I WAS ALMOST SCAMMED

 I know about scamming first hand: it happened to me when a scammer and his partner called to tell me I was to get a refund of $40.00. I won't go into the long story of the ins and outs of the deception, except to mention that on my computer screen they had pulled up my bank statement. Really! My bank statement. I saw it, it was right there. They were high tech slick operators. 

But, praise be, I caught on in time to stop their nefarious scheme and ignored their threats to send the police to my house to charge with trying to steal $40,000 from them! I told them to get the police to my house fast; that would be A-OK, it would be all right with me. 

Other scammers are at work. These are the prosperity preachers-- their scam is to use (i. e. abuse) an account in I Kings about a poor widow, her son, and the prophet Elijah and they, the scammers, are just as slick of the ones that almost got me. Let's examine how they skillfully work the scam.

In I Kings 7:7-17, Elijah the prophet finds that the brook has dried up and he's in need of water and food. God tells His poor prophet in need of food and water about a poor widow and her son, telling the prophet to go see her; she will give him water and food. 

Elijah finds the woman gathering sticks and asks her to bring him some water and bread. She's in such a desperate condition that she tells him,  “I don’t have any bread—only a handful of flour in a jar and a little olive oil in a jug. I am gathering a few sticks to take home and make a meal for myself and my son, that we may eat it—and die.”

But the prophet tells her, “Don’t be afraid. Go home and do as you have said. But first make a small loaf of bread for me from what you have and bring it to me, and then make something for yourself and your son. ¹⁴ For this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘The jar of flour will not be used up and the jug of oil will not run dry until the day the Lord sends rain on the land.’”

 "She went away and did as Elijah had told her. So there was food every day for Elijah and for the woman and her family. ¹⁶ For the jar of flour was not used up and the jug of oil did not run dry, in keeping with the word of the Lord spoken by Elijah."

And now the sheep, having heard the scammer tell that story, are setup for the shearing. Just as seeing my bank statement had set me up for their manipulation, prosperity preachers abuse this story all the time. They tell the sheep, "Even if you're as poor as this widow is, God will bless you when you give to my ministry.")

What's happened is that, in their telling, Elijah has become the multimillionaire Joyce Meyer, (or whoever is telling the story) and the sheep have become the widow. The sharing of the bread and water have transformed into money. Therefore, based on the Word of God, the scammer says, "Financial blessings will be yours when you give to the me, the millionaire, no matter how poor you are and that's a promise from God. (The scammers conveniently leave out the millionaire part.) God is at the ready to pour out financial blessings on you like you couldn't believe, they're told."

It's amazing how these scammers can sleep at night.

What they've done is take a description in Scripture and turned it into a prescription for the sheep. This account isn't a prescription of what you're to do, it's a description of God's providing for a poor widow and her son, as well as His poor prophet. Both of them are poverty-stricken. What we're reading in I Kings 7 is not a promise God makes.

These prosperity scammers employ various scamming tools to work this nefarious scheme on the unsuspecting sheep who have no idea they're being conned. The prosperity charlatans use their best selling books, their CDs, television, and church auditoriums to go to work, and churches cooperate with them because they're as ignorant as the sheep. 

If your church library has any of the scammers' books, burn them. If your church has such CDs, throw them into the flames too. 

As long as the sheep stay ignorant and have even scant wool, the scammers will come with their shears.     

HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT PART II

 It's difficult to see something hiding in plain sight; we can easily overlook what's not stated. As per last week, we saw that when the infamous serial adulterer, the one known only as "the woman at the well," became convinced that the Savior had now come and was talking to her, so she accepted by faith His offer and took a drink of the water of life, that is, she believed and was eternally saved.

What's hiding in plain sight in the evangelistic conversation in John 4 is that Jesus didn't demand that she feel sorry for her sins; He didn't order to stop living with a man who wasn't her husband; no admonition to clean up her life,no statement of "turn from your sins, no make a promise  promise to make Me the lord of your life. She met Him as a woman involved in adultery and she left saved as a woman living in adultery.

The one requirement for eternal life is faith alone in Christ alone as John states one hundred times in his Gospel. 

Let's move to something else that's hiding in plain sight: John the Baptist did not declare the same gospel message we do today. We see this by reading what he said when he presented his repetitive message the Bible calls the gospel ("good news") of the kingdom which was that the kingdom promised Israel in the Old Testament was at hand because your King has come!

In Luke 3, he's proclaimed that message, and the Jews listening ask, "Then what are we to do?" His answer was, “The one who has two ^[tunics is to share with the one who has none; and the one who has food is to do likewise.” ¹² Now even tax collectors came to be baptized, and they said to him, “Teacher, what are we to do?” ¹³ And he said to them, “Collect no more than what you have been ordered to.” ¹⁴ And soldiers also were questioning him, saying, “What are we to do, we as well?” And he said to them, “Do not extort money from anyone, nor harass anyone, and be content with your wages.”

We can see this isn't the good news we preach today  by comparing John the Baptist's message with Paul's in I Cor. 15: "Now I make known to you, brothers and sisters, the gospel which I preached to you, which you also received, in which you also stand, ² by which you also are saved, if you hold firmly to the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain.

"For I handed down to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, ⁴ and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures."

We see John's message was not that of Paul's when we read Galatians 2:16: "a person is not justified by works of the Law but through faith in Christ Jesus, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the Law; since by works of the Law no flesh will be justified." We Paul's message of the gospel in Romans 4:4-5: "Now to the one who works, the wages are not credited as a favor, but as what is due. ⁵ But to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness."

When we look at John's message in Luke 4, his is filled with works such as  giving  your clothes and your food to others; stop harassing people, don't extort higher taxes than the law allows, in other words,  "Stop these sins and start sharing,"

With the woman at the well, there was no, "Stop all this adultery and clean up your miserable, sinful  life.!" The message to her was, "Accept My free offer of eternal life."

What's the difference? The difference is John's message and his audience, as he states right off the get-go of his mission, is, "Get prepared, Israel, for your King who is now here." It's a message of get ready to accept His offer of the kingdom promised to you. His was a message for Israel. The King came. They rejected their King, shouting, "We have no king but Caesar!"  Therefore, the kingdom is now postponed.

Paul's message, Jesus message to the woman at the well were not the same as John's, nor should ours be.  

HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT PART I

There's an account in the Gospel of John which has been told and retold millions of times in church history down to right now today. It's the account an an encounter Jesus had with a woman at a well, a woman as immoral as they come a serial half-breed adulteress. The woman of no name whom we know as "The Woman at the Well," as recorded for all time in John 4. And it's in that chapter that a huge, big-time truth hides in plain sight. 

You know the story. John tells us that Jesus "had to pass through Samaria." This is the land of the much despised by the Jews, low-class Samaritans. Now, Jesus' disciples wouldn't even give her the time of day, so, Christ has to send them away to get some food while, He, tired from the trip, sits down by the famous well Jacob dug long, long ago. 

It's the hot time of the day and here comes the woman to draw water. The best time for this chore is later when it's not so scorching hot. But she comes at noon because no other women will be there and she won't have to endure their censorious looks, crude comments, and their ostracism. 

She sees that there's a Jewish Man there (she recognizes His Jewishness by the way He's dressed.) Lo and behold, He says to her,"“Give Me a drink." This surprises her, so, she asks, “How is it that You, though You are a Jew, are asking me for a drink, though I am a Samaritan woman?” John makes an editorial comment for his Gentile readers who aren't familiar with the long-established hostility existing in that day when he explains, "For Jews do not associate with Samaritans."

The conversation continues as Jesus replies, "“If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who is saying to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.” 

She's been doing this burdensome chore of hauling water for so long that she wants to know about such water. Jesus explains, "Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again; but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never be thirsty; but the water that I will give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up to eternal life.” 

To her, this must have sounded like what will later be known as The Fountain of Youth that Ponce de Leon would seek in Florida in the 14th century. She want's a drink.

The Stranger switches the subject and His command shock her:“Go, call your husband and come here.” The woman answered and said to Him, “I have no husband.” Jesus *said to her, “You have correctly said, ‘I have no husband’; ¹⁸ for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; this which you have said is true." How in the world could a complete Stranger know intimate and sinful details which she tried to cover up?

She now perceives that something is going on, so, she thinks He must be a prophet. She has a burning question for Him--she wants to know the answer to a long-standing argument between the Jews and Samaritans. The $64 question is, "Who's right? Are we Samaritans to worhip here or in Jerusalem like the Jews say?"   

The conversation continues by her saying that when the Messiah comes, He'll give us the answer. Then comes the bombshell: She's talking to Him!

She believes Him. She drops her water pot and takes off for town to say to the men, "So the woman left her water pot and went into the city, and said to the people,  “Come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done; this is not the Christ, is He?” They rush out of the city: "They left the city and were coming to Him." Many of the men believe Him saying that they too are convinced  that Jesus is the Messiah, "the Savior of the World."

Now did you see it? Did you see what's been hiding in John 4 for 2,000 years/ It's right there, right before our eyes and has been there for a long, long time. 

She's now a believer. But did you notice what Jesus did NOT say to her. He didn't say, You have to feel sorry for all those adulteries you've committed. You have to leave the husband you're with now. Or to phrase the way one pastor did erroneously thinking that James 4:7-10 is the way to gain eternal life: [Woman,], "Submit therefore to God. But ^[h]resist the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸ Come close to God and He will come close to you. [Woman], Cleanse your hands, you sinner; and purify your heart, you ^[i]double-minded. Be miserable, and mourn, and weep; let your laughter be turned into mourning, and your joy into gloom, [Then and only then, believe in Me.]

What's been hiding in plain sight is that she came to Jacob's Well an adulterous woman and left an adulterous woman, forgiven and saved by drinking the living water. As the book of Revelation concludes, "The Spirit and the bride say, “Come.” And let the one who hears say, “Come.” And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires, take the water of life without cost.