It all started with a simple request for a drink of water.
It is noon, the hottest part of the day. Jesus has been traveling with the disciples. He’s on his way from Jerusalem, traveling North to the area of Galilee. The journey takes them through the countryside of an area called Samaria.
Noon finds them paused on the way near the city of Sychar. Jesus is tuckered out (that’s what it says in my southern gospel). He rests by the well where the people of Sychar come to get water while his faithful followers go into the city to pick up some lunch. Its a famous well, a landmark in the community.
The story goes that this land many years ago was given by Jacob (later to be known as Israel) to his son Joseph. Jacob is one of the three great patriarchs of the faith and an important link to these people.
You see, Samaritans are not like by Jewish Israelites, because although Samaritans might descend from the same ancestors as the Jews, they don’t worship right. They’re the Isrealites from across the tracks.
Actually, they were only half Israeli descendants because long ago, when war broke out, and Assyria invaded their land, the Assyrians followed a practice of exporting Israeli citizens to other occupied countries and brought foreigners from those countries to the Samaritan region. It was a way to create upheaval among the people and to keep them from gathering together to try to overthrow the occupiers.
During that time, the Israelis intermarried with these foreigners, and adopted some of their ideas, particularly some of their religion and religious practices. Because of this, Samaritans are known as semi-pagan individuals who don’t follow the true faith of Israel.
When they tried, years later, to realign themselves with other Israelites from the south, they weren’t welcome. They had too many of their own ideas. So they set up their own temple of worship (which did NOT go over well) and set up their own quasi-Jewish faith.
And because of the dislike of others for them, they clung to their common ancestry heritage with other Israelites. They have great pride in the tradition that Jacob gave this land which they have possession of to his son Joseph,
and great pride in this well.
The story goes that when Jacob was searching for a wive, who later became his beloved Rachel, he saw her at a well. When he pulled back the stone from on top of the well, the well filled with fresh water and came gushing out. This abundance of water lasted for 20 years.
Water is an important item when you live in desert regions. It means the difference between life and death. Thats why this abundant well is a big dea.
Now, this well isn’t the same well where Jacob met Rachel, but Jacob and well traditions go way back. And this is Jacob’s land, and this is Jacob’s well, an important landmark and life source for this community.
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As Jesus gazes towards the city, looking in the direction that the disciples have gone, he sees a lone figure approaching. This figure continues to make their way towards the well where Jesus sits, and Jesus immediately recognizes that something is wrong with this picture for three reasons.
First of all, the figure approaching is a woman and she’s coming to the well in the middle of the day, and she’s coming alone.
Noon time was the wrong time for any woman to come to the well. During the day, women were secluded within their homes, seeing to their domestic duties. It was the men who gathered at this public community place during the middle part of the day, and for that reason alone no woman would come to the well at this hour.
Because coming to the well now, in the presence of men was a shameful, brazen thing to do. To do such a thing would ruin her reputation.
But it wasn’t just coming to the well in the middle of the day that was shameful. She was coming alone. No woman would come to such a public place alone. She is breaking with all the conventions of society. There was something unique about this woman.
Coming to the well all alone gives a person time to think. I wonder what was going on in her head. What was she mulling over on that long walk to the well? I wonder if it was the predicament she found herself in that sent her to the well alone in the middle of the day.
Was she struggling over her situation in life? Was she wishing, for whatever reason, things could be different for her?
Was she mulling over the problem that brought her to the well alone at the wrong time of day? Was she wishing that someone anyone could help her find a way out, could save her, could rescue her from her burdens? Could change her life?
What kind of problem would it be that we would find ourselves in the same situation? What would it be that would bring us to the well, alone and isolated at the wrong time of day?
Can we imagine what it is? Is there something that causes us to feel out of sync with the rest of the world, like maybe the rest of the world is against us, like maybe there is no hope, no way out of our problem?
As we come to the well, what would we be mulling over?
When she comes to the well to draw water, Jesus breaks a couple of social conventions of his own. He asks her to draw him a drink of water.
This doesn’t seem out of the ordinary to us. After all, its the midpoint of the day, and its hot. Jesus has been walking a long way, and he’s tired. How wrong is it to ask for a drink of water?
But Jewish people not only don’t speak to Samaritans, they would never share the same bowl or cup with a Samaritan. They’d get the Jewish equivalent of Cooties.
He’d have to drink from her ladle in order to get a drink. What was he thinking?
But on top of that, she was a woman. Men from any society Jewish or gentile didn’t speak to women in public places. It just wasn’t done.
His behavior is shocking.
I wonder if he was at all surprised when she answered him back.
I would think that based upon the fact that she is here alone at this hour, he made a pretty good guess that she would respond back to him if he were to talk to her.
What they are doing, their conversational intercourse would be as shocking to us today as public sexual intercourse.
Their conversation is THAT bold.
What follows is a very deep and interesting theological discussion. John who tells this story for us loves word play. Throughout his record of Jesus life we will find times when the words Jesus uses are common everyday words but he uses them with a different meaning than commonly understood.
Jesus speaks metaphorically a lot in John’s gospel and is constantly misunderstood at the literal level of the words. This particular story is full of such exchanges.
We begin with a discussion about water. Jesus asks for a drink, and she boldly responds, indicating she can’t believe Jesus would even ask for a drink from her.
Jesus replies - if she only knew who she was talking to, she’d be asking for a drink from him, because what he has to offer is life-giving water. We, of course, immediately make the jump to salvation and eternal life.
But she is thinking of the traditions of Jacob’s well. Living water is moving water, like in a stream or river. She thinks of the water that flowed in abundance from Jacob’s well in the stories. Does this guy think he can do better Jacob?
Paraphrasing Jesus words, he responds to her inquiry and clouded understanding:
“What if I was to tell you, that if you had the water I have to offer, you will never thirst again, that you will never want again?”
He’s thinking of her walk to the well, how she was mulling over her problem, how she thirsted for a solution (see, there is that word play of John’s). But she is thinking of never having to come to this place to draw water again. She’s thinking of no more shameful trips on her own in the middle of the day to the well.
She, too, is thinking of her problem, but she’s thinking of the wrong solution.
So to change her line of thinking, it appears that Jesus changes the topic of conversation. “Go and get your husband.”
But she doesn’t have one.
It has been understood for a very long time that her situation - and Jesus tells us EXACTLY what it is (it isn’t just that she has NO husband, she’s had 5 husbands and the guy that she is with now is not her husband)
- it has been understood that this means she is woman with loose morals and of loose character.
This might be true. But there are some interesting facts to this story that could cause us to question that line of reasoning.
The first and foremost is that, although Jesus can know everything about her life (see above), he doesn’t reprimand her for her situation.
Secondly, following their discussion, she does another bold and brazen thing. She goes to another public place in the city where the men are gathered, and she talks to them.
She tells them about her encounter with Jesus AND THEY LISTEN TO HER. If she had a reputation as a loose woman, they wouldn’t have done that.
So some have interpreted her story to be that of a loose woman. Others have suggested that her circumstances may be quite innocent. Tradition was that if your husband died, the nearest male was responsible for becoming your husband and taking care of you, particularly if you had no male children to care for you.
It is possible that she had 5 such husbands, and that the current male in line refused to marry her.
Either is possible. Even in the second scenario, people would have wondered at God’s obvious displeasure with her that she had such bad circumstances 5 times. Such predicaments would have been viewed as God’s judgement upon her.
I can’t help thinking about her readiness to leave the expected role of women behind - of her willingness to come to the well alone at this hour, her willingness to speak with Jesus, the depth to their conversation, the unabashed way she approached the townsmen to tell them of her encounter
and their apparent willingness to listen to her. There is something to this about her character. Everything about her is unconventional, certainly places her on the fringe of society, although she does have some interesting history and interactions with the towns folk.
I’m not so sure of either of the two suggestions. Maybe she’s just a different kind of woman. She is certainly not the norm.
So what does Jesus comment mean concerning her marital status? She didn’t tell Jesus everything there was to know about her. But Jesus had a way of knowing everything about her. Later she would tell the townsmen that he could tell her everything she’d ever done.
He knew all about her life. He knew her.
Now isn’t that an interesting relationship to have with Jesus? Ever have a relationship like that with someone? Granted it can be a little disconcerting for her. After all, he knew even the less seemly aspects of this woman’s life, but its those particular aspects that we mull over as we come to the well, don’t we.
Jesus can see our deepest shame, but Jesus can also see our deepest pain and our deepest need. He clicked immediately with this woman at the point in her life that set her life at odds with the rest of society.
He knew this woman.
And he knows us too.
He knows our need, knows our pain, know the point at which we need to change, knows the greatest potential within us, knows us better than we know ourself.
This woman discovered this at the well. He must be a prophet to see into her heart so deeply. So she turns the conversation to another aspect of her life that sets her at odds with society. She’s not just an unconventional woman, she’s a Samaritan woman. She has a bone to pick with Jesus over the Jewish versus Samaritan understanding of worship.
Its almost a denominational thing. But Jesus responds by placing priority where it ought to be. Its not about where you worship geographically, its where your focus is and where you worship physically.
Its worshipping in spirit and truth - in other words worshipping from the heart, loving God with the heart.
Its not getting it right by knowing which mountain to pray on. It doesn’t matter whether the land is in Jerusalem or Samaria. It matters whether or not your heart is right with God.
She likes what she hears.
It has the ring of truth to it. It liberates her from smudge of her Samaritan heritage because she does have a heart for God.
Do we have such a heart for God? What smudge is on our life that the love of God takes care of? What moral flaw in our character is there? What uncontrollable aspect of our life like her Samaritan blood is there that God can lift us above to make us pure and whole?
When Jesus says to us that the Father seeks those who worship him in spirit and truth, do we, like she, like what we hear?
What does such a love from the heart for God liberate each of us from?
I wonder if it isn’t at that moment that she begins to believe in Jesus as her savior. I wonder if his words don’t begin to ring with every longing that she has, that at that moment she begins to see what a difference Jesus can make in her life. I wonder if it isn’t hope in her words that I see, when she turns the conversation towards the subject of the Messiah.
I wonder if it is at that moment that she begins to wonder if Jesus isn’t the Messiah, the one who would save the world. He tells her it is so. He is the one.
She hopes, but her belief is tentative. At least she sounds tentative when she approaches the townsmen. Maybe this is for their sake rather than her own belief.
But I believe we see at this moment, the conversion experience of this woman, where hope is born in her life in a new way.
The disciples finally return with lunch and are shocked to see this public display of interaction but they don’t say anything.
The woman returns to the city to spread the word of her encounter, and what follows is another word play over the discussion of food.
The disciples bring lunch, but Jesus doesn’t want any. I believe he’s too excited to eat. He has been “fed” by his encounter with this woman. How did they end their conversation? Did she indicate she was going back to tell the others to come listen to him? Is he waiting in anticipation for their return?
Is it his hope? Does he know her so well that he knows it is what she will do? If so, does he know how the townsmen will respond?
In any case, when he tries to tell the disciples that it is just such experiences that feed him, they don’t get it. I think they wonder if they haven’t fallen down on the job. Someone else has fed their teacher and seen to his needs. They are thinking of literal food; Jesus is thinking of being spiritually fed.
He uses another metaphor of harvesting to expound on his point. We don’t know if the disciples understood any better.
Hopefully, we do. Hopefully we see that there are people out there, people we encounter everyday who are literally starving to be fed spiritually.
There are townspeople waiting for us to share with them our encounter. They are people we know and have relationships with, who need to hear from us what this woman has learned in her encounter with Jesus...
How Jesus meets us at the point of struggle in our lives. When we’re mulling over our problems, he’s listening, and knows how overwhelming they can be. Our physical struggles may not end. Sometimes there are consequences for our actions, but Jesus cares, reaches out to us especially when we feel on the edge, ostracized from society, cut off from life because of our problems.
He makes the initial request - to enter our lives, to have an encounter with us. But what Jesus has to offer us is so much more than we could ever imagine. It will quench our thirst in a way we can never imagine. Life may still have its problems. We will still have our quirks about us.
But our encounter with Christ provides us away to transcend all of life’s problems, get our priorities straight, find a way to what is really important, what really matters.
There are townspeople who need to hear this message and what’s really amazing, is that Christ can and chooses to work through people like us - no matter what we might have done or left undone, no matter what we might think of ourselves, or what others might think about us...
or even what we think they think about us.
We can be a messenger to the townspeople too. We can share what we’ve encountered with Jesus.
Next week is Labor Day Monday. The one following is Welcome Home Monday. In both cases special events are planned. Both are great opportunities to put into practice what we’ve learned from this encounter. Who are the townspeople who you and I need to talk to? Who are the townspeople we need to invite to join us here to discover what we have discovered.
What a great opportunity to do so.
As we do, maybe there are aspects of this woman’s story that speak to each us. Maybe there is a place we can tentatively begin to believe. Could this be the Messiah for each of us? Come and see.
In Jesus name, Amen.
