John 4:7-12 (NKJV) 7 A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.” 8 For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. 9 Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. 10 Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.” 11 The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water? 12 Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?”
In my last few posts we have looked at those manifestations of the Spirit that reveal something found in 1 Corinthians 12. We have defined these three “gifts” and tried to understand how they might work through us. Today I want to take some time to show you these gifts at work in the ministry of Jesus. I will be pointing out the word of wisdom, word of knowledge and the discerning of spirits as Jesus flows in them to change the life of a woman he never met. Although I will attempt to point out when Jesus is flowing in what gift, we must understand that which gift is at work is not really important. If you see them differently, that is perfectly OK. What is relevant is that God is moving in the life of this woman and she was never the same. That is what we want.
In John chapter 4, Jesus is preparing to go from Judea to Galilee. In verse 4 the NKJV says “He needed to go through Samaria.” If you look at a map, that makes sense as Samaria is on the way. However, in his day the Jews avoided Samaria. They would go out of there way to bypass this region. The reason was that the Samaritans were a people who were not purely Jewish. Captured people from other countries had been moved to Samaria by those who had conquered Israel in the past. They intermarried with the Hebrew people who had been left there. They were considered half-breeds and hated by the Jews. Nevertheless, on this day Jesus had to go through Samaria.
When he gets there, he is weary from the journey. His disciples had gone to get food. As he sits on what was Jacob’s well from the Old Testament, a woman comes toward him. The well was on a rise, so he sees her trudging up this hill. In his natural mind he knows that this woman is coming to the well at the wrong time. It is the hottest part of the day. Women usually come in the morning to get water for the day. He sees she is carrying a water pot to get water from the well. As she approaches, he askes her to get him a drink. That does not seem out of the ordinary, but the woman’s reaction is a bit harsh.
“Why are you, a Jewish man, speaking to me a Samaritan woman? You people don’t have anything to do with us.” She is suspicious of Jesus motivation. As we continue to learn about her, we can see that men have probably not been kind to her most of the time. They have used her for what they wanted. We know little about her background, but we do know that in that day a woman without a man to care for her had few options. I will leave her choices to your imagination.
I believe here we see the revelation gifts aft work in Jesus. He looks at her and responds. However, I do not think he is responding to her words. I think he is seeing into her spirit. I think he discerns what is in her heart and probably the evil spirits who have troubled her. He says, “If you knew the gift of God you are talking to you would ask and he would give you living water.” What an odd thing to say? I believe this is the word of wisdom at work. Jesus is sensing something from the Father. He knows there is more to this woman than what meets the eye. I believe God gives him wisdom in what to say. Her response is very important.
“You don’t have anything to draw with and the well is deep. Where are you going to get this living water?” She was immediately interested in what he might be talking about. I want to take a moment to explain why. This woman points out that this well is a special place. It was dug by Jacob, also known as Israel. In her culture she was taught that this well was the place to worship God. We find that out later in the conversation. She wants to know if he is greater than Jacob. Is this living water more than what she could find at Jacob’s well.
As I have prayed about this woman, I believe I know her story. She was somehow put into a position where she had no male to take care of her. We do not know how, but that is not relevant. We know as we read on that she had been with 5 men who acted as her “husband.” I doubt she was married to any of them. The first four either left her or she left them. In any case she is with number 5. Because of her background she is an outcast. She cannot go to the well in the morning with the other women. They ridicule her, reject her and might well drive her away. She is not up to their moral standards.
Day after day she comes to the well. She has been taught that she is supposed to worship God there. I believe that would mean this well is the place to meet God. I have no proof of this beyond what I believe God showed me, but I think at this time in her life she is tired. She does not want to live this way. She has no answers. She knows she has sinned, but she wants to be free. I can see her trudging up this hill to this well asking God, “Are you really here? I need help. I don’t know what to do. I want to change but I don’t want to starve. God please! Will you meet me at the well today?”
I do not know how long she had cried to God, but I believe that as Jesus was getting ready to head back to Galilee, God spoke to him and said, “Son, you need to go through Samaria.” On the day we are reading about in John 4, when the woman comes to the well, she has the same cry in her heart. “Lord is this the day you will meet me here. Is there some way you can help me?” As she approaches the well a stranger from a people who hated all Samaritans was sitting there. I can only imagine how she felt. “Oh no. I come here in this heat to avoid the ridicule of the women of the town and today there is a Jewish man here. I don’t need this. I don’t want to deal with him. Just let him leave me alone!”
Instead he asks her for a drink. As she protests, he tells her he has something for her. It is called living water. Why did he say that? It would not mean any more to her than it would to us if someone said, “Hey instead of buying that coke, I can give you some “living soda.” What in the world was “living water?” Yet she immediately changes her demeanor and expresses interest in what he may be talking about. “So, you have something more to offer than what I’m getting from this well?”
As I spent time across my desk from people hurting and in need, I would often find myself asking questions that I did not know why I asked them. Most of the time I found that the Holy Spirit was giving me a word of wisdom. A question that would touch a place in the heart that I had no idea was vulnerable. That is exactly what Jesus has done. He was not, in his human form, all knowing. He knew what the Father told him and did what the father showed him (John 8:38.) As he ministered to this woman, the Father gave him words to say that touched something in this woman’s heart.
She was coming to this well to meet God because she had a need. She did not know what “living water” was, but something in her resonated when he spoke the words. That is exactly what The Holy spirit wants to do in your interaction with the world. He wants to give you words of wisdom that come from God so the people know that he is the one who is there for them. More on how these gifts changed her life tomorrow.
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