The Woman at the Well.

 The Woman at the Well.

Now when the Lord knew that the pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John (although Jesus himself did not baptize, but only his disciples), he left Judea and departed to Galilee. He had to pass through Samaria. So he came to a city of Samaria, called Sy'char, near the field that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there, and so Jesus, wearied as he was with his journey, sat down beside the well. It was about the sixth hour.

A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink." (His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, "How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?" (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that 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 have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?" Jesus said to her, "Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life." The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water, so that I may never 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 him, "I have no husband." Jesus said to her, "You are right in saying, 'I have no husband'; for you have had five husbands, and the man you are now living with is not your husband. What you have said is true!" The woman said to him, "Sir, I see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshipped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem." Jesus said to her, "Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these 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 Messiah is coming" (who is called Christ). "When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us." Jesus said to her, "I am he, the one who is speaking to you."

— John 4:4–26

 

To whom did Christ first introduce Himself as the Messiah?

And who can worship Him? “God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.”

Vs 39 “And many of the Samaritans of that city believed on him for the saying of the woman, which testified, He told me all that ever I did. 

Christ stayed with the Samaritans for two days.

Vs 41 “And many more believed because of his own word: 42 and said unto the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy saying: for we have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world.”

Now in case no one ever pointed it out to you, women were not generally received as being persons of concern or to be respected in those countries and at those times. Some things never really change. Today the Southern Baptist Convention does not recognize women as teachers/pastors or other than members. Nope, the Samaritan men’s attitudes remain and have simply been echoed throughout the Christian world for the most part.

Do we believe that a woman can worship God in spirit and in truth? Can God use a woman to introduce Himself to others?

Some things today amaze me for the bona fide stupidity. Churches selling churches or properties so that one or another congregation can continue in its way. All things considered, buildings are just property—not holy and no more sacred than your local barn on the hill. What is truly holy? If worship is “in spirit and in truth,” then it is not the place nor the personage that makes the worship. Let us consider how we worship more than where. Let us consider who is able to open our eyes and ears to God. 

Rest well, my friends. You know that God loves you.