Introduction
It
is true of every sinner saved by grace that “we are his workmanship,
having been created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God has
before prepared that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2: 10). My desire
is to show you this workmanship as set forth in the well–known
incident of ‘the woman at the well’ in John 4. There we see the
great Workman, perfect God and perfect man. As man He was “wearied”
and “sat just as he was at the fountain” (v6); as God He knew of a
lost sheep in Samaria that needed to be found. That was why “he
must needs pass through Samaria” (v4, my emphasis). The
natural mind will see only a geographical reason for the necessity,
but the spiritual mind perceives an infinitely deeper cause: the
salvation of a precious soul. How blessed then it will be to
contemplate the wisdom in the way this divine Workman speaks as He
fashions and draws a vessel of mercy to Himself!
Seven times the
Lord opens His lips in addressing the woman of Samaria. From the
first utterance to the last, the wondrous skill of the divine
Workman is seen. When He begins to speak, the object of His
attention questions why He does so.
When He has left off speaking, the woman goes away into the
city saying “Come, see a man who told me all things I
had ever done: is not he the Christ?” (v29, my emphasis). Such is
the effect of a conversation with the Son of God! No miracle, no
wonder is performed before her eyes—He simply speaks to her,
beginning in her soul His work for heaven, for eternity and for God.
Let us look then
at these seven utterances in their order. The seven words from the
cross of Calvary are often dwelt upon, but these seven words by the
well of Jacob are worthy of our deepest attention too.
The
First
Utterance (v7)
— “Give
me
to
drink”
This
is the commencement of the divine work. The Lord begins by calling
the sinner’s attention to Himself: “Give
me to drink”
(v7, my emphasis). The woman would know from his dress that He was a
Jew, and no doubt she expected Him to conform to all her prejudices.
His unexpected request gained her immediate interest and attention:
“How dost thou, being a Jew, ask to drink of me who am a Samaritan
woman?” (v9). The centuries–old enmity between their two peoples
meant she had expected nothing but hostility from this Jewish
stranger. His request would have astonished her.
Is this not like
the first lesson we have to learn about God? As sinners, our
attitude towards God is antagonistic for “the mind of the flesh is
enmity against God” (Rom. 8: 7) and we are “alienated and enemies in
mind by wicked works” (Col. 1: 21). Our hostility mistakenly
presupposes a like hostility in return, but while God hates sin, He
does not hate the sinner. It is not at all His will that any should
perish (see 2 Peter 3: 9), and He has proved this by the fact that
He has “not spared his own Son” (Rom. 8: 32)—indeed while we were
yet sinners “Christ has died for us” (Rom. 5: 8).
The woman is
thus brought into contact with her Saviour (though she does not yet
know it). On the one hand, His request for a drink (a request with
which, as a Samaritan, she is loath to comply), brings home to her
the enmity in her own heart. On the other hand, the same request
arouses in her a curiosity in One who acts and speaks like none
other she has ever met. In His second utterance she further learns
that He not only asks but gives:
The
Second
Utterance (v10)
— “the
gift
of
God”
“If
thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that says to thee, Give
me to drink, thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have
given thee living water” (John 4: 10). The woman knew nothing of the
gift of God. Who, even in favoured Israel, had realised the truth
that God gives? That to which the Samaritan woman
clung expressed a quite contrary view of God, for human religion
ever regards Him as a receiver. A God who demands she
could comprehend, but a God who gives was a startling and new
revelation (as it is to many today).
The Lord’s
answer thus struck her, and, it would seem, softened any bitter
feeling there might have been in being accosted by a Jew. But if He
was offering living water (by which she only understood running and
not stagnant) then how could He supply it? “Sir, thou hast nothing
to draw with, and the well is deep: whence then hast thou the living
water?” (v11). Who was He? Who could He be? Was He greater than her
father Jacob who had given her people the well? What a tale He could
have unfolded had He told her that He had seen Jacob, had wrestled
with him and had blessed him! Certainly He was greater than her
father Jacob. Jacob dug a well in the ground—this Jewish stranger
could supply a fountain for the heart. If this poor woman desired to
know more of this wonderful gift, then the Lord would tell her in
His third utterance:
The
Third
Utterance (vs
13,
14)
— “a
fountain
of
water”
“Every one who drinks of this water shall thirst again; but
whosoever drinks of the water which I shall give him shall never
thirst for ever, but the water which I shall give him shall become
in him a fountain of water, springing up into eternal life” (vs 13,
14). How solemnly true is that first statement! Whatever the world
gives, it is not long before we “thirst again”. The woman had found
this in her sad history—multiple partners but no lasting happiness.
Nothing but living water can ever quench our thirst, and satisfy our
hearts.
The living water
is interpreted for us in John 7: 39 as being the Spirit which those
that believed on Christ would receive when He was glorified. The
Lord here is therefore anticipating a then future time, which is why
we find a certain reserve as to the way in which the gift is spoken
about. Now that He is in heaven, He gives the Holy Spirit to the
believer to be a fountain springing up within him into eternal life,
and also (as we shall see shortly) the power of worship. Thus it is
not only deliverance from hankering after pleasure, vanity and sin,
but a living spring of exhaustless and divine joy—rejoicing in God
our Father through the Lord Jesus Christ in the power of the Spirit.
It is now the
business of the divine Workman to create the sense of need. Like
many of us, the woman thought she knew the extent of her need, and
expressed a desire that her Companion might meet it: “Sir, give me
this water, that I may not thirst nor come here to draw” (v15).
However, this fell far short of what the Lord had in mind. It is now
that He takes a special arrow from His quiver, that she may be
“pricked in heart” (Acts 2: 37) and realise her greatest need of
all. This is done in the fourth utterance:
The
Fourth
Utterance (v16) — “Go,
call
thy
husband”
This
was the word that convicted the woman and compelled her to condemn
herself. He said “Go” but she couldn’t go: “The woman answered and
said, I have not a husband” (v17). It was a command calculated to
make her face the issue of her state before God. That she felt her
ruin before her neighbours is evidenced by the fact that she came to
the well at the time she did, but their thoughts were as nothing
compared to what God thought. Through the infinite skill of the
divine Workman, she began to see the true enormity of her guilt for
the first time. Conscience may have spoken before, but now it was
conscience informed by the Word and energised by the Spirit.
Oh, what a
moment in the history of a lost sinner, when the Word not only
reaches the heart, but finds good ground there—ground in which it
can grow and bear fruit! Before this the sinner is “dead in …
offences and sins” (Eph. 2: 1). The Word comes, but the sinner does
not heed it, for he is “like the deaf adder which stoppeth her ear”
(Ps. 58: 4). He is lifeless before God. But when the life–giving
Word comes, when the living water reaches him, then he begins to
live. Thus grace does not only say “Go, call thy husband” but also
“come here” (John 4: 16). He would draw her to Himself. But the
Samaritan has first to learn more about herself:
The Fifth Utterance (vs
17, 18) — “Thou hast well said”
The
Lord now reveals to the woman that He knew her heart, her life and
her thoughts: “Jesus says to her, Thou hast well said, I have not a
husband; for thou hast had five husbands, and he whom now thou hast
is not thy husband: this thou hast spoken truly” (vs 17, 18). The
turning point has been reached with this utterance. Not only has the
Saviour revealed her to herself, but He has also begun to reveal
Himself to her. She perceived at once the divine power of His words:
“Sir, I see that thou art a prophet” (v19). Initially a despised Jew
in her eyes, He has now become a prophet.
Her state is put
before her in a few brief words. He does not linger upon it, nor
rebuke her for it, yet there it lies before her in the light. Now it
is out it seems like a confession He had made for one who had not
the courage to make it for herself. So is she glad to be with Him
upon these terms with nothing kept back (as indeed nothing could be
kept back)? Not yet, for shrinking from the light that has been
placed upon her, the woman now gives a sudden turn to the
conversation. She will speak of anything but herself. There is a
mountain overshadowing them, the theme of many an argument between
Jew and Samaritan. She therefore turns to it, to see what the man of
God will say about it: “Our fathers worshipped in this mountain, and
ye say that in Jerusalem is the place where one must worship” (v20).
Though convicted of sin, she does not yet know the Lord as her
Saviour. Hence like many such she sees merit in turning to religious
questions—anything short of Christ. She knew many things—the
difference between Jew and Samaritan, between Mount Zion and Mount
Gerizim—but she did not know Him, nor the gift which He offered. In
grace, the Lord takes up her question and not only answers it, but
through it reveals to her what was far above her thoughts. The
divine Workman disposes of her question Where? as He had of
her Whence? and her
How? He points her away from the
lifeless formality of religious observances to a spiritual reality.
She had come to Jacob’s well seeking water; He would reveal to her
One seeking true worshippers. This He proceeds to do in His sixth
utterance:
The Sixth Utterance (vs
21–24) — “the true worshippers”
“Woman, believe me, [the] hour is coming when ye shall neither in
this mountain nor in Jerusalem worship the Father. Ye worship ye
know not what; we worship what we know, for salvation is of the
Jews. But [the] hour is coming and now is, when the true worshippers
shall worship the Father in spirit and truth; for also the Father
seeks such as his worshippers. God [is] a spirit, and they who
worship him must worship [him] in spirit and truth” (John 4: 21–24).
The Lord thus shows her that the real question is not
Where
to worship but Who and
How. The question
of Where to worship is of little importance, and effectively
shuts out the absolutely essential matters of
Who and
How.
If we are to be among those who the Father seeks as
His worshippers, our worship must be
spiritual,
and not sensual. The Greek word for “must” here is the same word as
used in John 3: 7 (“It is needful that
ye
should be born anew”, my emphasis) and in John 3: 14 (“thus
must the Son of man be lifted up”, my emphasis). There is no
choice left to us in the matter. It is not for us to say, I like to
worship in this way, or that way. It must be truly
spiritual worship. Anything that attracts or distracts any of our
senses is destructive of the only worship which God seeks and
accepts.
We cannot claim
worship by listening to music or by looking at pictures or by
smelling incense or touching beads. Neither the ear, nor the eye,
nor the nose, nor the fingers, can worship God, because they are all
flesh and not spirit, and true worshippers, if they are to be so,
must worship God truly in spirit. This revelation of truth showed
the woman that He who spoke with her knew not only herself, but also
that He knew God, and what God required. All this is
too much and too high for the poor Samaritan. She can take no more:
“I know that Messias is coming, who is called Christ; when
he
comes he will tell us all things” (John 4: 25). This prepares the
way for the great and solemn climax of the final and seventh
utterance at the well:
The Seventh Utterance
(v26) — “I who speak to thee am [he]”
We
have reached “the end of the Lord” (James 5: 11) with the Samaritan.
This word brings her to Christ, and leaves her with Him—the One who
is the centre of heaven’s glories and the centre of heaven’s
praises! Oh, what wondrous workmanship! Oh, let us admire this
infinite wisdom of our blessed Lord! Truly, He does all things well!
Let us also
learn the ignorance of those who are the subjects of His grace. We
see how one may know the difference between Jew and Samaritan and
places of worship; and all the time be profoundly ignorant of
oneself, of God, of Christ, and of true worship. One may know how to
sing, but not know how to worship. One may be an expert as to
different religions and systems and creeds, but like this woman, one
may be ignorant of “the gift of God” (v10), “the grace of God” (Acts
11: 23), the “salvation of God” (Acts 28: 28) and “The Christ of
God” (Luke 9: 20). Oh, let nothing hinder us on the way to Christ!
Let no question of having “dealings” (John 4: 9, AV) with this one
or that one hinder our direct dealings with Him! Let no questions as
to How or
Whence or
Where dim our eyes and
hinder us from enjoying “the gift of God” (v10)! Let no questions of
Who we are to worship with or
Where we are to worship,
hinder us from the true spiritual worship of the Father!
The Lord’s final
utterance, simple as the words are, is stunning in its effect and
sweeps away the last vestiges of her resistance: “I who speak to
thee am [he]” (v 26). The conclusion has been reached:
the
Lord has brought her to Himself!
