Living Water: John 4:1-42

Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John—although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee.

Jesus withdrew from potential conflict—the Pharisees were tracking his growing influence. He headed north toward Galilee.

Now he had to go through Samaria.

Had to. Most Jews avoided Samaria, taking the long route around. But Jesus had to go through. Divine necessity, not geography, drove the route.

So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.

Jacob's well—ancient, historic, deep. Jesus sat there, tired from walking, waiting in the noon heat. Tired as he was—John notes the humanity.

When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, Will you give me a drink?

Noon was an unusual time for drawing water—most women came at cooler hours. This woman came alone, in the heat. Perhaps avoiding others.

Jesus asked her for water. A Jewish rabbi speaking to a Samaritan woman—multiple boundaries crossed.

The Samaritan woman said to him, You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink? (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)

She noticed the impropriety. Jews do not associate with Samaritans. Men do not speak publicly with women. Rabbis do not address strangers at wells. Everything about this was wrong by social standards.

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.

If you knew. Her perception was limited. She saw a tired Jewish traveler. He offered living water—water that was alive, flowing, eternal.

Sir, the woman said, you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water?

Practical objection. No bucket, deep well. Where would this water come from?

Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?

Greater than Jacob? The patriarch who had dug this well, whose legacy they shared? The question was meant to challenge.

Jesus answered, Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.

Jacob's well required return trips. Jesus' water satisfied permanently. Not external supply but internal spring—welling up, overflowing, eternal.

The woman said to him, Sir, give me this water so that I won't get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.

She wanted the convenience—no more daily trips to the well. She had not yet understood what Jesus offered.

He told her, Go, call your husband and come back.

The shift was abrupt. Call your husband. Jesus moved from water to her life, from theology to biography.

I have no husband, she replied.

The simplest possible answer. True, as far as it went.

Jesus said to her, You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.

Jesus knew. Five husbands—whether divorced or widowed, the history was painful. And now living with someone outside marriage. Her life was exposed.

Sir, the woman said, I can see that you are a prophet.

Prophet. Someone who knew things supernaturally. She recognized the category.

Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.

She changed the subject—to theology, to the old argument between Samaritans and Jews. This mountain (Gerizim) or that mountain (Jerusalem)? A safer topic than her life.

Woman, Jesus replied, believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.

Neither mountain. The old debate was becoming obsolete. Location would cease to matter.

You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews.

Jesus did not deny Jewish priority. Salvation is from the Jews—the Messiah, the revelation, the fulfillment. But more was coming.

Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.

Spirit and truth—not location but reality. The Father seeks such worshipers. Worship was about to be revolutionized.

God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.

God is spirit. Not confined to temples or mountains. Worship must match his nature—spiritual, true.

The woman said, I know that Messiah (called Christ) is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.

Messiah. Even Samaritans awaited him. He will explain everything—including this conversation, perhaps.

Then Jesus declared, I, the one speaking to you—I am he.

I am he. The revelation was direct. No parable, no ambiguity. The woman at the well was the first person in John's Gospel to receive Jesus' explicit self-identification as Messiah.

Just then his disciples returned and were surprised to find him talking with a woman.

The disciples returned with lunch and found their rabbi in scandalous conversation. Surprised—but they did not question him.

Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?

She left her water jar. The reason she came was forgotten. She had found living water.

Come, see. The invitation Jesus gave was now on her lips. She invited her town to investigate.

Could this be the Messiah? The question was open, inviting. She did not claim certainty; she invited exploration.

Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony, He told me everything I ever did.

Her testimony was effective. The woman with the messy past became an evangelist. Her story brought others to Jesus.

So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words many more became believers.

Two days in Samaria. Jews avoided it; Jesus stayed. And many believed—not just from her testimony but from his words.

They said to the woman, We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.

Savior of the world. Not just Savior of Israel. Samaritans—despised half-breeds—recognized him as universal Savior.

The woman came for water and found living water. She left her jar, gained a spring. She had hidden in noon heat; she returned announcing Messiah.

Jesus had to go through Samaria. Now we know why.