Woman By the Well
Notes
Transcript
Has anyone ever had their picture drawn before?
Because if you have you know it all depends on who is drawing it and what there view is of you.
If you go to a sketch artist that makes those animated sketches, chances are they will exagerate a lot of your feaatures,
If you pay a professional chances are they might touch you up a little on ocassion to make it look really good.
Liam the other day drew a picture of me and this is what is looked like.
He said Dada big belly…
But you know whenever someone trys to draw a picture of someone it really shows you how that person views you and what they see.
And you know we have just started this series called Around The Table (where we have been looking at the different meals Jesus had with others
and so far (last week and this week) we were in the book of John, and something that is really interesting that is important to know is that one of the goals of John who is writing this book is to paint a picture of who Jesus was.
And he is not doing it from a biased prospective, He is not doing from a skewed point of view, but John was a disciple of Jesus and He paints this picture of who Jesus was from the life He lived and the storys that happened
And really today we are looking at a story that does not necessarily take place around a table, but a Drinking Well.
Which back then was this was a really social place.
And really today we see a picture painted of Jesus as someone who actually does something a little scandalous for this time
And so we are going to be in John 4:3-26 and let me just say this that while this is a little bit of a scandalous story, it is really good news for us.
And so like I said John 4 and we will just be starting in verses 3-6. It says this:
3 So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee. 4 Now he had to go through Samaria. 5 So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.
So Jesus is on His way to Galilee, and if you read the text it actually says somthing a little interesting, because it says Jesus had to go through Samaria,
And if you were reading this at the time and you were a Jewish person you would go wow, poor Jesus, because at this point the Jewish people did not like the Samaritains
It would be like if you were a Detroit Lions fan and you had to go to Green Bay, you would say I do not want to go there right?!
But you know on a serius note they thought very lowly of the people in Samaria,
In fact the Jewish people would call the Samarians “dogs” because that is just how low their view of them was.
But what makes this really interesting is that if you look at a map, Jesus could have easily went around Samaria, but the passage says before anything else that He had to go through Samaria,
And really this is the first thing I want you to get most of the time when we do not like someone, or we think they are annoying, we like to avoid that person.
I mean this is a super simple point right? if you find me really annoying, but and you know I work at the coffee house a ton, yo will probably avoid the coffee house.
But something that was really interesting is that Jesus’s ministry is not one where He avoids the people that people seem not to like, but He actually makes it a point to say these are the people I want to be around.
And so look what happens because Jesus comes to this well and it says He is tired, which I have to pause here because isn’t it nice to know we serve a God that is not far off, but He actually experianced what we did, He got tired,
And so He gets to this well around noon time, and around this time there would typically be no one at the well, because to get water in Biblical times was hard, you did not just turn on a faucet, but you had to work to get it.
So people would go to the well early to avoid working in the heat of the day
And so Jesus is probably here alone, or with very few people around, but someone comes along and look what it says in verses 7-9. It says:
in verses 7-9 it says this
7 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) 9 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.)
So look what happens a Samaritain woman comes to the Well and its the middle of the day, its hot and you kind of wonder what in the world is going on.
Why is she here right now? why did she not go earlier
And I am going to spoil a small part of the story, but we find out that this woman has actually been living in a way that considered sinful and at this time she would have most likely been shamed for the choices you can make.
And so she most likely not here because she slept in, but she was at the Well right now because she knew the judgemental glances she would get, if she went at a normal time,
She knew the shame she would get for the choices she had made
I mean have you been at this place?
And you can picture her seeing a Jesus (who was a Jewish Rabbi) and thinking great this is terrible.
But she continues to draw her water and something really interesting happens and this is really scandelous for this time, because it says Jesus ask her to give Him a drink.
And I love her response because she literally tells Jesus, you realize I am a samaritan and you are a Jew right?
We do not really associate… In fact we actually really dislike each other.
But look at this last part of the passage and this is a really long part so I apologize, but I want us to see the whole picture. Verses 10-26. And look at this exchange. It says this:
10 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.” 11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 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?” 13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 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.” 15 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.” 16 He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.” 17 “I have no husband,” she replied. Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. 18 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.” 19 “Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.” 21 “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 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. 24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.” 25 The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” 26 Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”
So like I said there is a lot there, and it would be hard to get to every piece of the passage today, but Jesus keeps talking about water right?
And the woman actually gets a little confused, because she says wait you do not even have anythingto draw the water up with.
but whats amazing is it turns out the water Jesus is talking about is actually a little deeper then regular water, because He is talking about “living water”
Becuase the truth is water is really important,
I mean when I went to Africa they had a phrase that meant “water is life”
and really this was true in this day where water was not easily available.
And when you got water you really had to work for it.
And really this is symbolic of what this womans life has been up until this encounter with Jesus.
She has seached for things to fill her thirst, but like we have talked about so much she found herself thirsting for more.
And ultimately she found herself back at the well.
I mean I don’t know about you but I really relate with the Samaritain woman, but me personally I am a person that loves to find fulfillment, and I can do it by working, I can do it by building things up, but if that fufillment does nto come from Christ it will just leave me wanting more.
I love this quote that CS Lewis (who wrote the chronicles of Narnia wrote) He says this:
“Creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exist. A baby feels hunger, there is such a thing as food, a duckling wants to swim: well. there is such a thing as water. If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probably explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove the universe is a fraud. Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing”
You know you may day I have this craving in my life and thats not nessacaraly a bad thing if we say what if this craving is actually pointing me to the the only one who can satisfy that craving or emptieness where I am missing somthing.
And really Jesus is telling her you need to stop striving for this old water, and get my living water.
Because the truth is if you have a container of water and it gets dirty, it is dirty right.
If I say hey Adam will you drink this, Adam you are going to pass right?
Because its contaminated,
What if I pour it in this cup, I mean the glass looks clean,
Why not?
Because it is dirty
And you know really What Jesus is telling this Samaritain women and is really telling us is that its easy for the water of our heart to get a little dirty.
And when our hearts are dirty, it makes the stuff that flows out of our heart dirty as well (even if you can’t see it)
But when Jesus says I am a spring of living water, He is actually saying that He can clean our heart and even when we mess up, the spring of water does not grow dry.
And let me close on this because I mentioned how this story is a little scandalous, because Jesus is reaching out to this woman and you have the holiest man alive talking to someone who is low in society, but here is the provacative part
Because if you are here there is a good chance each of us need a new heart, because we can reach for things that make us feel good, but its never enough.
And the beautiful thing is we have a God who does not see us in our filth and say look how nasty that person is or wow they should be ashamed, but He steps in and meets us where we are.
And He is willing to give us a new heart.
And this mroning as we close