September 9, 2012 John 4:1-30 A SAMARITAN WOMAN

Transcription

1 September 9, 2012 John 4:1-30 A SAMARITAN WOMAN It is meat and drink to do the will of him who sent me. Hmmm. That is not over my head just way beyond me. There are several dimensions to this story of the encounter between Jesus and the Samaritan woman. I think it is an astounding story. I think it is also interesting that many people miss quite a bit of the drama, and miss the implications of what is going on. On the other hand, though this has long been one of my favorite stories, I feel like I just woke up to some of the implications myself. What I am still missing I do not yet see, of course. Isn t it interesting that once we see something, from then on it seems rather obvious. But now the question is: How much of this story can I transfer on to you? Maybe you already see it all. But if so, you will love to have us talking about it again. There are three levels I hope we will talk about this morning. Level 1: The conversation between Jesus and this woman. Level 2: The backdrop of the story itself. What is a Samaritan? (And why does it matter?) Level 3: What happens as a result of this conversation between the Samaritan woman and Jesus. So let s start counting. If we get two out of three, that ain t bad, we sometimes say but in this case, that isn t good enough. Three levels. Let s see if we can get all three. LEVEL 1.) THE CONVERSATION. As it happens, the conversation Jesus is having with this woman has several levels. She is really smart. Smart and quick and far more than meets the eye. It is possible, even probable, that what meets the eye is pretty interesting too, physically speaking sexually speaking. And the story starts out with this Samaritan woman thinking that Jesus wants to pick her up. At least that s how I read it. BRUCE VAN BLAIR 2012 All rights reserved. PAGE 1 OF 10

2 But let s back up. The disciples have gone into town to get some supplies. Jacob s well is a quarter of a mile to the southeast of Shechem. So we are north of Jerusalem and south of Galilee, in the heart of Samaritan territory, which is also the heartland of the Northern Kingdom of Israel. But that was all seven hundred years before Jesus. In any case, this famous well is not far from Shechem. On the other hand, it is a long way to carry water, and far enough away from town that nobody from town would hear or know what was going on at the well. It is noon, the story says. Jesus is sitting by the well, but has no vessel with which to draw water. (The well is 75 to 105 feet deep, depending on the season.) The village nearby is called Shechem, which means shoulder. It is right on the shoulder of Mount Gerazim. Samaritans have their temple on Mount Gerazim. The road to Samaria, capital of the Northern Kingdom of Israel in former times, runs between Mount Ebal and Mount Gerazim. We are in the heartland of Samaritan territory. Why would Jesus even be here? While Jesus is sitting beside the well, a Samaritan woman comes to draw water from the well. The plot thickens. Why is she coming at noon? Most women would come in the early morning to get water for the day. They might come again in the evening to get water for the night. But who comes at noon? Somebody who wants to avoid the other women. Somebody who doesn t fit in very well with the rest of the village. This woman has a dubious reputation. So the conversation begins. Jesus asks the woman for a drink. It is surprising that a Jewish man would even speak to a Samaritan woman. Even more surprising, He asks her for a favor. Asking for a favor acknowledges her as a person of worth, someone with whom He is willing to associate. She is amazed. You, a Jew, ask for a drink from a Samaritan woman? The animosity between Jews and Samaritans was great (and we shall say more of it later). Not only is it strange that a Jewish man would even speak to a Samaritan, never mind a Samaritan woman, but He asks her for a favor? Even more astounding: This woman can only draw water with vessels she has brought with her. If Jesus takes a drink from her, it will break every kosher law of Judaism because, from standard Jewish perspective, she is unclean and anything she touches is unclean. The vessels she eats or drinks from are unclean. While we are on the subject, the Samaritans will end up inviting Jesus and His disciples to spend two days with them. Two days of BRUCE VAN BLAIR 2012 All rights reserved. PAGE 2 OF 10

3 hospitality, of conversation yes. But also of food and drink and sleeping quarters days of togetherness that are obviously forbidden by kosher laws. The disciples must have been troubled to be drawn in on this mission. But there it is. Following Jesus gets us into places we would never go if it were not for the bonds of loyalty and allegiance we have with Him. Anyway, this woman is intrigued by Jesus. Is this man a blatant hypocrite, more interested in a little drink on a hot day than he is in the Torah the Covenant of his people? What else is he interested in? Most women think they know what most men really want. Of course that isn t really true, except maybe about 85% of the time. So this woman is alert, and she starts to tease Jesus about His morals and the religious disputes between Jews and Samaritans, and I suspect that the banter between them has sexual overtones from the beginning, until Jesus moves beyond it. This woman may not be in good standing in her community, but she is still proud of her Samaritan heritage. She is quick to claim Jacob as her ancestor, and this well is a blessing to her people, straight from Jacob. Jacob is the father of the twelve tribes of Israel. He was renamed Israel after wrestling all night with the angel at the Wadi Jabbok on the way back home from Haran (where he had gone twenty years earlier to escape the wrath of his brother Esau.) So this woman is claiming her birthright as a descendant of Jacob. She is feisty and she is smart. And she is not making it easy for Jesus to get away with anything, though she is also willing underneath it all. Then Jesus switches from His request for a drink to a far greater favor that He could do for this woman. She, of course, does not jump to the spiritual level of His remark. He is offering to give her living water. She has not been going to Sunday School for years. She doesn t know that this is the divine and holy Son of God. What is she to think? Men often brag of their prowess in sexual banter. What does He mean by living water? So she stings Him again, but she also says, Okay, give it to me. But despite her acquiescence, she is still teasing Him, wouldn t you say? It has gone far enough, so Jesus invites her to call her husband. With that comment, the banter changes its flavor. The woman confesses that she has no husband, and Jesus acknowledges her real situation. So then she shifts to the real heart and core of the Jewish/Samaritan BRUCE VAN BLAIR 2012 All rights reserved. PAGE 3 OF 10

4 quarrel. Seeing that Jesus is far more than she at first suspected, she says: Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, but you Jews say that the place where God must be worshipped is in Jerusalem [at the temple]. Then this woman is truly amazed and dumbfounded. She hears words she never expected or even dreamed she would ever hear coming from a Jew. The time is coming when you will worship the father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. The time is coming, indeed it is already here, when true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. Clearly both Jews and Samaritans are being foolish, from Jesus perspective. God is greater than a little quarrel about the temple in Jerusalem or the temple on Mount Gerazim. Who could be saying such things except the Messiah? Suddenly, and in fact very quickly, the Samaritan woman is on an entirely different level. As far as we know, Jesus never does get His drink. But the woman goes off to town. She swallows her pride and her shame and goes with her incredible news to the townspeople. And she sets Jesus up for a twoday revival meeting among the Samaritans in Shechem. In short, she helps Jesus to open a mission for Samaritan Christians in the heart of country off-limits to Jews. Incredible. That is Level 1, and certainly more than enough to fascinate us with this story. LEVEL 2.) WHO ARE THE SAMARITANS? As mentioned, we are in Shechem. About eight miles to the northwest lies Samaria, the old capital of the Northern Kingdom of Israel. But we need to drop back to 722 B.C., nearly seven hundred years before this conversation took place between Jesus and this Samaritan woman. Our question is: Where did the Samaritans come from, and why this animosity between Jews and Samaritans? This woman obviously considers Jacob her ancestor, and she believes that she and her kinsmen have a rightful place among the twelve tribes of Israel (Jacob). What happened? In 722 B.C. (before and after) the Assyrians were a mighty empire. Their capital city was Nineveh. Jonah, you remember, refused to go to Nineveh to preach repentance. Jonah was deathly afraid that the Ninevites might actually repent and then God would forgive them. Jonah could think of no worse calamity than that the Ninevites might repent and be forgiven. He wanted God to smite them. He wanted God to destroy them. BRUCE VAN BLAIR 2012 All rights reserved. PAGE 4 OF 10

5 But the story of Jonah is a fable, and at the moment we are concerned with history. Sometimes when kings died and new rulers came to the throne, vassal states would rebel, thinking perhaps they were far enough away or there would be confusion enough during the change of leadership that they could stop paying tribute, at least for a while. So the Northern Kingdom of Israel, along with several other provinces, rebelled from Assyrian control when Sargon II came to power. Big mistake! Sargon was neither weak nor disorganized. He sent his armies almost immediately to deal with the rebellion. They decimated Israel. (They came within a whisker of defeating Judah (the Southern Kingdom) as well, and Jerusalem was spared by a miracle. But that s another story.) Having defeated Samaria and every other stronghold in Israel, Sargon was naturally eager to offset the expense of this campaign. Aside from the booty taken from the cities he had conquered, there were also some valuable citizens. Those with skills, learning, or anything to contribute, he deported to Assyrian cities; 27,290 Jews were carried into captivity so serve the Assyrian empire. What was left in the region of Samaria were the citizens deemed worthless, at least not worth the expense of transporting them to Assyria. But Sargon also had some Assyrian citizens who didn t seem to be worth much either. So, in a Botany Bay kind of scenario, Sargon deported the undesirable Assyrians down to the region of Samaria he had conquered. He did this in 721 and again in 715 B.C. Samaritans, then, are the descendants of this joining of the dregs of Assyria with the dregs of Israel. Meanwhile, the Babylonian Empire rose to power and conquered Assyria. Then in 586 B.C., the Babylonians conquered Jerusalem the Southern Kingdom of Judah fell and the Babylonians deported all the useful Jews from Jerusalem and the surrounding areas to Babylon. Then the Persians conquered the Babylonian Empire. But a strangely enlightened and religious king came to power in Persia, and his name was Cyrus. Cyrus decided that he would allow all the Jews who wanted to return to Jerusalem to do so. He sent back with them some of the gold and utensils that had been taken from their temple in Jerusalem. He even took money from his own treasury to help them rebuild the Jerusalem walls and their temple. And so, under Ezra and Nehemiah (and others) the Jews returned from exile to rebuild and start over again. It was a miracle. But when they BRUCE VAN BLAIR 2012 All rights reserved. PAGE 5 OF 10

6 got back home, they discovered that the descendants the remnants of the Northern Kingdom were there, and had been all along. These Samaritans thought of themselves as a faithful remnant, just like the Jews returning from Babylon thought they were a faithful remnant. And these Samaritans wanted to help rebuild the walls and the temple and be part of the new Judaism returning from exile. But the Jews from Babylon were convinced that they had been punished by Yahweh for breaking the Covenant. That was what the prophets seemed to have been telling them. That was why they had been exiled to Babylon for two generations. So now, having just returned home to Jerusalem, they should break the Covenant again by mingling with the half-breeds the Samaritans? They thought it was a test to see if they had learned their lesson to see if they would really remain faithful this time. So they refused the offers of help from the Samaritans, and they refused even to associate with them. (Sanballat is the name of the Samaritan leader at the time. Some of you will recognize it.) The Samaritans, for their part, were hurt and angry about this rejection. And so the desire to be faithful and to keep the Covenant backfired once again. Religion is tougher than people think. And in this story we find Jesus and this Samaritan woman still wrestling with the remains of this ancient animosity between Jews and Samaritans. Nobody intended evil. Both sides wanted to be faithful and obedient to God. But the hatred and resentment and animosity were thick between them. The chances of any reconciliation seemed far-fetched, if not impossible. LEVEL 3.) WHAT IS THE RESULT OF THIS CONVERSATION BETWEEN JESUS AND THE SAMARITAN WOMEN? (THE WILL OF HIM WHO SENT ME.) The disciples return with their supplies and find Jesus talking with the Samaritan woman. Inside, the disciples are thinking: What are you doing? What if somebody sees you talking to this woman? They are nonetheless a bit cautious about voicing their concerns outright. They know better by now than to be too sure of themselves when they think Jesus is doing something dumb or wrong. It is an attitude we would all do well to develop further. Then the woman goes off to town to tell the people that this must be the Messiah; she has more evidence than is easy to portray. BRUCE VAN BLAIR 2012 All rights reserved. PAGE 6 OF 10

7 It is always interesting when the followers think their Leader is blowing it. Here, we get an awkward little exchange. The disciples start out wanting Jesus to eat some of the food they have brought from town. Interesting! This is the guy who can feed five thousand with food He can conjure out of thin air. At least that s how some of you insist on telling that story. And now the disciples are afraid Jesus is hungry, yet helpless to do anything about it? Jesus assures them that He has food beyond anything they know about. In this dialogue Jesus deals with their unspoken issues, though it takes them a while to catch on. It gets summarized in His comment: For me it is meat and drink to do the will of him who sent me until I have finished his work. Study groups frequently go sideways at this point. What is the will of God? How can we know what God really wants us to do? And so on, until the muddy waters get muddier and muddier. Why is Jesus here? What is Jesus doing? Is this really obscure or complicated? It is outlandish, but it is not obscure or complicated. Jesus wants to start a mission to the Samaritans. That is ridiculous to any Jewish perspective of the time. But this story makes it absolutely clear that Jesus believes it is the will of God for Him to spread His Message, His Invitation, His Gospel to the Samaritans even though the Samaritans are hated and considered to be outside the Covenant and outside the plans and purposes of God. I say absolutely clear even though I am well aware that all of us remain, at times, confused and uncertain about things that Jesus has made absolutely clear. Jesus needs an in a way to get a hearing in this village; a place to start with the Samaritans. And this woman provides it. This woman becomes the link, the crack in the door. The disciples are concerned precisely because the plan is working. If something is established between Jesus and the Samaritans, that will be a disaster. Any good Jew could tell you that. If the Samaritans are coming in, a lot of Jews will stay out or leave. Of course, a lot of Jews are staying out already. But that just makes the danger more obvious, the threat even greater. Only, Jesus doesn t care about that side of the threat. He is delighted. The fields... are white, ripe for the harvest. And those fields are the Samaritans living in Shechem. Others have sowed, and you have come into the harvest. Jesus is about to enter a very ripe mission BRUCE VAN BLAIR 2012 All rights reserved. PAGE 7 OF 10

8 to the Samaritans. This strange and wonderful woman has helped to open the way for Him. Now He needs the disciples to help as well, regardless of their current or former prejudices. If they want to stay with Jesus, they need to see through the veil and help with the real work. It is a stunning thing. Jesus is breaking (again) with all normal understandings of the Covenant. Work on the Sabbath; a Sabbath s journey; honoring father and mother; It was said to you by the men of old, but I say unto you... It is not the first time Jesus has seen the Covenant in a different light. But it is still startling. Jesus is siding against the Ezra/Nehemiah understanding of the Covenant. At this point that view has become so locked-down that it is no longer questioned. It is the established precedent for understanding what God wants what being a good Jew means. We are right. Everybody else is wrong. And we don t want to have anything to do with anybody who doesn t switch over entirely to our way of thinking and doing and seeing things. Yet clearly, the will of him who sent me is a mission to extend the ministry to extend the faith and fellowship of the Christian Message to the hated Samaritans. Paul echoes it in Ephesians. The great secret of God, now being proclaimed everywhere, is the coming unity: the inclusion of Gentiles into the Covenant, into the faith family of all peoples. The Good News of Jesus Christ is not based on human nobility, or on the understanding of spiritually evolved people. It is not based on human sentiment, or on the good hearts of right-thinking people. The Gospel comes to us on God s terms and it rests on God s love, not on ours. And only the Christ of God could have made that clear to us. We don t get to approve or disapprove of it. We don t get to vote on it. We get to take it or leave it. And if we take it, there is no way we can avoid claiming it for others as well. To be sure, the record shows that many times along the way, Christians have tried to do this very thing; they have tried to claim it for themselves and deny it to others. But it has never worked out. God has always thwarted such efforts in the long run. He thwarts them still. The will of him who sent me is to break barriers that divide and separate any of us from each other and from God. The prophets had been mighty, but in this case they had also been wrong. God was not punishing the Jews for breaking little details associated with the Covenant. God was concerned, and always had been and always would be concerned, for all the children to learn to accept and care about each other all of them, across all lines. BRUCE VAN BLAIR 2012 All rights reserved. PAGE 8 OF 10

9 That does not invite any of us to live beneath the Covenant to lie, cheat, steal, or murder each other. That does not invite any of us to cease our repentance, or not turn again toward the light and life and love of God s Kingdom. We are never given a license to teach people that morality doesn t matter or that idolatry is now acceptable. But it does invite all of Jesus sincere followers to help break down the barriers undo the many reasons we think we may have for rejecting or refusing to accept others. Here was a woman most people would not have been willing to even talk to. Here was a people that no serious Jew would have considered fit to associate with, never mind accept, eat with, care about, or include in the faith family. But we watch Jesus and it all blows out the window. We watch Jesus and know that following Him is a lot bigger and more demanding than we want it to be. So are we thinking about gays in our time? Are we thinking about Muslims? Are Republicans thinking about Democrats, or Democrats about Republicans? Do we think about God bless India or China or Mexico, or is it only God bless America? I have trouble with some of these dimensions. I suppose all of us have a problem with the Gospel somewhere. But the Gospel keeps pushing the borders: a Roman Centurion; a Samaritan woman; an Ethiopian eunuch; some disreputable women; a whole world full of Gentiles; a slave named Onesimus, and eventually slavery itself. It is really hard to go from My God to Our Father... But the Spirit knows we have nowhere else to go that does not lead us back to Cain and Abel. We don t even have to stay so general. Some of us have relatives, neighbors, business associates, or folk in other wings of Christendom who bug the bejesus out of us. One of them sat next to me on the airplane from Denver to Seattle just a few days ago. You know me well enough, I suspect, to know I am not suggesting that there are easy answers. Enormous damage is being done, and sometimes we are called to care about those being damaged. But does that confuse us about the will of God? Jesus is the Reconciler; if we are reconciled to God, that has inevitable consequences on all our other relationships. The barriers are never God s will, no matter how often they are ours. So we pray every morning, because without the Spirit s guidance, how can we possibly find ourselves engaged in all the plots and counterplots of this broken world without losing the connection between us and the Father? BRUCE VAN BLAIR 2012 All rights reserved. PAGE 9 OF 10

10 It means we must open our minds and prepare our hearts for borders much wider than those we have usually found ourselves living with. The fields are white for the harvest, but everywhere Christians are still painting them gray or pink or dark. To be sure, like you, I need to be busy where I am, minding the business the Spirit hands to me busy with the will of him who calls us and sends us. But sometimes I cannot keep from remembering Jesus, and what He was like and even how He treated this Samaritan woman. What an amazing Man He was! What an amazing Leader and Savior and Christ we have. God help us to be more like Him. BRUCE VAN BLAIR 2012 All rights reserved. PAGE 10 OF 10