As a child, we used to travel from Danbury, NH to Brandon, VT for Thanksgiving and other holidays to see my grandmother.  On the way there was an outdoor spring on the side of the mountain where people could stop and get cool mountain water.  We didn’t stop every trip, but as a young child, I really liked it when we did.  It was neat to see water flowing out of a pipe continually and the feel the coolness of the water.  And this was in the outdoors.  There is a similar spring in South China where many people stop and get water to drink.

              13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

This passage of scripture tells me something about the Christian life.  It tells me that every Christian has a spring inside them.  If you meet a genuine Christian, you meet someone who has a spring of living water, moving water.  They will not be like a well where you have to let a bucket down to find out if there is water.  They will be like a spring in which the water will flow out and over the reservoir.  I cannot think of anyone that I know is a Christian who does not have this spring inside them that leads to eternal life.

13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

Notice the word “everyone.”  Notice the word “whoever.”  This is all inclusive.  The words “everyone” and “whoever” are limited by the context.  It is “everyone who drinks this water…”  “but whoever drinks the water I give him…” 

If we drink physical water, we will get thirsty again.  If we drink the water Jesus gives us, we will never thirst.

Never thirst for what?  Never thirst for eternal life for one thing.  Every true Christian does not thirst for eternal life.  Why?  They have it and they know it.

If you disagree with me, I will tell you that that is what the text says.  It says whoever drinks will never thirst, but that the well will spring up to eternal life.

When we are born into this world, we are ignorant of spiritual realities. As we grow older, we become aware that God has created the world and we may have learned that God is love.  However, we cannot be sure of that, as we hear it from all kinds of people.  But have you ever heard it from God?

The Christian says, “Yes we have.  Jesus is God, the son, who came down to this earth from heaven.  When Jesus speaks, God speaks.  Jesus is the way, the truth and the life.  We can know about spiritual realities through Jesus.”

So I challenge you that whatever your beliefs maybe, Jesus said that we will never thirst again, but if we receive the water he gives us, it will spring up within us to eternal life.

If you are uncertain as to whether or not you will go to heaven, it is because you have not had a drink of the water that Jesus gives.  For the water that Jesus gives springs up into everlasting life and you will not thirst for that again.

I love the way that Jesus presents this.  The word for “spring” is the same word John used earlier to when he referred to Jacob’s well.  But this well is modified by another word.  This well springs up.  In Jesus’ day, the wells did not spring up.  You put a bucket down.  But this well that Jesus puts in us springs up to eternal life.  Sometimes this word is translated “fountain.”

Do you get the picture?  It is like there is a fountain in us that, when the water come out, quenches our thirst for eternal life.

The water is not eternal life.  The water from this spring “wells up” or “springs up” to eternal life.

So what is this spring?  What is this well?  John 7:37-39 gives us the answer.

“37 On the last and greatest day of the Feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. 38 Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.” 39 By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.” John 7:37-39, NIV.

The spring that is in us is the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit is the “streams of living water that will flow from within us.”  It is the work of the Holy Spirit to give us assurance of eternal life. 

If the streams of living water flow up into eternal life and we see that the streams of living water is the Holy Spirit, then we see that the assurance of eternal life is the end result of his work in our lives.

Which comes first, the work of the Holy Spirit or our faith?  Does the Holy Spirit come in and give us faith, or does the Holy Spirit come in response to our faith?  Verse 39 says that it will be those who believe who will receive the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit comes in response to our faith.  When we believe in Jesus, the Holy Spirit comes in.  These are not my words, but the words of Jesus.

So what do we need to believe to receive the Holy Spirit, this living water, this spring within us? 

First, we need to know what the gift of God is.

“10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”” John 4:10, NIV.

Jesus is the gift of God.  “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotton Son…”  Jesus is the gift of God.

When you receive Jesus, you receive not only Jesus, but all he has to offer.

It’s like marriage.  When a person marries another person, they not only get the person, but also all their gifts, abilities, experiences and character.  We call this the “whole package.”

When you get Jesus, you get the “whole package.”  Included in that package is eternal life.

The apostle Paul put it this way, “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord.”  When we get Jesus, we get eternal life.  When we get eternal life, we get it through Jesus.

Eternal life is a gift.  Jesus is a gift.  You cannot buy him, work for him, earn him.  Jesus comes into your life as a gift, a gift from God.

Every true Christian knows this, believes this, and is settled that eternal life is a gift from God.

Second Jesus says that we need to know “who it is that asks you for a drink.” 

Who is Jesus?  The woman starts out by seeing that he is a Rabbi, a teacher.  She knew this by his dress.  Second, she calls him a prophet.  She knows this by his amazing ability to tell her stories of her own life that he had no way of knowing.  Third, she struggles with the question, “Is Jesus the messiah?” 

The word “messiah” is literally, “The Anointed One.”  To be anointed meant to be specially chosen by God, to be his representative, to be one he has specially chosen to speak through.

The woman at the well struggled with this question.  She runs back to the village and asks, “Could this man be the Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed one of God?”

In order to have the kind of faith that Jesus talks about here, you must believe that Jesus is from God, that what he says is true, that he is the Anointed One of God.

When the woman went back to her village and told them she had met a man who told her everything she ever did, some of the people believed on the spot that the Messiah was sitting down by the well.  Others believed when they came and talked to Jesus themselves.

Every true Christian not only believes that Jesus and eternal life are a gift from God, they also believe that Jesus is God’s Son, anointed an chosen by him to die on the cross, to be buried, to rise again.  They believe that Jesus spoke truth when he spoke about God and about us.

If you believe, then you will receive the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit will be in you like a river that springs up to eternal life.

It is the most important question I can ask.  Are you a Christian?  Do you know that salvation is a gift from God that cannot be earned?  Do you know that Jesus is the savior of the world?  Do you know that you have eternal life?

If you answer to any of these questions is “no”, Jesus is telling you that if you believe in Him, he will give you salvation as a gift, he will save you from your sin.  He will give you eternal life. 

Why not settle this today?  You have been attending this church for a while or may be it is your first Sunday.  But you know in your head that Jesus is the Savior, but you have never asked him for this living water that will satisfy your spiritual hunger, you have never put your faith in Him.  Why not confess that Jesus is Lord.  Believe in your heart God raised Him from the dead.  If you do, you will be saved.