
We keep trying to make the same water better - what if there is actually
water?
1 Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John— 2 although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. 3 So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee.
4 Now he had to go through Samaria. 5 So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.
7 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans)
10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”
11 “Sir,” the woman said, “You have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”
13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again,14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.” —John 4:1-15
Stop going back
Our history is part of us, but it doesn’t get to define us.
History of Jacob’s well - Sychar was ancient Shechem
- Abram’s first stop in Canaan after leaving his homeland; and also the place where God appeared to Abram and renewed His promise to give the land to Abram and his descendants (Genesis 12:6-8)
- Jacob stopped here on his way back home with his wife and his kids and built an altar (Genesis 33:18-20)
- Jacob’s daughter, Dinah, was raped there, and Jacob’s sons in turn massacred the men of the city (Genesis 34)
- Jacob gave this land to Joseph after discovering he was still alive (Genesis 48:22) and eventually Joseph’s bones were buried there (Joshua 24:32)
- Joshua made a covenant with Israel, renewing their commitment to follow God in that place (Joshua 24:15 - “as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”)
Drink better water
Jesus came to give us new water,
We draw from the well of
“Following Jesus will make your life better, and make you better at life.” ~Andy Stanley
Better water
1. This water doesn’t wash over, it actually
2. This water
Our prayer is the same as the woman at the well (verse 15) -
Give me this water, better water, so I can stop going back.