The Woman of Samaria

 A Sinner's Story

Have you sinned so much that you don’t think Jesus Christ could or would ever save you?

Let me tell you about the woman of Samaria.

The Gift of God

Jesus was traveling one day and entered a town called Sychar.  It was about noon and He was tired.  As He was sitting by the town’s well of water, a woman from the city came to get some water and take it home.

When the woman drew up some water, Jesus asked her for a drink.  Knowing that she was a Samaritan and the Man before her was a Jew, she was perplexed, because Jews do not associate with Samaritans.

Questioning Him about their interaction, Jesus responded by saying, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.” John 4:10

I Who Speak to You

This began a conversation between the two that revealed the woman had 5 prior husbands and was currently living with a man out of wedlock.  As they spoke, the woman realized this Man knew things He shouldn’t and said to Him, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet.” John 4:19

The curious thing about this conversation between Jesus and the woman of Samaria, is that Jesus did not use parables as He spoke with her.  He spoke plainly about God and what God wants for His children.

The woman finally said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When He comes, He will tell us all things.” John 4:25

Jesus’ response?  “I who speak to you am He.” John 4:26

Ready to Believe

Wow!  Jesus could not be more blunt than He was being at that very moment.  He declared plainly that He was the Messiah the people were waiting for.  Because the woman of Samaria dared to believe Jesus, she became the vessel to proclaim Christ to her community and the result is that many people from the city were saved.

I think Jesus spoke plainly with this woman because she did not trust in herself.  Although she lived in the darkness of sin, there was part of her waiting for the light of the messiah.  The woman of Samaria was ready to believe and Jesus knew it.

A Perpetual Door

Let’s get back to you.

I understand that times were different back then.  It may seem that 6 men in one woman’s life is not horrible compared to today’s standards, but life was not designed that way and it has not been that way from the beginning.  As the centuries roll by, mankind has become less sensitive to the Holy Spirit and God’s intention for His creation.

Can we be honest?  What part of a life of sin is so great?  I’ve been there.  In hindsight, there was nothing but pain, confusion, and lifelong regret.  I am so glad that Jesus Christ saved me and showed me the way out of the pit I was in.  As far as my regrets, I do my best to trust them to Him.

Jesus Christ came to the earth 2000 years ago to establish a perpetual door to heaven through His suffering and death, so that everyone who enters by that door may live forever with Him in peace, love and wholeness.  It is a door that so many people since then have stumbled upon and entered, but countless more reject for a myriad of reasons.

Time to Let Go

Let me ask you again.  Have you sinned so much that you don’t think Jesus Christ could or would ever save you?  The answer is, no.

Do you know that you will not be judged by your sin?  Jesus Christ said, “Assuredly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they may utter.” Mark 3:28

What does this mean for you?  It is time to let go.  Turn your back on those things you thought were filling you up and turn to Jesus Christ.  Accept His gift of salvation.  It cost Him dearly and is a treasure that you and I can cling to as we journey through this life to the next.

The Guest List in Heaven

Don’t let sin hold you back from approaching Jesus Christ.  And do not believe the lies from those who have not yet found the door to heaven.  They are lost.  Each of them believes they know the truth about life, but they have been misled.

The apostle, Paul, said it beautifully.  “But where sin abounded, grace abounded much more, so that as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Romans 5:20-21

What we will be judged by is what we do with Jesus Christ.  If in this life, you choose to avoid Jesus Christ and never get to know Him and be known by Him, then what will you say when your name is not on the guest list in heaven which is Christ’s home?

Call on Jesus Christ

Sin can never overtake God’s grace and the life He has established for you.  You are free to choose, but don’t make that choice blindly.  Genuinely ask Jesus Christ who He is and He will show you.  Be open to hearing from Him.

We are near the end of life as we know it.  The Second Coming of Jesus Christ is at hand and many are finding what they had missed for so long.

How about you?  Forget what lays behind.  None of us can carry that baggage and you don’t have to.  Jesus Christ has made it as simple as He can because He wants you with Him when this life is over.

Call on Jesus Christ.  You will not be disappointed.

What the Bible Says

A Samaritan Woman Meets Her Messiah

Therefore, when the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John (though Jesus Himself did not baptize, but His disciples), He left Judea and departed again to Galilee.  But He needed to go through Samaria.

 So He came to a city of Samaria which is called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph.  Now Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied from His journey, sat thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour.

 A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.”  For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.

Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.

Springing Up into Everlasting Life

Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says 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 nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water?  Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?”

Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.”

In Spirit and Truth

The woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw.”

Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.”

The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.”

Jesus said to her, “You have well said, ‘I have no husband,’ for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; in that you spoke truly.”

The woman said to Him, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet.  Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship.”

Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father.  You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews.  But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him.  God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

Food to Eat

The woman said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When He comes, He will tell us all things.”

Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am He.”

And at this point His disciples came, and they marveled that He talked with a woman; yet no one said, “What do You seek?” or, “Why are You talking with her?”

The woman then left her waterpot, went her way into the city, and said to the men, “Come, see a Man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this be the Christ?”  Then they went out of the city and came to Him.

In the meantime His disciples urged Him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.”

But He said to them, “I have food to eat of which you do not know.”

Therefore the disciples said to one another, “Has anyone brought Him anything to eat?”

The Savior of the World

Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work.  Do you not say, ‘There are still four months and then comes the harvest’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest!  And he who reaps receives wages, and gathers fruit for eternal life, that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together.  For in this the saying is true: One sows and another reaps.’  I sent you to reap that for which you have not labored; others have labored, and you have entered into their labors.”

And many of the Samaritans of that city believed in Him because of the word of the woman who testified, “He told me all that I ever did.”  So when the Samaritans had come to Him, they urged Him to stay with them; and He stayed there two days. 41 And many more believed because of His own word.

Then they said to the woman, “Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard Him and we know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world.” John 4:1-42