Knox Presbyterian Church

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Before we hear this passage of scripture in John 4 some contextual background, for you to better appreciate this story of Jesus engaging with the Woman of Samaria at the well.
The geographic detail in this story is vital to unpacking the riches – depth of its meaning. Jesus comes to a Samaritan city called Sychar where Jacob’s well is located.

1. Jesus is in Samaritan Land, enemy territory where one of the symbols of the patriarchal faith of the Israelites – Jacob’s well – is located.

2. Essential to the meaning of this story is its setting in the midst of a people which — since the destruction of its temple on Mount Gerizim – had been considered as “alien folk” by the Jews. In so many words they were seen as subhuman, not even considered as a nation or a people.

3. Why the hatred? Here’s the background. During the time of exile and restoration returning Judean exiles rebuilt the temple in Jerusalem. It was there shrine to God and they couldn’t stomach the idea of any other place of worship for the restored nation. The Northerners – the Samarians had not been carried off in exile. Two very different historical experiences, there was little enmity between the two until much later when the Samarians permitted Alexander the Great to build them that temple on Gerizim, that eventually got destroyed.
The situation worsened steadily between 300 and 100, yielding “Samaritans” as distinct term from “Samarians” in Hebrew and Greek. Labeled – more easily categorized as subhuman.

4. Now contrary to the common sense and wisdom of the day Jesus engages the enemy offering her living water. The fact that she is woman and a polygamist only deepen the power of the coming paradox – for she is a contrast to the impeccable credentials of Jacob. Yet in a supreme twist of irony Jesus offers her -- the most sub human of the subhuman – water that not even Jacob can supply.

Now I invite you to hear and listen for God’s word.

(John 4:5-42) So he came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there, and Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon. A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink." (His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) The 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.) Jesus 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." The woman said to him, "Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?" Jesus said to her, "Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but 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." The 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." Jesus said to her, "Go, call your husband, and come back." The woman answered him, "I have no husband." Jesus said to her, "You are right in saying, 'I have no husband'; for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!" The woman said to him, "Sir, I see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem." Jesus said to her, "Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But 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. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." The woman said to him, "I know that Messiah is coming" (who is called Christ). "When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us." Jesus said to her, "I am he, the one who is speaking to you." Just 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?" Then the woman left her water jar and went back to the city. She said to the people, "Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?" They left the city and were on their way to him. Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, "Rabbi, eat something." But he said to them, "I have food to eat that you do not know about." So the disciples said to one another, "Surely no one has brought him something to eat?" Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work. Do 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. The reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, 'One sows and another reaps.' I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor." Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman's testimony, "He told me everything I have ever done." So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them; and he stayed there two days. And many more believed because of his word. They 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."

The Sound of Water This morning we continue in this season of Lent to look more closely at some of the more well known stories about Jesus to see what clues they provide to this question: What was the life and mission of Jesus really about and how does that matter for now?

This narrative is the longest recorded conversation in the gospel of John. Perhaps that’s why a blogging pastor wrote this at www.desperatepreacher.com: “I find this story EXHAUSTING! Almost every verse could be a sermon within a sermon. I’m trying to find a way to get the hearer to become like the Samaritan woman who, because of her encounter with Jesus is able to discover a deeper kind of faith, one that goes far beyond what she had previously been able to imagine. Any ideas?”

Any ideas on how to present Jesus as the ultimate reconciliation agent between enemies in the world?

Any ideas on how to present Jesus as the “I Am” who through God knows what is going on in the human heart?

Any ideas on how to present Jesus as the one who is responsible for enemies believing in God?
Any ideas on how to present the sound of living water, that Jesus promises, will not only quench but satisfy our deepest thirst?

(Take drink of water from glass with ice cubes) Any ideas?

Do you know how incredible this story is, what it could mean for you personally in the ‘nitty-gritty’ details of your life?

What it might mean for our world? Think about this, according to this story Jesus offers life to a perceived enemy of his people, to a woman no less who even has “to many relationships” baggage! The life that emerges in this woman eventually brings enemies of together – Jews and Samaritans worshipping side by side in John’s community of faith!

Any ideas on how to present the sound of living water?

Interesting isn’t it that we live in these two creative tensions,

It’s all about what Jesus can do for us individually,

Or is what Jesus can do for the broken relationships between enemies in our world?

Just like the woman in our story.
Jesus gets personal with her, revealing intimate knowledge of her life (you have had five husbands, and now are with someone who is not your husband).

She responds by getting the focus off her life, and back on the issue that divides her as a Samaritan and him as a Jewish man (Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem).

Was she afraid that she would be condemned for both her personal and religious and cultural choices?

Or did she sense something different about him that eventually opened her to the possibilities of the saving grace of reconciliation for her world, where all is known, nothing is forgotten, yet all is forgiven, accepted if you will in the best sense of that word.
What does this living water sound like?

For me it is very personal. A year ago you might recall that I spent a week in silence at the Holy Spirit Retreat Center in Anchorage, Alaska. Each day there was a specific prayer and theme dealing with hearing:
Monday – Listen to God say, “Come to me, I love you.”
Tuesday – Listen to God say, “I want to forgive and heal you.”
Wednesday – Listen to God say, “Through this woman I send my son.”
Thursday – Listen to God say, “I remain with you as your food and drink.”
Friday – Listen to Jesus say, “By my dying and rising I open the way to eternal life for you.”
Saturday- Listen to Jesus say, “Receive my spirit.”
Sunday- Listen to Jesus say, “Have my Spirit so that you may live on in my love.”

This is what I heard as I listened. I saw my parents judging the faith of a Catholic woman – who was one of my friend’s best friends. I heard how she and my friend felt at my parent’s inability to welcome her as a woman of faith in our God. I felt my anger and fear. I remembered how I didn’t know how to speak then, about what I increasingly know – our God is a God who is in the business of the reconciliation of all things, however painful. I saw and heard that I needed to tell this Catholic woman and my friend – some 25 years later – how sorry I was that I didn’t stand up for God’s love for humans like you and me, who like the Samaritan woman have stories that thirst for the living water that Jesus offers. What she emailed back to my friend and me was far beyond what I was able to imagine. She told us how incredible it was that God could bring back people into her life to bring healing. She was going through a painful divorce, wondering if God had forgotten about her, wondering if God still loved her. Hearing words of my confession around fear brought healing to her present wound and healing to my friend and me in places that we didn’t even know needed healing.

What would living water that Jesus offers sound like to you?

“You are not my enemy,” Jesus says. “God does not condemn the perceived enemies of his people.” Because of what John has seen, Jews and Samaritans welcomed by Jesus, now worshipping God together he sees Jesus as savior of the world endowed with power by God to know what is going in the human heart, offering grace to heal too many broken relationships, too many old historical wounds.

Is there any better welcoming sound than living water when you are spiritually parched? Receive this gift of God asking for and receiving the gift of reconciling grace – for you personally and for your… the world. I look forward to hearing how your living water sounds as it moves you into deeper places of this kind faith, beyond your imagination.

Come to the Water, and hear the sound of our choir’s invitation inviting you into the deep healing of God reconciling you with yourself, and with each other, here and beyond, for your sake and our sake, for the future of God’s community in this place.

CHOIR /PRAYERS OF PEOPLE