John 4:5-42        “When Jiggling Wires Isn’t Good Enough”

     A woman’s car was stalled at an intersection.  Hood up, the woman flagged down a passing motorist for help.  “I can’t get it started,” she said.  “But if you jiggle the wire on the battery, I think it’ll work.”  The guy grabbed the positive battery cable and it came off in his hand.  Yep, definitely the cable was too loose.  He told the woman that he could tighten the cable if she had some tools.  “My husband says to just jiggle the wire,” she replied.  “It always works.  Why don’t you just try that?” Convincing the woman that she’d need someone to keep jiggling the wire every time she turned off the engine, she finally found a wrench and reluctantly handed it to him. 

     How many times have we, in our own lives, tried to get a “quick fix” from God?  “I have this problem, Lord, and if you’ll just jiggle the wire, things will be OK.  I’m in a hurry, so let’s just get me going again the quickest way possible.”  But God doesn’t want to “jiggle wires.”  He wants to take the time necessary to deal with our real problem and fix it.  

     The story in today’s Gospel is about another lady who needed more than just a wire jiggled.  The setting is a village well.  Like a small town coffee shop, the village well was a popular place where people gathered every day to draw water.  People would come and share the news of the day.  They’d stay as long as necessary to get caught up on the latest happenings.  The well was the center of activity in the ancient world.

     Women would gather water from the local well early in the morning before the heat of the day or they would wait until after the sun set to draw water.  We’re given a clue that something was wrong in this woman’s life when we see that she came to the well at the hottest time of the day, a time when she’d be sure no one else was around.  

     As Jesus and his disciples were traveling through Samaria they stopped to rest at this well.  Jesus sent his disciples to look for food while he rested.  It was midday and very hot.  No one was around.  In a few minutes, however, this Samaritan woman approaches to get some water.  Expecting to find no one at the well, how surprised she must have been to find Jesus there.  And if she was surprised to see Jesus, she must have really been shocked when he spoke to her.  For you see, in Jesus’ day men weren’t permitted to speak with women in public, even their wives.  It was especially scandalous for a Jew to have any dealing with a Samaritan.

     But Jesus senses something is wrong in her life.  Speaking out of the depths of his concern for her he offers a word of hope.  He offers her “living water.”

     Jesus begins by helping this woman see herself in a new way.  In the longest recorded conversation of Jesus with any person, Jesus asks this Samaritan woman, “Give me a drink.”  The woman is shocked because Jews didn’t share cups or bowls with Samaritans.  And so she questions Jesus.  Jesus replies, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, `Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.”

     As is often the case in John’s gospel there’s some level of misunderstanding in their conversation.  Jesus is talking about new life, eternal life, and the woman thinks in practical terms. She replies to Jesus, “Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep.”  Still, the mention of “living water” gets her attention.   

     Naturally the Samaritan woman asks Jesus for some of this “living water,” so that, in her own words, “I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”  In her way of thinking not only would she never be thirsty again, but she’d never have to face the humiliation or scorn from the other women because she’d no longer have to go to the well.  She’d have this “living water,” and she could experience some peace in her troubled life.  

     But Jesus needs to do something else for this woman.  He tells her, “Go, call your husband, and come back.”  There was only one problem.  She claimed she had no husband.  Jesus knew the truth and confronted her with it.  The woman responds, “Sir, I see that you are a prophet.”

     Jesus confronts the woman at the well with her sinful past, so she can see herself in a new way.  As a result of this conversation the woman is changed.  She leaves her water jar and heads into town to tell other people that she has found the Messiah. 

     Jesus offered this woman the gift of new life.  Jesus confronts each one of us and when we face the truth about ourselves we too are changed.  We too realize what we’ve been missing.  Jesus offers us the gift of new life.

     After we have met Jesus and claim him as Lord of our lives, the next step is to tell others that we have found the Messiah.  That’s exactly what the Samaritan woman did.  After her encounter with Jesus she went into town to tell other people, “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done!  He cannot be the Messiah, can he?”  And perhaps the most amazing thing of all is that the townspeople believed the witness of the woman and followed her back to the well to meet Jesus.

     What a wonderful model of evangelism.  The woman who shied away from people because she wanted to avoid their scorn was energized to tell others, the very people who had hurt her, that she had found the Messiah.

     The townspeople discovered Jesus only because of the unlikely witness of the woman at the well.  The people were intrigued with her testimony and wanted to see this special man for themselves.  They came and met Jesus and they believed in him.

     Jesus had done more than jiggle a few wires in this woman’s life, hadn’t he?  He had shown her herself as she really was and offered her living water.  How about you?  Is it time to quit asking God to “jiggle a few wires?”  Is it time to ask him to give you living water as well?

                                                AMEN