Grace for the Outcast. John 4:5-42. 09/08/24.
Grace for the Outcast
John 4:5-42
Rev. Rhonda Blevins
September 8, 2024
So he came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon. A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” (His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) 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.) 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.” The woman said to him, “Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?” Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 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.” 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.” Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come back.” The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband,’ for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!” The woman said to him, “Sir, I see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.” Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 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. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” 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.” Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one who is speaking to you.” Just then his disciples came. They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman, but no one said, “What do you want?” or, “Why are you speaking with her?” Then the woman left her water jar and went back to the city. She said to the people, “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?” They left the city and were on their way to him. Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, “Rabbi, eat something.” But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” So the disciples said to one another, “Surely no one has brought him something to eat?” Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work. Do you not say, ‘Four months more, then comes the harvest’? But I tell you, look around you, and see how the fields are ripe for harvesting. The reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’ I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.” Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I have ever done.” So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. And many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.”
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Two cars were speeding along a country road, heading toward each other at a blind curve. One driver was a man, the other a woman. As it was a nice day, both drivers had their windows down enjoying the fresh, country air.
When they came to the bend, the two drivers suddenly saw each other at the last minute. Both drivers pressed their brakes, barely managing to squeeze past each other without incident. The woman yelled out at the man, “Pig!” The man yelled back to the woman, “Cow!” The man accelerated off and around the corner and crashed . . . into . . . a pig.
What do you think about that story? The woman was only trying to warn the fellow that there was a pig around the corner! The man reacted way too quickly, assuming that the woman was calling him an ugly name. Maybe you assumed the same thing?
How often do we make assumptions? How often do we believe something that isn’t true or right or accurate, simply because we don’t have all the facts? Assumptions are simply unexamined beliefs. People make assumptions all the time, often without realizing it.
Assumptions are a natural part of how our brains work. They’re kind of like shortcuts—they help the brain process information quickly:
Assumptions help us fill in information gaps based on past experiences or knowledge, enabling us to make decisions faster.
Assumptions happen because our brains are wired to recognize patterns, so when we encounter something familiar, we often assume it will behave like it did in the past.
Assumptions can arise from biases, like confirmation bias. We make assumptions that align with our beliefs, even if they aren’t accurate.
While assumptions are necessary for navigating the world, they can also lead to misunderstandings or errors in judgment, especially when they go unexamined.
Today, I want to examine some assumptions that history has made about a woman we read about today from John 4. We call her “The Samaritan Woman” or “The Woman at the Well,” and well, I think she’s been misunderstood for over two millennia.
We first meet “The Woman at the Well” when she’s coming out to draw water at midday. Now, midday is an unusual time for her to come draw water. Women usually went out en masse in the mornings to the community well to draw water, so that their families would have water for the day, and to avoid the midday heat. But our friend is going out alone. We don’t know why, but preachers like me have enjoyed making assumptions! We’ve assumed she was shunned by other women because of details about her life that will emerge.
Assumption #1: The woman at the well is an outcast.
When the woman at the well meets Jesus, and he begins to speak with her, which he is not supposed to do according to custom—he is not supposed to speak with women, and he is not supposed to speak with Samaritans. Jesus reveals things about her life, specifically, that she has had five husbands, and the one she’s with now is not her husband. Oh my! The assumptions we’ve made about this woman!
Five husbands mean she’s divorced five different men, right? I mean, that’s what we might assume in today’s world.
But this didn’t take place in “today’s world.” This story took place in a world where women were property with little agency and no power to divorce. Men could divorce. And they often divorced women because of infertility. So instead of assuming this woman was filing for divorce every chance she got, perhaps we can find our place of empathy for her, imagining that she endured five divorces because of her inability to produce children. Or maybe her five husbands died. It’s easy to jump to conclusions when we don’t have the full story.
Assumption #2: The woman at the well is a loose woman.
Now, let’s talk about the last thing Jesus names about her situation. Jesus says to her: “The one you have now is not your husband.” Ah! And now she’s “living in sin?” Strike three for this loose, outcast of a woman.
Not so fast!
There was an ancient law called “Levirate marriage”—you can read all about it in Deuteronomy 25. Levirate marriage required a man to marry his brother’s widow if the brother died without leaving a son. This practice was intended to preserve family lineage and inheritance within Israelite society. So, instead of “living in sin,” is it possible that the woman at the well was in a “Levirate marriage?” That’s a more complicated scenario, isn’t it? It’s easier for our brains to jump to conclusions.
Assumption #3: The woman at the well is “living in sin.”
Let’s review the assumptions we make about this “Woman at the Well.”
· Assumption #1: The woman at the well is an outcast.
· Assumption #2: The woman at the well is a loose woman.
· Assumption #3: The woman at the well is “living in sin.”
Wow! That’s a lot of assuming!
Can you, for a moment, place yourself in the shoes of the “Woman at the Well”? Maybe you deserve the treatment you’ve been given for 2,000 years by people reading your story. Maybe you don’t. Maybe you wish that people who like to make assumptions about you knew more of your story. Instead, you continue to live with the objectification, the shame, the rejection.
Now, find yourselves back in your own shoes. Have you ever been the victim of inaccurate assumptions? Sometimes it can be harmful, sometimes harmless.
One common experience I have is that when people find out I’m that I’m a pastor, they assume they can’t cuss around me. To that, I’ll usually say, “My profession has never prevented my husband from a well-timed expletive!”
Back to the “Woman at the Well.” Whether our assumptions about her are accurate or way off base—it doesn’t matter. Because this story isn’t really about unearned assumptions—this story is about unearned favor. This story is about Jesus’ outlandish grace.
After Jesus tells her story to her, and she confirms the details, she quickly changes the subject to the hot political topic of the day—the proper place for worship. Jesus doesn’t take the bait. The woman then says: “I know that Messiah is coming . . . when he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.” Then something remarkable happens. For the first time in recorded history, Jesus reveals himself as Messiah to this unnamed Samaritan “Woman at the Well.”
It wasn’t Peter. It wasn’t James. It wasn’t John. It wasn’t his father, Joseph. It wasn’t his mother, Mary. None of these individuals heard it first.
Jesus revealed himself as “Messiah” to this unnamed Samaritan “Woman at the Well.” This is outlandish grace!
After this dialogue, the woman returns to the city and tells everyone she meets about what happens. Maybe she’s not the outcast we think she is, because the townspeople go out to the well to meet Jesus for themselves. Here’s the result of her witness:
Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I have ever done.” So, when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. And many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.”
From that moment until now, this woman—this outcast—goes down in history as the very first evangelist of the gospel of Jesus Christ our Lord.
Despite our treatment of her in the Western Church, the Eastern Church has treated her much better. They even sainted her, calling her “Saint Photine,” the “enlightened one.” Saint Photine has a feast day each year and takes her esteemed place among the saints as the “Patron Saint of Women’s Ordination.” (I knew I liked this woman!)
What if?
What if Jesus obeyed the customs of the day and acted appropriately? He would not have spoken to this “Samaritan woman.” What if Jesus hadn’t extended grace to her? The townspeople would probably never hear about Jesus. They would probably never believe.
Remember the guy driving the car from the story I told at the beginning? If he hadn’t been so quick to make assumptions, maybe he wouldn’t have crashed into a pig.
Instead of making assumptions about people, let us be more like Jesus, slow to assume, quick to extend grace. We never know where we’ll find the next diamond in the rough.
Here’s the challenge for you this week: simply notice how many times you make assumptions about others. Notice, then say to yourself, “This is what I’ve assumed, but is it true?”
Then extend grace, because God’s outlandish grace is greater than all our sin.