What’s the best investment you’ve ever made?
In 1935 there was a woman by the name of Grace Groner who was 25 years old who made a very wise investment.
She found herself in the middle of the depth of the Great Depression looking for a job. She had struggled all her life. Grace was orphaned at a young age and was raised by neighbors who had compassion on her. Grace wasn’t wealthy by any stretch of the imagination. But she was determined.
She found a job working for Abbott Pharmaceuticals and worked there for the next 43 years! During her first year, she took some of the money she earned and she bought three shares of Abbott stock for $180. At the time, that was a lot of money, especially coming out of the Great Depression.
She held onto that stock for the next 75 years! Whenever it made money, she just reinvested it. Over time, those shares split and grew and when she died at the ripe old age of 100 in 2010 she had 100,000 shares of Abbott Stock.
Some of you are thinking, I need to start investing today!
She was a millionaire. But what’s even more interesting is that no one even knew it. She lived a simple life in a one bedroom cottage in Lake Forest, Illinois. She worked most of her life as a secretary. She never owned a car and was content to walk where she needed to go. She shopped at yard sales. She never had any children and lived a quiet life beloved by many friends and coworkers.
Because she made a wise investment at a pivotal moment in her life this woman who was born in complete poverty died a millionaire.
A Different Kind of Investment
What’s the best investment you’ve ever made?
My guess is that some of us would answer that question in financial terms. Some of you in this room may have a similar story to Grace, where at just the right time you made a wise investment for a relatively small amount of money and it was incredibly profitable for you.
Even those of us who aren’t savvy investors understand this principal of making wise investments.
And maybe you’ve made some wise financial investments along the way. And if we were to ask you what’s the best investment you’ve ever made you might have a story like Grace Groner to share.
But some of you might answer that question in a different way. Because in your mind, the best investment you’ve ever made wasn’t financial, it was personal.
And the story you share may not even be about the investment that you made in another person, it may be a story about how, at just the right time, someone made a personal investment in you!
I don’t know about you, but I’ve got a short list of people I’m eternally grateful to who at just the right time in my life, made a personal investment in me. And their time, their care, their concern, their counsel… without it, I don’t know where I would be today if God had not put that person in my life at just the right time!
This weekend we remember and celebrate the life of Martin Luther King, Jr. In his book, Strength to Love, he wrote these words…
Love and friendship. These are the kinds of investments that have an eternal impact! These are the kinds of things that lead to beloved community.
An Unlikely Investment
Jesus was particularly good at making these kinds of investments in people. And today I want us to look at one story told by John about a time when Jesus made an unlikely investment in an unlikely person at an unlikely time.
In John 4, we have this incredible story…
1 Jesus knew the Pharisees had heard that he was baptizing and making more disciples than John 2 (though Jesus himself didn’t baptize them—his disciples did). 3 So he left Judea and returned to Galilee.
4 He had to go through Samaria on the way.
Now the truth is, Jesus didn’t HAVE to go through Samaria.
In fact, many Jews would refuse to go through Samaria. They would go around Samaria but they would not be caught dead in Samaria. That’s how much Jews and Samaritans hated each other. There was a deep divide between Jews and Samaritans and that was for a lot of different reasons… but what’s interesting is that John writes that Jesus HAD to go through Samaria.
Why would John say that? Some Jews would travel through Samaria because it was the shortest, easiest route to get from Judea to Galilee. But geographically speaking, it wasn’t the ONLY route. Jesus really didn’t have to go that way.
Unless he did… for a different reason.
A Divine Appointment
John writes…
5 Eventually he came to the Samaritan village of Sychar, near the field that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob’s well was there; and Jesus, tired from the long walk, sat wearily beside the well about noontime. 7 Soon a Samaritan woman came to draw water…
Now we get to the real reason Jesus HAD to travel through Samaria. It wasn’t because he was trying to quickly get to his destination in Galilee, it was because he was on his way to a divine appointment.
Jesus comes to this well in Samaria to meet with a woman who needed to meet with Him.
There’s a lot to reflect on in this story, but don’t miss this. Far too often we make decisions about what we HAVE to do based on what’s practical, what’s efficient, fast, easy, or normal. We’re in a hurry to get things done and we make decisions accordingly.
But Jesus made decisions based on his mission. Jesus HAD to go through Samaria because he WANTED to meet with this woman.
He sits at this well all alone. The disciples have headed into town to buy some food. But Jesus stays here, in the middle of the day, in the middle of the heat, because he’s in the middle of a MISSION.
This woman comes to the well at noon to draw some water. No doubt she saw Jesus, but she never in her wildest imagination thought Jesus would see her. Much less talk to her. The facts were that she was a woman, a Samaritan woman, and he was a man, a Jewish man, and a Rabbi.
The two of them should have never been seen alone together. And the two of them should have never had a conversation. Tradition frowned on it. Cultural norms discouraged it. But here, in the gospel of John, we find one of the longest conversations Jesus ever has with anyone!
The Conversation
7 …Jesus said to her, “Please give me a drink.”
9 The woman was surprised, for Jews refuse to have anything to do with Samaritans. She said to Jesus, “You are a Jew, and I am a Samaritan woman. Why are you asking me for a drink?”
10 Jesus replied, “If you only knew the gift God has for you and who you are speaking to, you would ask me, and I would give you living water.”
11 “But sir, you don’t have a rope or a bucket,” she said, “and this well is very deep. Where would you get this living water? 12 And besides, do you think you’re greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us this well? How can you offer better water than he and his sons and his animals enjoyed?”
13 Jesus replied, “Anyone who drinks this water will soon become thirsty again. 14 But those who drink the water I give will never be thirsty again. It becomes a fresh, bubbling spring within them, giving them eternal life.”
15 “Please, sir,” the woman said, “give me this water! Then I’ll never be thirsty again, and I won’t have to come here to get water.”
16 “Go and get your husband,” Jesus told her.
17 “I don’t have a husband,” the woman replied.
Jesus said, “You’re right! You don’t have a husband— 18 for you have had five husbands, and you aren’t even married to the man you’re living with now. You certainly spoke the truth!”
Jesus Wanted to Make an Investment
Now we begin to understand what Jesus already knew, why this woman came to the well at noon to get to water. All the other women came in the morning, in the cool of the day to get water. But she has come alone, at noon, in the heat, hoping not to see or talk to anyone, to get water.
Why? Perhaps it’s because she’s ashamed of herself.
But Jesus is not ashamed of her.
Jesus met this woman in her shame, in her aloneness. Everyone else in town is done with this woman. But Jesus? Jesus decides to give her his time.
This is a woman most people took from. All men wanted was to use her, to take something from her. She was a woman most people saw as having no value, as worthless. But Jesus not only saw her as someone of immeasurable worth, but someone he wanted to INVEST in.
Which I think is really interesting because if we’re being honest, we tend to invest the most in the people we love. In the people that we highly value. We even sometimes choose to invest in the people who we know can benefit us and help us. We look to make investments in people who in our minds are good investments.
But Jesus sees this woman, and every person, as a person of immeasurable worth. As a good investment. And he invests in someone here at this well in Samaria in the middle of the day that most everyone back in town has already given up on!
One of the First
Jesus and this woman continue to talk, and she realizes that he must be more than a Rabbi, a teacher, he must be a prophet. And she’s got questions. Jesus doesn’t minimize her questions, he doesn’t patronize her so he can get back on the road to Galilee, He takes time to have a conversation with her. A conversation that leads her to say to Jesus…
25 “I know the Messiah is coming—the one who is called Christ. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”
And this prompts Jesus to say…
26 “I am the Messiah!”
Jesus came through Samaria from Judea so he could make his divine appointment with this woman to tell her something very few people even know about at this time, that God’s Messiah has come and that HE IS God’s Messiah, the Savior of the world!
She becomes one of the first to learn that Jesus is God’s Messiah!
Shocked!
27 Just then his disciples came back. They were shocked to find him talking to a woman…
Which… to be honest, they should have been but they also should NOT have been. They should have been shocked for all the reasons we talked about earlier. Never in a million years would anyone have thought that a Jewish Rabbi would be having a conversation with a Samaritan woman of questionable reputation in the middle of the day at Jacob’s well.
But these disciples, they were also an unlikely bunch made up of fishermen, a tax collector, and a zealot. All unlikely choices to be disciples of any Rabbi let alone God’s Messiah. Truth is, the reason they had other professions is because they had been passed over at an early age by every other Rabbi in their own hometowns. Jesus called them later in life, after they had already chosen different professions, after they had been rejected by other Rabbi’s, to come and follow him and be His disciples.
You see, Jesus was always investing deeply in people, he was famous for making unlikely investments in unlikely people at unlikely times because he understood the principal of making an ETERNAL INVESTMENT in the life of another person. And he took every opportunity to make eternal investments in people.
Which brings me back to the question…
Who are YOU investing in?
Here’s what I believe is true with all my heart… People are starved for relational investments. For your time.
We live in a world where we don’t seem to have time for each other anymore. We can blame the world we live in, social media, technology… but it doesn’t change the fact that while we live in a world that has never been more connected, people have never felt more alone.
And just like this woman at a well in Samaria in the middle of the day, people are still longing for someone to come and meet them in their ALONENESS so that they won’t be alone, or feel alone, anymore.
By the way, that initial investment of $180 that Grace Groner made in 1935, it turned into 7.2 million dollars by the time she died.
After her death, she left the money to Lake Forest University, the school she had attended, to help future students like her who needed help. That $180 investment had grown substantially over 75 years. But she was never known for her money. In fact, after her death in 2010, she became known as a secret millionaire. But in her life, she was known differently.
An Eternal Investment
William Marlatt was Grace Groner’s attorney and friend. Someone once asked him about Grace. William said this about her, “She did not have the needs that other people have… She could have lived in any house in Lake Forest but she chose not to… She enjoyed other people, and every friend she had was a friend for who she was.”
Sounds like Grace knew something about investing in people, too.
She understood what Jesus wanted this woman to know, what Jesus wanted his disciples to know…
Never underestimate the value of an eternal investment in the life of another person.
You just never know how lives can be eternally changed because of your time, your love, and your concern. And when you die, it won’t be those financial investments that you’re most proud of, it will be the personal investments you made along the way.
Who needs you to make an eternal investment in them? Start investing today!
The Rest of the Story
28 The woman left her water jar beside the well and ran back to the village, telling everyone, 29 “Come and see a man who told me everything I ever did! Could he possibly be the Messiah?” 30 So the people came streaming from the village to see him.
39 Many Samaritans from the village believed in Jesus…
I’d say the eternal investment Jesus made that day yielded a HUGE return.
May we, too, be Eternal Investors in the lives of others. May there be MANY who hear our TESTIMONY and BELIEVE in JESUS because of US!
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