44. Springs of Living Water

Covering John 3:9 through Chapter 5:

The whole Bible is filled with metaphors, the use of what is known to impart to us the meaning of what is un-knowable. In fact, God’s over-the-top use of metaphors, often mixing them together, can seem confusing. – Am I a son of God or the bride of Christ?

It is the Flow of Gospel Word that removes all confusion, for the one task of all the metaphors is to cause us to KNOW a God who is Spirit moving through us in the various ways depicted by the many metaphors. The two primary metaphors are the reproduction of life and the Tabernacle of Moses. Yet there are many more, all of which take their meaning out from these two. In fact, the water becoming wine and the Lamb and Dove together are very similar in their meanings to us.

John’s Metaphors. Metaphors of significance through these chapters are the Water of Life, the Bread of Life, the River of Life, and the Light of Life. John also weaves in the Door and the Way, and places them all into the Reproduction of Life.

Just as Paul is big on exuberance, so John is big on metaphors, and thus to know John, we must also know how he comprehends God with us. Everyone of these metaphors posits a direct interaction between each one of us and God, face to face, utterly personal, a response of faith and movement. And everyone of them shows us God inside of us and we inside of God – through Jesus. God uses every metaphor to cause us to KNOW the Father, and to KNOW the Flow that is Jesus Sent into us, which is – Life!

The Purpose of Metaphors. We are approaching John on the assumption that, through the Flow of Word into the human experience, God intends us to go from Paul’s Grace to John’s Life. The veil cast upon the gospel by two thousand years of unbelief was not God’s intention, though it was inevitable, for all things must come to completion. We address the contrast because the Gospel has been so hidden, but our thoughts for ourselves must go from grace to grace and from life to life.

It is the incredible and complete involvement of the Devoted Spirit in our lives that requires the metaphors, for how can we know Spirit? Spirit is the essence of God touching us. And not just “touching us” but flooding our entire beings, spirit, soul, and body, with God’s essence. God wants us to know Spirit, and that by experience.

From Life to Fire. (Chapter 3) • 16 For God loves the world-cosmos such that He gave His Son, His Only Seed-Kind, so that everyone believing into Him should not be lost, but should possess age-unfolding life. • 17 For God did not send His Son into the world-cosmos that He might judge the world-cosmos, but so that the world-cosmos might be saved through Him.

John is moving from the most unbelievable metaphor, the one that says we are conceived of God, to the most difficult metaphor which is Light, Light caused by Fire. Light makes visible, light is honesty, light is judgment. God’s purpose is Salvation, not judgment, but without light, no one knows to flee the darkness into the Salvation of God. Few verses are more wrongly defined than John 3:16, including, even, God loves. We must bring it into the Gospel.

God-Love. Definition: Age-unfolding life is to know the one True God (see John 17:3), thus death and lostness is not to know God, though all live inside of Him. Nowhere in the Gospel are these two concepts presented as geographical locations to which people “go” after physical death.

Definition: The “world” in John 3:16 is defined, not as the interactions of humans and demons, but as the people of the world. God-Love seems like Fire, at times, but Love wins all.

Ruling Verse 9: The Son of man comes to seek and to save what is lost (Luke 19:10). Jesus, the Word God speaks, does not return to the Father except in accomplishing the purpose for which God sent Him (see Isaiah 55:10-11). This is Paul’s gospel, that Jesus wins all and returns all to the Father.

The Judgment of Light. • 18 The one believing into Him is not judged, the one not believing, however, has already been judged, because he has not believed into the name of the Only Seed-Kind, the Son out from God. • 19 This is the judgment, that the light has come into the cosmos and men love the darkness rather than the light, for their deeds are evil. 20 For everyone practicing evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, that his works might not be exposed. • 21 The one practicing the truth, however, comes to the light, that his works might be made visible that they have been done inside of God.

John is saying, “Listen, you are sons conceived of God, now deal with the LIGHT.” – Indeed, whom the Lord loves, He disciplines, and flogs every son whom He openly welcomes and receives (Hebrews 12:6).

To Come to the Light. The desire in Christians to bend John 3:14-21 into a future time and into different places, not here, not now, not me, is overwhelming. Why? Because of an irrational fear of Light. There is no such thing as “going to meet your Maker.” Every created thing lives utterly inside of God right now and always. You can’t touch anything without passing through God-All in glory, without passing through LIGHT (and Love).

To “come to the Light,” is to “give an account in the presence of God,” which is to give thanks inside of and to place the Lord Jesus upon every moment, circumstance, and interaction of your life, which is Paul’s “every knee bowing and every tongue speaking Christ.” It can take place ONLY today, for tomorrow does not exist. Believing INTO Jesus must be real and complete.

The Day of Salvation. It is important for us to understand what is happening. We are rescuing John 3:16 out of the horrors into which it has been cast by the refusal of Jesus Now. And we can do so only by switching entirely into that knowledge of reality given to us by the Ruling Thoughts of God, which we now see as appearing everywhere in the Bible.

Definition: Today is the Day of Salvation, a “someday salvation” does not exist except in the delusions of unbelief and the refusal of the Light. We enter INTO Jesus today, this moment and every moment, without keeping anything we are or have done from Him.

John will continue, now, in this contrast of Light and judgment, and of keeping ourselves inside of Jesus. Nonetheless, Gospel Word places us as sons with Him.

Believe INTO Jesus. Definition: Every human lives only inside of God, and every human deed is done inside of God, inside of all Light. Darkness exists only in the psychotic delusions of the human mind at war against God. To “come to” the Light is to acknowledge God as all; we do so ONLY inside of Jesus.

Ruling Verse 10: To believe into Jesus is to live and to remain inside of John 14:20. Inside of Jesus, we give everything we are and do to God, regardless, including our sin and our shame. We hold nothing from the Light, and in doing so, we place the Lord Jesus Christ upon everything we are and do.

Ruling Verse 7: The certainty with which we place ourselves into Jesus, regardless of all our stupidity, is “coming to the light.” It is giving our account in the presence of God every moment. To “bend the knee” is to give thanks inside of all.

From Old to New. Thus is my joy fulfilled. • 30 It is inevitable for Him to increase and for me to be made less. 31 The One coming from above is above all. The one whose being is out from the earth is out from the earth and speaks out from the earth. The One coming out from heaven is above all.

This is John the Immerser speaking, the final prophet of the old covenant; the prophet whose job is to point Israel to the New Covenant inside of Jesus, the One prophesied by Moses. He is not giving a formula for salvation, but the end of the old.

Covenant: John the Immerser is the final prophet of the old covenant; his job is to point to the New Covenant prophesied by Jeremiah now coming inside of Jesus. “For me to be made less” means that the old covenant and everything in it ends upon the Cross.

Knowing God. (Chapter 4) 13 Jesus answered her, “Everyone drinking of this water will thirst again. • 14 Whoever drinks out from the water that I will give him, however, will never thirst in this age, but the water that I will give him will become inside of him a spring of water bubbling up into age-unfolding life.”

I think this might be my favorite metaphor of God inside of me – a spring of water bubbling up. Because I grew up on the western slopes of the Cascades in Oregon, springs of water bubbling up were a big part of my boyhood joy. Springs of water were everywhere, and playing with the flow of that water was my favorite pastime – or in it or alongside of it. Flowing water was my life, and the sound of water bubbling over rocks was my music. My desire is to know God in the same depths of meaning.

Gospel Word inside of Us. Gospel Word, living and energeoing, bubbles up inside of us into knowing the Father. The flow of golden oil speaks of Gospel Word as Fire and as Light, that which lights the Church on Fire, but springs of living water is something utterly personal inside of us.

There is the thought here of complete abandonment into that Word bubbling up, that we would know and define ourselves in NO OTHER WAY. I exist by, I know myself by, Gospel Word bubbling up inside of me into knowing My Father sharing all with me. To believe “into” Jesus is to place myself only there, that I come out from God, not just as Sustaining Word in power, but as a son, out from Gospel Word arising always inside of me.

Gospel Word Arising. Definition: God uses metaphors to teach us of His ways inside of us; they are an essential element in our knowing an unknowable God. This is why John 6:63 is critical, for God is speaking into us Spirit and Life.

Definition: “Springs of living water bubbling up” is a most beautiful description of God inside of us. Living water is Gospel Word, that is, Jesus, but God as Word is always there inside of Jesus bubbling up, wanting us to KNOW Him.

Ruling Verse 3: We thirst; we drink of Jesus.

Ruling Verse 10: To know God is LIFE. God is inside of Jesus Sent into us, and His knowledge bubbles up inside of us personally as Gospel Word ever flowing. We know God by His Gospel Word arising from within our hearts.

Worship the Father. • 23 But the hour is coming and now is, when the true worshipers will worship [kiss] the Father inside of Spirit and truth; indeed, the Father also searches with great desire for such to worship Him. • 24 God is Spirit, and it is necessary that those worshipping Him, should worship [kiss] inside of Spirit and truth.

I have known incredible depths of worship inside of Spirit. Yet we held to so much unbelief and refusal inside of it. My unbelief was no problem for Jesus, but it did mean I could not really know the Father. The Father searches with great desire for true worshippers to worship Him. – With my body, I thee worship. – Marriage union, the conception and bringing forth of LIFE. True worship is to embrace a God who speaks the TRUTH.

Marriage Union. Jesus has brought us into the inner sanctum of marriage union with God, that God might plant His Seed into our hearts, that we might bring forth the knowledge of God into the knowledge of all. This interaction is the depths of worship. Where do we put this? I do not know. It is Life; it is Ruling Verse 7 and 10 and 8 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 5.

Definition: “God is Spirit” means that God is always touching every created thing, desiring to be known. God searches with great DESIRE for those who will “kiss” Him in return, that is, those who will so Love Him that knowing Him is Life itself.

Life: True worship is marriage union, to give one’s self entirely to the Father, that He might plant His Seed, the Lord Jesus, into our hearts, that we might bring forth His Life into our world, the knowledge of God covering all.

Sowing and Reaping. • 34 Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the desire of the One who sent Me, and to complete His work. 35 Do you not say that it is yet four months before the harvest comes? Look and see! I say to you, • lift up your eyes and see the fields, for they are white for harvest already. • 36 The one who reaps receives his wages, and gathers together fruit into age-unfolding life. Then the one who sows will rejoice together with the one who reaps. 37 Indeed, the saying is true, “one is sowing and another reaping.” 38 I sent you to reap that for which you did not toil; others have toiled, and you have entered into their labor.”

We just brought out the words that the Desire of the Father is that we would worship Him, that is, receive His Seed to bring forth His Life into creation. Every part of this interaction is what Jesus IS and DOES, Jesus Sent into us.

“Food” to Jesus. Ruling Verse 10: Jesus Sent into you says to you, personally, “My FOOD is to be your connection with God and God’s with you in every moment and particle of your life, even to your complete union with God inside of worship (the Father’s Desire), even to your bringing forth His knowledge into creation. This is My sustenance; this is why I am.”

The thing is, Jesus gave this incredible definition of Himself, one which we would know only as we KNOW Him inside of us, in the context of the harvest. Because Jesus lives inside of all true believers, the initial concept of the harvest, sweeping multitudes into the faith of Christ, is correct. The difference for us is the knowledge that this same Jesus is now inside of us – as He is, and that the Gospel into which the harvest takes place is a Gospel of Life.

Reaping the Harvest. You see, this harvest is out from “the Father searches with GREAT DESIRE.” And it is into a House built for God that the harvest is being reaped. In other words, this harvest is into the Feast of Tabernacles, which Jesus said is always right now. In Matthew 9:38, Jesus uses the word “apostle-ed,” to send laborers into that harvest.

Definition: The harvest is into Christ that He might build us together as the dwelling place of God, where the Father might be worshipped. This harvest is the Feast of Tabernacles, that God might tabernacle among His people.

Ruling Verse 9: Our ministry is to the Father, for His sake, for God greatly desires to be known. Creation set free is the obvious outcome of such a ministry. This harvest into the Church is the firstfruits of this ministry to the Father.

Father and Son Together. (Chapter 5) • 19 The Son is able to do nothing of Himself, except what He perceives the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, these things the Son does also. 20 Indeed, the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all that He Himself does; and greater works then these He will show Him, so that you might marvel. • 21 For just exactly as the Father awakens and gives life to the dead, in this same way, the Son also gives life to whomever He desires. • 22 Indeed, the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, 23 that all might value and honor the Son, even as they value and honor the Father. He who is not valuing the Son, is not valuing the Father who sent Him.

I don’t think we have ever connected with what Jesus means in these words; they have been only vague ideas bouncing around.

Understanding Light and Life. And this is why the metaphors of Gospel Word that Jesus is, in between the Father and us, are so important, along with the conceptualization of an electrical universe, for these things depict the reality in which we actually live.

We must go back to John 1:4-9. Inside of Him is life actively, and this life is the light of humans. This light is made visible inside of the darkness… That Light is true, who gives light to every human entering into the world-cosmos. – John continues to present to us the interplay of Light and Life in our existence as sons conceived of God. These words are not for the unregenerate, for the unregenerate are incapable of knowing them. These words are for mature sons, who walk in Spirit, just like Jesus, and must be understood only in that way.

Possessing Life. Okay, I can see that we must bring in this whole section, for God’s meaning is found in the Flow.

• 24 The one who continually hears My word and believes the One who sent Me, possesses age-unfolding life and does not come into judgment, but has already and completely changed place out from death and into life. • 25 It is as I say to you. The hour is coming and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. • 26 Indeed, just as the Father possesses life inside of Himself, so also He gave to the Son to possess life inside of Himself, 27 and He gave to Him authority to execute judgment, because He is the Son of man. – • 30 I am not able of Myself to do anything; even as I hear, so I judge; and My judgment is just, because I do not seek my own desire, but the desire of the One who sent Me.

The Giving of Life. Verses 21 and 26 give us the meaning, that God gives Life to Jesus who then gives the same Life to whomever He wants, which means that everything Jesus says about Himself and His own relationship with the Father He is transferring as Himself to us. This whole passage, then, is the first part of Jesus making us to be just like Himself, which is to know the Father in exactly the same way that Jesus knows the Father, the same Flow, the same relationship, the same interaction.

Then, verse 24 is the swing verse. Jesus presents Himself in Person and His Word as the same thing, coming to us. Think – I (Word) stand at the door and knock (Revelation 3). Mary’s response is the only True response, “I belong to You. Let it be to me according to Your Word.”

From Death to Life. Look again at verse 24, for Jesus’ instruction concerning ask and believe is the only thing that prevails. Upon hearing the Word, we believe that it is already TRUE in all, thus we go straight from death to life without judgment. Jesus later defines judgment as – The one who ignores Me and does not seize hold of My words does have one that judges him. The word which I spoke will judge him inside of the last day (John 12:48). – Now we are able to comment on each bulleted verse in order, starting with verse 19.

Definition: Jesus is defining Himself as the Son out from God, that He is not the Source, that all doing comes out from the Father, not out from Him. Yet Jesus then places Himself in full confidence in God, that God directs and shares every step with Him.

Our Connection with God. Covenant: Although God is our Source, we do not connect with Him except through Jesus. God gives Life to Jesus first, then Jesus turns and gives that same Life to us. Life is knowing the Father; thus the first and most important part of being made like Jesus is that He causes us to know the Father in just the same way that He knows the Father.

Covenant: It is the Word that judges all (see John 12:48), whether we receive that Word as our own story of self or whether we refuse it. To honor the Father and the Son is to believe that God is speaking Truth into us.

Ruling Verse 7: We have one response to every Word God speaks, “Oh God, let it be to me according to what You mean by what You say” (see Luke 1:38). Then, in obedience to Jesus, we believe we have received all Word fulfilled (see Mark 11:22-24).

From Union to Likeness. Ruling Verse 5: To “hear the voice of the Son of God” means to receive a Jesus who comes into union with us first. Whatever our darkness, our ignorance of God, our hades, our death, the moment we receive Jesus, we are instantly and completely inside all that LIFE is and means. We know God.

Life & Definition: Knowing God comes only out from knowing Jesus Sent into us first (see John 17:3). God possesses Life. Life is movement within and without. Life energeoes us within and is every next step we take. God gave all authority inside heaven-earth to humans (see Hebrews 2:8) and then transferred that authority to Jesus because He is also human.

Covenant: Just like Jesus, we can do nothing of ourselves. Just like Jesus, we judge all things by the speaking of God entering into us. Just like Jesus, we seek God’s Desire. This is LIFE!

Come to Jesus. 36 I have a greater testimony than that of John, however. • For the works that the Father has given me to complete, these same works which I do, also give witness concerning Me, that the Father has sent Me. • 37 And the One who sent Me, the Father Himself, has given witness concerning Me. But you have neither heard His voice at any time, nor seen His form. 38 And His word you do not have remaining inside of you, for you do not believe Him whom He sent. • 39 You diligently search the Scriptures, for you imagine that you will discover age-unfolding life in them. Yet the Scriptures also give witness concerning Me, 40 but you have no desire to come to Me, that you might possess life.

Verses 39-40 are simply the best wording of everything Jesus and John have been saying up until now. – Come to Jesus.

Judgment to Life. There is in all of this, then, a tremendous REBUKE and a sweeping JUDGMENT. And it is Christians caught in it, for we have not believed. COME TO ME – not to “studying the Bible” – that you might possess Life – the very Life that God possesses.

Jesus in Person and Gospel Word are the same thing. Yet John, in laying out this Flow of Jesus’ words, has not left Spirit Word as the Seed of God by which we are conceived of God planted into us in the sweet embrace of worship, to bring forth the harvest, that is, the knowledge of God entering into the knowledge of all, Chapters 3 & 4.

Finally, we have three bullet points to write three Gospel Comments. Only the Flow shows me where each one fits.

We Come to Life. Definition: Jesus continues to define Himself as the One who shows us the Father. Jesus’ works can be defined as “meeting people’s needs with the giving that is God.” This is the definition of Grace, a God who gives of Himself to each one personally and for real. This Grace is what we behold.

Covenant: To receive Jesus, as every Word God speaks fulfilled now inside of us, is to honor the Father.

Life: Our life is Jesus (see Colossians 3:4). We come to Jesus, not “to” the Bible nor Christianity, ideas, or performance. This Jesus is Sent by the Father into us (see Colossians 1:27). The idea of a “faraway Jesus, back then, up there, someday,” is the greatest enemy we have ever faced, the greatest dishonor of the Father. Jesus alone saves us. We come to Jesus; we come to Life.

Springs of Living Water. John Chapters 3-5 were for us a bunch of unrelated thoughts. It is the Flow of Gospel Word that shows us God’s Desire, that we would KNOW the Father as Jesus knows the Father, and that we would bring forth that knowledge into creation. But at the Heart of this Flow is the most beautiful of metaphors, that God our Father is bubbling up always inside of us, laughing in Joy, causing us to know His presence always with us, sharing life and every next step together. This is the nature of the God who tells us to call Him Father; this is the Flow of our lives forever.

We go next to the Bread of Life, John Chapter 6. In all these metaphors, John is showing us our intimate AND organic union with the Lord Jesus Christ – through receiving Him.

Let’s Pray Together. “God, our Father, look upon us, for we belong to You. Let every Gospel Word that You speak be the only Life we are. We believe, Oh God, that Your Word is Jesus fulfilled inside of us.

“Lord Jesus, we come to You that You might be our Life, that through You, we might know the Father. Lord Jesus, we study the Bible, not to learn ideas, but to behold that wondrous Flow of Gospel Word into us that You are. Lord Jesus, You make us to be just like Yourself in knowing the Father, in loving one another, and in revealing God to all.

“We thank You, Lord Jesus, that You cause us to know the Father as springs of living water ever bubbling up inside of us. We thank You, Lord Jesus, that You become Yourself inside of us, sharing all things with us.

“God, our Father, out from the All-Authority that You have given to Jesus inside of us, we look upon all our fellow Christians in every land on earth. We see Your Church, longing to know You, yet unable to believe Your Word. We see the harvest ready to be swept into Christ, into Your dwelling place, a people running into the Feast of Tabernacles, that You might come Home, oh God.

“We are in Your Hand, Father, Your Desire fills our every step. Be Yourself through us for the sake of all our Christian brethren, that they also might know You. We ask of You, Father, and now we believe that we have received already, ALL that we have asked. We honor You, Father, as You prove Jesus faithful and True through our lives given wholly to You inside of Him.”