John 4:1-42 - The Biblical Illustrator

When therefore the Lord knew

The first visit to Samaria

I. THE STORY ITSELF.

1. The memorable halt (John 4:1-6).

2. The surprising request (John 4:7-9).

3. The opened vista (John 4:10).

4. The proud reminiscence (John 4:11-12).

5. The perennial fountain (John 4:13-14).

6. The weary request (John 4:15).

7. The merciful wound (John 4:16-18).

8. The everlasting debate (John 4:19-20).

9. The majestic annunciation (John 4:21-24).

10. The sublime claim (John 4:25-26).

11. The marvellous wonder (John 4:17).

12. The startling surmise (John 4:28-30).

13. The bidden manna (John 4:31-35).

14. The cheery parable (John 4:35-38).

15. The glorious harvest (John 4:39-42).

II. LESSONS OF THE STORY:

1. The duty of seizing opportunities.

2. A model for religious conversation.

3. The true method of quenching the soul’s thirst (John 4:13-14).

4. The spirituality of Christian worship (John 4:21-24).

5. A test of Messiahship (John 4:29).

6. The sense of vocation the true food (verse 31-34).

7. Harvesting the Church’s privilege and duty (John 4:35).

8. The community of Christian fruition (John 4:36).

9. The present the harvest of the past (John 4:37-38).

10. The power of a single conversion (John 4:39).

11. Spiritual privileges to be cherished (John 4:40).

12. The superiority of personal experience (John 4:41-42).

13. A pastor’s personal invitation. (G. D. Boardman, D. D.)

Christ at Jacob’s well

This history teaches us that

I. No soul is so LOST BUT THE LORD CAN FIND IT. Frivolity was natural to this woman. She had lived without restraint and morality. Woman has one safeguard against sin--innate delicacy. This lost, all is lost; and this was so with the Samaritan. How many would have turned away from her as hopeless, But Christ turns to her because she is a soul whom the Father has given Him to save.

II. NO OCCASION IS SO TRIFLING BUT THE LORD CAN USE IT. The woman comes to draw water, a common act, by a common way. Who would have thought that the way would have led to everlasting life? The least trifle may become in God’s hand a means of salvation: a word spoken at random, a familiar scene, an unforeseen hindrance, the monotony of life, the influence of a friend. God’s seeking grace encompasses us like the air we breathe.

III. NO STRENGTH IS SO FEEBLE BUT THE LORD CAN INCREASE IT. Few could have been morally weaker than this woman. She lacked the power to understand Christ and to know herself. Christ had to awaken everything in her. So are we impotent; but the Spirit of Christ helps our infirmities. Christ asks in order that He may give. He requires humility, but only to exalt, the surrender of the old life in order to confer life eternal.

IV. NO BEGINNING IS SO SMALL BUT THE LORD CAN LEAD IT TO A BLESSED END. What a small beginning here I And yet before long a disciple and evangelist is found. Don’t despise little beginnings and struggling souls. (Carl Keogh, D. D.)

Jesus at the well

I. A SYMPATHETIC COMPANION.

1. Sharing human infirmity (John 4:6; Isaiah 53:3; Matthew 4:2; Mark 14:34; John 11:35; John 19:28).

2. Accepting human supplies (John 4:7; Matthew 21:17; Mark 2:16; Luke 7:36; Luke 19:5; Luke 24:41).

3. Surpassing human expectations (John 4:9; Matthew 8:27; Matthew 9:8, Matthew 22:22; Mark 5:20; John 3:9).

II. A HELPFUL COMPANION.

1. Dispelling ignorance (John 4:10; Mark 2:10; Luke 19:42; John 10:38; John 13:7; John 15:15).

2. Arousing desire (John 4:14; Matthew 5:6, Matthew 11:28; John 3:12; John 14:12; John 16:24).

3. Begetting prayer (John 4:15; Matthew 9:27; Matthew 15:22, Matthew 20:30; Mk Luke 18:41).

III. A DIVINE COMPANION.

1. Knowing all things (John 4:17; John 1:48; John 2:25; John 16:30, John 21:17; Colossians 2:3).

2. Illustrating true worship (John 4:23; Exo 20:3; 2 Kings 17:35; Psalms 96:9; Jeremiah 25:6; Matthew 4:10).

3. Avowing the Messiahship (John 4:26; Psalms 2:6; Matthew 16:16; John 11:27; Acts 3:18, Acts 17:7. (S. S. Times.)

Jesus at the well

How immense the distance between “Give Me to drink” and “I am He.”

I. AN OBJECT-LESSON IN THE ART OF RELIGIOUS CONVERSATION.

1. No duty more difficult than that of opening out a conversation on the things of the soul. This an art, because we must learn it by practice through mistakes and discouragement. Jesus left few discourses, because His teaching was mostly conversational, suggested by passing things. Beginning here with human thirst and eliciting questions, He gradually and naturally led up and on to the highest truths.

2. Notice the skill with which Jesus avoids a plain answer to a plain question, and so replies that He becomes the questioner and arouses deepening curiosity and interest.

3. The use He made of the woman’s moral intuitions and the truths she already knew. This was the favourite method of His dialectics.

4. Here do we need our lesson from Christ.

(1) How perfectly He entered into human need!

(2) He had infinite patience with the narrow and dull and earthbound.

(3) With all this went an equal faith in that hidden but immortal power to which He appealed.

II. THE TRUTHS OF THIS DISCOURSE.

1. Living water.

(1) The comparison of spiritual blessings to water familiar in Scripture.

(2) The characteristic of this water is that it is a gift. Men do not have to fetch, buy, nor earn salvation, but receive it.

(3) This water of life is not Christ, for He gives it, but the whole truth and grace which make for salvation.

2. True worship.

(1) The vital inward power brings one into the true attitude of worship. The heart first, form afterwards.

(2) True worship must be an inward secret thing. Ritual, music, etc., only aid the silent movements of the soul towards God.

(3) True worship must be true to God’s requirements and our own moral wants, not merely honest and sincere, although misguided, but in accordance with the reality of things.

(4) The Father seeks such worship.

3. Jesus the Messiah. Salvation was of the Jews, but Christ was the fulfilment of hopes as old as the race. (Sermons by the Monday Club.)

The woman of Samaria

1. The person here introduced was a member of a race specially hateful to the Jews; but Jesus was above the prejudice of His nation.

2. The Samaritan was a woman. “Never speak to a woman in the street, even if she be thy wife”; “Burn the words of the law rather than teach them to a woman,” were current maxims in Jewish society. But Christ, in the unsullied purity of His manhood, brushed aside as cobwebs all social regulations which tended to perpetuate feminine servitude.

3. This woman lived in habitual sin. But Christ came to save sinners. Notice Jesus Christ

I. ENLIGHTENING THE WOMAN. He leads her from natural to spiritual subjects.

1. Observe His sweet courtesy. He opens the conversation, not with a sneer or opprobrious epithet, after the manner of a Jew, but with a request; and notwithstanding her ungracious rebuff, not one word of rebuke escapes Him. A most gentlemanly stranger. True religion teaches us to be courteous. This urbanity impressed her, and He became successively in her eyes Jew, Sir, Prophet, Christ. The truth must be spoken in love, and love will impress quite as much as truth.

2. Notice that the woman’s lack of culture did not hinder Christ making the grandest disclosures. A radical mistake is made when the attempt is made to simplify the gospel beyond what Christ has done. The sublime will always awaken the corresponding consciousness. This is one reason why the words of Christ have more power and permanence than the systems of men.

3. The Lord made a discovery to this woman which He never made to any one else--His Messiahship. Why? Because that would not have been safe in Judaea or Galilee? Rather because of the different dispositions of those He addressed.

II. RECLAIMING THE WOMAN. The object of His enlightening her was to save her.

1. Christ always aimed at doing good.

(1) In ancient times men did good spasmodically; relief was the result of natural impulse. But in Christianity impulse has been dignified into a principle.

(2) Plato and Aristotle teach you to love men for your own sakes; Christ for their sakes and His. The essence of the gospel is not self-interest, but self-sacrifice.

2. He sought to do the highest good by reclaiming the worst characters. There are three stages in history relative to this subject.

(1) A state of well-nigh complete insensibility. The Iliad delineated heroes and cowards, strong men and weak, but not good and bad.

(2) The next stage is marked by the awakening of conscience and of the idea of right and wrong. Virtue is applauded, vice censured. But the idea of justice taught men to sympathize with the man sinned against, not the sinner.

(3) The last stage is that of full-orbed mercy in Christ, teaching us to compassionate both the injurer and the injured. Christ changed the attitude of the world in respect to its notorious sinners.

3. To accomplish these ends He threw into His philanthropic movements unprecedented zeal (John 4:34).

(1) He had infinite faith in human nature. He saw its hidden potentialities. A lady, examining one of Turner’s pictures, remarked: “But, Mr. T., I do not see these things in nature.” “Madam,” replied the artist, with pardonable naiveté, “don’t you wish you did?” Christ saw what none of His contemporaries saw. The age was pessimistic; Christ was the only optimist of His time.

(2) According to the strength of His hope was the fervour of His zeal.

III. INSPIRING THE WOMAN, inparting to her His own enthusiasm.

1. She at once set about converting her neighbours. She did not lecture them; she only related her experience. We can also “say” if we cannot preach. Despise not the day of small things. Her “saying” led to the evangelization of a whole city.

2. The success attending the woman’s simple efforts filled the Saviour with holy joy. (J. Cynddylan Jones, D. D.)

Christ and the woman of Samaria

I. THE MINGLED TACT AND CONDESCENSION OF CHRIST IN DEALING WITH A CARELESS SINNER. He does not begin with reproof, but with a request for water, a subject uppermost in her thoughts. This at once threw a bridge across the gulf between them. So Christian workers must go to the sinful, and bear down upon them in the spirit of friendly aggression, studying the best avenues to their hearts, and avoiding any show of superiority.

II. CHRIST’S READINESS TO GIVE MERCIES TO CARELESS SINNERS. If she had asked, He would have given. “Ask and receive.”

III. THE PRICELESS EXCELLENCE OF CHRIST’S GIFTS WHEN COMPARED WITH THE THINGS OF THIS WORLD (John 4:13-14). Thousands of men have every temporal good, and are yet weary and dissatisfied. Jesus alone can give solid happiness. His waters may have their ebbing seasons, but they are never completely dried.

IV. THE ABSOLUTE NECESSITY OF CONVICTION TO CONVERSION. The woman was comparatively unmoved until our Lord exposed her breach of the seventh commandment. From that moment she is an Inquirer after truth. Till a sinner sees himself as God sees him he will continue careless and trifling. Conscience must be pricked by the preaching of the law.

V. THE USELESSNESS OF ANY RELIGION WHICH ONLY CONSISTS OF FORMALITY. True and acceptable worship depends on the state of the worshipper’s heart (1 Samuel 16:7).

VI. CHRIST’S GRACIOUS WILLINGNESS TO REVEAL HIMSELF TO THE CHIEF OF SINNERS. Nowhere in the gospels do we find such an explicit avowal as in John 4:26. Whatever a man’s past life may have been there is hope and a remedy for him in Christ. He will undertake to cure the apparently incurable. (Bp. Ryle.)

The lost one met and saved

I. THE JOURNEY.

1. The occasion (John 4:1; cf. Isaiah 51:13).

2. The route. There were four routes (Matthew 19:2; Acts 23:23). The Jews usually chose that by the Jordan valley, to avoid Samaria.

3. The reason (Luke 9:10).

4. The rest. Notice Christ’s humanity.

II. THE MEETING.

1. The woman

(1) A Samaritan;

(2) with some knowledge of God (John 4:20);

(3) expecting the Messiah (John 4:25).

2. The time. Midday. Not the usual hour for drawing water; but a time for such an one to do so unobserved.

3. The request. Compliance with it would have done honour to an archangel. Christ placed Him- self in the position of one desiring a benefit.

4. The reply (John 4:9). This man is not like other Jews.

III. THE CONVERSION.

1. The first flash of light (John 4:10; cf. Ephesians 5:14). Water is sold in Egypt as the “gift of God.”

2. Its reception (John 4:11-12). The woman is perplexed, and seems to struggle between the literal and the spiritual. She changes her mode of address--“Sir.” Our Lord takes no notice of her query, but addresses her state of mind.

3. The leading on (verses 13, 14). The woman’s desire is intensified. The light becomes obscured. How true a picture of an awakening soul I

4. The revelation (verse 16). The request is granted in Christ’s way, not in her’s. He flashes light on her soul and her past (verses 18, 29).

5. Her anxious inquiry (verses 19, 20). How is salvation to be obtained? Not by forms, places, etc.

6. The gift received (verses 25, 26).

IV. THE EFFECT (verse 28). She hastens away a saved sinner to save others John 1:41-45). See a mark of her change, as showing its reality in the fuluess of her confession (John 1:29; cf. John 1:17; Luke 19:8, Luke 23:41; Romans 10:10). (J. Gill.)

Jesus at the well of Sychar

The Fourth Gospel may be called the Gospels of the Conversations, for, more than any other, it reports particular interviews of our Lord with individuals. These conversations, too, are real conversations, for Jesus was not like some famous men, who discourse in monologue. Even His addresses to the multitude were often interrupted by the inquiries or remarks of others, and, in smaller companies, He guided the conversation, while apparently taking the lesser part. The “golden silences” of Jesus are very marked, and George Borrow, in that fascinating book, “The Bible in Spain,” relates that the taciturn people of the little Republic of Andorra noticed these silences, and said of them, “Jesus played the Andorran.” While He spoke with authority, yet He dispelled all feeling of restraint, and even seemed to awaken in others unwonted freedom. Not unfrequently He gave the thought, and let them do the talking. Christ never appears to have saved anything for a large audience, nor feared that any utterance of truth, breathed into the receptive heart of however humble a hearer, could fail of its effect. And these conversations all have a personal turn. They attach great principles to common life, and they lead people through their own needs to the grandest spiritual truths. Jesus evidently has confidence in the living power of truth, and therefore does not press it, but leaves His hearers to follow out the idea and make the application for themselves. If, then, we would understand the effect of our Lord’s conversation with the woman of Samaria, we must read it in the message she bore to her people: “Come, see a man which told me all things that ever I did. Can this be the Christ?” This perfect knowledge of the Christ is our greatest safeguard. It is needful, to defend us from plunging farther into sin, that we have the confidence of a loving Saviour. When we are on the verge of temptation, the thought that He knows and grieves over our past sins may win us back. When will we learn the noonday lesson taught at the well of Sychar, that it is the Christ who reveals us to ourselves! It is not for you to find out your sin, but for Him to reveal it to you. With the Psalmist, you ask God to search you, “that you may be led in the way everlasting.” You are to become acquainted with your own heart by having Him read it to you; and all you can tell Him will be of that which He has told you before. Repentance now loses its bitterness, because it is the revelation of the Christ. “Once,” says Luther, “I thought no word so bitter as repentance; now there is none more sweet, and those passages in the Bible that used to terrify me now smile and sport about me.” In the same spirit, Augustine says, in his “Confessions,” “I will now call to mind my past foulness and the carnal corruptions of my soul; not because I love them, but that I may love Thee, O my God. For love of Thy love I do it; reviewing my most wicked ways in the very bitterness of my remembrance, that Thou mayest grow sweet unto me.” The power of such a revelation of the Christ is manifest in the fact, that the largest harvest of souls our Lord ever gathered while on earth was reaped in the two days He spent at Sychar. A soul brought face to face with Him, beholding His glory by being self-revealed, is a fit instrument to convey to others the advent of the Christ. (James G. Vose.)

The model Teacher

I. His ZEAL.

1. He went to a most unwelcome neighbourhood. His hereditary prejudices were arrayed against it, yet, when the world of Palestine was open to Him, our Lord mast needs go through it.

2. He became a teacher. What condescension of His; what an ennobling of the office.

3. He was satisfied with a class of one scholar. He talked just as long, kindly, and eloquently as He did to thousands. The great doctrines were in many cases given quietly to individuals. Regeneration to Nicodemus; resurrection to Martha; spirituality of worship to this woman.

4. He occupied Himself with a disagreeable pupil. Never was there more unpromising scholar.

5. He laboured with her when He was wearied almost to exhaustion.

II. His TACT.

1. How ingenious He was in catching an illustration to interest her mind. He took her water-pot for His text, as He did afterwards fish, loaves, etc. Try to link the unknown on to the known.

2. How quick He was in turning the illustration so as to impress her conscience. He knew He had done nothing until He made her feel that she was a sinner. So McCheyne, standing before a forge fire, said gently to the workmen, “Who can dwell with everlasting burnings”; and Payson to his coach companion on nearing their destination, “Are you prepared for the end of the journey which is so much longer than this?”

III. His SPIRITUALITY. He made the interview religious. Like all other sinners, the woman wanted to talk about something else.

1. Jesus avoided all discussion of sectarian questions. She

(1) Proposed sectarian questions;

(2) Suggested ritualistic points;

(3) Ventured on speculative inquiries.

2. Jesus pressed home the one lesson He wanted her to learn first of all. He told her of

(1) The exact state of her case, and drew her to an admission of it;

(2) The demands of Divine law;

(3) The Redeemer’s help.

3. Jesus completed His work by disclosing Himself. (C. S.Robinson, D. D.)

The pedagogy or rudimentary teaching of Jesus

The Church has a twofold mission.

1. To collect the masses, to bear patiently with them and educate them.

2. To go after individuals, person- ally to lay hold of their inner life in order to bring them into a state of salvation. Particular communions have leaned some to one side and some to the other. Romanism has cultivated the social element; lesser communities have laid greater stress on individual faith. Both objects ought always to be united. Let us learn from the pedagogic example of the Lord. Here He reaches the community through the individual; but the individual must first be educated to the faith and knowledge of the truth. There are three steps.

I. The first is reached BY AWAKENING IN THE WOMAN A SENSE OF A DEEPER WANT, the desire for something better than this well can offer.

1. She had regarded life as a matter of sensual enjoyment. The accusations of conscience had not troubled her, and she was happy in her way.

2. Jesus makes her discontented. It was not cruel, only inevitably painful, as is a surgical operation. To destroy quiet is the first step to the cure. Suspended between heaven and earth our souls are drawn to God, but bound to the World, and in the latter we seek happiness. This is the delusion of sin. A life of worldliness assumes a variety of forms, from the most degraded to the most refined, but the principle is the same. And that all is vanity is the first lesson we must learn and teach, to excite the desire for “living water.”

II. “GO, CALL THY HUSBAND,” is the second stage. The first is of doubtful result. It may lead right or left; to pride and contempt of other men who have no aspiration. Christ’s words, therefore, lead us from the struggle without to that within, to sin as the occasion of the mischief. This sin we must willingly know and renounce. This the woman was led to by the look of love which read her history in her heart. This teaches us to enter lovingly into personal life. A tender solicitude unlocks the heart and encourages confession. The word which exposes sin is the law in the hand of love.

III. Conviction of sin awakens the desire for forgiveness in prayer. The inquiry respecting Gerizim and Jerusalem was no evasion, but led to the third step, where our Lord refers her to THE HISTORICAL REVELATION FOR SALVATION. “Salvation is of the Jews.” God must be worshipped in Spirit, yet the revelation of Himself was in Israel, and its end the Messias. It is not enough to tread the path of inward self-knowledge; we must walk also in the way of faith. Not only do we move to meet God, He is come to meet us. The truth of salvation is historical, and the historical gospel is a moral certainty. So the woman proved. The saved individual now seeks to save society. “She left her water-pot,” etc. Conclusion:

1. We should go forth and lead souls to Christ as Christ led this woman.

2. No doubt we shall be weary sometimes, but, if the Master was weary, we need not be ashamed, And the wells which men have dug will then be doubly refreshing; for what- ever the Creator has given to man to enjoy is also given for the refreshment of the soul.

3. But the soul lives not by these alone, and when the highest matters press we must be prepared to renounce them, for they do not quench the soul’s deepest thirst. (C. E. Luthardt, D. D.)

Characteristics of Christ displayed in this conversation

I. Our Lord’s MERCY is remarkable. That such an one as He should deal so graciously with such a sinner is a striking fact.

II. His WISDOM. How wise was every step of His way in dealing with this sinful soul!

III. His PATIENCE. How He bore with the woman’s ignorance, and what trouble He took to lead her to knowledge.

IV. His POWER. What a complete victory He won at last! How almighty must that grace be which could soften and convert such a carnal and wicked heart! (Bp. Ryle.)

Subsidiary points

I. HUMAN FOLLY AND DIVINE WISDOM in contrast.

II. OUR LORD’S REAL HUMANITY in His subjection to weariness and thirst.

III. OUR LORD’S REAL DIVINITY in the mastery of all the secrets of the human heart.

IV. OUR LORD’S WILLINGNESS TO IMPART THE DEEPEST TRUTHS TO THE HUMBLEST understanding, thus assuring us that, although God has hid these things from the wise and prudent, He has revealed them unto babes. (H. J. Van Dyke, D. D.)

When … the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John

The journey to Samaria

I. THE DEPARTURE. The reason for it was the jealousy of the Pharisees at Christ’s success.

1. Jesus saw that a storm was coming, and withdrew. To abandon the profession or defence of the gospel from dread of suffering is quite a different thing from the persecuted Christian in one city fleeing to another to there hold forth the Word of life.

2. It is that persecutors are not always the open enemies, but are sometimes the professed friends, of religion, and that the name of God has often been associated with relentless cruelty.

3. The Pharisees did not hear Christ, but received reports doubtless exaggerated, for they heard that He personally baptized.

4. The great work of the ministry is not to baptize, but to preach. They are Christ’s fellow-workers in discriminating the truth, but not fellow-workers with the Spirit in communicating grace.

II. THE ARRIVAL.

1. Although the district was alien, there were souls to be saved.

(1) To the eye of man Jesus appeared to be fleeing from persecution.

(2) To the eye of God the visit was part of a mysterious plan by which the glory of the Divine government was to be revealed.

(3) To the eye of faith it offers an illustration of the manner in which the purpose of God is fulfilled.

2. Christ’s presence and work at Sychar, with its illustrious antecedents, offer encouragements to prayer for those who are to come after us.

(1) Parents should be stimulated to pray for children’s children,

(2) Believers to plead for the future of the Church. (A. Beith, D. D.)

Christ driven away

I. FALSE TEACHERS ARE ENEMIES TO THE TRUE. They will join with corrupt magistrates and favour their villainies (Isaiah 9:15), as the Pharisees did Herod against John. Christ, therefore, will rather trust Herod in Galilee than the Pharisees in Judaea (cf. Acts 25:11)

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II. IT IS NO UNCHARITABLENESS, BUT WISDOM, TO SUSPECT WICKED MEN; as Christ did the PHARISEES.

III. WHEN ONE TEACHER IS GONE GOD CAN RAISE UP ANOTHER. The Pharisees thought themselves well when John was out of the way, but Christ gives them more displeasure (Mark 1:14). They thought themselves sure when Christ was crucified, but Christ raised up twelve more to do greater things than Himself. Ministers are mortal, but the Church is immortal (Psalms 2:1).

IV. PROMISES ARE TO BE SEALED TO THOSE ONLY WHO REPENT AND BELIEVE.

1. Disciples were made

2. Then were baptized.

V. GOD TURNS THE MALICE OF MEN TO THE GOOD OF HIS CHURCH The Pharisees drove Christ to Galilee, but on the way a whole city was brought to Him. An ill wind that blows nobody good. (Jeremiah Dyke.)

The retreat of Jesus

The first turning point in His official life.

I. MOTIVES. The Pharisees began to watch Him with hostile eyes; the Baptist is imprisoned.

II. CHARACTER. Free consciousness. He retreats

1. In free discretion, without fear.

2. In holy discretion, “the Lord knew.”

III. RICH RESULTS. Beneficent sojourn in Samaria.

IV. SIGNIFICANCY.

1. He ceases to baptize.

2. He tarries in Samaria on His return.

The rite of baptism

I. AS PRACTISED BY JOHN (John 1:25-28, John 3:23; cf. Mt Mark 1:4-8; Luke 3:8; Luke 3:20).

1. Its nature--water baptism. Its mode uncertain. The word signifies either the application of an object to water or water to an object. Hence to immerse (2 Kings 5:14) or to wash (Mark 7:4; Luke 11:38). Against immersion in the present case stand

(1) The multitudes;

(2) The impromptu and public manner;

(3) Its practice in all seasons.

In favour of pouring is the contraposition of “with water” and “with the Spirit” (John 1:33), by which the two baptisms are distinguished. The believer is not immersed in the Holy Ghost, but the Holy Ghost descends on the believer.

2. Its import--purification of the outer life; reformation rather than regeneration.

3. Its design--preparation for Messiah.

4. Its obligation--faith. The recipient was bound to believe in and go over to the Messiah when He appeared.

II. AS CELEBRATED BY CHRIST (through His disciples) (John 3:22-26).

1. Its resemblance to John’s.

(1) Performed in the same way.

(2) Possessed the same significance.

(3) Looked towards the same end.

2. Its difference from John’s. Administered

(1) By Christ’s express authority.

(2) To such as professed their faith in a “come” Messiah.

(3) With a view of admitting to Christian discipleship.

(4) As an acknowledgment of obligation to learn and obey.

III. AS ADMINISTERED BY THE APOSTLES (Matthew 28:19; Mk Acts 2:38, Acts 9:18, etc.).

1. How tar it agreed with the preceding.

(1) In form it was a baptism with water.

(2) In authority it rested on the commandment of Christ.

(3) In significance it symbolized purification and sealed faith in the Messiah.

(4) In effect it introduced to the Messianic Church.

(5) In design it bound to acceptance of the teaching and obedience to the rule of Christ.

2. How far it went beyond the preceding. It -

(1) Rested on the authority of the risen as well as of the incarnate Christ.

(2) Symbolized inward renewal by the reception of the Holy Ghost.

(3) Was administered on a profession of faith, not simply in the

Messiah, but in the Trinity.

(4) Was not restricted to the Jewish people.

(5) Was not provisional, but permanent. (T. Whitelaw, D. D.)

Why Christ did not personally baptize

Lightfoot mentions because

1. He was not sent so much to baptize as to preach.

2. It might have been taken as a thing somewhat improper for Christ to baptize in His own name.

3. The baptizing that was most proper for Christ to use was not with water, but with the Holy Ghost.

4. He would prevent all quarrels and disputes among men about their baptism, which might have risen if some had been baptized by Christ and others only by His disciples. To these reasons we may add another of considerable importance. Our Lord would show us that the effect and benefit of baptism do not depend on the person who administers it. We cannot doubt that Judas Iscariot baptized some. The intention of the minister does not affect the validity of the sacrament. One thing seems abundantly clear, and that is, that baptism is not an ordinance of primary, but of subordinate, importance in Christianity. The high-flown and extravagant language used by some divines about the sacrament of baptism and its effects is quite irreconcilable with the text before us, as well as with the general teaching of Scripture (see Acts 10:48; 1 Corinthians 1:17).

The three baptisms

There are three degrees in the institution: John’s baptism, which was a general consecration to the Messianic kingdom by repentance; the baptism of Jesus, an attachment to His person as a disciple; baptism as reconstituted by Jesus after His resurrection as a consecration to the possession of salvation thenceforth acquired by Him for the whole world. We do not find that the subjects of the first baptism (the apostles, e.g.) were afterwards subjected to the second or third. It was they, on the contrary, who were charged with administering the two last (verse 2; Acts 2:1-47.). (F. Godet, D. D.)

He left Judaea

From Jerusalem to Nazareth, by way of the hill towns of Shiloh, Sychar, Nain, and Endor, the distance, as a bird would fly, is about sixty-four miles, being nearly the same as that from Oxford to London. By the camel paths, and there are no other, it is eighty miles. A good rider, having little baggage and less curiosity, may get over the ground in two Icing days; to do so, however, he must make up his mind to spend twelve hours each day in the saddle, on stony hill-sides, with very little water, and still less shade, under the blazing light of a Syrian sun. An easy journey, with time to rest and read, to see the wells, rums, and cities on the route, may be made in four days; though better still in five. The Lord and His disciples went through the land on foot, resting by the wells, under the shade of fig-trees, in the caves of rocks. The first part of this journey, a ride of thirty-six miles from the Damascus gate, to be done in about twelve hours, brings you to one of the most lovely and attractive spots in Palestine--the site of Joseph’s tomb and Jacob’s well. (W. H.Dixon.)

The original word, αφίημι, is a remarkable one; καταλεὶπο might have been expected (Matthew 4:15; Hebrews 11:27); and there is no exact parallel in the New Testament to this usage (yet comp. John 16:28). The general idea that it conveys is that of leaving anything to itself, to its own wishes, ways, fate; of withdrawing whatever controlling power was exercised before. Christ had claimed Jerusalem as the seat of His royal power, and Judaea as His kingdom. That claim He now in one sense gave up. (Canon Westcott.)

He must needs go through Samaria

Christ and the Samaritans

The ministry of Christ may be divided into two sections, the Galilean and the Judaean. Taking Capernaum as a centre and describing a circle of ten miles, and taking the Temple as a centre and describing another circle of equal radius--between these two points the life of Christ oscillated. Separating the two provinces was a strip of country inhabited by a mongrel semi-alien race--the Samaritans, between whom and the Jews there was a long.standing feud. How will Christ treat it? Will He pass round it? Will He widen the chasm? Or will He loin the two in one? Let us see.

I. WHEN CHRIST SPEAKS OF THE SAMARITANS IT IS IN WORDS OF FAVOUR AND COMMENDATION.

1. In the Samaritan “Stranger” of Luke 17:11-20, He finds the truest worship of Jehovah offered, not on Moriah, nor yet on Gerizim, but by the wayside.

2. In the parable of the Good Samaritan a comparison is drawn between the Samaritan and the Jew, to the eternal honour of the one, and the eternal shame of the other. The former is placed beside the very elite of Judaism, the priest and Levite, and the Master uses their selfish inhumanity as a foil to throw out more clearly and brightly the noble generosity of this “stranger.”

3. Christ is Himself called a Samaritan (John 8:48), doubtless because of His strong Samaritan leanings, and He does not protest.

II. CHRIST SEEKS TO REMOVE THE PREJUDICES OF HIS DISCIPLES BY PERSONAL CONTACT WITH THE DESPISED RACE.

1. The exception (Matthew 10:5) is due to their narrow views and prejudices.

2. Christ takes them with Him into Samaria (chap. 4.) and sends them to “have dealings” with the Samaritans; and tarries with them there two days (verse 40), and thus the old prejudices are removed by friendly hospitalities.

III. CHRIST OFFERED TO THE SAMARITANS THE PRIVILEGES OF HIS KINGDOM.

1. He deigns to ask a favour of the Samaritan woman and speaks one of the sublimest discourses of His ministry.

2. She and her fellow-citizens proclaim Christ the Messiah.

3. As a result of this the chasm is filled up (Acts 1:8; Acts 8:5-8). Henceforth the Samaritan is no more the “stranger,” but “a fellow-citizen with the saints, and of the household of God.” (H. Burton, M. A.)

Utilizing disagreeable necessities

1. The first signs of hostility to Christ (John 4:1).

2. The prudence of the Master. Just as it was necessary for Him to die for a world’s salvation, so now it is required that He should live in order that the true cause and nature of His death may be manifest. There is therefore nothing unworthy about this escape.

3. We must seek the explanation of this movement, not in the eternal decrees. Samaria would prove a neutral zone to keep His enemies at a distance, and while passing through it would not probably be followed. And besides, it admitted of His utilizing what might have been an anxious period and a waste of time.

I. HE IGNORED A FALSE DISTINCTION. Ceremonial cleanness and goodness were confounded by the Jews; a confusion rectified by the Parable of the Good Samaritan. Church and society are still full of such distinctions.

1. It is for us, not wantonly, but on sufficient occasion to expose and set at nought the error.

2. To get at true distinctions one must first expose false ones. But we must be sure that it is false and that the true does not preponderate, and that we have something better to substitute.

3. Wisdom and courage arc, therefore, necessary.

4. No safer guide can be found than a strong desire to do good and glorify God.

II. HE CONVERTED AN INCONVENIENCE TO A SPIRITUAL USE. He is a fugitive, but He does not hurry through the country, nor forget its spiritual destitution in His own sorrows.

1. Annoyance or ill temper at the disturbance of settled plans ought not to make us weary in well doing. Many are idle in the Church because they cannot get the particular thing they like best. But the greatest discoveries and reforms have been effected by the determination to do what we can.

2. Illtreatment on the part of professors is no excuse for idleness or cynicism.

3. Nor ought we to be engrossed with our own troubles. Doing good is the way to recovery.

4. Let us try to improve the unpleasant and unfortunate people and leave the world better than we find it.

III. A SPECIAL BLESSING ATTENDED HIS IRREGULAR EXTEMPORIZED MISSION. Each incident links itself easily on to another. It almost seems a beautiful creature of circumstances. Inconveniences are often Providential. A fault in the strata may point to richer seams. (A. F. Muir, M. A.)

The needs be

I. BY THE DETERMINATE COUNSEL AND FOREKNOWLEDGE OF GOD.

1. A wandering star was to be reclaimed from its devious orbit.

2. The locality was most unpromising.

3. What the Church would have missed had this chapter been lacking.

II. THE PEERLESS VALUE OF A SINGLE SOUL IN THE SIGHT OF CHRIST. The narrative is the parable of the Lost Sheep in impressive reality.

III. THE YEARNING PERSONAL LOVE OF THE SAVIOUR.

IV. LET NONE DEEM THEMSELVES BEYOND THE PALE OF CHRIST’S SYMPATHY AND SUCCOUR. (J. Macduff, D. D.)

The occasion of the journey

He must needs go through Samaria, not only because that province lay in His way, but because He was hungry, and in poor half-heathen Samaria lay the savoury meat which His soul loved. In the same manner He must needs pass through our nature and our world, as He goes from the glory of the eternity past to the glory of the eternity to come. It was not any physical necessity; for the Maker of all worlds might bane found another path from glory to glory without visiting this shooting star. But He must needs pass through the abode of fallen humanity on His way to the throne of the kingdom, because He longed to save the lost with a longing like hunger, and here only could be found the food that would satisfy His soul. His own sovereign love laid the necessity upon Himself. The sun, His creature, is under an inherent necessity of giving out light; so Christ, the light of the world, must needs give out the light of life, and therefore He casts Himself in the way of a dark world, as the hungry seeks food and the thirsty makes his way towards water-springs. (W. Arnot, D. D.)

In the path of Christ

Happy for them that they lay in our Saviour’s way to be looked upon: His paths drop fatness. Luther had rather be in hell with Christ than in heaven without Him. (J. Trapp.)

Providence shown in conversions

Now, there are divers things in those providences Which are versant about this work, and exceedingly sweet and taking; as, viz., The wonderful strangeness and unaccountableness of this work of Providence in casting us into the way, and ordering the occasions, yea, the minutest circumstances about this work. Thus you find in Acts 8:26-30. The eunuch, at that very instant when he was reading the prophet Isaiah, had an interpreter, one among a thousand, that joins his chariot just as his mind was, by a fit occasion, prepared to receive the first light of the knowledge of Christ. So, for the conversion of the Samaritans, it is observed John 4:4) Christ must needs go that way, because it lay just in the road betwixt Judea and Galilee, and at the sixth hour, i.e., high noon, He rests Himself upon Jacob’s well, still seeming to have no other design but His own refreshment, by sitting and drinking there; but, oh! what a train of blessed providences follow this, which seemed but an accidental thing! First, the woman of Samaria, and then many more in that city, are brought to believe in Christ, as you find in John 4:29, John 4:41. (J. Flavel.)

Unquenchable enthusiasm

When I was going to Europe in 1867, my friend Mr. Stuart, of Philadelphia, said, “Be sure to be at the General Assembly in Edinburgh, in June. I was there last year,” said he, “and it did me a world of good.” He said that a returned missionary (Dr. Duff) from India was invited to speak to the General Assembly on the wants of India. This veteran missionary, after a brief address, told the pastors who were present to go home and stir up their churches to send young men to India to preach the gospel. He spoke with such earnestness, that after awhile he fainted, and they carried him from the Hall. When he recovered he asked where he was, and they told him the circumstances under which he had been brought there. “Yes,” he said, “I was making a plea for India, and I did not quite finish my speech, did I?” After being told that he did not, he said, “Well, take me back and let me finish it.” But they said, “No, you will die in the attempt.” “Well,” said he, “I shall die if I do not,” and the old man asked again that they would allow him to finish his plea, When he was taken back, the whole congregation stood as one man, and as they brought him on the platform, with a trembling voice he said: “Fathers and mothers of Scotland, is it true that you will not let your sons go to India? I spent twenty-five years of my life there. I lost my health, and I have come back with sickness and shattered health. If it is true that we have no strong grandsons to go to India, I will pack up what I have and be off to-morrow, and I will let those heathen know that if I cannot live for them I will die for them.” (D. L. Moody.)

Commendable enthusiasm

Exception being taken, as I have said, to his energy and vehemence, Rowland Hill told how he had once seen a vast bank of earth, below which some men were at work, suddenly rend asunder; and leaving its bed, precipitate itself forward to bury them alive before they could utter a cry, or move a foot to escape. And who then, he asked, found fault with me, because, in my anxiety to save them, my cries for help were loud enough to call the neighbourhood t6 the rescue, and be heard a long mile away. Left there, they perished, miserably perished--needing what God, not man, always is, “a very present help in trouble.” (Dr. Guthrie.)

Our attitude towards Samaria

There is much in the disposition of the Samaritans that reminds us of the feelings of thousands of our own population to-day. Not only are they alienated from our faith, but they suspect us of a haughty and exclusive, or at least patronising attitude towards them. There is no fiercer resentment than the pharisaic spirit excites. Note the example of Christ.

I. CHRIST DOES NOT AVOID SAMARIA. He will not shun those who entertain prejudices unpleasant to encounter. And we shall never restore the slums to piety if we skirt them with dainty feet.

II. CHRIST DOES NOT HURRY THROUGH SAMARIA, BUT SEEKS CONVERSE WITH ITS INHABITANTS. None mere hurried visits to the headquarters of prejudice, rushing as through a cloud of suffocating smoke we must encounter, but amidst which we will not stay, will suffice. There must be true intercourse.

III. CHRIST IS FORBEARING IN HIS ATTITUDE. His first overture is met with a half-playful, half-bitter reminder of what He never sanctioned, the division of sentiment between Jew and Samaritan. What do we oftener meet? It is irritating to be taunted with the conduct of those whose spirit we do not share, though we may nominally share their religious name. But we ruin our influence by recrimination or bitter rejoinder. Like Christ, we must gently ignore the taunt.

IV. CHRIST, WITH SACRED TACT, INTRODUCES HIS GOSPEL. Had He commenced controversially, the woman’s heart would have been hardened; had He commenced with His final announcement (John 4:26), she would have been sceptical; had He commenced with such words as He used to learned Nicodemus, she would have been hopelessly bewildered. But He takes “water” for His text to this water-carrier, and in a picture lesson unfolds the truth. Ours are blind eyes if they see not texts in the commonest things, where-from we may preach the gospel of the kingdom. In that gospel Jew and Samaritan alike find hope and peace. (W. Hawkins.)

He cometh to a city of Samaria called Sychar

The locality

This name is only found in St. John 4:5, but it is universally considered to be the same as Sichem or Shechem, which is frequently mentioned in the Old Testament history. Dr. Robinson (Bib. Res. 3.118) says, “In consequence of the barred of the Jews, and in allusion to the idolatry of the Samaritans, the town Sichem probably received among the Jewish common people the by-name of Sychar, which we find in the Gospel of St. John; while Stephen, in addressing the more courtly Sanhedrim, employs the ancient name (Acts 7:16). Sychar might be derived from a Hebrew root, meaning either falsehood or drunkard.” Josephus describes Sheehem as between Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal. The present Nabulus is a corruption of Neapolis; and Neapolis succeeded the more ancient Shechem. The city received its new name from Vespasian. The situation of the town is one of surpassing beauty. It lies in a sheltered valley, protected by Gerizim on the south and Ebal on the north. The feet of these mountains, where they rise from the town, are not more than 500 yards apart. The bottom of the valley is about 1,800 feet above the level of the sea, and the top of Gerizim 800 feet higher still. The site of the present city, which is believed to have been also that of the Hebrew city, occurs exactly on the water- summit; and streams issuing from the numerous springs there, flow down the opposite slopes of the valley, spreading verdure and fertility in every direction. Travellers vie with each other in the language which they employ to describe the scene that bursts here so suddenly upon them on arriving in spring or early summer at this paradise of the Holy Land. “Here,” says Dr. Robinson (3:96) “ a scene of luxuriant and almost unparalleled verdure burst upon our view. The whole valley was filled with gardens of vegetables, and orchards of all kinds of fruit, watered by several fountains, which burst forth in various parts, and flow westward in refreshing streams. It came upon us suddenly like a scene of fairy enchantment. We saw nothing to compare with it in all Palestine. Here, beneath the shade of an immense mulberry-tree, by the side of a purling rill, we pitched our tent for the remainder of the day and night We rose early, awakened by the songs of nightingales and other birds, of which the gardens around us were full.” (F. I. Dunwell, B. A.)

Its history

Few places in Palestine, after Jerusalem, have had so much of Bible history connected with them. Here God first appeared to Abraham Genesis 12:6). Here Jacob dwelt when he first returned from Padanaram, and here the disgraceful history of Dinah, and the consequent murder of the Shechemites took place (Genesis 34:2, etc.). Here Joseph’s brethren fed their flocks when Jacob sent him to them, little thinking he would not see him again for many years (Genesis 37:12). Here, when Israel took possession of the land of Canaan, was one of the cities of refuge (Joshua 20:7-8). Here Joshua gathered all the tribes, when he addressed them for the last time (Joshua 24:1). Here the bones of Joseph were buried, and all the patriarchs were interred (Joshua 24:32; Acts 7:16). Here the principal events in the history of Abimeleeh took Judges 9:1, etc.). Here Rehoboam met the tribes of Israel after Solomon’s death, and gave the answer which rent his kingdom in two 1 Kings 12:1). Here Jeroboam first dwelt, when he was made king of Israel (1 Kings 12:25). And finally, close by Sheehem was the city of Samaria itself, and the two hills of Ebal and Gerizim, where the solemn blessings and cursings were recited, after Israel entered Canaan (Joshua 8:33). A more interesting neighbourhood it is difficult to imagine. Whichever way the eye of a wearied traveller looked, he would see something to remind him of Israel’s history. (Bp. Ryle.)

The parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. In two different ways this had come into the hands of Jacob. First, he had purchased it from the “children of Humor,” and then, when the Amorite invaded it, and took violent, unrighteous possession, he had, with his “sword and his bow,” recovered it. The land thus belonged to Jacob by right of purchase and by right of conquest: it became the property of his son by gift, by inheritance, and by grateful acceptance on his part. Our spiritual Jacob has both purchased our inheritance and taken it out of the hand of the Amorite; so likewise He bestows it freely on His dear children and they gratefully receive it, and rejoice in it as their portion. Eternal life is at once the gift of God and the fruit of faith. It becomes ours according to His eternal purpose, and also by the faith which accepts it--such faith as that of Joseph. Joseph was in Egypt, apparently independent of Canaan. The time when he or his seed could claim the inheritance was far distant--four hundred years of dreadful bondage were included in the intervening period--but Joseph believed. “God will surely visit you,” said he to his descendants, when he was dying, “ and ye shall carry up my bones from hence.” A similar faith had dictated the words of Jacob. “Beheld I die, but God shall be with you, and bring you again to the land of your fathers.” A faith having the same origin, exercised against the same discouragements, and producing the same blessed fruits of patience, endurance, and hope, must be ours. (A. Beith, D. D.)

Now Jacob’s well was there

Jesus found at the well

Some years since there lived in the west of England a well-known character called “Foolish Dick.” Not being considered quite sharp, one day he was going for a pitcher of water, when a good old man hailed him with “So, Dick, you are going to the well.” “Yes,” he replied. “Well, Dick, the woman of Samaria found Jesus at the well.” “Did she?” was the answer. “Yes,” said the good old Christian. Dick passed on, full of thought; the remark riveted on his mind by the Holy Spirit, quickening him into new life. He thought, “Why should I not find Jesus at the well? Oh, that I could find Him! Will He come to me?” He prayed, and found Christ at the well; left his water-pot to tell his neighbours what be had found, and from that time proved the reality of his conversion by his holy and active life, proclaiming Christ to others.

Suffering begets sympathy

Jesus Himself being weary was the more able and apt to help this poor Samaritress. He that hath had the toothache will pity those that have it. “We are orphans all,” said Queen Elizabeth in her speech to the children at Christ’s Hospital, “let me enjoy your prayers, and ye shall be sure of my assistance.” (J. Trapp.)

No sympathy without suffering

Johnson, whose robust frame was not in the least affected by cold, scolded me as if my shivering had been a paltry effeminacy, saying, “Why do you shiver?” Sir William Scott told me that when he complained of a headache, in the post-chaise, Johnson treated him in the same manner. “At your age, sir, I had no headache.” (Boswell.)

Jesus sitting on the well

Many things remind us of our Lord: a well, a weary peasant resting at noon. How truly human was Jesus!

1. How worn was His humanity. He was more weary than His disciples.

(1) He had a greater mental strain than they.

(2) He had a weariness they knew not of.

2. His self-denials even then were remarkable.

(1) He would in all points be made like unto His brethren.

(2) He would not exempt Himself from fatigue.

(3) He would not work a miracle for His own refreshment.

(4) He would not refuse to bear heat, thirst, exhaustion.

3. He has thus made Himself able to sympathize with

(1) The traveller who rests by the road-side.

(2) The labourer worn out with toil.

(3) The sufferer who feels pain.

(4) The poor man who must rest on a cold stone, and look for refreshment to the public fountain.

(5) The weary mind.

I. LET YOUR CONSCIENCE DRAW A SPIRITUAL PICTURE OF YOUR WEARIED SAVIOUR. He is wearied with our

1. Sins (Isaiah 43:24).

2. Formal worship (Isaiah 1:14).

3. Errings through unbelief (Psalms 95:10).

4. Resistance of His Spirit (Isaiah 63:10).

5. Cavillings and rebellions (Malachi 2:17).

Perhaps we have specially wearied the Lord, as we read in Amos 2:13, where singular provocations are mentioned. That is a grave question asked by the prophet Isaiah (vii. 13).

II. LET YOUR CONSCIENCE DRAW A SPIRITUAL PICTURE OF YOUR WAITING SAVIOUR. He waits

1. For comers to the well: He seizes on all occasions to bless, such as affliction, the hearing of the Word, the recurrence of a birthday, or even the simplest event of life. Men have other errands; they come to the well only to draw water, but the Lord meets them with His greater errand.

2. For the most sinful: she that had five husbands.

3. To enlighten, convince, convert.

4. To accept and to commission.

5. To begin by one convert the ingathering of a great harvest. How long He has waited for some of you! At how many points has He been on the outlook for you? Is He not waiting for you at this very hour? Will you not yield to His patient love?

III. LET YOUR PENITENCE DRAW ANOTHER PICTURE. Alter the position of the character.

1. Be yourself weary of your sinful way.

2. Sit down on the well of your Lord’s gracious ordinances.

3. Wait and watch till your Saviour conies.

4. Ask Him to give you to drink, and, in so doing, give Him to drink, for this is His best refreshment.

5. Drink yourselves of the living water and then run to tell others.

Conclusion: Will you not do this at once? May His Holy Spirit so direct you! (C. H. Spurgeon,)

The weary pilgrim

1. If now, with all the comforts of tent and equipage, the modern traveller finds locomotion oppressive and exhausting, what must it have been to Christ with no aid but the staff and rough sandal?

2. It is in such incidental occurrences that our Lord’s humanity and condescension are most touchingly exemplified.

3. He worked miracles for others, never for Himself.

4. My Saviour is my brother. He took not on Him the nature of angels.

(1) Because angelic nature is a Spiritual essence and incapable of corporeal suffering.

(2) Because He could not then have participated in feeling with those He came to redeem.

5. But my Saviour is my Lord or He could never have relieved my want.

I. Let the WEARY WITH LIFE’S JOURNEY, with pain, travail, and loneliness consider Him, lest they be weary and faint in their souls.

II. Let the WEARY WITH SIN who have come up through hot valleys of temptation, and are now sitting by poisoned wells, the pitcher broken at the cistern, the zest of life gone, without shelter, hear Him say, “Come unto Me and I will give you rest,”

III. Let those WEARY WITH THE BURDEN AND HEAT OF THE DAY IN THE MIDST OF THEIR LIFE’S CALLING, in manhood’s sixth hour, one half of existence over, hasten to Him, lest the valley of death, like the valley of Shechem, be close at hand while the fountain of life is neglected. Conclusion. You are Spiritually between the Ebal of courses and the Gerizim of blessings--Which are you to choose? (J. R. Macduff, D. D.)

Christ in His human weakness and Divine exaltation

I. WEARY AND YET THE REST OF A WEARY SOUL.

II. THIRSTY AND YET A FOUNTAIN.

III. HUNGRY AND YET ENJOYING HEAVENLY FOOD.

IV. LEFT ALONE AND YET IN SPIRIT SURROUNDED WITH APPROACHING NATIONS. (Lange.)

Weariness and work

1. This world is a place of weariness through sin; but love is a weariness that heaven approves, that of the Shepherd seeking the lost sheep.

2. There is a great mystery in this weariness: for the weary man was God; but He was weary that we might have rest.

I. CHRIST’S WEARINESS AS IT REFLECTS OUR OWN.

1. Christ was weary in His work, not of it.

2. We need not be surprised, therefore, if we are weary.

3. When so, wait upon Him to renew thy strength.

II. WEARINESS CAN BE PUT TO PURPOSE.

1. Under the most unlikely circumstances God can bring us work and refreshment at the same time. Christ had to all appearance turned His back on His work; but He had not, and when He seemed most unfit He did it most effectively. So Paul was taken from work to prison, but then he was instrumental in the jailers conversion.

2. The willing heart will often create its own opportunities. Christ was weary but watchful. A willing heart can find its work at any time and place.

We think we could do more were we better placed. But Christ says, “He that is faithful in that which is least, is faithful also in much.”

3. An earnest mind will avail itself of small opportunities, and through little things become really great. Christ was contented with a congregation of one. He did not preach sensational sermons, but sermons which created a sensation. He spake as earnestly to one as to a thousand.

III. CHRIST ASKS US THROUGH HIS WEARY REPRESENTATIVES TO MINISTER TO HIS WEARINESS. The poor, sick, widows, orphans, overworked pastors, etc., in Christ’s name cry, “Give me to drink.” (W. Poole Balfern.)

The realness of the scene

By a singular fate this authentic and expressive memorial of the earliest dawn of Jewish history became the memorial no less authentic and expressive of its sacred close. Of all the special localities of our Lord’s life in Palestine, this is almost the only one absolutely undisputed. By the edge of the well, in the touching language of the ancient hymn, “Quoereus me, sedisti lassus.” Here He halted, as travellers still halt, in the noon or evening of the day. Up that valley His disciples “went away into the city.” Down the same gorge came the woman to draw water, according to the unchanged custom of the East; which still, in the lively concourse of veiled figures round the wayside wells, reproduce the image of Rebekah, and Rachel, and Zipporah. Above them, as they talked, rose “this mountain” of Gerizim, crowned by the Temple, of which vestiges still remain, where the Samaritan sect “said men ought to worship,” and to which still, after so many centuries, their descendants turn as to the only sacred spot in the universe: the strongest example of local worship in the world, where the sacredness of local worship was declared to be at an end. And round about them spread far and wide the noble plain of waving corn. It was still winter or early spring, “four months yet to the harvest;” and the bright golden ears had not yet “whitened” their unbroken expanse of verdure. He gazed upon them; and we almost seem to see how the glorious vision of the Gentile world, with each successive turn in the conversation, unfolded itself more and more distinctly before Him, as He sate absorbed in the opening prospect, silent amidst His silent and astonished disciples. (Dean Stanley.)

Jacob’s welt an emblem of the sanctuary

Note that

I. NO GOOD DEEDS ARE EVER DONE IN VAIN, AND THAT THEY HAVE POWER TO BLESS MANY AGES TO COME.

1. None can measure his power for good. Influence may be mightier after death than in life. When Jacob dug that well, he little thought of the multitudes for whose refreshment he was providing, or of this sacred incident. Do you think the discoverer of printing foresaw the penny newspaper, or Columbus New York, and Boston, and Chicago? God watches over good efforts, and influences to bless them.

2. But if Jacob knew not all his well would do, he knew it would bless. How like a well is a gospel sanctuary! Look at the desert all around--how refreshing this spot in contrast. Here the weary find rest, the thirsty water.

3. Churches, like wells

(1) are made by man’s effort, but filled with God’s gift;

(2) Are not stagnant pools but living springs?

II. JESUS STILL REFRESHES HIMSELF AT WELLS BUILT BY HIS PEOPLE.

1. What was it that refreshed Him here? “My meat,” etc.

2. And Jesus still comes into our sanctuaries, and asks for small gifts of love as the return for His own greater love. He is yearning to find satisfaction in souls--waiting to see the full fruits of His servants efforts to save men.

3. How grateful was Jesus for this seat. He commanded John to record this gratitude. None of us will ever regret anything done to please Jesus.

4. You say, if I had seen Him, I would have invited Him to my home. Have you opened you heart to the heavenly Guest?

III. THIS WELL IS CHRIST’S APPOINTED PLACE TO MEET UNSATISFIED SOULS.

1. He was there before the woman, waiting for her, and thoughtfully sent away the disciples that no restraint might check her conversation. Has He not promised to meet His people in His house? Have you not often said, “It was as though the preacher knew all my circumstances.”

2. That woman, often like ourselves, little expected to find her Saviour.

3. She left her water-pot, and how often have you left your burdens.

IV. THIS WELL IS THE PLACE FOR QUIET FREE CONVERSATION WITH THE SAVIOUR, where Christ wants to enlighten, refresh, and pardon. (R. H.Lovell.)

Why religious ordinances are sometimes unprofitable

The ordinances of religion are compared to wells of water; but then they are like Jacob’s well. The water lies far below the surface, and to the man of the world, the mere professor of religion, who has the name but not the faith of a Christian, we may say, as the woman said to our Lord, “Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep.” Faith is, as it were, the rope, and our souls the vessels, which we let down into this well to fill them with living water. But that they do no good to some forms no reason why we should despise or neglect ordinances. It is no fault in the bread that, thrust between a dead man’s teeth, it does not nourish him. Water will revive a withering, but not a withered, plant; wine will revive a dying, but not a dead, man; the breath of your mouth, or the breeze of heaven, will rekindle the smouldering coal, but not the cold, grey ashes of the hearth. And it is only spiritual life that can derive benefit from such ordinances as are intended to revive the faint and give strength to the weary. (D. Guthrie, D. D.)

The ordinances necessary

Christ is the well of the water of life. It is by faith the soul reaches out after this living water, Faith is the soul’s muscular action, by which the water is drawn up and brought into use. But faith needs as an implement those means which Christ has appointed. These means are the pitcher in which the water is conveyed. Faith is not a Christ; neither are sacraments a Christ; but faith (under all circumstances) and sacraments where they may be had, are necessary to the appropriation and enjoyment of Christ. (Dean Goulburn.)

Influence after death

It is related of a broker in one of the Italian cities that his strict economy brought on him the reputation of miserliness. He lived plainly and poorly, and at his death a hundred thousand men in the city were ready to curse him until his will was opened, in which he declared that early his heart was touched with the sufferings of the poor in the city for the lack of water. Springs there were none, and the public wells were bad; and he had spent his life in accumulating a fortune that should be devoted to bringing, by an aqueduct, from the neighbouring mountains, streams that should pour abundantly into the baths and dwellings of the poor of the city; and he not only denied himself of many of the comforts of life, but toiled by day and by night, yea, and bore obloquy, that he might bless his fellow-citizens. He is dead; but those streams pour their health yet into the city. (H. W. Beecher.)

Value of a well in the East

When we remember that in the land where most of the Scriptures were written there was, for the greater part of the year, but burning and scorching heat; that there was no winter, as we understand the term; that water was as precious as gold; and that the digging of a well was the work of kings and princes; that shadow was a luxury, to attain which hours of sore and weary travelling were accounted well spent--we can understand the beauty and force of such figures as Jesus uses in speaking to the woman of Samaria. Digging a well rendered a man the benefactor of his race. “Canst thou do more than dig a well?” was the meaning of the woman’s question to Jesus. (H. W. Beecher.)

Topography of Jacob’s well and neighbourhood

As the well is near magnificent springs gushing from the roots of Gerizim, and flowing to the East, the Patriarch’s task in sinking so deep a well and building a wall round it, can only be explained by the jealousy which the Canaanites, like all Eastern peoples, regarded their own springs. To have trusted to these would have been to invite trouble. It was, therefore, much better for Jacob to have a well of his own, so as to be independent. This well lies a little off the road, on the right hand. There is nothing visible now above ground. A little chapel, about twenty feet long, once built over the well, has long ago fallen; its stones lying about in heaps. The ground slopes up to the fragments of the broken-down wall. The church dates from the fifth century, but, except these stones, the only traces of it are some remains of tessellated pavements and carvings, which are hidden beneath the rubbish. Over the well is a large stone, with a round hole in the middle, large enough for the skin buckets of the peasantry to pass down. This stone is probably as old as the twelfth century. The mouth Isaiah 7:5 feet across, and its depth, which some centuries ago was 105 feet, is still about 75 feet, though for ages every visitor has thrown down stones to hear the echo when they strike the bottom. It is cut through a thick bed of soil, and then through soft rock; the water filtering through the sides to the depth occasionally of 12 feet, though it is dry sometimes for years together. It is thus rather a “beer” or rain pit than a spring well; hence, the contrast between “this water” and “living water.” Our Lord must have sat with His face towards the S.W., since He speaks of Gerizim as “this mountain.” Around Him were the same sights as are before the visitor of to-day--the rich valley running up westward towards Shechem, with a rippling streamlet in its centre; the groves that border the town hiding the houses from view; the heights of Gerizim, towering in rounded masses one over another to a great height, close before Him on the south. Mount Ebal, steep but terraced almost to the top into gardens of prickly pear, lay behind them; the little hamlet of Balata, where Abraham’s altar once stood under the sacred tree; the mud huts of Sychar; a little village now called Askar, not half as far off as Shechem, and the dome of Joseph’s tomb being at its foot. To the east, beyond the great plain, was Salim, near to AEnon, where the Baptism preached, and the wooded Hill of Phinehas, with the tomb of the once fiery high priest. (C. Geikie, D. D.)

The interior of the well

Some men were set to work to clear out the mouth of the well, which was being rapidly covered up. A chamber had been excavated to the depth of ten feet, and in the floor of the chamber was the mouth of the well, like the mouth of a bottle, and just wide enough to admit a man’s body. We lowered a candle down the well and found the air perfectly good, and after the usual amount of noise and talking among the workmen and idlers, I was lashed with a good rope round the waist, and a loop for my feet, and lowered through the mouth of the well by some trusty Arabs, directed by my friend, Mr. Falcher, the Protestant missionary. The sensation was novel and disagreeable. The numerous knots in the rope continued to tighten and to creak, and after having passed through the narrow mouth I found myself suspended in a cylindrical chamber, in shape and proportion not unlike that of the barrel of a gun. The twisting of the rope caused me to revolve as I was being lowered, which produced giddiness, and there was the additional unpleasantness of vibrating from side to side, and touching the sides of the well. I suddenly heard the people from the top shouting to tell me that I had reached the bottom, so when I began to move I found myself lying on my back at the bottom of the well: looking up at the mouth the opening seemed like a star. It was fortunate that I had been securely lashed to the rope, as I had fainted during the operation of lowering. The well is seventy.five feet deep, seven feet six inches diameter, and is lined throughout with rough masonry, as it is dug in alluvial soil. The bottom of the well was perfectly dry at this time of the year (the month of May), and covered with loose stones. There was a little pitcher lying at the bottom unbroken, and this was an evidence of there being water in the well at some seasons, as the pitcher would have been broken had it fallen upon the stones. It is probable that the well was very much deeper in ancient times, for in ten years it had decreased ten feet in depth. Every one visiting the well throw stones down for the satisfaction of hearing them strike the bottom, and in this way, as well as from the debres of the ruined church built over the well during the fourth century, it has become filled up to probably more than a half of its original death. (Lieut. S. Anderson, R. E.)

Jacob’s well a type

Now Jacob’s well was there. The Samaritans were infinitely corrupt in their doctrine and worship, yet they had the fountain of the Mosaic doctrine among them. They had received the Pentateuch, and worshipped God according to Jacob’s rites, and the letter of Moses’ law. But the letter without the spirit is dead. The stagnant well of water, becoming muddy by agitation, and corrupt by lying undisturbed, is inferior for use and gratification, and is not like the running water of the living spring, which continually freshens itself, and runs itself clear, and is always replenishing itself in purity and copiousness, for use and enjoyment. A greater than Abraham, or Jacob, or Moses, must give them this spring. Jacob’s children, after the flesh, drank of that well, but his spiritual children, and they only, should drink of this water. (L. R. Bosanquet.)

Christ and the woman of Samaria

I. THE SAVIOUR AS A JEWISH TRAVELLER. Observe three things.

1. The simplicity and humbleness of His life. He comes to this earth as a poor man. Learn from this:

(1) That poverty is perfectly compatible with extensive religious usefulness.

(2) That religion in particular cases imposes much labour on its disciples.

(3) Those who wish to study the Scriptures, must study and labour hard too.

2. The superiority of moral to bodily pleasures. Our Saviour was thirsty, but we do not read that He immediately quenched His thirst.

3. In our Saviour a beautiful instance of amiableness and general benevolence.

II. THE VIEW GIVEN OF OUR SAVIOUR AS A DIVINE TEACHER.

“Sir, I perceive Thou art a prophet!” What did He teach?

1. He instructed the woman in divine worship.

2. Let us look on the same subject in another form, and consider the Saviour as giving the doctrine of worship.

3. And worship of God should be in accordance with His nature and character. God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must do so in spirit and in truth. Our Saviour had in view the overthrow of three great errors: one is atheism. The next error is idolatry. The other error at that time in reference to God and His worship was pantheism.

4. The other lesson our Lord Jesus Christ taught this woman was, He told her all that ever she had done.

III. THE THIRD LIGHT IN WHICH JESUS MANIFESTED HIMSELF, WAS AS THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD. Here He spiritualizes the scene, and represents Himself as possessing that which was essential to the happiness of men--living water. (Caleb Morris.)

The appropriateness of the place for the purpose

Not inappropriate, surely, was it that He should occupy a spot beneath the shadow of Gerizim, “the mountain of blessing;” He Himself about to become so, in a nobler sense, to an outcast, “the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.” (J. R.Macduff, D. D.)

Sat thus on the well--The adverb may designate the attitude of a man who is there, awaiting what God will say; or it reproduces the notion of fatigue; thoroughly worn out with fatigue, as He was; or perhaps it signifies, without any preparation, taking things as He found them. (F. Godet, D. D.)

The sixth hour.--I think that the “sixth hour,” in the text before us, means twelve o’clock, for the following reasons.

1. It seems exceedingly improbable that St. John would reckon time in a manner different to the other three gospel-writers.

2. It is by no means clear that the Romans did reckon time in our way, and not in the Jewish way. When the Roman poet, Horace, describes himself as lying late in bed in a morning, he says, “I lie till the fourth hour.” He must surely mean ten o’clock, and not four in the afternoon.

3. It is entirely a gratuitous assumption to say that no woman ever came to draw water except in the evening. There must surely be exceptions to every rule. The fact of the woman coming alone, seems of itself to indicate that she came at an unusual hour, and not in the evening.

4. Last, but not least, it seems far more probable that our Lord would hold a conversation alone with such a person as the Samaritan woman at twelve o’clock in the day, than at six o’clock in the evening. The conversation was not a very short one. Then the woman goes away to the city, and tells the men what has happened, and they all come out to the well to see Jesus. Yet by this time, in all reasonable probability, it would be quite dark, and the night would have begun. And yet, after all this, our Lord says to the disciples, “Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields” (John 4:35). There is a special seemliness in the fact that our Lord held His conversation with such a person as this Samaritan woman at noon, day. When He talked to Nicodemus, in the preceding chapter, we are told that it was at night. But when He talked to a woman of impure life, we are carefully told that it was twelve o’clock in the day. I see in this fact a beautiful carefulness to avoid even the appearance of evil, which I shall entirely miss if the sixth hour meant six o’clock in the evening. I see even more than this. I see a lesson to all ministers and teachers of the gospel, about the right mode of carrying on the work of trying to do good to souls like that of the Samaritan woman. Like their Master, they must be careful about times and hours, especially if they work alone. If a man will try to do good to a person like the Samaritan woman, alone and without witnesses, let him take heed that be walks in his Master’s footsteps, both as to the time of his proceedings as well as to the message he delivers. (Bp. Ryle.)

The self-abnegation of Christ

In the case of Nicodemus, He was ready to give him the time set for rest; here He does the same when tired and thirsty at noon. (C. E. Luthardt, D. D.)

There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water

Connection between the conversations with the woman of Samaria and with Nicodemus

I. THERE IS A STRIKING CONTRAST AND COMPLEMENT BETWEEN THE TWO. The woman, the Samaritan, the sinner, is placed over against the Rabbi, the ruler of the Jews, the Pharisee. The nature of worship takes the place of the necessity of the new birth; yet so that either truth leads up to the other. The new birth is the condition of entrance into the kingdom; true worship flows from Christ’s gift.

II. THERE IS A REMARKABLE SIMILARITY OF METHOD in Christ’s teaching in the two cases. Immediate circumstances, the wind and the water, furnished present parables, through which deeper thoughts were suggested, fitted to call out the powers and feelings of a sympathetic listener.

III. THE MODE IN WHICH OUR LORD DEALT WITH THE WOMAN finds a parallel in the synoptic gospels (Luke 7:37, etc.; comp. Matthew 26:6, etc.). The other scattered notices of the Lord’s intercourse with women form a fruitful subject for study (John 11:1-57, John 20:14, etc:; Matthew 9:20 and parallels, Matthew 15:22, etc., and parallels, Matthew 27:55 and parallels, Matthew 28:9, etc.; Luke 8:2, etc., Matthew 10:38, etc., Matthew 11:27, etc., Matthew 13:11, etc.). (Bp. Westcott.)

Christ and the woman

I. A MEMORABLE INTERVIEW DESCRIBED (John 4:7-8).

1. Memorable to Jesus.

(1) For the place where it occurred: Jacob’s well, a scene of loveliness and fertility, marred only by the city of liars or drunkards; a spot consecrated by sacred memories.

(2) For the time when it happened--at noon in Midsummer--an unusual season and hour; at the close of a long journey in obedience to His Father’s will; at a moment of weariness and loneliness and perhaps sadness at having to leave Judaea; waiting for the next opportunity.

2. Memorable to the woman. Because of

(1) The person she met.

(2) The truths to which she listened.

(3) The discoveries she made.

(4) The treasures she found.

3. Memorable to the Evangelist. On account of

(1) The insight it afforded into Christ’s character.

(2) The light it cast upon the work.

(3) The prospect it opened of the ultimate triumph of the kingdom of God.

II. A PROFITABLE CONVERSATION OPENED.

1. A simple request preferred (John 4:7); natural (Judges 4:19); moderate 1 Kings 17:20); courteous (Psalms 45:2; Luke 5:22); condescending (Matthew 11:27); honouring the woman; gracious.

2. An astonishing answer returned (verse9). Persons of narrow intelligence generally surprised to find others capable of throwing off prejudice.

3. An important truth announced (verse10). What keeps men from becoming Christians is ignorance (Ephesians 4:18)

(1) Of God’s gift (John 7:39; Acts 2:38);

(2) Of Him through whom that gift is offered (John 8:19; 1 Corinthians 2:8);

(3) Of the terms upon which it can be secured: by asking (Matthew 7:7; James 4:3) freely (Isaiah 55:1);

(4) Of the certain success of every application, Christ denying none who John 6:37; Revelation 21:6); and

(5) Of the value of the gift (John 7:38-39; Romans 8:2; 2 Corinthians 3:6; Galatians 6:18). (T. Whitelaw, D. D.)

The drawer of water

I. WHAT BRINGS HER THERE? The distance was a mile and a half, and much nearer were two copious fountains as old as the Canaanites, besides springs in and around the city. The hour, too, was peculiar. It is only the wayfarer or caravan that pause at noon for refreshment. Moreover, it was not the public well of the city, because there was no accommodation for drawing water. The answer is a superstitious virtue supposed to attach to the well. In Europe we have many monasteries and shrines reared around sacred fountains, to which pilgrims resort. The objection to this, grounded on the profligacy of the woman, is answered by the fact that abject superstition is often allied with licentiousness; as in the case of many Mohammedans, Roman Catholics, and Hindoos.

II. THE GUIDING HAND WHICH BROUGHT HER AT THAT TIME. Nothing, in an earthly sense, was more purely accidental. Who can doubt that all unknown and unforeseen by her it was one of those ordinary every-day providences of God which we are compelled to believe if we would unriddle the mystery of the world. The same” needs be” which brought the Redeemer there brought also her. The same truth is often illustrated in our individual histories. Events apparently trivial and unimportant form the mighty levers of life shifting our whole future. (J. R. Macduff; D. D.)

The woman of Samaria

Though this woman was a sinner, her coming forth to draw water herself was commendable. It is the devil that meets with us when we are idle. The angel of the Lord appeared to the shepherds while they were keeping watch over their flocks by night. Matthew was called at the receipt of custom. Peter, and Andrew, his brother, were fishing; James the son of Zebedee, and John, his brother, were mending their nets, when called by the Saviour. Elisha was ploughing when Elijah cast his mantle upon him, and said, “Follow me.” Saul was seeking his father’s asses when he met with Samuel, who anointed him king over Israel. How favourable the season! “His disciples were gone away into the city, to buy meat.” How unsuitable would company have been in a case like this. There is business that can only be tranacted between God and the soul. How often does religion take its rise from solitude. It teaches us what He is in Himself; “The gift of God”; by way of emphasis and distinction. It teaches us what He has to bestow; “living water.” It teaches us how we are to obtain this blessedness of Him. We must ask: nothing less is required, nothing more. It teaches us the reason why men do not apply to Him. It is because they do not know Him. It is in religion as it is in nature, the understanding sways the will and the affections. “Wisdom is the principal thing”; therefore we are to “get wisdom, and with all our getting to get understanding.” And hence we see the difference between this woman and blind Bartimeus, on a similar occasion. Bartimeus was sitting by the wayside begging, when Jesus was passing by--but he knew that it was Jesus; and therefore he cried, “Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy on me.” “The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” (W. Jay.)

Give Me to drink

The thirsting Saviour

I. A TESTIMONY TO THE TRUE HUMANITY OF OUR LORD. In His spiritual thirst for the woman’s salvation we must not lose sight of His natural thirst. Christ was thoroughly human. Grasping this we see

1. His ability to suffer death.

2. The power of His example.

3. His kinship with us.

4. His sympathy for us.

II. AN IMPLICATION OF HIS DEITY.

1. Had He been a man claiming Divine powers would He have asked for water? A pretender would have attempted a miracle.

2. His Godlike reserve. Christ is never prodigal of miracles because conscious of the fulness of His Divine power. He uses natural means whenever they can serve His purposes.

III. AN INSTANCE OF THE FREENESS AND GREATNESS OF HIS LOVE TO SINNERS.

1. The woman embodied all that could excite the aversion of a Jew.

(1) Her Samaritan birth rendered her an object of sectarian hatred,

(2) Her sex forbade a rabbi to be familiar with her.

(3) Her loose life would have brought down the contempt of a Pharisee.

2. But Christ had no national animosity, sectarian bigotry, professional dignity, or self-righteous loathing.

3. He sees a lost soul in whom longings for better things have not been wholly stifled and sets Himself to save her.

IV. A LESSON OF WISDOM, TACT, AND ZEAL IN SAVING SOULS.

1. Christ suits His method to individual characters and circumstances--touching with equal ease the two extremes of society.

2. He seizes trifling opportunities.

3. He sets a signal example of turning secular things to sacred uses.

4. The lesson He here teaches can only be learned by practice.

5. The encouragement to learn this lesson is that our wise and Divinely-directed efforts in small matters may yield rich results.

V. AN EMBLEM OF HIS THIRST TO SAVE SINNERS.

1. This was deeper than His spiritual craving.

2. He thirsts now for you.

3. This thirst can only be quenched by your surrender. (A. Warrack, M. A.)

Christ’s request

In this notice

I. A GRACIOUS ACT OF SPIRITUAL AGGRESSION ON A SINNER. He did not wait for the woman to speak to Him, but was the first to begin conversation.

II. AN ACT OF MARVELLOUS CONDESCENSION. He by whom all things were made, the Creator of fountains, brooks, and rivers, is not ashamed to ask a draught of water from the hand of one of His sinful creatures.

III. AN ACT FULL OF WISDOM AND PRUDENCE. He does not at once force religion on the attention of the woman, and rebuke her for her sins. He begins with a subject apparently indifferent, and yet one of which the woman’s mind was doubtless full. He asks bet for water.

IV. AN ACT FULL OF THE NICEST TACT, and exhibiting perfect knowledge of the human mind. He asks a favour, and puts Himself under an obligation. No line of proceeding, it is well known to all wise people, would be more likely to conciliate the woman’s feelings towards Him and to make her willing to hear His teaching. Simple as the request was, it contains principles which deserve the closest attention of all who desire to do good to ignorant and thoughtless sinners. (Bp. Ryle.)

Christ abolishing prejudices

I. OF THE ANCIENTS AGAINST THE FEMALE SEX.

II. OF STATUTE AGAINST THE FALLEN.

III. OF NATIONALITY AGAINST AN ALIEN RACE.

IV. OF RELIGION AGAINST SEPARATISM AND HERESY. (Lange.)

The conference

Each one of us must come to have a personal dealing with Christ.

1. It may be at one of the crisis-hours of existence.

2. It may be at a dying hour.

3. It must be at the day of Judgment.

I. CHRIST OFTEN COMES AND SPEAKS UNEXPECTEDLY. When the woman left her home she never dreamed of this interview. Christ often comes

1. In sudden sicknesses.

2. Sudden reverses.

3. Sudden sanctuary visitations.

II. CHRIST OFTEN COMES AND SPEAKS TO THE SINNER WHEN ALONE. Had the woman come with other females at the customary evening hour this conversation would have been impossible. So in another case (chap. 8:9, 10).

III. CHRIST OFTEN SPEAKS IN THE MIDST OF THE ORDINARY DUTIES OF LIFE. So with the apostles. Christ thus puts His seal on life’s daily drudgery. (J. R.Macduff, D. D.)

Chance in the Divine economy

Here, then, we have an instance of what appeared to be chance, and what was chance as much as any human affairs can be so, being made subservient to a great and beneficial end. It was with no design of meeting the woman that Christ passed through Samaria, nor did He sit down by the well because He knew she would repair thither, but because He was weary; neither did the disciples go into the city that Christ might be left alone for this interview, but to buy meat; nor did the woman go to the well to meet a teacher and to receive instruction, but to draw water. The coincidences were all of them unconnected with each other. And this is what in common language we properly enough call chance. But in all such cases, though on the part of man the circumstances and results are undesigned and accidental, on the part of God they are foreknown and fore-ordained. (J. Fawcett, M. A.)

The real significance of the woman’s coming to Christ

As at the memorable scene of patriarchal days the ark of the testimony was placed between the adjacent hills, so now did the true Ark stand between her and the Ebal of curses directing and conducting her up to the mountain of blessing, and saying, “Woman, thy sins are forgiven thee.” Shechem, her ordinary dwelling-place, was one of the old cities of refuge. She may possibly have seen with her own eyes the manslayer hastening with fleet foot along the plain of Mokhna up the narrow valley she had just traversed to be safe within the appointed walls from the avenger of blood. That Old Testament institution and type had, in the Adorable Person standing by her side, a nobler meaning and fulfilment. Though all unconscious at the moment of her peril and danger, He was to her the great antitypical Refuge from the avenging sword of that law which she had so flagrantly outraged in heart and life. (J. R. Macduff, D. D.)

The Jewish treatment of women

It is worth noting that this freedom of speech between man and woman was condemned by the rabbins. One rabbinic precept is: “Prolong not speech with a woman”; a later edition reads: “One’s own wife is meant--how much less the wife of another”; and a third statement goes so far as to intimate perilous consequences in the next world for those who disregard this injunction. The Talmud declares it scandalous for a man to talk to a woman on the street; and women were prohibited from keeping schools because that would imply consultation with the fathers of their scholars. (S. S. Times.)

The revolution Christ effected in the treatment of women

If proof were needed of a strange abnormal disturbance in the history of the human race, it would be found in the treatment woman has received at the hands of society. Throughout the animal world the female sex is treated with consideration. Among birds and beasts the female is never systematically maltreated. This occurs only among men. The Saviour, however, in the unsullied purity of His manhood, brushed aside as cobwebs all social regulations which tended to degrade or oppress women. But He could not do it without exciting the wonderment even of those who knew Him best. Notwithstanding her life of illicit indulgence, the Saviour enters into earnest holy conversation with her. We have an account also of So, rates once holding a parley with the “strange woman.” What is the purpose of his conversation? Does he endeavour to reclaim her? Nay; he only teaches her how to ply her infamous trade with greater success, furnishing her, out of his deep knowledge of human nature, with new foibles wherewith to entrap the unwary. In extenuation of his offence it has been alleged that he was only making an experiment with his much-vaunted “method.” Maybe; but it conclusively proves that he had no adequate conception of the gross turpitude of moral evil, and that he was animated by no strong desire to win back to virtue those who had fallen from feminine integrity. What infinite distance separates the conversation of Socrates with the courtesan from the conversation of Christ with the Samaritan woman! (J. Cynddylan Jones, D. D.)

Christ’s gentleness with the fallen

A hawthorn, near Glastonbury Church, one of the oldest churches within these realms, was reported to bud and blossom in midwinter; whereas the bushes and trees round about looked bare and naked, this particular one appeared clad in beauty. What was the cause of its flowering in mid-winter? Tradition answered that Joseph of Arimathaea, the supposed first missionary of Christianity to Britain, and the accredited founder of the Glastonbury Church, touched it one day in passing with the fringe of his garment, whereupon extraordinary virtue flowed into the bush, and it forthwith blossomed. What is not true naturally may be true spiritually. Let men of prickly characters, the cantankerous thorns of humanity, be gently brushed by the hand of love, and forthwith they will flower in all the beauty of holiness. (J. Cynddylan Jones, D. D.)

Soul-winning tact

A colporteur entered an Austrian shop. He relates: “A little girl asked me what I wanted. ‘I have Bibles to sell.’ The little girl brought word that her parents had plenty of books, and would rather sell than buy. This led me to a little more boldness in my attack. I walked in a little nearer, and talking to some one supposed to be in the room, I explained what my books were. ‘My husband is a Roman Catholic,’ was the reply; ‘he would object to read the Bible.’ ‘But I am very fond of my Bible; may I just read a short portion to you?’ Within a second room the husband himself was at work. He overheard our conversation and the passages read, and, peeping round the corner, said he would buy a copy. By-and-by a second man issued forth from the inner room. He would also take a copy. A regular talk began, and the people said, ‘Stay and have some dinner with us.’ I did, and we parted capital friends.” (Bible Society Report.)

Tact and kindness will win souls

At Mr. Moody’s mid-day meeting, a minister rose and said he endorsed all which had gone before, and then related the following incident. “I was holding a mission in a colliery district, and in the course of the morning when I was inviting people to the evening meeting, I knocked at a door and found a woman at the washing-tub. I said to her, ‘I called to tell you I.am holding mission services at such and such a chapel, will you and your family join us?’ ‘Chapel,’ she said; ‘I am up to my eyes in washing. I have three black men coming in, and there’s that wringing machine, I gave fifty shillings for it, and it’s broken the first round.’ She was in a towering passion, and I thought I would not say any more to her, so I took a look at the machine and found it was not broken, but had only slipped out of its gear, so I unscrewed it altogether, and set it right, and then said, ‘Now you have been hindered so I’ll just take a turn at the wringing.’ So I went to work, turn, turn, turn. At last she looked up and said: ‘Where did you say the chapel was?’ I told her. She said: ‘I’ll tell my husband to-night, and we’ll come.’ That woman got blessed, and her husband and all her family, and she turned out the best worker in the village, and there was a blessed work of God in that place. She went from house to house, saying, ‘Come and hear the minister, it’s he as mended the machine!’“