, especially those who head up or are involved in Zionist or Zionist-adjacent organizations.  If there is any group that might be considered “for sale,” it is this one, and it is a group that is supporting the most immediate violence against innocents.