Scripture Scribbles: March 12, 2023

the Gospel

John 4:5-42

Jesus came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, 
near the plot of land that Jacob had given to his son Joseph.
Jacob’s well was there.
Jesus, tired from his journey, sat down there at the well.
It was about noon.

A woman of Samaria came to draw water.
Jesus said to her,
“Give me a drink.”
His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.
The Samaritan woman said to him,
“How can you, a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?”
—For Jews use nothing in common with Samaritans.—
Jesus answered and said to her,
“If you knew the gift of God
and who 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 do not even have a bucket and the cistern is deep; 
where then can you get this living water?
Are you greater than our father Jacob, 
who gave us this cistern and drank from it himself 
with his children and his flocks?”
Jesus answered and said to her, 
“Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again; 
but whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst; 
the water I shall give will become in him
a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
The woman said to him,
“Sir, give me this water, so that I may not 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 and said to him,
“I do not have a husband.”
Jesus answered her,
“You are right in saying, ‘I do not have a 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 can see that you are a prophet.
Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain; 
but you people say that the place to worship is in Jerusalem.”
Jesus said to her,
“Believe me, woman, the hour is coming
when you will worship the Father
neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.
You people worship what you do not understand; 
we worship what we understand, 
because salvation is from the Jews.
But the hour is coming, and is now here, 
when true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and truth; 
and indeed the Father seeks such people 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 the Messiah is coming, the one called the Christ; 
when he comes, he will tell us everything.”
Jesus said to her,
“I am he, the one speaking with you.”

At that moment his disciples returned, 
and were amazed that he was talking with a woman, 
but still no one said, “What are you looking for?” 
or “Why are you talking with her?”
The woman left her water jar 
and went into the town and said to the people, 
“Come see a man who told me everything I have done.
Could he possibly be the Christ?”
They went out of the town and came to him.
Meanwhile, the disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat.”
But he said to them,
“I have food to eat of which you do not know.”
So the disciples said to one another, 
“Could someone have brought him something to eat?”
Jesus said to them,
“My food is to do the will of the one who sent me
and to finish his work.
Do you not say, ‘In four months the harvest will be here’?
I tell you, look up and see the fields ripe for the harvest.
The reaper is already receiving payment 
and gathering crops for eternal life, 
so that the sower and reaper can rejoice together.
For here the saying is verified that ‘One sows and another reaps.’
I sent you to reap what you have not worked for; 
others have done the work, 
and you are sharing the fruits of their work.” 

Many of the Samaritans of that town began to believe in him
because of the word of the woman who testified, 
“He told me everything I have done.”
When the Samaritans came to him,

they invited him to stay with them; 
and he stayed there two days.
Many more began to believe in him because of his word, 
and they said to the woman, 
“We no longer believe because of your word; 
for we have heard for ourselves, 
and we know that this is truly the savior of the world.”

the devotion

Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one speaking with you.”

The woman left her water jar and went into the town and said to the people, “Come see a man who told me everything I have done. Could he possibly be the Christ?”

How stunningly our Lord reverses the rules of the world. I think I could pray for a lifetime with the fourth chapter of John’s gospel. But today, he is inviting me to notice the woman at the well’s heart and how he draws her into his own. Here she is, alone, seeking water. She is alone because of a combination of her choices, the things that have been done to her, and the social exclusion of the other women of Sychar. My own heart aches relating to this feeling. Perhaps she walks defiantly, telling herself that she is better off without the gossip and wrong judgment of those women. Perhaps she walks in shame, feeling the weight of rejection, exhaustion and hopelessness. Either way she is thirsty and it is hot.

And that is where our Lord chooses to meet her. His being there, alone, at that precise moment is no accident. He went there for her. He went precisely there so that he could tenderly offer himself to those aching depths of her heart and body.

And by grace, she opens her heart to him bit by bit as they talk. This opening is not easy. But he is so patient and so gentle and the truth of who he is washes over her like the water they talk about together.

And isn’t it beautiful and so stunningly antithetical to the way the world works that it is from exactly the place of deepest pain and shame in her heart that the spring of water wells up to eternal life? The women and men of Sychar pushed her away because of those dark places. But the Lord tenderly reveals himself to her through those dark places and his healing of her heart in just those places flows into healing for the whole community through encounter with Jesus.

It’s almost too beautiful. Will you pray with me?

Sweet Lord, the way you work is so stunning, so beautiful, so healing. Help me to receive you in the darkest, thirstiest parts of my heart, like the woman of Sychar did. When I feel rejected, alone, or shamed, give me hope and trust that it is exactly in and through those places that you will tenderly set your spring to well up to eternal life drawing a whole thirsty and broken world to you.

Today’s devotion was written by Lucia Parker