Healing Rays of Righteousness

She was a woman, a Samaritan woman, a very lonely woman thirsting for companionship. She had made some very bad choices in life, trying to satisfy this thirst. She knew she had made a mess of her life and was now considered an immoral outcast by her own townspeople. She also knew she was the daily gossip at the village well where her neighbors gathered during the cool of each morning and evening for their water supply.

And so, to avoid the stares and sharp pain of ridicule and rejection, she would make the much longer walk to Jacob’s well, about a mile from town, for her needed daily supply of water. She would do so during the noonday heat while her neighbors were resting in the shade of their houses. But the water from Jacob’s well could never satisfy her unquenchable thirst for respect, acceptance, peace, and happiness.

It was noon-time when Jesus and his little band of disciples came to a fork in the road near the town of Sychar. At this fork in the road was Jacob’s well. This was a spot rich in the history of the Jewish people. Centuries earlier, Jacob had dug this deep well for his family and animals.

What memories must have stirred in Jesus as he sat down at this well, “tired as he was from the journey.” The disciples had gone into town to buy food, while Jesus rested. It is very likely that on their way into town they would have passed the Samaritan woman coming out to Jacob’s well where Jesus was resting. I am wondering if they greeted or acknowledged her. Remember they were Jewish men and she was a Samaritan woman.

All the makings of the usual dramatic confrontation between Jew and Samaritan are present as the woman approaches the well. But Jesus only makes a simple, unexpected request of her, “Will you give me a drink?”

Jesus has a need, and in politely asking this woman for help, cuts through centuries of suspicion and animosity, and treats her with respect and dignity as a human being. He treats her kindly even though he knows the immoral secrets she hides.

The woman responds with undisguised amazement, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” And so a dialogue is opened in which there comes an amazing reversal of roles. It is not long before the woman who has been asked for a drink of water is addressing the thirsty traveler as “Sir” and asking him for the water he offers.

Jesus offers this thirsty woman “living water” as “the gift from God.” He tells her that this water would quench her deepest thirst and longings, not just for a day, but forever; and that it is continuously fresh and abundant, “a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

“GIFT” – what a beautiful word of generosity and grace. But the gift cannot be received without the Giver, Jesus. Unless, the woman comes to know and accept the One who speaks to her, God’s gift of “living water” can never be hers. For God shares this living water only through his Son, Jesus.  And, yes, the gift is free, but it cannot be received without acknowledgment of thirst, confession of sin, and repentance. I encourage you to read the full story in the Gospel of John, chapter 4.

All through Scripture, water is a rich symbol of the spiritual life. Living water vividly described that everlasting spiritual water which could quench and revive the parched, dying human spirit.  So the Psalmist cries out, “As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God.” (42:1). And the prophet Isaiah speaks of its rich spiritual meaning, “With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation.” (12:3).

In his gospel, the Apostle John records that on the last day of the annual Jewish Feast of Tabernacles, Jesus throws out that urgent invitation to all who could hear him, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.” Then John explains, “By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive.” (7:37-39).

This is the invitation the Samaritan woman is hearing. And it is the invitation Jesus still gives to all whose lives are barren, lonely, and dried-up. It is the invitation given to all who keep dipping their buckets into the wells of the world for water that does not satisfy nor quench the deep thirst of the soul.

John W. Peterson seems to be echoing the testimony of the Samaritan woman in his hymn, Springs of Living Water: “I thirsted in the barren land of sin and shame, And nothing satisfying there I found; But to the blessed cross of Christ one day I came, Where springs of living water did abound.” (Refrain) “Drinking at the springs of living water – Happy now am I; My soul they satisfy. Drinking at the springs of living water – O wonderful and bountiful supply.”

May it be so!

                                                                                                                                                           Ray M. Geigley                                                                                          “Healing Rays of Righteousness” – July 17, 2019
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