“Go and get your husband,” Jesus told her “I don’t have a husband,” the woman replied. Jesus said, “You’re right! You don’t have a husband — for you have had five husbands, and you aren’t even married to the man you’re living with now. You certainly spoke the truth!” “Sir,” the woman said, “you must be a prophet. So tell me, why is it that you Jews insist that Jerusalem is the only place of worship, while we Samaritans claim it is here at Mount Gerizim, where our ancestors worshiped?” (John 4:16-20 NLT)Through my almost four decades of ministry, it has always been funny in dealing with people with obvious moral problems.
Jesus is talking to a woman at a well. She is obviously an outsider, since she is coming at a time when no one else is there. Most women used the well as a gathering place to talk and visit. She was alone, which indicates she had no friends.
Jesus asks her for a drink. Jewish men did not speak with non-Jewish women. She was Samaritan, which was a mixed-race group of people inside Israel which were looked down on.
When he asked her to go get her husband, she simpers like a young woman. I don’t have a husband. Jesus said, you have that correct. You’ve had five and are living with a man now.
This is a woman with relationship problems. And she was astonished by both his discernment and his straightforward commenting on her life.
Like so many people with similar lives, she tries to redirect Jesus away from her personal life. She does it in a way that people try to do with preachers. She asks a theological question.
She figures that if she can get him onto something else, he will sit and talk then she can leave.
But instead, he gives her a brief answer and tells her that God is a Spirit, and those who worship him worship him in Spirit and in truth.
He goes on to a couple of other things and it baffles her. He seems truly interested in her.
She tells him that she knows that the Messiah will come and explain things the way he is right now. In her mind, the Messiah will be a person who will care about her and want her to know about God.
Then he does something amazing. He tells her that he is the Messiah (v26). This is the first time he confesses this and he tells it to a woman in an immoral lifestyle.
And he doesn’t come down on her like a ton of bricks, condemning and castigating her for her obvious sin. He just talks to her.
That is what the Messiah would do, just talk to people. He wouldn’t scream and thunder and castigate and condemn. He would love and talk.
People are dying for someone to love them and to talk to them.
When we bring the Messiah and the grace of God into people’s lives, we should do it like Jesus: talking and loving.
People have enough condemnation and, quite frankly, expect any Christian to add to it.
That is not what Jesus did.
No comments:
Post a Comment
To comment, post your comment and click the anonymous button. It would be nice if you signed it so I could know who you are.
You are welcome to say anything you want as long as it is nice. If I don't like it, or it is ugly, I will take it off, place it into the garbage disposal, grind it up, and allow it to be flushed into the Gulf of Mexico where it will be eaten by a fish and then excreted where it will lie on the bottom of the ocean until it is covered up by other comments.