The Woman at the Well

(Taken from John 4:5-30)

Early on as he was gaining notice, rumors were flying about Jesus, his ministry and popularity. Controversy threatened to divide his followers between him and John the Baptist. Rather than stay and fuel the rumors of gossip and jealousy, Jesus quietly withdrew to the Galilee.

The Jews thought so unkindly of the Samaritans that they usually went out of their way to avoid them. Though it was a shorter distance to go through Samaria on their way to Galilee, most often they went around it, making their journey much longer. Jesus was not bound by convention or social custom. The Bible states: “And he must needs go through Samaria.”

Imagine Jesus sitting at a well in Sychar, the capitol city of Samaria, the same well that was made by Jacob so many years before. He sits there alone, in the scorching heat, waiting and watching as a solitary figure approaches. A woman, an outcast among the outcasts. A woman of dubious reputation who comes to the well at noon, the hottest part of the day, to draw her water in order to avoid the persecutions of the other women.

She tells us how Jesus asked her for a drink of water but instead he gave to her living water that she need never thirst again.