JESUS FILLS OUR THIRST AND HUNGER
John 4:5-42
Third Sunday in Lent, Year A
Analysis by James Squire
5So he came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon. 7A 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.) 9The 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.) 10Jesus 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.” 11The woman said to him, “Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? 12Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?” 13Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 14but 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.” 15The 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.” 16Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come back.” 17The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband,’ 18for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!” 19The woman said to him, “Sir, I see that you are a prophet. 20Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.” 21Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews.
23But 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. 24God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” 25The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.” 26Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one who is speaking to you.” 27Just 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?” 28Then the woman left her water jar and went back to the city. She said to the people, 29“Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?” 30They left the city and were on their way to him. 31Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, “Rabbi, eat something.” 32But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” 33So the disciples said to one another, “Surely no one has brought him something to eat?” 34Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work. 35Do 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. 36The reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. 37For here the saying holds true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’ 38I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.” 39Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I have ever done.” 40So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. 41And many more believed because of his word. 42They 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 Wikimedia Commons
“The gift of the wellspring of eternal life is what others reap when we testify to the good news of Jesus’ death and resurrection.”
DIAGNOSIS: Drinking from the wrong well
Step 1-Initial Diagnosis (External Problem) – Endless trips to the well/store
The woman of Samaria draws water from a well (later than most), as is her custom. The disciples have gone to buy food in town and later return.
Jesus strikes up a conversation with the woman first, and the disciples later – both filled with many questions. The disciples may keep some of their questions to themselves about Jesus in his conversation with the woman, but they try to interest him in the food they bought instead. In both conversations, however, Jesus speaks of his offer of living water (to the woman) and heavenly food (to the disciples). Neither the woman nor the disciples understand.
In our modern vernacular, we often speak of thirsting and hungering for knowledge and relationship and meaning. It’s not clear that either the woman or the disciples ever grasp even this metaphor. To her credit, the woman at least is seeking understanding (vv. 9-15), though she is primarily interested in what Jesus has to offer in the value of water that permanently quenches. The disciples are simply (prejudicially) dumbfounded and astonished (v. 27) that Jesus is even talking with a Samaritan woman. They turn their conversation with Jesus to the perishable food they have bought (v. 31).
Step 2-Advanced Diagnosis (Internal Problem) – Rabbi, eat something
Our trust is limited to our own meager understandings of water and food, that which fills thirst and hunger.
The woman of Samaria recognizes that going about her life drawing lifeless water from a well is not enough to sustain her, so she is fascinated with the living water that Jesus offers, though she has her doubts about his ability to provide it (v. 11). The disciples want to feed Jesus with the food they have brought rather than letting Jesus feed them. They do not seem interested in the living water or the food that Jesus offers (v. 34).
Our own internal doubts, prejudices, and disapprovals – even in scrutinizing the company that Jesus keep are especially evident in the silent questions of the disciples: “What do you want?” “Why are you speaking with her?” (v. 7) Perhaps the first readers of John’s gospel are also susceptible to this kind of attitude, and all our attendant understandings of righteousness that we really trust. When Jesus shows interest in someone we don’t approve of, we’d like to feed him some of our food. We appeal to his sense of loyalty and honor. We think Jesus should conform to our own (false) understanding of his mission.
Step 3-Final Diagnosis (Ultimate Problem) – Thirsty/hungry forever
Where we all fail is that our thirst and hunger is so limited to perishable things, and hence we even fail to grasp the imperishable things that Jesus comes to offer with our many questions. We may even want to put God in a box of our making, where God is dependent on us, not us on God – perhaps even dismiss God’s presence altogether. And as long as we remain stuck on our water and food as the meaning of life, we remain forever thirsty and hungry – and perishing.
PROGNOSIS: Jesus, the wellspring of eternal life
Step 4-Initial Prognosis (Ultimate Solution) – Jesus’ desire to nourish us is eternal
Still, for our sake, nothing will distract Jesus from “the will of him who sent me” (v. 34). He dismisses their (our) food, but still does not discard us, in all our stubborn, thick-headed, hard-hearted failing. Instead, he follows the will to the point of death. “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work” (v. 34). His work is sowing the seeds in us (vv. 35-36), for the sake of “gathering fruit for eternal life.” Jesus’ own thirst and hunger is to establish a relationship with us. His desire is to abide with us (14:17, 15:4-10), even in our perishing state. We are those for whom he is willing to go all out, even unto death on a cross, for in his death and resurrection, he gives us his wellspring of eternal life (v. 14).
Step 5-Advanced Prognosis (Internal Solution) – Eat this bread, drink this cup
Because Jesus is the bread of life and the living water that never perishes, we eat and drink in trust and hope. We still need to go to the grocery store and make sure the water bill is paid – endlessly recurring tasks in both cases. But Jesus’ dying and rising for us gives us something deeper to sink our teeth into and quench our thirst. For all our recalcitrant stubbornness, Jesus is relentless in mercy. The Samaritan woman, by this story’s end, shows some signs that she is ready to trust Jesus to change her life (v. 29). The disciples may have some further journey to the cross to find the depths of that relentless mercy and all its hope, even beyond boarded doors (20:19-28). But for them all, and for us as well, faith turns to Christ as our food and drink! (20:29-31).
Step 6-Final Prognosis (External Solution) – Endless testimony to the source of eternal life
The woman of Samaria is not a person of our own petty prejudicial condemnation. She is our constant invitation to join in the fun. After all, Jesus sowed a seed in each of us, begging us to reap the benefit of eternal life, “so that sower and reaper may rejoice together” (v. 36). She invites her friends and neighbors to join her in that trust (vv. 30, 39-42).
Whatever else the woman of Samaria may have understood, she certainly is an excellent evangelist. She even shares her news in such a way as to point away from herself (v. 42). It is the good news that is most important, not the one proclaiming it. Likewise, for us, “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” (v. 37). Jesus sowed that we may reap; through our outreach, Jesus sows so that others may reap. The gift of the wellspring of eternal life is what others reap when we testify to the good news of Jesus’ death and resurrection. Through our testimony, the Holy Spirit (or Advocate – 15:26-16:15) will sow the seed. That is the food that Jesus offers us. It gives us eternal life, and we thirst and hunger endlessly to share it.
