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Back to the Well
The woman took the hint and left. In her confusion she left her water pot. Back in the village she told the people, "Come see a man who knew all about the things I did, who knows me inside and out. Do you think this could be the Messiah?" And they went out to see for themselves.
John 4:28-30 (The Message)
John 4:28-30 (The Message)
I'll take you back always, and
Even when the pain is coming through
Even when the pain is coming through
Even when the pain is coming through
I'll take you back
From "Take You Back" by Jeremy Camp
It was the hottest part of the day when the woman went out for water. She would have gone out early in the morning, while it was still cool, as everyone else in town had the sense to do, but she wasn't exactly the most loved person in town. She could no longer bear the mocking whispers, the cold stares, and the sideways glances, so she resigned herself to the brutal heat of the noonday sun.
As the woman neared the well, she was dismayed to see a man sitting beside it. It was evident that he was tired. She decided that she would do what she normally did when she happened to see someone at the well. She would keep her head down, avoid eye-contact, draw her water as fast as she could, and then head back home.
"Would you give me a drink of water?" the man asked.
The woman looked at the man and noticed that he was a Jew. What is he doing in Sychar? she wondered. "How come you, a Jew, are asking me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?" she asked him.
"If you knew the generosity of God and who I am, you would be asking me for a drink, and I would give you fresh, living water," the man replied.
The encounter was starting to get weird. The man asked the woman for water and then said that she should be the one asking him for water. "Sir, you don't even have a bucket to draw with, and this well is deep. So how are you going to get this 'living water'?" she asked, somewhat annoyed.
"Everyone who drinks this water will get thirsty again and again. Anyone who drinks the water I give will never thirst - not ever. The water I give will be an artesian spring within, gushing fountains of endless life," the man replied.
The woman pondered the concept for a moment and imagined how nice it would be to never need water again. No longer would she have to go to the well day after day. No longer would she have to choose between the judgmental glances of the townspeople or the merciless heat of the midday sun. Though the prospect seemed too good to be true, she could not let it pass her by. "Sir, give me this water so I won't ever get thirsty, won't ever have to come back to this well again!" she said to the man.
"Go call your husband and then come back," the man said.
The woman felt a twinge in the pit of her stomach. "I have no husband," she said.
"That's nicely put: 'I have no husband.' You've had five husbands, and the man you're living with now isn't even your husband. You spoke the truth there, sure enough," the man said.
The woman suddenly felt her heart leap into her throat as the rest of her body went numb. How did he know? she wondered.1
As Catherine led us in the meditation on the story, I placed myself in the shoes of the woman who went to draw water. I imagined walking to the well in the noontime heat, carrying a heavy water jar. I imagined meeting Jesus at the well and finding myself in a conversation with Him. I imagined Jesus' asking me a question related to a particular sore spot in my life. I imagined offering a quick answer, only to hear Jesus bring up something I'm hesitant to discuss with people.
The Ignatian exercise was followed by a half hour of solitude and reflection. I went outside, sat down on a bench at the church playground, and continued to reflect on the story.
We typically make a lot of assumptions about the Woman at the Well. We assume that, because she had been married five times and was living with a man to whom she was not married, she must have been promiscuous or adulterous. It is likely that there was much about her situation that she could not control.
The story tells us that the woman was married five times, but it does not tells us why she was married five times. Maybe some of her husbands died, or maybe some of them abandoned her. The Jewish Law, which the Samaritans also followed, made provisions for a man to divorce his wife if "she does not please him because he finds something objectionable about her,"4 and some men had rather broad definitions of the phrase something objectionable.5 There were no such provisions for women, who were pretty much treated as property in those days.6 The woman's current living arrangements were by no means ideal, but they were preferable to life on the streets.
Whatever the reason for the woman's situation, it was a source of shame that alienated the woman from everyone else in town.
I suppose the story of the Woman at the Well resonates with me because I too carry around a lot of shame. I am not the person I want everyone to think I am. I want everyone to think I'm intelligent, insightful, and spiritual, but, on the inside, I feel like a malignant, tangled mess of inadequacy, frustration, resentment, selfishness, and rage.
Typically we assume that, when Jesus asked the woman about her husband, He was confronting her about her sinfulness. I think that maybe Jesus brought up the source of the her shame because He wanted her to know that He already knew what she wanted to hide from Him and that He still accepted her.
The woman quickly changed the subject, and the conversation continued. She began to believe that the man with whom she was speaking was the long-awaited Messiah. She left her water jar at the well, went back to the town, and told the townspeople - the very same people she had done her damnedest to try to avoid - about the person she had just met. Because of the woman, many of the townspeople met Jesus for themselves and began to believe in Him as well.7
Jesus accepted the woman as she was. He did not fix her situation for her, but he gave her a reason to overcome her shame, and she was reconciled to her community.
I shared my observations with the other people who attended the prayer service, but the lesson was solidified for me after I went home for the evening. I had some problems with my phone, and, as I am wont to do in such situations, I lost my temper. I experience an inordinate number of technical problems for someone who works with computers professionally, and it seems like something inevitably goes wrong with everything I own. I oscillate between believing that God loves me and thinking that God must have it out for me. I went to bed, feeling utterly disgusted with myself. If God hated me, God had a good reason. I remembered what I learned during the service, and the lesson became even more clear to me.
God knows everything we have ever done, good or bad;
God knows everything we hate about ourselves, rightfully or wrongfully;
God knows everything we don't want anyone else to know about us;
and absolutely none of it makes God love us any less.
Sometimes God's grace can seem too good to be true. It can seem radical and even heretical to think that God accepts us when we find ourselves so utterly unacceptable. It is when we feel most unlovable that we need to remember God's love the most. May you, dear reader, know that God loves you, even when you struggle to love yourself.
Grace strikes us when we are in great pain and restlessness. It strikes us when we walk through the dark valley of a meaningless and empty life. It strikes us when we feel that our separation is deeper than usual, because we have violated another life, a life which we loved, or from which we were estranged. It strikes us when our disgust for our own being, our indifference, our weakness, our hostility, and our lack of direction and composure have become intolerable to us. It strikes us when, year after year, the longed-for perfection of life does not appear, when the old compulsions reign within us as they have for decades, when despair destroys all joy and courage. Sometimes at that moment a wave of light breaks into our darkness, and it is as though a voice were saying: "You are accepted. You are accepted, accepted by that which is greater than you, and the name of which you do not know. Do not ask for the name now; perhaps you will find it later. Do not try to do anything now; perhaps later you will do much. Do not seek for anything; do not perform anything; do not intend anything. Simply accept the fact that you are accepted!"
~ Paul Tillich, The Shaking of the Foundations
~ Paul Tillich, The Shaking of the Foundations
For additional thoughts on the story of the Woman at the Well, see the following posts:
- "Bigger, Better Band-aids" (2017 Lenten Perspective)
- "A Simple Act of Inclusion" (2016 Introspection)
- "For All Who Are Thirsty" (2014 Sermon)
Notes:
- This narrative is based on John 4:5-18. Dialogue was taken from The Message.
- http://www.theanchorage.org/
- https://www.ignatianspirituality.com/ignatian-prayer/the-spiritual-exercises/what-are-the-spiritual-exercises
- Deuteronomy 24:1-2 (NRSV)
- Rob Bell. "Jesus and Divorce." Mars Hill Bible Church podcast, 07/11/2010.
- Tripp Fuller and Nathanael Welch. "Politics, Musical Theater, and the Woman at the Well." Homebrewed Christianity's Theology Nerd podcast, 04/06/17.
- John 4:19-42
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