New for 2025, the Bible Study column runs four times a year in the February, May, August, and November issues. It invites Friends to reflect on Bible passages that have inspired or challenged them, whether through writing or discussion. We welcome your submissions and comments at Friendsjournal.org/bible-study.
In the story, Jesus and his disciples are traveling from Judea to Galilee. Their route takes them through the region of Samaria, and they stop at the historical well of Jacob in the city of Sychar. Jesus, tired from the long walk, sits beside the well to rest, and we learn that the disciples left him to buy food in the city. While Jesus is at the well, a local Samaritan woman comes to draw water, and Jesus asks her for a drink. The woman is surprised that Jesus speaks to her because a Jewish man would never share drinking vessels with a Samaritan—especially a woman. And in Middle Eastern societies of the time, a man and woman meeting at a well implied an intimate relationship rather than just the meeting of two strangers.
But Jesus steps outside of these conventions and prohibitions to engage the woman in conversation, and to satisfy his thirst. His words speak of his need for water, but they also take the woman beyond the simple act of helping a weary stranger. In response to her amazement that he would talk to her at all, Jesus says these curious words to her: “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water” (John 4:10). The woman finds this statement even stranger because Jesus has nothing to lower into the well to get water, and she misunderstands his speaking of “living water” to mean flowing water, so she asks him how he will do this. He answers: “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life” (John 4:13–14).
Now she is completely astounded and eagerly asks Jesus for this water so that she will no longer be thirsty nor constantly need to do the hard work of carrying water from the well. She is still thinking in physical terms rather than the spiritual terms he is using.
As they continue to converse, we learn that Jesus somehow knows specifics about the woman’s relationships. This convinces her that he is a prophet. They talk about the proper place for worship, and Jesus again turns the conversation to the spiritual by saying that a time will come when her people will worship “in spirit and in truth.” She tells him she knows the Messiah is coming, and he reveals to her that he is the Messiah. At this point, the disciples return and are surprised to find Jesus talking to a Samaritan woman. She leaves and goes into the city to tell people about this unusual encounter. Because of her story, the people come to meet Jesus and ask him to stay. He remains there for two days, and they become convinced that he truly is the Messiah.
Many threads of this story could be followed, but the central idea is given in verse 10, where Jesus begins, “If you knew the gift of God . . .” Are not many of us like this woman at the well: absorbed in the daily tasks of living that accord with the general assumptions of society and communities in which we live? Jesus grasps the situation immediately; if only the woman recognized who Jesus was, she would ask him, and he would give her living water. But the woman totally misses the significance of Jesus’s words.
Do we know what the gift of God is? Many see suffering and injustice in the world and conclude that God is cruel. What Creator would make a universe in which pain, poverty, war, and hatred are so prevalent? Others see this cruelty and injustice and conclude that there is no God. How is it possible to believe in a loving God who would allow such things to happen?
However, God does not change the physical world to suit our convenience or comfort. God does not answer prayers that provide us with material things, advance our careers, punish those who commit violence or engage in injustice, nor heal our bodies from disease in some miraculous way. God is not the cause of huge natural disasters. He does not turn back the blizzard nor still the earthquake in answer to our prayers.
Such viewpoints misunderstand the very nature of God and what God gives. If only we knew that God is God of the spiritual world, we would ask Him for things of the spirit and not of the physical world. If we ask God for love, will He not give it to us? If we ask for courage and spiritual strength to live with or through a serious disease, the loss of someone we love, the loss of a job, persecution and discrimination, and even war, will we not be strengthened? If we ask for our hearts to be opened to help those facing daily hunger, homelessness, loneliness, and despair, will not love be placed in our hearts to move us to action? If we ask for joy and happiness in our lives despite challenges and trials, is it not there for us?
If we know the gift of God, we also know who is asking us for a drink. Jesus’s life and teaching provide examples by which we can try to live our lives. His example is a life of compassion and integrity; of self-sacrifice and self-respect; of forgiveness, justice, human dignity, and boundless love, even for those who seek to harm or ignore others.
When we know what God gives, we can ask for it, and we will be given living water: an ever-renewing fountain of spiritual strength that is ours to tap. This eternal spring is what Friends call the Light Within or that of God; it is an unending source of hope, faith, joy, forgiveness, and love. It is an endless fountain waiting to come forth within each individual. It is not only available to us as individuals, but when we find ourselves in despair, we can call on our community to hold us in that Light: to bring us back to that living water wherein we find our true life.
Discussion Questions
- When you’re distracted by the busy work of the world, what has led you back to spiritual contemplation?
- Have you ever received the gift of living water from God or the Spirit? How and when? What was this experience like?
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