John 4.1-26 (PART 1 WORSHIP)
Intro:
This second interview is another illustration of the fact that “He knew what was in a man” (2:25). The Samaritan woman contrasts sharply with Nicodemus. He was seeking; she was indifferent. He was a respected ruler; she was an outcast. He was serious; she was flippant. He was a Jew; she was a despised Samaritan. He was (presumably) moral; she was immoral. He was orthodox; she was heterodox. He was learned in religious matters; she was ignorant. Yet in spite of all the differences between this “churchman” and this woman of the world, they both needed to be born again. Both had needs only Christ could meet.
Another word for true/authentic
God’s seeking
The world of sinners loved by God includes not just respectable insiders seeking truth (Nicodemus) but broken outsiders running from the truth (the Samaritan woman). None of us are beyond the need of God’s grace and none of us are beyond the reach of God’s grace. Jesus has come to seek and to save both the “found,” those who presume they already have a relationship with God, and the “lost,” those who realize they don’t.
1. Biblical Worship breaks boundaries
In John 4:1–42, Jesus crosses strict cultural boundaries separating races (in the general sense of culturally distinct peoples), genders and moral status, pointing to the new and ultimate unity in the Spirit.
Samaritans and Jews worshiped the same God and both used the law of Moses (although the Samaritans made a few changes in it). But they despised one another’s places of worship and had remained hostile toward one another for centuries.
4:16–17. In view of the ambiguity of the situation (see comment on 4:7), her statement, “I have no husband,” could mean “I am available.” Jesus removes the ambiguity, which stems from his refusal to observe customs that reflected ethnic and gender prejudice, not from any actual flirtation on his part.
Mount Gerizim, the Samaritans’ holy site equivalent to Judaism’s Jerusalem, was in full view of Jacob’s well. She uses the past tense for “worship” precisely because of her continuing consciousness of Jews’ and Samaritans’ racial separation: roughly two centuries before, the Jewish king had obliterated the Samaritan temple on that mountain, and it had remained in ruins ever since. Samaritans mocked the Jewish holy site and once, under cover of night, even sought to defile the Jerusalem temple. Jews similarly ridiculed Mount Gerizim and even built many of their synagogues so worshipers could face Jerusalem.
The division between Jews and Samaritans was legendary, a division Jesus did not and would not recognize. Samaritans were rejected because of their mixed Gentile blood and their differing style of worship, which found its center on Mount Gerizim. On this mountain Samaritans had built a temple that rivaled the Jewish temple in Jerusalem.
Jesus’ excursion into Samaria resulted in one of the most fascinating dialogues recorded in Scripture. Resting by a well, Jesus encountered a Samaritan woman who had been living a life of habitual immorality. Their conversation proceeded upon two levels, the spiritual and the temporal, with the woman constantly finding excuses for Jesus’ probing of her inner world. Her first shock was that Jesus would even speak to her, an act unheard of for that day between a Jewish man and a Samaritan woman. Jesus continually responded not to her questions but to her needs, offering her the opportunity of receiving “living water” (4:10).
The “sixth hour” normally means noon; thus Jesus and the disciples had been journeying for perhaps six hours. (According to another system of time reckoning, less likely here, “sixth hour” would mean 6 p.m.—cf. 19:14—in which case Jesus and his disciples would be ready to settle down for the night and lodge there—4:40.) The local women would not come to draw water in the midday heat, but this woman had to do so, because she had to come alone (for her reasons, see comment on 4:7).
That this Samaritan woman comes to the well alone rather than in the company of other women probably indicates that the rest of the women of Sychar did not like her, in this case because of her sexual activities (cf. comment on 4:18). Although Jewish teachers warned against talking much with women in general, they would have especially avoided Samaritan women, who, they declared, were unclean from birth. Other ancient accounts show that even asking water of a woman could be interpreted as flirting with her—especially if she had come alone due to a reputation for looseness. Jesus breaks all the rules of Jewish piety here. In addition, both Isaac (Gen 24:17) and Jacob (Gen 29:10) met their wives at wells; such precedent created the sort of potential ambiguity at this well that religious people wished to avoid altogether.
Important also is the fact that this chapter demonstrates Jesus’ love and understanding of people. His love for mankind involved no boundaries, for He lovingly and compassionately reached out to a woman who was a social outcast. In contrast to the limitations of human love, Christ exhibits the character of divine love that is indiscriminate and all-encompassing (3:16).
Samaria. When the nation of Israel split politically after Solomon’s rule, King Omri named the capital of the northern kingdom of Israel “Samaria” (1 Kin. 16:24). The name eventually referred to the entire district and sometimes to the entire northern kingdom, which had been taken captive (capital, Samaria) by Assyria in 722 B.C. (2 Kin. 17:1–6). While Assyria led most of the populace of the 10 northern tribes away (into the region which today is northern Iraq), it left a sizable population of Jews in the northern Samaritan region and transported many non-Jews into Samaria. These groups intermingled to form a mixed race through intermarriage. Eventually tension developed between the Jews who returned from captivity and the Samaritans. The Samaritans withdrew from the worship of Yahweh at Jerusalem and established their worship at Mt. Gerizim in Samaria (vv. 20–22). Samaritans regarded only the Pentateuch as authoritative. As a result of this history, Jews repudiated Samaritans and considered them heretical. Intense ethnic and cultural tensions raged historically between the two groups so that both avoided contact as much as possible (v. 9; Ezra 4:1–24; Neh. 4:1–6; Luke 10:25–37). See note on 2 Kin. 17:24.
4:7 A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Women generally came in groups to collect water, either earlier or later in the day to avoid the sun’s heat. If the Samaritan woman alone came at 12:00 p.m. (see note on v. 6), this may indicate that her public shame (vv. 16–19) caused her to be isolated from other women. “Give Me a drink.” For a Jewish man to speak to a woman in public, let alone to ask from her, a Samaritan, a drink was a definite breach of rigid social custom as well as a marked departure from the social animosity that existed between the two groups. Further, a “rabbi” and religious leader did not hold conversations with women of ill-repute (v. 18).
4:8 to buy food. This verse indicates that since Jesus and his disciples were willing to purchase food from Samaritans, they did not follow some the self-imposed regulations of stricter Jews, who would have been unwilling to eat food handled by outcast Samaritans.
With Christ’s coming, previous distinctions between true and false worshipers based on locations disappeared. True worshipers are all those everywhere who worship God through the Son, from the heart (cf. Phil. 3:3).
4:9. Surprised and curious, the woman could not understand how He would dare ask her for a drink, since Jews did not associate with Samaritans. The NIV margin gives an alternate translation to the Greek sentence with the word synchrōntai (“associate” or “use together”): the Jews “do not use dishes Samaritans have used.” This rendering may well be correct. A Rabbinic law of A.D. 66 stated that Samaritan women were considered as continually menstruating and thus unclean. Therefore a Jew who drank from a Samaritan woman’s vessel would become ceremonially unclean.
The location of worship is not important, but the Object is! The English word “worship” is from the Anglo-Saxon weorthscipe, literally reading “worthship.” Worship is attributing worth and honor to the living God.
Jesus has no jar to lower into the well; moreover, even with a jar he could not get “living” (i.e., fresh or flowing) water from a well (see comment on 4:10).
Her saying “our father Jacob” is an affront to the Jewish teaching that the Jewish people were children of Jacob, and the Samaritans were at best half-breeds. The one who is greater than Jacob does not argue the point with her; it is peripheral to the issue he wishes to drive home.
Jesus clarifies her ambiguous statement: she had been married five times and is not married to the man with whom she now lives. Samaritans were no less pious and strict than Jews, and her behavior would have resulted in ostracism from the Samaritan religious community—which would have been nearly coextensive with the whole Samaritan community.
When he speaks of “worship in Spirit and truth,” Jesus may have in view the common identification of the Spirit with prophecy in ancient Judaism, as well as Old Testament passages about charismatic, prophetic worship (especially 1 Sam 10:5; 1 Chron 25:1–6). Given the general belief that the prophetic Spirit was no longer active, Jesus’ words would strike ancient ears forcefully. The future hour (4:21) is present as well as future; Jesus makes the character of the future world available to his disciples in their present lives (see comment on 3:16). For oppressed Jews and Samaritans longing for the future promise, this was also a striking statement.
22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth,
True worshipers are those who realize that Jesus is the Truth of God (3:21; 14:6) and the one and only Way to the Father (Acts 4:12). To worship in truth is to worship God through Jesus. To worship in Spirit is to worship in the new realm which God has revealed to people. The Father is seeking true worshipers because He wants people to live in reality, not in falsehood. Everybody is a worshiper (Rom. 1:25) but because of sin many are blind and constantly put their trust in worthless objects.
The word “spirit” does not refer to the Holy Spirit but to the human spirit. Jesus’ point here is that a person must worship not simply by external conformity to religious rituals and places (outwardly) but inwardly (“in spirit”) with the proper heart attitude. The reference to “truth” refers to worship of God consistent with the revealed Scripture and centered on the “Word made flesh” who ultimately revealed His Father (14:6).