BIBLE STUDY #35
THIRD SUNDAY OF LENT
March 27, 2011


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 Gospel of the Lord

Reflection

John’s Gospel is a gospel of personal relationships. He speaks about his relationship with the Father, with the disciples, the relationship of the disciples with each other, and he reveals himself in his relationships. Jesus discloses himself to these people and they discover who he is and what he means to them.

In this gospel story of the Samaritan women, Jesus reveals himself little by little and invites her to faith. Eventually, she comes to faith and invites other Samaritans to do the same, who respond by coming to faith. These Samaritans are schismatic Jews and not part of official Judaism. But they come to a much greater acceptance of Jesus than official Judaism or most of the Jewish people.

John’s Gospel emphasizes that Jesus is the transcendent Son of God, but it is in this same Gospel that we also feel the touch of Jesus’ humanity, such as in today’s passage where Jesus is tired from his journey when he reaches the well. Other translations will use the word exhausted or wearied in place of tired. In any event, we can relate to that kind of feeling.

A meeting at Jacob’s well is a favorite setting for meetings between men and women that influence the course of salvation history, such as Abraham and Rebecca in Genesis 24:11-27, or Jacob and Rachel in Genesis 29-1-21.

Jesus meets a Samaritan woman at the well and asks her for a drink. She would have been surprised, not only because a man was talking to her (the apostles were amazed at this upon their return), but it was a Jewish man, and she being a Samaritan, would have nothing to do with Jews. Samaritans refused to worship in Jerusalem and even helped foreign powers fight against Israel. Communication between the two was forbidden by law, and there was a ritual taboo on eating and drinking from the same vessels.

It is interesting to me that Jesus meets this woman at the well at noon. Water was procured in the morning, normally. Why was she there at noon? Was she being ostracized from the community for some reason, like her many marriages? It is another instance where Jesus associates with the most downtrodden and oppressed people. This is a good example of how we should act.

Jesus reveals himself little by little. He refers to himself as a ‘gift from God’. Jesus is the connection we have to the Father. There is a painting in the Sistine chapel of God reaching down with his right hand, and Adam reaching up with his right hand, but they don’t meet; there is a gap. Jesus closes that gap by making it possible for those hands to meet.

Jesus gives us the gift of living water, which is the gift of himself, which is for all and confers eternal life. This living water is also seen as the Holy Spirit, insofar as one interiorizes the self revelation of Jesus.

The woman doesn’t understand and questions Jesus. He says that everyone who ‘drinks of this well’, that is, believes in him, ‘will never thirst’, that is, have eternal life. She doesn’t really understand, but wants this gift of living water so she doesn’t have to keep coming to the well. She knows Jesus has something special and is someone special, but she doesn’t yet understand who he is or what he is offering. At this point, he is only a Jewish man with a special gift.

Jesus then draws her closer to faith in a surprising way. He asks her to go and get her husband. She replies that she has no husband, and 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.” Now Jesus becomes a prophet, because he knows her background without being told. By telling her of her own life, she is brought to a greater understanding of Jesus.

We learn a lot more about Jesus because we learn that he supersedes and is replacing worship both at Mt. Geratzim (that is the Samaritans, who do not possess true knowledge of God, since their religion grew out of national and political ambitions) and in Jerusalem (the Jews who have legitimate worship of God, and salvation, since the Messiah and Savior comes from them). Jesus brings Christian worship, which is the worship of the Father in a communion of faith with the Son (who is and brings the truth), through the interior action of the Holy Spirit. Worship is not limited to a place, but happens anywhere and everywhere. We get to know God by accepting Jesus, and the Spirit helps us grow in our faith. Jesus is the new Temple by which we worship the Father in spirit and truth.

The woman believes that when the Messiah comes he will tell them everything (explain to them, maybe?). Jesus reveals himself as the Messiah, the divine, transcendent revealer of God. When he says “I am”, he is referring to the Old Testament notion of the divine power of God.

The disciples return and are amazed that he is talking to a woman. Remember, woman had no standing whatsoever in those days, and were considered like property; and it wasn’t seemly for a man like Jesus to be talking with a woman anyway. They want Jesus to eat, but he responds, “I have food to eat of which you do not know.” His ‘food’ is doing the will of the Father and completing his mission as the Savior of the world. He sees the Samaritans are ripe for harvesting, just as there will be a great harvest of souls in the future. The harvest time has arrived with Jesus, and the disciples will be doing much harvesting in the future.

The woman brings the gift of Jesus, the living water, to the other Samaritans by testifying to them what Jesus did. Jesus stayed 2 days, and his word convinces them that he is the savior of the world.

We see the growth in faith in this passage. Jesus starts out as a Jew, then becomes a prophet, then the Messiah, then finally and most importantly, the savior. Through the conversation of one outcast woman with Jesus, and her willingness to bring others to Jesus, and whole nation is ‘harvested’ and believe in Jesus, the giver of eternal life.

When I read this passage, I am always reminded of our own journey in faith. We were baptized with the living water, brought into the church with the Trinitarian formula of Father, Son, and Spirit. Initially, we know nothing and are brought to faith by people who are like the Samaritan woman and share the living water of Christ so we can appreciate this great gift of God, and so we can to grow in our understanding of faith. As children, we have a limited understanding of Jesus. As our minds and bodies grow and mature, we hopefully leave behind these simple childlike ways of understanding Jesus and come to a mature faith. Jesus is more than just a good man, more than a prophet, more than a healer, more than a Messiah, that he is the savior of the world.

When we understand and interiorize Jesus as the savior, the one who conquers sin and death, the one who offers eternal life, we come to understand that Jesus is the one who gives us life; that is, he is the one who gives us peace, happiness, and meaning in this life as well as eternal life. Just as we need water to survive, we need this living water to survive eternally. He is the one who gives us hope in a world torn by strife, discord, and sin. In this day and age, we need the hope that all is not lost, that there is more than what we see, and in the end, if we persevere, we will inherit eternal life. Now, that is something worth sharing. Can we be like the Samaritan and share this living water with others?

Fr. Phil