As I was rushing out the front door of the parsonage in Polson, Mt. twenty some years ago, I turned to yell to my family... "I Love You". From down the block a stranger turned and called back... "I Love You Too!!"
One doesn't expect to have such intimate exchanges between strangers on the street. But how refreshing! How refreshing...
When the Samaritan woman met the man at the well. She had no idea that she was about to be transported into an extremely intimate conversation that would cover closely guarded secrets from her personal life as well as her strongly held religious convictions. She went to the well to get some water to take care of the needs of the day and instead had an encounter with Jesus... this Jesus we love, this Jesus we follow. And in that encounter she would be changed forever.
This woman has gotten a seriously bad rap over the years. By some she's considered to be a loose woman, a woman of questionable virtue and character. All because she has had several husbands and the man she's living with is not her husband. I think we need to examine her situation in order to really understand the incredible encounter that she had with Jesus.
We need to know that a woman who was divorced in Jesus' day and culture didn't have a choice in the matter. The power to divorce only belonged to the man, the woman was really seen more as property... property that was transferred from father to husband. A remnant of that still remains in many modern marriage ceremonies... "Who gives this woman to be married to this man?"
Richard Lowery, in the Lenten Bible Study we're using on Tuesdays, points out that... "In the ancient world, women's economic security depended on their marriage. Divorce normally was a one-sided affair, with the husband calling all the shots. That she has been divorced so many times and is now with a man who is not really her husband indicates that that she is in a very precarious economic position. It is even possible that she is a debt slave who has been designated as a concubine for the householder. In other words, he is "not really your husband." While she very likely would have suffered the disdain of others, it is most likely that she had little control over her own sexuality and therefore her own social and economic status. Her unusually high number of husbands is a sign not of her "loose morals," but of her vulnerable social-economic status." (2011 Lenten Bible Study - Dr. Richard Lowery - General Ministries of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ))
So, here we find a woman... a woman who is in a vulnerable position in life... coming to the well and meeting 1) a stranger, 2) a Jew, 3) a man. On all three counts she is meeting someone with whom she ought to feel uncomfortable at best. Normally, this encounter would have been a few moments of awkward silence... but not today, not with Jesus.
Jesus has a way of cutting to the chase... would you mind getting me a drink of water? Her response is telling... 'How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?' I don't know if we're able to fully wrap our minds around the huge chasm that ought to separate these two people... I tried my darnedest to come up with a modern equivalent of the difference between this woman and Jesus... but none of them measured up... How is it that you, a member of the Taliban, ask me, a teacher of 'Women's Studies' at Wellesley College for advice on dating? How is it that you, a member of the KKK, ask me, Malcolm 'X' directions to the best Jazz joint in Harlem?
Actually, I think those get close to what a huge deal this is for this particular woman to have a friendly encounter with Jesus at the well in Samaria. It's mind blowing. Or at least it ought to be... She can't understand it. But then, she doesn't yet know who it is that she has met by the well. That will unfold as the story progresses.
So... we have this woman, vulnerable, bruised by life's unfortunate consequences... meeting Jesus in the middle of an average day, doing average chores.
And then, they talk... and as they talk, it all comes out... her life is very different from Jesus' - she's been in and out of relationships, her faith is different than Jesus and the Disciples... while the Jews center their faith life in the temple, her people center their faith life on this mountain. She and Jesus have little in common really. And yet, Jesus offers her 'living water'. Jesus offers her a connection with God that has been absent from her life up to this point. Jesus offers her an encounter with the grace of God by acknowledging to her that he is indeed the one sent by God, the one they'd been anticipating. And here's the kicker... he comes, not as royalty, not as a high and mighty priest in Jerusalem, not as some high mucky muck political leader who is unapproachable... but as just some guy standing by the well, needing a drink. That's the miracle of the incarnation... God is found in some guy you just happen to meet on the street, some stranger who surprises you with grace.
The Samaritan woman had no inkling that her life was about to change forever. But it did.
And it can happen to us.
The woman came to the well. She was reduced to absolute honesty. All the secrets she wanted to hide were trotted out in front of God, and... do you notice something here... there was no judgement. Simply being known, truly known, is sometimes the greatest miracle of all. We all hide stuff. We all have bits of ourselves that we never reveal... thoughts, circumstances, mistakes, ugliness, victimization, abuse, pain, regrets. Stuff that we would rather be left off the table. And God comes in, sees all the stuff we thought we could keep hidden and says... "Oh that? I've always known about that, child. Don't worry... don't worry."
The man at the well was the presence of God. And that same presence is available to us. The woman came, was seen in all honesty and then she was given grace. We come, we are seen in all honesty and we are given grace.
Some people wonder why I never preach about the punishment and cost of sin. Why do I always talk about grace and love. I've thought long and hard about that... and here's my answer. Because you're preaching that to yourself everyday of your life. You never quite measure up, you never fully become the person you were supposed to be when you grow up, you are lacking, lacking, lacking. People don't have to be reminded that they mess up. We know we mess up. They need to be reminded that the man at the well, the Word made flesh, this Jesus in whose name millions of people around the world are gathered... came and touched people who never thought they would ever be counted worthy... and called them 'child of God'. I don't see the judgement and rejection in the teachings of Jesus. I see just the opposite... you are loved, you have always been loved and you will always be loved.
And that's what this woman experienced on that day long ago when she met the man by the well. It matters not that the rest of the world calls you names, rejects you, whispers behind your back... the man by the well is waiting, he knows you, really knows you, and still he loves you.