The Woman At The Well Series

Anybody recognize the name Elizabeth Taylor? She was an English-born American actress who passed away at the age of 79. She was a movie star during what would be called the Golden Era of Hollywood when all the great movies were made. She won several Academy Awards including for Best Actress in the movie Butterfield 8. She probably was best known for her role as Cleopatra costarring with Richard Burton. This would have been 1963. Elizabeth Taylor was obviously known for the movies she made, but she was also known for her beauty. She was a beautiful woman with violet eyes and because of that she was also known for her love life. She had a number of husbands. Somebody said eight, but it is actually seven because she married one guy twice, Richard Burton.

We are going to meet a lady today who gives Liz Taylor a run for her money not in regards to movies made but in regards to husbands had. If you would open your Bibles to John 4:1. As a refresher, we have been going through the book of John. We have been following the miracles and the ministry of Jesus Christ. As Chris talked about last week, we begin to see that Jesus was getting pretty popular. He was getting more popular than John the Baptist. Consequently, the public began to take notice and follow him around which caused the Pharisees to begin to take notice also, and they didn’t like that. Jesus was feeling some tension there and he thought it was time to head north and take his ministry on the road and head north towards Galilee. This passage tells us that in order to do so he had to go through Samaria first. Samaria, you may recall, if you are familiar with the Old Testament, is the originally Jewish area. It is a province called Samaria but there is also a city known as Samaria. It was the place where the Jews resided for a long time. Part of what would be called the Northern Kingdom way back about 900 B.C. About 700 B.C. the Assyrians, which were their enemies farther north, came down and captured the city of Samaria. They destroyed the cities and deported a bunch of the Jewish people to Assyria. They didn’t take all the people but they focused on the wealthy and educated. They took the wealthy and educated Jews out of Samaria and brought them up to Assyria and they sent some of their population down, some of the poorer people and people caught up in pagan religion. What happened was, over several hundred years, you had this mixture of Jewish and Assyrian people that were worshippers of pagan gods and they came together and began to inter-marry. Pretty soon you had what would be called a half-breed mixture of people. Half Jewish, Half pagan. The religion took on that form. They would worship on this mountain called Mount Gerizim. You can imagine the Jewish people who lived in Jerusalem had a bad attitude about the Samaritans. They didn’t have any respect for them. They would consider them unclean. They would do everything they could to avoid contact with them. So much so that if they were going to head north to Galilee, they would do everything they could to go around them. They would avoid any sort of contact with the Samaritan people, except for Jesus. Jesus had to go through Samaria. He didn’t have to. He could have gone around but he chose to go through Samaria because he saw himself as having a divine appointment with this lady at the well. That is where we are going to pick up the story starting at chapter 4:1. I am reading from the New International Version. (Scripture read here.)

There is a lot of information there and a lot of passage. I am going to see if I can condense it in the next few minutes to give you an idea of what I think is happening and possibly some lessons that we can learn from this situation. We have Jesus going north into Samaria. It is clear he meets this Samaritan woman. This woman has several strikes against her. First of all, she is a Samaritan. She is considered unclean since birth in the eyes of the Jews. Untouchable. She is a woman, which back then women were not in high regard whether a Jew or not. They were actually on the level of livestock. I don’t know how to put it any nicer. They were considered lower than slaves. She was a Samaritan woman. She was probably poor because she had to go fetch the water herself. She didn’t have any slaves. We also can figure out by reading it that she was probably a little bit promiscuous. She was popular with the fellows. She was untouchable. In Jewish eyes you don’t want to go near this person. Yet Jesus, being the man he was, had a way of breaking down these cultural barriers. He decided he was going to go and sit down by this well and not only was he going to talk to this woman; he was going to ask her for something. He was going to ask her for a drink, which means that he is asking for a drink out of probably a utensil of hers. It is unthinkable in the eyes of the Jews. By sitting down at that well he is breaking all these cultural and religious barriers. Not only that, as we see in verse 7, he is putting himself in a bit of an awkward situation. In John 4:7 “When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, ‘Will you give me a drink?’ (His disciples had gone into town to buy food.)” They went to get groceries, which means that Jesus was alone with this lady. Nowadays, I don’t know where people meet their fiancés. Some meet them on the internet. Some of you might have met in a bar or tavern. Back then, they met at the well. That is the place they would meet. They would have this common need to go out and meet at the well. If you don’t believe me, go back and read the first chapters of Genesis and you see all these matchups happening at some sort of a watering hole or well. That is what was going on back then. The Samaritan woman comes up and Jesus says will you give me a drink. Maybe she is thinking this guy kind of likes me. Let’s check him out a little bit. Maybe with a little sarcasm she says “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” John reminds us once again that Jews and Samaritans don’t hang out together. John is good about filling in the blanks for us 2,000 years later. He lets us know that they don’t hang out together. She is feeling him out saying how is that you, being the big shot Jew that you are would come and ask for a drink from little old me Samaritan girl. Why would you do such a thing? “Jesus answered her, ‘If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.’” What is that about? When he says the word living water what comes to mind for her is probably a fresh spring or a fountain or a stream. In other words, something that is continually flowing versus the stagnant water that you might find in a well. She is thinking about something that is just continually flowing. In the Bible, when you see words like living stream or water flowing, it is a symbol of abundance and prosperity. It is a symbol of God’s blessing. In fact, I think it is Isaiah 58:11 when God is putting his blessing on Israel and saying what the blessings will be like he says “You will be like a well-watered garden whose springs never fail.” That is the picture Jesus is trying to give but she is still on the earthly level. She is thinking in terms of pure regular water. Jesus is trying to move her into the spiritual realm. When he talks about living water, he is talking about the Holy Spirit. How do you know that? I was able to read ahead like I am sure some of you are reading. You would see in chapter 7 a scripture where Jesus is at the Passover feast and he stands up and says “‘If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me as the scripture says, streams of living water will flow from within him.’ By this he meant the spirit whom those who would believe would later receive.” We know when Jesus is talking about the living water he is not talking about the wet stuff. He is talking about the Holy Spirit that is being made available to this woman right now. She is still a little suspicious. She might even be getting a little annoyed. She says “You have nothing to draw with and the well is deep.” How are you going to do it? “Are you greater than our father Jacob who built this well and gave water to his flocks and his herds and his sons.” Are you greater? What are you trying to say Jesus?