Moments with my First Love [UNDER REVISION]

MOMENT 76: Samaratian Woman

Have you ever experienced being encountered by Jesus? I mean, in an unexpected way especially in a moment when you lease expected it?

And that moment as well, is the moment that you are soooo weary. So are so empty. And you have no more strength to seek for Him, you have no more guts to go unto Him. Yet Jesus, Himself, come to you. Come just for you.

You can see yourself in the story of this Samaritan woman, who happened to met the Savior at a well.

      And he had to pass through Samaria. So he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there; so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour.

      There came a woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus said to her, Give me a drink. (For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.)

      The Samaritan woman said to him, How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria? ( For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.)

      Jesus answered 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.

       The woman said to him, Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.

      Jesus said to her, Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty forever. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.

      The woman said to him, Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw

      Jesus said to her, Go, call your husband, and come here.

      The woman answered him, I have no husband.

      Jesus said to her, You are right in saying, I have no husband; for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.

      The woman said to him, Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.

      Jesus said to her, Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.

      The woman said to him, I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.

      Jesus said to her, I who speak to you am he.

      Just then his disciples came back. They marveled that he was talking with a woman, but no one said, What do you seek? or, Why are you talking with her?

      So the woman left her water jar and went away into town and said to the people, Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ? They went out of the town and were coming to him.

      Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony, He told me all that I ever did. So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. And many more believed because of his word.

      They said to the woman, It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world. -John 4:4-30,39-42

Even with a different purpose and reason for travelling, the same heat of the sun makes the Savior, Jesus, and a Samaritan woman weary from their travel. The woman came to the well to draw water, however Jesus came for her alone. She is the reason why Jesus had to go through Samaria.

This woman is not just weary from carrying a water jar on her head but also from carrying an emptiness in her heart. For too many years, she comes to this well always at noon, the hottest hour of the day and always just by herself.

This woman had a span of five husbands—she is living a life with no assurance. A life that leads nowhere. Too draining. Too wearying. Yet she chose this life because deep within her, she knew that she needed someone to fill the lonely nights of her even though it shallow and tepid..

She has gone from man to man like one lost in the desert, having a jar in her both hands on her head, sun-strucked and delirious. Again and again she returned to the matrimonial well, hoping to draw from it something to quench her thirst for love and happiness. But again and again she has left that well disappointed.

Her empty water jar that she always carries in her hands is a telling symbol of her life. But not now that Jesus came for her. Not anymore that Jesus purposely came for her.

Are you this woman? So tired from having a life of emptiness and keep on going back to a well that can't even satisfy and fill the hollow you have within. You keep on coming back to someone that can't take you to a clear road. You keep on coming back to a thing that you thought could fill your emptiness, but just makes you disappointed at the end.

Or unlike this woman, you already have tasted the living water of Jesus yet you are still searching for other things to fill your life—social media? Pleasure? Friends? Lovelife? Acceptance? Satisfaction? Happiness? What are you seeking for to filla you aside from Him? But you see, as you lowered your cup into the depths of worldly wells, you keep on seeing it empty as you bring it up.

The Savior purposely came for you today. He sees within you s hollow aching. He sees a container in your soul that will forever will remain empty unless you allow Him to fill it. Jesus looks tenderly into your past, and like the woman, He saw all failures from searching.

In the story, He stated the woman's past and present marital status but makes no reference to her sins. He gives no call to repent. He present no structured plan of salvation. He offers no prayer. He only brought her from the noisy city to a queit welk. In that place, Jesus showed her a reflection of herself and revealed who He really is as He said, "I who speak to you am He."

Reflect today, dear. May you keep you mind vivid today as Jesus is meeting you by the well and saying this words—I who speak to you am He. May this moment keep you from wandering to seek water at any other well than His.

Remember that even Jesus has alrwady given you a living water, it can still be stagnated if you keep on loving a life of indifference and impiritues.

I pray to you, who's weary and empty today, may God fill you up with His living water. I pray that God will renew you, the one who is reading this—renew your living water. May God renew a zeal to tell your friends, you acquaintance and even strangers to share the moment you had with Jesus—a moment of filling with living waters after so many stagnant and empty years. May God renew a zeal you have with Jesus alone.

Shalom!
Glory be all to God! :)