What I’m Thinking: Water

Two thirsty people met at a well. One thirsted for water, the other for water of the spirit.

Here’s a transcript:

I’m thinking about the fourth chapter of John’s Gospel (John 4:5-42): Jesus’ conversation with a woman at a well in Samaria.

I suspect the story is familiar. Jesus and his disciples, in their travels, came near to a Samaritan village. Jesus’ friends went on into the town to get supplies. Jesus paused by a well, and when a woman came up to draw water, he asked if she would draw water for him.

She was surprised; Jews do not ask things of Samaritans or vice versa (or at least they didn’t in the first century), and Jesus said, “Well, if you knew who was asking, you would have asked him for water.”

It turns out the two of them were both in need of water: Jesus in need of water to sustain the body, but the woman was in need of spiritual water, water for the soul, that would sustain her heart.

Over the course of their conversation, she became more and more persuaded that Jesus was a prophet, and then more than a prophet: the one sent by God to redeem the people of Israel and Israel’s God. She went to her neighbors and she invited them to come out and meet him, and they too became persuaded from their encounters with Jesus that here they had found the Messiah.

And it all started with that simple request: water for the body. It started with that invitation: receive water for the spirit.

My friends, seek out the water of life, the water of life that sustains the body. And seek out the water of life that sustains the spirit. We depend on both to get through our days and our nights and our lives. You may find it in a place that you think you know or you may find it in some place and in someone that is outside of your experience.

Seek out the water of life my friends, for body and for spirit, and be blessed.

That’s what I’m thinking. I’m curious to hear what you’re thinking. Leave me your thoughts in the comments section below; I’d love to hear from you.