The Third Sunday of Lent

February 24

Living Water, Woman at the Well

John 4:5-42

⁵So he came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. ⁶Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon.

⁷A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” ⁸(His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) ⁹The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?” (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.) ¹⁰Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” ¹¹The woman said to him, “Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? ¹²Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?” ¹³Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, ¹⁴but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.” ¹⁵The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”

¹⁶Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come back.” ¹⁷The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; ¹⁸for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!” ¹⁹The woman said to him, “Sir, I see that you are a prophet. ²⁰Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.” ²¹Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. ²²You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. ²³But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him. ²⁴God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” ²⁵The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.” ²⁶Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one who is speaking to you.”

²⁷Just then his disciples came. They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman, but no one said, “What do you want?” or, “Why are you speaking with her?” ²⁸Then the woman left her water jar and went back to the city. She said to the people, ²⁹”Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?” ³⁰They left the city and were on their way to him.

³¹Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, “Rabbi, eat something.” ³²But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” ³³So the disciples said to one another, “Surely no one has brought him something to eat?” ³⁴Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work. ³⁵Do you not say, ‘Four months more, then comes the harvest’? But I tell you, look around you, and see how the fields are ripe for harvesting. ³⁶The reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. ³⁷For here the saying holds true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’ ³⁸I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.”

³⁹Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I have ever done.” ⁴⁰So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them; and he stayed there two days. ⁴¹And many more believed because of his word. ⁴²They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.”

Notes on John 4:5-42

Note that Rabbis were not supposed to speak to strange women in public and Jews considered Samaritans ritually unclean, so the woman is surprised by Jesus’ request (v. 9). Jesus answers her: if you knew that God gives to those who ask (“‘the gift of God’,” v. 10) and that I am his agent, you would be the one asking for a drink, “‘and he would have given you living water’.” She misunderstands, thinking that he asks for spring water. (A legend about Jacob: for him water rose to the top of this well and overflowed.) Are you counting on such a miracle, for “you have no bucket” (v. 11). This water was good enough for Jacob, so are you greater than him? Jesus contrasts the well water with “water gushing up to eternal life” (v. 14). (In John, living water is the vehicle of the gift of the Spirit in baptism.) While she still doesn’t understand, she at least now asks (v. 15).

Vv. 16-18 are difficult to follow, but they do show that Jesus has insight, so she believes he must be “a prophet” (v. 19), and can therefore resolve a religious dispute: the common ancestors of the two peoples worshiped on Mount Gerizim (“this mountain,” v. 20) but Jews claim that the only proper worship site is Jerusalem.

Jesus replies (v. 21): “the hour” of God’s intervention in the world “is coming”; then cultic sites will be irrelevant. Samaritans, by accepting only part of the Bible, denied themselves access to the part of God’s end-time plans given through the prophets (“what you do not know,” v. 22); “Jews” are at least on the right track.

The time is both “coming, and ... now here” (v. 23) to worship God spiritually, discerning “truth,” the reality revealed in Jesus. God is “spirit” (v. 24, life-giving power). She decides to wait to understand until the “Messiah” (v. 25) comes, but Jesus tells her: “‘I am he’” (v. 26). In her haste to tell others about this amazing man, she leaves her “water jar” (v. 28) behind. Come, she says, judge for yourselves! Jesus tells his disciples that the real food that sustains his life is obeying God and completion of his task (v. 34). There is no time to delay (v. 35a) God’s harvest, “Gathering fruit for eternal life” (v. 36, conversion to Christ) is ready now. Others have already begun to sow, and preach the good news. Meanwhile, after hearing the woman’s witness, many hear for themselves and come to believe in Christ. Jesus is “truly the Savior of the world” (v. 42).

Reflection Questions

1. If you were raised to believe that Samaritans were despicable people, how would you feel about Jesus for making a special effort to wander through a Samaritan town talking to people? If you were raised to believe that men were not supposed to talk to women in the streets, how would you feel toward him for talking to a woman? (See 4:27 for his disciples reaction.)
2. How would you describe the woman’s response to Jesus’ questions?
3. Is there something significant in the fact that Jesus chose a woman to be the first person to whom he revealed his true nature?
4. What social, ethnic, racial, political, religious barriers do you have difficulty overcoming? What aspects of Jesus’ conversation could help you in your own growth and development as a Christian?

Prayer

God of life and breath,

Jesus reached out to the woman at the well,

do we have the courage to reach out to others as well?

Jesus broke the barriers of custom and prejudice of his day to share your love with the loveless, do we have the courage to do the same today?

All around us are people who are hurting, lost, or lonely. With your “living Water” within us we could be agents of your grace and invite them into your family.

Help us to find the courage, the strength, the wisdom, to reach out to those in the world who are lonely and share with them your love. “The fields,” as Jesus said, “are ripe for harvesting.”

We pray that we might strengthen our church and your kingdom by sharing your love.

Amen