When Israel was wandering in the wilderness after their deliverance from Egypt, time and time again, they spiritually fell away, but time and time again, through His chosen Prophet Moses, God miraculously delivered them. One time, the People of Israel were in danger of perishing from thirst. They found no water in the harsh, parched, merciless desert.

Forgetful, fickle, and ungrateful, they lost their faith, as they lost their way, and they murmured against God and His Prophet; but God, once again, would provide. God instructed Moses to take his staff and strike the rock crosswise. Moses did as God told him, and immediately and miraculously, water gushed forth from the rock, washing, cleansing, refreshing, rejuvenating, and delivering His People.

As He gave them the manna from Heaven to deliver them from starvation, so God gave them water from the rock to deliver them from thirst. God delivered them from danger and death, and God redeemed them from their faithlessness and wanton ways.

In Israel, we see the prefigurement of the Church, and in Christ, we have deliverance and redemption--even though we, too, are ungrateful, undeserving, and unworthy. Jesus Christ, indeed, is our Rock, our Saviour, Deliverer, and Redeemer.

In today's appointed passage on the Samaritan Woman, Jesus pastorally and lovingly waits for a certain person in the hot sun. He does this because no one goes to draw water in the merciless midday sun; after all, it is too hot and unbearable--no one that is, unless you are someone who does not want to be seen and wants to avoid others. And sure enough, such a person comes; but this person is unique, and unbeknownst to her, she will be uniquely chosen.

This person in question is a woman, and she is not any ordinary woman. She is a Samaritan and a woman of ill-repute. In those days, Jews had nothing to do with Samaritans. They were considered heretics, foreigners, and race polluters. Moreover, this Samaritan woman had had many men and was scandalous. She would have been considered an untouchable to be shunned, impugned, and avoided.

She was clearly ostracized, marginalized, and alienated. She could never go to draw water when others were there. If she had, they would have abused her and not have allowed her to draw, but water is not just for cleansing and refreshment, it is indispensable for life, and so she had to come nevertheless; Thus, she came when no one else would be there to harass or stop her. She came to the well that was more important to the Jews than she was, for water was everything, and she was nothing.

However, there would be a Jew waiting for her this time, and this Jew was also a man and a Rabbi, and although she was a woman, a Samaritan, and a sinner, He was, notwithstanding, patiently waiting for her. Jews had nothing to do with Samaritans, men looked down upon women, and Rabbis shunned those of ill repute, but Jesus would obliterate all barriers to come to meet, know, and save the person.

Wisely, and pastorally, Jesus asks a drink of the woman. By beholding Himself to her, He drops the conspicuous gender, ethnic, and religious barriers between them. Then, she trusts and confesses to Him. He listens and accepts her, for He did not come to judge, condemn, and punish her, but rather to redeem her. Thereupon, Jesus continues to lead her spiritually by building upon what they have in common rather than emphasizing their obvious differences.

Gradually, Jesus would lead her by means of the familiar and transitory and introduce her to the transcendent and eternal. She had come for water that refreshes, washes, and sates for the moment, but Jesus would introduce her to the water that gives purification, renewal, and life eternal. He would take her from the present and the terrestrial to the eternal and the celestial. He would help her rise above her condition and status to become a new creation, a new being, and a child of God.

As Israel from Egypt, He would free her from the chains of custom and convention, bring her from the darkness to light, and deliver her from death to life. The water she sought was necessary for now, but it was not sufficient for life eternal. Jesus the Word, as the Water of Life, was there to show her and give her This Water, and He would, moreover, ordain her to bring her people to This Water, This Life-giving Spring, Who came from the Sources of Israel.

As the Teacher, Jesus taught her that she, a Samaritan, like the Jews, worshiped a material and temporal place. At one time, this was necessary, but this was no longer sufficient. She must now worship in spirit for eternity. For what is an earthly place compared to Heaven? What is flesh and blood compared to water and Spirit? What is time compared to eternity?

That which is born above in water and Spirit is for eternity and infinity. That which is born of flesh and blood is for a time and finitude. Jesus guides her from the local to the universal, from the material to the spiritual, from the present to the future, and from earth to Heaven.

Instructively, the well and the water are for this transitory life, and Jacob’s well is for a place and a memory for a people, but this all pointed to Jesus Christ as the Rock and Water for eternal life, for Heaven, and for the future of all peoples in all places; and now, mysteriously, Jesus had a purpose for Fotini, as past and future, man and woman, Jew and non-Jew met in the present at the anointed place of Jacob’s Well—an historical place that would providentially auger the future.

Yes, the Samaritan Woman would meet at a physical place, but Jesus would meet her at her spiritual and emotional place, and lead her to the higher, transcendent, universal, and eternal truth, as the One Who is the Truth, and enlighten her, in order to empower her to be an “apostle” to the Samaritans, and she, in turn, would lead the Samaritans to Jesus, the Light and the Truth. She would lead her people to Jesus, their Lord and God, the Source of the Springs of Israel and Life Eternal.

When Jesus’s Disciples returned and found Him conversing with a Samaritan Woman, they were amazed, for Jews had nothing to do Samaritans, and moreover, as a Rabbi, he was speaking with a woman. However, they still thought ignorantly in material terms of flesh and blood and not in Spirit and Truth.

Foreshadowing what was to come and God’s plan for her to be a living vessel of salvation to others, Fotini left her water pot at the well. One could not do without one’s water pot, for how else in those days could one retrieve water, and water is indispensable to life. Thus, she signaled that she would return, and return she did, with those from her village, and together, they would return to the well they knew in order to come to know the Well they hitherto did not know—The Well of Life.

Ignorant of what their Master had set in progress, the Disciples were urging their Master to eat, and then, to their amazement, Fotini had returned, but she did not return alone. She returned with the people from her village, dressed in their traditional white, and thereupon, Jesus told His Disciples to look up and see the fields of these people “white for the harvest.”

As Jesus had told them when they urged Him to eat, His food is to do the Will of the Father Who sent Him. Likewise, their food is to reap the harvest of these peoples ripe in their white garments that He sowed, and thus, by His example, they, too, must likewise sow and thereby reap, for you reap what you sow.

Just as the woman was chosen; the place was chosen. Jacob’s Well given to Joseph, who did not just deliver Israel from the famine, but delivered all nations from the famine, was the proper place and setting for this lesson to His Disciples. Joseph was a Type of Christ who was delivered by God from the tomb of the well to deliver his people and all peoples. Christ rose from the rock of His Tomb to give all peoples a new drink from which they will never thirst, for that water will become a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.

                                                                       In our Risen Lord,

                                                                                                          †Father Jim