3. As a consequence of all this we can perceive in the language of the text Christ's joy in the discovery of a special opportunity of carrying out the highest purpose of the Father's will. It would seem that his meeting with the Samaritan woman awakened almost a state of excitement in his mind. It lifted him above the reach of physical desires. This I suppose was because he recognized in that meeting an opportunity of doing what he knew was dearest to his Father's heart. His errand was to ultimately save the world, and now he was engaged in saving at least one soul. No doubt his devotion to the Father's will sustained him, even in the darkest hour. When the will of God consigned him to the hatred of men, to the rejection of the people, to the bitter sorrow of the cross, he could bow his head in humble compliance and say, "Thy will, not mine, be done." But he knew well that the Father willed his sorrows in order to the world's salvation, and that the object dearest to the Father's heart was the recovery of lost souls. He himself has told us of the angels' joy over such. And he has described the whole object of his appearing to man by these matchless words: "God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him might not perish, but have everlasting life." And therefore his love of God the Father, no less than his love of man, made him hail with especial joy such an opportunity as this. We may fairly say that Christ followed the lead of providence. He did himself what he requires of us; he was quick to recognize opportunities. He heard in them a divine call; and by all his sense of his mission among men, by all his desire to please the Father, did he hail the rising faith of that Samaritan and rejoice in bringing to her the message of salvation. Hence I say his evident excitement, if we may use the phrase. Hence his obliviousness to hunger. Hence his forgetfulness of his former fatigue. "Lift up your eyes," he cried to his disciples, "and look on the fields, for they are white already unto harvest." The Father's will would be accomplished, and in the joy of service his soul found its food. He wanted nothing else. Such fruitful obedience was to him its own reward. I say again, therefore, what a spiritual life was this! Praise itself seems almost to defile it. It was perfect. It was sublime. Thus can we understand his sinlessness. We can imagine no higher ideal; and marvelous to say, here was the ideal realized. We cannot wonder any longer that over this Jesus of Nazareth God should say, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased."