Sermon

May 6, 2007

The Woman at the Well

An exegesis-A Spiritual rather than a Material Approach to Jesus

by Fr. Stavros N. Akrotirianakis

Look at the Gospel lesson as printed in the bulletin, I will refer to it throughout.

One of the many positive qualities of Christ was that He was a good teacher. He taught with His life and His words, with love and compassion. Throughout the Gospels, we see Him approach different people on their own level. For instance, to Nicodemus, a Jewish leader, He taught by quoting the scriptures, because Nicodemus was a learned man. He used pastoral images when speaking to shepherds and images of the sea for fishermen. He gave signs to those who needed signs, miracles to those who needed miracles and challenges to those who needed to be challenged. In this morning’s Gospel lesson, Jesus encountered a woman of Samaria sitting by a well, and being that she was uneducated, but curious, He used simple words and was patient in drawing her out to learn by figuring things out, rather than by just dictating to her.

Because of growing opposition by the Pharisees, Jesus leaves Judea and goes to Galilee, which is north of Judea. (John 4:3) Galilee was largely a Gentile population, and Jesus going there is symbolic of the fact that His ministry is for the world, not just His own Jewish people. It also represents His rejection by His own people. Samaria was a region between Judea and Galilee and the Jews and Samaritans were sworn enemies.

Jesus is tired and thirsty from His journey, representative of His full humanity. He encounters a woman of Samaria sitting by the well and asks her for a drink. (4:7) Jesus initiates a conversation with the woman. He has read her heart, and knows she is searching for truth. He wants to provoke her to think beyond the immediate material world because He wants to reveal Himself to her. He wants to heal her of her passions.

The Samaritan woman is surprised at the request of Jesus and asks, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?” (4:9) Jesus answers her by giving her some information to make her wonder further, without revealing to her who He actually is. He wants her to come to that conclusion on her own. He says, “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” (4:10). In the ordinary sense, living water could have been understood to be flowing water, like from a stream as opposed to a well. Symbolically, it represents true life from God, who is the fountain of life.

The Samaritan woman, however, answers in a materialistic way, “You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do you get that living water?” (4:11) She begins to think and wonders if Jesus is someone special, and asks, “Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself?” (4:12)

Jesus wants to tell her, “Yes, I am,” but he refrains from that because she is still not in sync with him. She is still thinking materially. He wants to give her another chance to rise higher to the spiritual level, so He says, “Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again. But whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. The water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up to everlasting life.” (4:13-14)

The woman still doesn’t get it—all she can think of is her material convenience: “Sir,” she says, “give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here again to draw.” (4:15) In other words, it’s hard work drawing water in the heat of the desert, where can I get the free water? Imagine the frustration of Christ and the pain in His heart that His creation has fallen so far, that they are unable to connect with Him any more, even when He stands in front of them, conversing with them, even when He gives them all the hints as to His identity.

Jesus shifts His dialogue from the spiritual to the material and says to her, “Go call your husband.” (4:16). She answers, “I have no husband.” (4:17) Then, Jesus delivers the major jolt: “You are right in saying you have no husband, for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband, in that you have spoken truly.” (4:17-18) This wakes her up. She says, “I perceive that you are a prophet.” (4:19) Now Samaritans did not accept any prophet after Moses, so in thinking Jesus is a prophet, she opens the door to discuss the burning dispute over the prophets between the Jews and the Samaritans.

She says, “Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship.” (4:20). She now wants to know where is the proper place to worship God. She is now the one leading the dialogue. She is now opening the door for Jesus to teach her.

Jesus begins to teach her that the hour is coming, (4:21) meaning the hour of His death on the cross, when the sacrifice will be made once for all, and will supplant the necessity for any temple anywhere. The idea that worship must be performed only at a specific place of revelation, like Mount Zion, will give way to His revolutionary teaching about worship in spirit and truth. Jews and Samaritans historically argued where true worship should take place—Jesus says that true worship is tied to the spirit, not a location. (4:21-24).

The Samaritan woman hears truth spoken and she marvels. Her eyes now begin to open and her heart is burning. She says, “I know the Messiah is coming, who is called Christ. When He comes, He will tell us all things.” (4:25). Now, she is ready for the fullness of the truth and the truth is revealed to her. Jesus says, “I am He who is speaking to you.” (4:26) In the Old Testament, the name by which God revealed Himself was Yahweh, meaning, “I am.” By saying “I am He who is speaking to You,” Jesus is using the same name revealed by God to Abraham (Genesis 17:1) and Moses (Exodus 3:14). Jesus is more than a prophet and more than the Jewish Messiah; indeed He is the Incarnate God Himself.

About this time, the disciples arrive and they marvel that He is speaking with a woman, because this was not done. The woman leaves her water-pot and goes into the city and says to the people she finds, “Come and see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?” (4:29) In doing this, she becomes the first evangelist, the first person to bring the good news of Christ to others. Later, history tells us, she was baptized and named Photini, the one who illuminates. She was later martyred by being thrown down a well, and is a saint of the church.

Now the disciples of Jesus say to Him, “Rabbi, eat.” (4:31) He tells them, “I have food to eat of which you do not know.” (4:32) As they did many times, the disciples do not understand Jesus’ words—He speaks of food to eat of which they do not know, and they react in a materialistic way. Jesus tells the Disciples to “lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest.” (4:35) It is the Samaritans that are ready for the harvest. Jesus tells the disciples, “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 labor.” (4:37-38). The sower is God the Father. Jesus is the reaper, and will also send the disciples out to reap what has been sown. As for those who “have labored,” these are the prophets, like St. John the Baptist and others, who have prepared the way of the Lord.

Many Samaritans of the city believed in Jesus because of the woman’s testimony. (4:39). They are the first to recognize Jesus as the Savior of the world. Ironically, it is not the Jews, God’s chosen people, but it is the Samaritans, the hated enemies of the Jews. The fact that the Samaritans are the first believers is representative of the fact that the Gospel is for all peoples of all nations. Also, the Samaritans don’t believe only because of the woman’s testimony, but they come out and see for themselves, and confess Jesus as “the Christ, the savior of the world.” (4:42)

Many people approach the church in the same way the Samaritan woman approached her conversation with Jesus at the well—in a materialistic, rather than a spiritual way. Our relationship with the church and indeed with God seems to be defined more and more in legalistic terms—a list of do’s and don’ts, rules to be followed, looking for exceptions to the rules, asking “what is the minimum,” and so on. We struggle with our faith, the great intangible, and salvation, which cannot be quantified or possessed. Membership in the church is more closely linked to proprietorship rather than stewardship, we see ourselves as more owners of the church than as servants of the church. And sadly, sometimes the ministry of the church is reduced to coercing and cajoling those who do not want to come to church regularly to attend more frequently, rather than ministering to those who come often with joy.

I’ve often envisioned Jesus looking down from heaven upon His churches and addressing us in the same way He addressed the Samaritan woman: “If you knew the gift of God and what it means to be an Orthodox Christian, you would be here all the time and you’d invite all your friends to come with you. You would have asked and received all of the fruits of the Spirit—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, self-control, and along with them, self-confidence, fulfillment, forgiveness, a clear conscience, the power of prayer, the gift of the Holy Spirit, and Communion with God.” What we have as Orthodox Christians is so beautiful and so powerful, and yet most of us are locked out of its beauty because we have not approached it in the right way. Perhaps many of us don’t get it, because we continue to look at Orthodox Christianity in a materialistic way. We view Orthodoxy as a convenience rather than a challenge, as a possession rather than a gift, something we’ve been entrusted. In many ways, we have made and are still making the church into things that God did not intend for it to be, and consequently, we are reaping the fruit of our labor—frustration with the church and with our selves, and a sense of estrangement from God.

Just like with the Samaritan woman, Jesus reads our hearts, He wants to provoke us to think beyond the immediate material world because He wants to reveal Himself to us and to heal us and to show us truth. But it is impossible to have such a revelation of God when we come to Him in material rather than spiritual terms. Imagine how frustrated God must be and the pain in His heart that His creation has fallen so far, that we are unable to connect with Him. We see that when the woman stopped thinking about her material convenience and began to ask questions, she became the one leading the dialogue with Jesus and was now opening the door for Jesus to teach her and to touch her life.

When we are merely reacting to the church—Well, it’s Holy Saturday, so I’ll go and receive Communion; Oh, there’s a baptism so I have to go, and so on, are we really opening the door to our hearts for Jesus to come in? And if we come in fear or obligation, are we really open to hearing the truth and experiencing an encounter with the living God?

When we maintain a materialistic attitude towards God and the church, they become like a possession, like an artifact that we take off the shelf and show other people, only to put it back in its place after showing it off. The church doesn’t become alive for us. Truth does not penetrate our hearts, Christ does not come into our souls. When we seek to lead the dialogue with God, through our own initiative and our own investment of time, that’s when we open the door of our hearts to hear the truth.

The Samaritan woman was converted when she began to look at Jesus in a spiritual way, when her ears were opened and she heard the truth, when her eyes were opened and her heart was burning, when she ran into the city and shared the good news with others, “Come and see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?”

The beauty of Orthodoxy is accessible to everyone, and this is truly a blessing. To a little baby, the church speaks with sights and sounds and smells. To the teenager, the church speaks through youth groups and camps. To those whose hearts are beset with emotions, the church offers hymns that reach us on an emotional level. To those whose minds yearn to be filled with knowledge, the church teaches us with scriptures, prayers and sermons. To those who have gone astray the church offers confession and reconciliation. To those who are in sorrow, the church offers comfort.

The Samaritan woman became the first evangelist for Christ because she invested some of her time, and she put her materialistic side away and finally began to engage Jesus in a spiritual way. When we approach Christ with a heart that is genuine, a soul that yearns to give of itself without demanding anything in return; when we come to God and ask not for material blessings but to bless us with faith, then we will know what a great gift we have in Christ and in our church. As Jesus stands over the well of your life, and asks you for a drink of what is in your heart, don’t ask, “How is it that You, ask me, for a drink?” Rather, ask Him to give you the living water of His salvation, so that you will never thirst again. Amen.