Read the passage several times through, slowly and prayerfully. It might help to use your imagination to picture the scene. At the end of the text you will find helpful background information in our ‘Setting the Scene’ section.

As you read, look out for shockers and blockers.

Shockers – a phrase, word, image or something from the text that resonates, stands out or connects with you.

Blockers – something from the text that raises questions for you.

John 4.4–26

This time he had to go through Samaria, and on his way he came to the town of Sychar. It was near the field that Jacob had long ago given to his son Joseph. The well that Jacob had dug was still there, and Jesus sat down beside it because he was tired from travelling. It was noon, and after Jesus’ disciples had gone into town to buy some food, a Samaritan woman came to draw water from the well. Jesus asked her, “Would you please give me a drink of water?” “You are a Jew,” she replied, “and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink of water when Jews and Samaritans won’t have anything to do with each other?” Jesus answered, “You don’t know what God wants to give you, and you don’t know who is asking you for a drink. If you did, you would ask me for the water that gives life.”

“Sir,” the woman said, “you don’t even have a bucket, and the well is deep. Where are you going to get this life-giving water? Our ancestor Jacob dug this well for us, and his family and animals got water from it. Are you greater than Jacob?” Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will get thirsty again. But no one who drinks the water I give will ever be thirsty again. The water I give is like a flowing fountain that gives eternal life.”

The woman replied, “Sir, please give me a drink of that water! Then I won’t get thirsty and have to come to this well again.” Jesus told her, “Go and bring your husband.” The woman answered, “I don’t have a husband.”

“That’s right,” Jesus replied, “you’re telling the truth. You don’t have a husband. You have already been married five times, and the man you are now living with isn’t your husband.” The woman said, “Sir, I can see that you are a prophet. My ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews say Jerusalem is the only place to worship.”

Jesus said to her: Believe me, the time is coming when you won’t worship the Father either on this mountain or in Jerusalem. You Samaritans don’t really know the one you worship. But we Jews do know the God we worship, and by using us, God will save the world. But a time is coming, and it is already here! Even now the true worshipers are being led by the Spirit to worship the Father according to the truth. These are the ones the Father is seeking to worship him. God is Spirit, and those who worship God must be led by the Spirit to worship him according to the truth.

The woman said, “I know that the Messiah will come. He is the one we call Christ. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” “I am that one,” Jesus told her, “and I am speaking to you now.”

Contemporary English Version (CEV)

Setting the Scene

Women usually carried out daily chores in a group for mutual protection as well as making the journey more tolerable and interesting, going to the well early in the morning to avoid the heat. This woman is alone, and at the well at noon. The implication is that this woman was ostracized by the rest because of her immorality.
‘You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan’: there had been long-standing and bitter antipathy between Jews and Samaritans. Pious Jews would travel around Samaria to avoid defilement, but for Jesus defilement comes from within, not from the outside. Jesus sets aside 500yrs of hostility to speak to her.
On seeing this woman at the well, Jesus was expected to courteously withdraw to a distance of at least twenty feet to indicate it was safe for her to approach the well. Jesus breaks a huge social taboo by talking to a woman in a public place without witnesses.
Jews wouldn’t share vessels with Samaritans because they considered that to do so would make them unclean. So Jesus affirms her dignity and worth in asking her to serve him a drink of water.

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