What do you think of when you think of a well? Do you picture a fairy-tale wishing well in an idyllic setting? Do you picture a wooden bucket and a long rope dipping into cool, clean water? I want you to picture a deep hole cut into rock and earth with a narrow opening. No fairy-tale stone work. I want you to picture a well where the water is a combination of water coming up from the water table and water that gathers there from the rain like a cistern. The water is drinkable, but we don’t know how refreshing it might taste. This is the water source for the local city and is used to provide water for the people of the town as well as for the livestock. Women are the ones who come to well to draw water, which they carry in large clay jars. They gather in the morning for the most part, and they converse there while they do their work.
In this context, I want to take a look at the story in John chapter 4 of the woman at the well. If you’re like me, you’ve grown up with stories of Jesus talking to the Samaritan woman, an immoral-type person who is thoroughly sinful. The story becomes a story of Jesus calling out her sin, taking her to task, not allowing her diversionary tactics to hold sway over what he wants to say to her, and it culminates with her acceptance of his identity as Messiah and evangelizing her community. But, I propose that this version of the story is all wrong. I think the story is much more poignant than that and holds much richer and deeper meaning.
So let’s take a look at this story again and see what we find there:
Now he had to go through Samaria. 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 teh journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.
Sychar is most likely the city of Shechem. If you remember, Shechem was destroyed by the sons of Jacob after the rape of their sister Dinah. Shechem was given to Joseph by Jacob, and Joseph’s bones were buried there. (Joshua 24:32). Shechem was also located at the base of Mt. Gerizim. Noon was not the normal time for drawing water from the well, but it wasn’t a particularly odd time of day to be going to the well as Exodus 2:15-19 gives this time of day for the time when the daughters of Reul, priest of Midian, came to water their flocks and met Moses at the well.
When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) 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–or For Jews do not use dishes Samaritans have used.)
It wasn’t unusual for Jesus to speak to women. He often responded to women like the Syrophonecian woman who came to him for healing of her daughter. He had women among his disciples who supported his ministry financially. So speaking to women would not have been unusual for Jesus, but this woman was a Samaritan. This is the important point. The Jews believed that the Samaritans were idolaters sent to live in the region during the Assyrian captivity. They considered them extremely unclean. They didn’t believe they were true Jews, and they argued over the place of worship of God. The uncleanness of Samaritans is why they wouldn’t used dishes Samaritans had used. The Samaritans, for their part, believed they were direct descendants of Joseph. They claimed that it was the Jews who had fallen away from true worship of God by following a rogue high priest and establishing the temple in Jerusalem. They believed that they alone had preserved the right form of worship as given to Moses. They knew the Torah, but they didn’t accept the prophets or the writings as inspired Scripture. The subtle differences in dress would have signaled to the Samaritan woman that Jesus was a Jew. These people were political and religious enemies. We’re talking Hatfield’s and McCoy’s. This is what made the exchange so unusual, so open/honest, and so critical to John’s purpose.
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.” “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us this well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”
This is the first time Jesus has referenced “living water.” What is living water? It’s active spring water. It is flowing water. It moves rapidly. Living water is not from a cistern. It doesn’t stagnate. It flows. In Jeremiah 17:13, the prophet calls God Himself a spring of living water. Living water would have brought to mind also the water from the rock that Moses provided to the people in the wilderness, which was a picture for the coming Messiah. But the Samaritan woman didn’t know the works of the prophets. They weren’t Scripture, so she took this statement of living water seriously. Her question was open and honest. She really wanted to know what it was Jesus was offering, and who he was since he had clearly broken with tradition in speaking to her. Here was an important person. Here was someone from the enemy camp who saw her, who acknowledged her, who didn’t treat her as unclean, and who was offering her something she had never heard of before.
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.” 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.”
As Christians, we understand what Jesus is talking about here. He is offering her renewal. He is offering her refreshment–continual refreshment–through a relationship with him. This water isn’t meant to be kept either. It’s meant to flow from Christ, through us, and on to others around us. It’s meant to act as a beacon and draw others in. Springs attract people. You see the bubbling water, and you go to investigate. Wells, on the other hand, are known locations for water. They are places of tradition. In this way, Jesus is showing us that a spirit of religious tradition in and of itself won’t get us the living water that true relationship with him offers. We can’t meet our needs there. We won’t find satisfaction there. We’ll get something, but we won’t get the fullness of God’s promises.
He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.” “I have no husband,” she replied. 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.”
This is usually the part of the story where condemnation upon condemnation is heaped upon the Samaritan woman. She is often portrayed as a woman of loose morals. In our modern day thinking, this woman must have divorced multiple times. She must not understand the sanctity of marriage. She’s clearly shacking up with a boyfriend. And Jesus is pointing out her sin to her. But is he? During this period of history, women didn’t really have the authority to divorce a husband. That right belonged to the men. And they could divorce for almost any reason, but the most typical reason would be that a woman was not bearing children. We’re also not told in the biblical text that she had been divorced at all. We’re simply told that she had five husbands. It’s possible her husbands died. What Jesus saw in the Samaritan woman was not an immoral woman who had no understanding. What Jesus saw was a woman who had been deeply hurt, either through the death of her husbands, or through divorces from the inability to bear children, or through divorces from unfaithful husbands, or any combination of the above. Jesus wasn’t calling out her sin. He was calling to her need. He was showing her that he understood exactly who she was and exactly what she needed. Isn’t it interesting that in response to her request for the living water, Jesus points to her need for healing and understanding. He isn’t being judgmental. He is offering grace.
And the people of Jesus’ time would have known this because Shechem was a city of refuge (Joshua 21:20-21). Cities of refuge were given by God to extend grace to those who had killed unintentionally. They were places of protection. Shechem was also the location where Joshua gave the Israelite people the choice to serve God and re-establish the covenant with Him or to turn away and serve their false gods. Finally, Shechem was part of the inheritance of Joseph. His entire life was one of grace and protection. His final blessing from his father Jacob in Genesis 49:22 is that Joseph would be a fruitful vine climbing over a wall. Later, John would record Jesus identifying himself as a vine. In this encounter, we see Jesus and the Samaritan woman reaching out to each other over the wall of division between the Samaritans and the Jews at a location bequeathed to Joseph by the well of Jacob who gave him the original blessing, and we see Jesus offering a new covenant to the Samaritan woman at the very place the Israelites had renewed their covenant with God previously.
“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.” “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. 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. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in Spirit and in truth.” The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you–I am he.”
Remember, the Samaritans did not believe in prophets other than Moses. This woman has realized that Jesus is someone important. She has believed that she is a true worshiper of God. The term Samaritan literally means “the keepers.” They thought they were the ones who had held true to the worship of God as He had intended it. So when the Samaritan woman recognizes in Jesus something spiritually significant, her first question is about how to worship rightly. It isn’t a change of subject. It isn’t a dodge of her sin. It’s the upper most question on her heart. This woman has served the Lord faithfully as a Samaritan (otherwise the strict Samaritan codes would have put her out of society or stoned her). Her heart’s desire is to truly worship the right way, in a way acceptable to God. So she asks Jesus to tell her the truth about how to worship. And Jesus gives a beautiful answer. Neither the mountain NOR Jerusalem is important to worship because God isn’t about a location. He’s about a relationship. Worshiping in Spirit and in truth is not restricted to a place. This echos the prophecy of Zechariah that living water will flow from Jerusalem to the east and to the west. It foreshadows Jesus covenant being opened to the entire world.
So what can we learn from this story? How do we apply it?
- God is more concerned about knowing us individually than He is about religious tradition, barriers, obstacles, etc. God will cross all obstacles to reach out to us. He will pursue us. He will connect with us. It’s all about relationship.
- God isn’t looking to judge us for our sin. He’s looking to meet our needs. The offer of living water touches the deepest parts of us. It brings soul healing for hurts. It removes all barriers. It uncovers hidden things. He offers living water despite where we are. He offers salvation with no strings attached. We either accept the offer or we don’t. It’s an offer of grace.
- If we want to worship God we must worship in Spirit and in truth. What does that mean? Well, we have to have a connection to the Holy Spirit in order to worship God. That connection only comes when the Holy Spirit is living within us, when we have accepted Jesus as our Lord and Savior, and when we are seeking after God’s Spirit in an ongoing relationship. We must also worship in truth. This word means “uncovered; not hidden.” Just as the Samaritan woman needed to have her deepest needs uncovered and was able to be open and honest with Jesus, we need that same openness. We have to uncover our hurts and needs. We need to confess our sins if that is blocking us from being transparent before God. When we are open to God, then the living water of Jesus can flow into us and then flow out of us.
- We are blessed to be a blessing. Our relationship with Jesus isn’t something we can hide away. It will be in us a spring of living water. It will attract others. It will spill out. It will be visible. This is the reason that the later testimony of the Samaritan woman about Jesus brought the people of her village to see for themselves. When we have a relationship with Jesus, people can’t help but notice!
A Beautiful Mess 