John 4:1-26:  1 Now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard, “Jesus is making and baptizing more disciples than John” 2 —although it was not Jesus himself but his disciples who baptized— 3 he left Judea and started back to Galilee. 4 But he had to go through Samaria. 5 So he came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob's well was there, and Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon. 7 A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” 8 (His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) 9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?” (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.) 10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,' you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” 11 The woman said to him, “Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? 12 Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?” 13 Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 14 but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.” 15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.” 16 Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come back.” 17 The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband'; 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!” 19 The woman said to him, “Sir, I see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.” 21 Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” 25 The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.” 26 Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one who is speaking to you.”

Can you remember a time when you were really, really thirsty? I don't mean just ordinary thirst. I mean a time when you were so thirsty you thought you would pass out.

Superstition Mountain is about an hour out of Phoenix . I was working in ShowLow, AZ between my junior and senior year in college. I took a long weekend and left the cool air of the White Mountains in northern AZ to visit some friends in the Phoenix area. I enjoyed the desert. I enjoyed climbing and hiking. My friends told me that Superstition Mountain was a nice day climb. I left before sunrise on Saturday morning, parked my car at the foot of the mountain and started my hike just as light dawned. I calculated that I would be up and down the mountain well before noon. I left my water in the car for when I returned. Water is heavy. After a rigorous climb to the top I began my descent. But, on the way down I became disoriented and lost. I walked to where I thought I had left my car and it was not there. I walked along the base for several more hours, back and forth. I thought my car had been stolen. I walked well into the late afternoon. The sun was extremely hot. My body was desperately needing water and shade. After ten hours in the desert sun I could not find either. I finally happened across an abandoned shed and laid down inside. I was dizzy and disoriented. I was so thirsty.

In our story from John we find Jesus thirsty. He had been walking a long way, in the heat of the Mediterranean sun. He sat down at the well, an old, old well, Jacob's well for that matter. But Jesus faces two problems: one, he has arrived at the well at noonday (few come out of the town to draw water in the heat of the day) and, two he has no bucket. Thirsty, tired, out in the heat of the noonday sun, and no bucket, what is Jesus to do?

Fortunately for Jesus a woman comes to draw water. She will rescue Jesus, so it appears. But it is here that the story takes a surprising turn. Who rescues whom?

The woman comes at noonday, our story goes. Commonly women draw water early in the morning or evening. Though uncommon, some womenfolk need to draw water in the “off” hours. Yet the story invites us to consider a reason for this woman to draw water in the heat of the day. She has a past. Marriages, many of them, have failed. And the man she lives with now is not her husband. We don't have the details. No matter, it's a scandalous affair from the outside looking in, for the first as well as the twenty-first century. She would prefer the heat of the sun to the “heat” of the stares and judgments of the townspeople. So she comes at noonday. She doesn't meet the women of the town. At this well she does, however, meet Jesus.

She is shocked when Jesus asks her for a drink. He is a man. She is a woman. Men don't speak to women in public places. Jesus is a Jew. She, a Samaritan. Jews despise Samaritans. He is a rabbi, a teacher, a religious type. She is one with a checkered past. Rabbis never address such a person. At this well, Jesus seems completely unconcerned about social and cultural taboos, cultural barriers and the like.

She comes, like Jesus, needing water. She too is thirsty: “Sir, give me this water” our story reads, “so that I may never be thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.” She doesn't get it. Jesus is using water to speak of something spiritual, eternal. She is still thinking of the well and the tiresome task of drawing water each day. She doesn't understand it all. She comes thirsty. That is enough. Jesus doesn't require that she grasp the entire meaning of his words, only that she receive what he offers.

The woman is again shocked when Jesus demonstrates clairvoyance: he knows her life, her five husbands as well as her present arrangement. There is no judgment, however, in Jesus' words. He simply speaks what is. And her response … she offers no defense but changes the subject to proper worship and such. Nonetheless, at this well Jesus knows the pain and shame of this person's past. At this well the woman doesn't pretend to be more than she is, broken and thirsty.

How thirsty are you today? Today we are all welcome to come to this well, of sorts, Holy Communion.

At this well, you will meet Jesus, in with and under the wafer and the wine.

At this well, barriers are down, walls dismantled, all that would pull us apart is removed.

At this well, all that is required is thirst, a thirst for forgiveness and renewal. We don't have to understand it all. We are invited to receive it. That's all.

At this well, we come broken, sinners, that is. This well is for sinners only. Thirsty sinners.

The way of Jesus can, at times, be uphill, hard, and hot. We can become dizzy, disoriented and lose our way. So come. Come to the well and drink deeply. AMEN

-Rev. Dr. Philip Johnson

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