Faith Lessons from the Woman at the Well
In my career as a professional Christian counselor, I made it a priority to teach my clients how to renew their minds and find healing for their emotions through the truth found in God’s Word and by the power of a personal relationship with Jesus. A significant testimony of healing that I find myself teaching from over and over is “The Woman at the Well”, John 4: 7-42.
The first spiritual lesson we learn is that because of Jesus there are no longer barriers for those who are not God’s chosen people, the Jews, nor for women who were often treated with less value than men at that time. The woman at the well was initially quite rude to Jesus, because she was used to being treated poorly by Jews, both as a Samaritan and as a woman. We soon learn there is great shame added to her already lowly identity as a woman who has been married five times. She was seen as an outcast, even by her own people, so she had to come to the well in the heat of the day, in hopes of avoiding ridicule by others. Now, here she is, trying to mind her own business, only to be asked by a man, a Jewish man, for a drink of water.
How often does our own view of ourselves, steeped in the shame and accusations of the world around us, makes us feel unworthy to intimately relate to Jesus. Just like this woman. Even after someone explains the grace and forgiveness that comes with accepting Jesus as your Savior, how many continue to struggle with their identity and never really experience true freedom from the sins of their past? This was a significant part of the work I did with my counseling clients, to bring individuals into receiving the freedom, healing, and total restoration that Jesus’s blood purchased for them at the Cross. How often have you found yourself arguing with Jesus, like the woman at the well? “Why are you talking to me? Why would you be asking anything of me?” Have you ever questioned (especially before you put your full faith in Jesus), if what He had to offer was so much better than the life you had at the time, as the woman challenged Jesus at the well? She asked if He was greater than Jacob who gave them the well? (The nerve of this lady!) But until we fully engage in a personal and experiential relationship with Christ, we sound exactly like her, don’t we? Questioning God and His ways…not yet understanding the deeper realities of His Kingdom.
Jesus goes on to explain that He is the Living Water that will not only give her eternal life, but that she would no longer thirst for the things of this world, that she would find spiritual fulfillment in Him alone. When the woman asked Him to give her a drink of “this water” He could see her heart was not yet pure, that although she was seeking to understand, she was not repentant. To fully receive forgiveness and experience the complete freedom Jesus came to give her, He had to expose her sin. So, He asked her, where is your husband? She then confessed she has no husband and Jesus agrees, He tells her that she has had five husbands and the man she lived with now, was not her husband, revealing her sins and the depths of her hidden shame.
Have you watched this particular scene from the media sensation, “The Chosen?” As a counselor, I really appreciated the liberty the filmmakers took in the script, at the point in which it is revealed the woman has been married five times, Jesus begins to describe each husband and how it was from the very beginning that she was abused, and how that changed her forever. This wound that occurred early in her life, left her feeling unworthy, rejected and hating herself, which then led her to be treated poorly by others in the future. This insight is not blatantly revealed through Scripture, but it could be assumed to be quite accurate, given the nature of abuse and trauma. The scene is so beautiful because it shows how Jesus connected to people through love and compassion. It was in this moment, when He offered understanding instead of judgment, that the woman began to experience the healing that comes from being truly loved and accepted. As her heart changes from being defensive (due to sin) to knowing she is loved, she immediately wants to know how she can worship Him, because that is the natural response of being forgiven. May we never grow cold or complacent to the lavish love and high-cost Jesus paid so that we may have eternal life! May the woman at the well be a life-long example of how we must seek to expose our sin, accept forgiveness, and worship Jesus with all of our might, particularly by telling others about how He has changed our lives.
Jesus goes on to explains that He is the Messiah, the one who has come to make all people equal, that she and all those who believe will be able to worship Him in their hearts and will no longer be segregated or considered unworthy to worship in the temple. Now, no matter one’s race, ethnicity, gender, or sinful past, ALL will be considered righteous because of Jesus. This news is so exciting the woman runs into town to tell everyone about Him. The Living Water, the Messiah, the Prophet. Scripture states that many came to believe because of the woman telling her testimony, a woman that was previously rejected by all of society, that lived in the shadows to avoid ridicule, was now bringing hundreds, perhaps thousands to saving faith, because of the transformation she experienced, from the merciful and sacrificial love of Jesus.
I also found it interesting that when Jesus went into town, the people said it was no longer because of what the woman told them that they believed, but once they met Jesus and experienced His preaching, when they had a genuine encounter with Him of their own, they came to fully believe He was the Savior of the world. Isn’t that just how faith works? Someone might be a powerful evangelist and cause many to take that first step of faith, to say a prayer and believe in their hearts that Jesus is Lord, but until you begin to hear His voice for yourself, until you walk with Him and experience a little life with Him, it is only then that you truly believe He is the Savior.
What if Christians had compassion for others, for their pain, for the abuse or trauma they may have experienced in the past, that led them to a life of sin and unfortunate choices, rather than casting judgment? What if believers were vulnerable and exposed their own sin more often, to truly partake of the healing that comes from receiving God’s grace and mercy, over and over? To worship the Savior with such exuberant joy that others would ask why you are so excited? When was the last time you told someone about all that Jesus has done for you? And not stories from when you were first saved, but from today.
Yes, this “woman at the well” has so much to teach us about our faith, about who the Messiah, the Christ, the Anointed One truly is. May you take time to celebrate this revelation with fresh gratitude, and proclaim it to the world around you. Follow in her example, share your joy and the truth of Jesus’ love with others, with someone who is in thirsty and in desperate need of a drink, of Living Water.
