Daily Bread John 4
Daily Bread John 4
7When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, "Will you give me a drink?" 8(His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
9The Samaritan woman said to him, "You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?" (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.[a])
10Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water."
11"Sir," the woman said, "you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his flocks and herds?"
13Jesus answered, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life."
15The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water so that I won't get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water."
16He told her, "Go, call your husband and come back."
17"I have no husband," she replied.
Jesus said to her, "You are right when you say you have no husband. 18The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.
Observation:
Jesus was tired from his journey which went through the town of Samaria. There was a strong dislike between the Jews and the Samaritans. Samaria used to be the capital of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, but with the downfall of Israel, Jews began to see Samaritans as not truly of Jewish heritage. Many of the Jewish people who ended up there when the temples were destroyed in the 8th century, ended up marrying native Samaritans and thus began a mixed breed of Jew/Samaritan.
But this woman had ancestral ties with Jacob, who bought a plot of land there which has been associated with what has been called “Jacob’s well”, although that term is not used in the Old or New Testament. Here is a pic of the well in a Christian church in 1934 (although through history the exact location has deviated).
But rather than getting so caught up in the well or its location, we should focus on the message that Jesus gives to the Samaritan women, that though the water she would get from the well would provide her temporary satisfaction, only would the Spirit of God fill her with something that would give her true satisfaction.
Application:
The woman had been trying to fill her life with relationships, as referenced by the five marriages she had been in, and the man she was living with who wasn’t her husband. Jesus stops to give this message of life-giving water at time when she needed it the most. Jesus shows his love for her, despite the fact that men would not normally ask a woman for a drink at the well, especially not a Samaritan woman.
Jesus also redefines worship from something limited by a location (the Jews worshipped in a temple in Jerusalem and one in Samaria) to something that was made possible via worshipping in Spirit and Truth. Although God met the Jews in certain places that they sanctified in the Old Testament, true worship would flow from the Spirit in a believer’s heart at they lift up their hearts and lives to the one true God!
Today, we still thirst for the living God. It is good for us as we go to worship to think of it as an encounter with God that fills our thirsty souls. As we praise God, listen to His Word, experience His Holy Sacraments, we are connected to our Heavenly Father, through the power of the Holy Spirit, and Jesus living within us.
Prayer: Fill us with living water God. Help us to not try to quench our thirst with things of the world, which will only leave us craving more and will never satisfy. Thank you for the Living Water that Jesus came to bring us through His Spirit. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
7When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, "Will you give me a drink?" 8(His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
9The Samaritan woman said to him, "You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?" (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.[a])
10Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water."
11"Sir," the woman said, "you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his flocks and herds?"
13Jesus answered, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life."
15The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water so that I won't get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water."
16He told her, "Go, call your husband and come back."
17"I have no husband," she replied.
Jesus said to her, "You are right when you say you have no husband. 18The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.
Observation:
Jesus was tired from his journey which went through the town of Samaria. There was a strong dislike between the Jews and the Samaritans. Samaria used to be the capital of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, but with the downfall of Israel, Jews began to see Samaritans as not truly of Jewish heritage. Many of the Jewish people who ended up there when the temples were destroyed in the 8th century, ended up marrying native Samaritans and thus began a mixed breed of Jew/Samaritan.
But this woman had ancestral ties with Jacob, who bought a plot of land there which has been associated with what has been called “Jacob’s well”, although that term is not used in the Old or New Testament. Here is a pic of the well in a Christian church in 1934 (although through history the exact location has deviated).
But rather than getting so caught up in the well or its location, we should focus on the message that Jesus gives to the Samaritan women, that though the water she would get from the well would provide her temporary satisfaction, only would the Spirit of God fill her with something that would give her true satisfaction.
Application:
The woman had been trying to fill her life with relationships, as referenced by the five marriages she had been in, and the man she was living with who wasn’t her husband. Jesus stops to give this message of life-giving water at time when she needed it the most. Jesus shows his love for her, despite the fact that men would not normally ask a woman for a drink at the well, especially not a Samaritan woman.
Jesus also redefines worship from something limited by a location (the Jews worshipped in a temple in Jerusalem and one in Samaria) to something that was made possible via worshipping in Spirit and Truth. Although God met the Jews in certain places that they sanctified in the Old Testament, true worship would flow from the Spirit in a believer’s heart at they lift up their hearts and lives to the one true God!
Today, we still thirst for the living God. It is good for us as we go to worship to think of it as an encounter with God that fills our thirsty souls. As we praise God, listen to His Word, experience His Holy Sacraments, we are connected to our Heavenly Father, through the power of the Holy Spirit, and Jesus living within us.
Prayer: Fill us with living water God. Help us to not try to quench our thirst with things of the world, which will only leave us craving more and will never satisfy. Thank you for the Living Water that Jesus came to bring us through His Spirit. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
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