An Unlikely Preacher

The Woman at the Well Encounters Jesus

It is the middle of the day. The sun is high over Samaria, and the heat is intense. No one normally comes to the well at this hour.

But one woman does.

She comes alone, carrying her jar, hoping to avoid the other women of the town.

When she arrives, she finds someone already sitting there: Jesus.

And with that encounter, her entire life begins to change.

Life is messy. In the encounter with the Samaritan woman, Jesus shows many complications of living out the faith in the Holy Land during the first century. The Samaritans were ethnically related to the Jews, and their religion had some of the same roots. And yet, they felt like they were from two different worlds. Although it was the more direct route between Judea and Galilee, pious Jews often walked around Samaria to avoid their poorly respected neighbors.

In this encounter we see the tragic effects of humanity’s rejection of its original holiness.

Although he was made by God in a state of holiness, from the very onset of his history man abused his liberty, at the urging of the Evil One. Man set himself against God and sought to attain his goal apart from God. Although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, but their senseless minds were darkened and they served the creature rather than the Creator (Vatican II, Gaudium et Spes, 13).

This description of humanity after the fall applies to all of us. We see it in the history of the Samaritans, in the life of the woman at the well, and in our own lives today. She had shaped her life according to her own desires. The Gospel tells us it was about noon when she came to draw water. That is an unusual time. Normally, the women of the town came together in the cool of the morning or evening. But she comes alone, in the heat of the day. Perhaps she prefers the burning sun to the burning looks of the other women in the village. Her struggle with good and evil mirrors our own struggle.

All human life, whether individual or collective, shows itself to be a dramatic struggle between good and evil, between light and darkness. Indeed, man finds that by himself he is incapable of battling the assaults of evil successfully, so that everyone feels as though he is bound by chains. But the Lord Himself came to free and strengthen man, renewing him inwardly and casting out that “prince of this world” (Jn. 12:31) who held him in the bondage of sin (Vatican II, Gaudium et Spes, 13).

She experiences a division inside her heart that we might recognize in ourselves. There is always a conflict between truth and sin. Her religion is confused, because her entire people are separated from the worship centered in Jerusalem. Her thirst for authentic worship could be slaked only by the coming of the true God. She appears to live on the margins of her own community. She confesses to Jesus that she is living with a man outside of marriage, and Jesus points out that she has been married five times. And yet, she is the one person in the town whom Jesus encounters. He chooses to reveal himself to her. Jesus does not call only those who are perfect, but rather he calls all of us to be perfected.

Following this incredible encounter with Jesus, the woman at the well becomes his greatest promoter. She goes into the town and preaches the goodness of the man who helped her discover her own sins, but also her own worth. When Jesus reveals our sins, he does this not in a self-righteous way to manipulate and gain power. Rather, he hopes to free us from the bonds that keep us trapped. Sin binds, while grace sets us free.

Life is messy, but Christ does not avoid the mess. He enters it. At the well of Samaria, he entered the complicated life of one woman. Through her, he reached an entire town. She did not simply repeat platitudes that she had heard once. Rather, she shared her experience of the Messiah. We must be careful not to repeat doctrine in a purely abstract way while neglecting to share our lived experience of Christ. He wants this story to repeat in your life. Let Jesus help you clean up the mess in your life. Then, turn around and do the same for someone else.