A friend has told me of an opportunity he had several years ago to invest some money in the stock market. His financial adviser was encouraging him to invest in a small but stable computer company. He wasn’t sure. While the company had a decent reputation, they were small and had never shown overwhelming growth and they didn’t appear to him to have long-term potential. So he invested his funds elsewhere.
That year, the small company released a new music device called the iPod. And stock prices for Apple soared and have never returned to the reasonable rates my friend turned down.
Call it a missed opportunity.
The disciples missed an opportunity as well — only it was far more significant. They had been sent by Jesus on a task to procure some food from a small city named Sychar. He would wait for their return by a well (John 4). They returned a short time later, having done the very thing Christ asked them to do (v. 8)
So upon their return the natural thing was to urge Jesus to eat (v. 31). Jesus evidently refused their please because the text says they were “urging” — that is, they were repeatedly asking Him to eat. You can hear their pleas: “Come on, Jesus, the food is getting stale…let’s eat. Why don’t You eat?…We’ve gone to a lot of work to get this food, please eat.…You need strength that this food will give You…”
Conversely, while they were preoccupied with food, the woman was back in Sychar — the town they’d just left — doing evangelism. In fact, the contrast between the disciples and the woman is quite striking as the chart below reveals:
The disciples had gone with a ministry purpose to Sychar — to get food for the Savior. They were being obedient. There is no hint that they were begrudging of this responsibility or reticent to serve. They were just focused on food — “Let’s do exactly what Jesus said to do.”
On the other hand, Jesus gave no command to the woman. But when the disciples showed up and took over her conversation with Jesus (v. 27), she left her water jar (remember she came to get water!) and hastily returned to the city to tell her fellow dwellers about Jesus.
The disciples knew Jesus best. They were most equipped to speak for Him. And they were so focused on the task of ministry that they forgot the purpose of ministry and missed an opportunity. (Did they miss this chance because Jews had no dealings with Samaritans, v. 9?)
Don’t be too critical of the disciples — they eventually figured out this principle (see Acts 4:8-13 as one example). But here’s an application for me and us today: It is possible to serve Christ, doing what He’s called us to do, and completely miss the opportunity to do other ministry at the same time. And even more significantly, we may have ministry responsibilities in a certain town (or neighborhood or school or store or job setting), but at the same time there are likely opportunities to declare the good news about Christ and salvation and freedom from sin.
Lord, give me eyes today to see ministry to people (especially those who need the gospel) while I am about the various tasks of ministry that you have called me to do. Do not let me miss the people of ministry and gospel ministry while I am about the task of ministering.
Words of Grace 