It was noonday at Sychar. The disciples went on into the village to buy food. Someone has suggested they were seeking out the stores that gave the clergy discount. Jesus stayed at the well on the outskirts for a respite from the sun’s blistering heat.
Then a woman arrived to get some water. Jesus said to her: “Woman, give me a drink.” She was surprised that Jesus spoke to her for two reasons. First, men did not publicly speak to women. Two, she was a Samaritan, and Jews had no dealings with Samaritans. They considered them unclean — ritualistically speaking. Thus, Jesus had crossed both a gender and a racial line by speaking to this woman.
She replied: “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of water from me, a woman of Samaria?” Jesus ignores her question, ignores the racial issue, and gets to the heart of the matter. He said: “If you had known who was asking you for water you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”
Jesus was, of course, talking of something else. But the woman cannot get beyond the literal. And it seems she was making fun at Jesus: “You do not have a bucket to draw the water and this well is deep. Just how are you supposed to draw this living water of yours? Our father Jacob drank from this well. Do you think that you are better than he is?”
You cannot miss the irony in her sarcasm.
By gender, by race, by religion, these two people are dramatically different, but Jesus has a way of breaking every barrier down. And in this particular story, Jesus was offering to this woman something that she was longing for.
When we meet people, we usually ask, “How are you?” But how many of us really stop to listen for the answer? For most people, they just move on without listening for the answer. And of course, many just say, “Fine,” even if they are really not. Sometimes, when people ask me that question, I jokingly say, “Do you really want to know? Let us sit down and I will tell you.”
I think this is the difference between Jesus and us. Jesus stops and listens, and offers us the water of life. We don’t.
In verse 6,we are told that it was the sixth hour. Women do not come to draw water at high noon; it’s too hot. You get your water in the morning or evening. And like a sari-sari store in a barangay, a well is where people socialize, catch up on the news, perpetuate the community gossip. All is fine when talk is cheap unless you are the subject of the rumor mills. Then it’s another matter. It hurts. It’s painful.
You’ve got to sense that somehow, someway, this woman has been avoiding other people. She comes at high noon to draw water when she is all alone. And Jesus noticed this. I’m not really sure what the problem of this woman was. Except that in Verse 16, Jesus says to her, “Go, call your husband.” She replies, “I have no husband.” Jesus says, “You are right when you say ‘I have no husband.’ The fact is you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband.” Amazing! How did Jesus know?
Suddenly, we have moved from cultural struggles to personal pain. Jesus saw in this woman some personal pain. He saw her thirst for living water.
What was her situation? I used to think I knew, but I was a lot smarter when I was younger, and fresh from the seminary than I am now. And now, I’m not sure what was going on. Evangelists like to describe her as promiscuous. But have you ever thought, “What if her five previous husbands died?” What if she was going through the pain and grief of losing the closest person to her again and again and again — five times? Can you imagine the pain and the grieving she experienced?
Or, what if five husbands had divorced her? After all, women had no say about divorce during that time. It was the husband’s prerogative in every case and circumstance. What if five times she was told, “I do not need you anymore. You are no longer my wife and you are out of here!”? It would leave one thirsting for that living water.
We do not know the source of her thirst, and it probably doesn’t matter. The fact is there is pain, and there is that longing for water that quenches her thirst.
But granting that this woman was a promiscuous woman, notice that Jesus did not shake his finger in her face, and give her a lecture on how to behave. Rather, he brags on her for telling the truth.
I wish that we could somehow get this message across in the church. The purpose of religion is not to dwell on the bad in people and yell at them over and over again how bad they are. Rather, the role of the church is to enhance the good in people. It is to elevate people, and not pull them down.
Unfortunately, we have not always done a very good job with that in many of our churches.
Of course, it is not easy when we disagree with someone. The point I would like to bring with you is that Jesus talked with her, and met her needs.
Many of us, like this woman, are also thirsting for that water that gives life. Some of us have pain we have to bear. Some are undergoing trials and temptations. Some are grieving for a loved one. Others are struggling with relationships. And in our pain, sometimes we feel that no one cares nor understands us.
We look for unconditional love, and end up broken-hearted. We need to be comforted, and no one is there. The cares of this world have left us lonely and empty. Like the woman at the well, we are seeking for that which satisfies our longings.
A movie star was asked to define her greatest need. She replied: “My greatest need is to have someone know me, really know me, and not go away.”
Jesus is offering us the water that can quench this thirsting of our souls. Jesus picks us up when we are down. He gives us hope. When greed seems to take over our world, Jesus comes to us with the cross, a symbol of self-sacrifice. When others use power to trample the rights of others, Jesus comes to us in humility as the suffering servant. He knows us best, and loves us most.
And when we have filled our cups with that living water, like what happened to that Samaritan woman, it spills out to all around us, touching lives. The grace we have received changes us, makes us reach out, empowers people to move beyond their normal habits.
It is interesting to note that in the Samaritan’s enthusiasm to tell her story, she forgot her pain. She came to the well in solitude; she returned bringing others with her. She came to the well as one disgraced; she returned as one graced.
In a Junior-high camp, the boys picked on a 13-year old kid named Billy. He could not talk right nor walk right. He dragged his body across the campground in spastic fashion, and when he spoke, his words were markedly slurred. The boys would mimic him, and then would laugh. One time, the cabin where Billy was staying was asked to lead the devotion. They voted Billy to be the speaker so they can be entertained by his struggling attempts to say something at all. The day came and this did not bother Billy. Somehow, he dragged himself up to the rostrum as waves of snickers flowed over the audience. It took Billy almost half a minute to say, “Je-sus…loves me…and…I…love Je-sus.” When he finished, there was stunned silence. All over, there were junior-high boys with tears streaming down their cheeks. Some had their heads bowed. Years later, those boys would say, “The turning point of my life was when Billy spoke.”
God can use us, with all our pains and weaknesses. If we drink from that living water, it will spill out to others around us.
The village of Sychar has not changed too much. Most likely, at night there is still the same howling, lonely wind that blows against the blistering sand. The well — it is still there, too.
There is something else that has not changed or vanished with the ages either. That is the Living Water that is offered to you and to me today. Do you feel empty? Could you use a filling that only Christ can give? Let us pray as what that song says, “Lord come and quench this thirsting of my soul… Fill it up and make me show.”
