Relentless About Jesus, Relentless for the Lost

Jesus is relentless about people because he is relentless about every lost sheep, every lost coin, every wandering son and daughter. The vision of a church relentless about Jesus starts there: Jesus came looking. Jesus goes into the wilderness for the one. Jesus sits at a well in Samaria for the woman everybody else had written off. Jesus sees the people across the street, the people sleeping in, the people carrying shame, and the people who do not yet know his name.

John shows that Jesus “had to go through Samaria,” even though good Jewish people normally took the long way around. Jesus crosses the lines that everybody else treated as permanent. The Samaritan woman was a woman, a Samaritan, and somebody with a messy story, yet none of that kept Jesus from speaking to her. People matter more than the categories, the gossip, the shame, and the reasons somebody thinks they should stay away.

Jesus offers living water to a woman who came to Jacob’s well thirsty in more ways than one. The living water becomes “a fresh bubbling spring” that gives eternal life. Jesus then brings her hidden life into the light, not to shame her, but to free her. The water jar left beside the well becomes a beautiful picture: an encounter with Jesus leaves shame behind. The woman who came at noon to avoid people runs back to those same people and says, “Come and see.”

Jesus also says worship is no longer trapped on one mountain or in one building. True worship happens in spirit and truth, everywhere and anywhere. Relentless worship means making all of life about Jesus: serving, encouraging, giving, bringing peace, using gifts, helping people, and inviting others into community. Worship is bigger than singing, even though singing matters.

Jesus turns from the woman’s story to the crowd coming out from the village and tells the disciples, “Wake up and look around. The fields are all ready, ripe for the harvest.” The harvest is people brought to eternal life. The urgency is real because people are open, hungry, and waiting for somebody to share a story, offer love, and make a simple invitation.

Luke 15 brings the reason into focus. Heaven throws a party when one sinner repents. The Father sees the lost son while he is still far away, runs to him, embraces him, and celebrates his return. A church relentless about Jesus grows personally and grows outwardly, not for its own name, but because Jesus is still coming for people. The vision is simple: get as many people into God’s kingdom as quickly as possible.

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Key Takeaways

• 1. Jesus crosses every line for people. Jesus did not avoid Samaria, and he did not avoid the woman at the well. Religious categories, social boundaries, and somebody’s past did not matter more than a person standing right in front of him. Relentless love refuses to treat people as problems to avoid when Jesus sees them as people worth pursuing. [52:51]
• 2. Leave shame behind at the well. The woman came to the well carrying more than a water jar. Jesus exposed her story without crushing her, and she left that jar behind as she ran toward the very people she had been avoiding. Shame keeps people hidden, but Jesus brings forgiveness that sends people back into life, community, and witness. [54:38]
• 3. Worship belongs in everyday life. Jesus moves worship beyond arguments about the right mountain or building. Worship includes songs, but it also includes generosity, service, encouragement, peace-making, fasting, and using gifts for others. A life relentless about Jesus turns ordinary places into places of surrender and praise. [49:24]
• 4. The harvest is ready right now. Jesus tells his disciples to wake up and look around because the fields are ripe. People do not need every theological answer before they can hear an honest story of what Jesus has done. Urgency does not mean pressure; it means recognizing that somebody may be waiting for an invitation into the kingdom. [57:54]
• 5. The Father celebrates the found. Luke 15 shows a Father who watches for the lost son and runs before the son can earn anything back. Repentance is not a walk toward cold rejection but a return to open arms, a robe, a ring, and a feast. The church can pursue the lost with confidence because heaven already rejoices when they come home. [1:03:19]

Youtube Chapters

• [00:00] - Welcome
• [31:16] - Relentless About Jesus
• [33:05] - Jesus Is Relentless About People
• [34:06] - The Lost Sheep and Heaven’s Joy
• [37:17] - Jesus Meets the Samaritan Woman
• [40:07] - Living Water That Gives Eternal Life
• [43:34] - Worship in Spirit and Truth
• [45:13] - Leaving the Water Jar Behind
• [46:48] - The Fields Are Ready for Harvest
• [48:41] - Relentless Worship Everywhere
• [51:30] - Jesus Cares About People
• [54:10] - Leave Shame at the Well
• [56:16] - The Urgency of the Harvest
• [1:00:09] - The Lost Sheep, Coin, and Son
• [1:05:33] - Why the Church Is Relentless
• [1:06:38] - A Vision for Kingdom Growth
• [1:09:09] - Prayer for the Lost and Found

Bible Reading

John 4:1-42
“Now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John (although Jesus himself did not baptize, but only his disciples), he left Judea and departed again for Galilee. And he had to pass through Samaria. So he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there; so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour. A woman from Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, 'Give me a drink.' (For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, 'How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?' (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, 'If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, 'Give me a drink,' you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.' The woman said to him, 'Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.' Jesus said to her, 'Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.' 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, 'Go, call your husband, and come here.' The woman answered him, 'I have no husband.' Jesus said to her, 'You are right in saying, 'I have no husband'; for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.' The woman said to him, 'Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.' Jesus said to her, 'Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.' The woman said to him, 'I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.' Jesus said to her, 'I who speak to you am he.' Just then his disciples came back. They marveled that he was talking with a woman, but no one said, 'What do you seek?' or, 'Why are you talking with her?' So the woman left her water jar and went away into town and said to the people, 'Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?' They went out of the town and were coming to him. Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, saying, 'Rabbi, eat.' But he said to them, 'I have food to eat that you do not know about.' So the disciples said to one another, 'Has anyone brought him something to eat?' Jesus said to them, 'My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work. Do you not say, 'There are yet four months, then comes the harvest'? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for harvest. Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, 'One sows and another reaps.' I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.' Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony, 'He told me all that I ever did.' So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. And many more believed because of his word. 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.” [37:17]

Luke 15:1-32
“Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, 'This man receives sinners and eats with them.' So he told them this parable: 'What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it? And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.' Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance. Or what woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it? And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.' Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.' And he said, 'There was a man who had two sons. And the younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.' And he divided his property between them. Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living. And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him anything. But when he came to himself, he said, 'How many of my father's hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants.' And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. And the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.' But the father said to his servants, 'Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and sandals on his feet. And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.' And they began to celebrate. Now his older son was in the field, and as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. And he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. And he said to him, 'Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf, because he has received him back safe and sound.' But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, but he answered his father, 'Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!' And he said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.” [34:06]

John 4:23-24
“But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” [48:41]

Observation questions

1. In John 4, what social, religious, and personal barriers made Jesus’ conversation with the Samaritan woman surprising? [51:30]
2. What changes in the woman’s actions after Jesus speaks with her, especially regarding her water jar and the people in her village? [45:18]
3. What does Jesus identify as his “food” or nourishment, and what does he tell the disciples to notice as the village crowd approaches? [46:37]
4. In Luke 15, what actions do the shepherd, the woman with the coin, and the father take when what was lost is found?

Interpretation questions

1. Jesus knew the woman’s painful and complicated story, yet he offered her living water and spoke with dignity. What does this show about the way Jesus brings hidden sin and shame into the light? [54:10]
2. Jesus says true worship is in spirit and truth rather than being limited to one mountain or building. What might it mean for worship to be sincere, God-centered, and part of everyday life? [48:41]
3. Jesus describes the harvest as people being brought to eternal life. Why might the disciples have needed to “wake up and look around,” even while they were focused on ordinary concerns like food? [46:48]
4. In the parable of the lost son, the father runs to meet his son before the son can earn anything back. How does that shape the meaning of repentance and returning to God? [01:03:19]

Application questions

1. The Samaritan woman had reasons to expect rejection, but Jesus crossed those lines to meet her. Is there someone you tend to avoid because of their reputation, beliefs, background, or complicated story? What could it look like to take one gracious step toward them this week? [52:51]
2. The woman left her water jar and ran toward the people she had been avoiding. What shame, regret, or label may be keeping you hidden from God or from healthy Christian community? What would it look like to leave that shame with Jesus rather than carrying it alone? [54:38]
3. Worship includes singing, but it also includes serving, encouraging, giving, making peace, and using gifts for others. Which everyday setting—home, work, school, friendships, or recreation—could become a more intentional place of worship for you this week? [49:33]
4. Jesus says the fields are ready for harvest. Who in your life may be more open to a conversation about Jesus than you have assumed? What simple next step could you take: listening well, sharing part of your story, offering prayer, or extending an invitation? [57:54]
5. Heaven celebrates when one person turns to God. How can this group become better at celebrating spiritual steps—whether someone asks for prayer, returns to church, begins following Jesus, or shares faith with another person? [01:01:40]
6. Both personal growth and outward mission matter: following Jesus more fully and helping others encounter him. Which one feels more natural to you right now, and which one needs more attention in this season? [01:06:31]