The Compassionate Christ: Find Rest and Renewal in Jesus’ LoveНамуна

THE RESTORER HAS COME

Come, all you who are thirsty,

come to the waters;

and you who have no money,

come, buy and eat!

Come, buy wine and milk

without money and without cost.

ISAIAH 55:1

Before you begin, read John 4:1–42.

Just before the sixth hour, when the sun was high in the sky, she stepped across the threshold of her home and pulled the heavy wooden door closed behind her. She paused for a moment to secure her veil, roll up her leather bucket, and tuck an empty water jar into the crook of her arm. Then she took a few steps forward and peered cautiously into the street. Thankfully, it was deserted. Her neighbors had wisely retired indoors to avoid the brutal midday sun.

She took a deep breath and walked toward the city gate. If she hurried, perhaps she could fill her jug and make it back home before the good citizens of Sychar stirred from their naps. Head down, she walked as quickly as she could past shops and row upon row of houses of the upright, respectable, and just. A noise to her right startled her, and she turned just in time to make eye contact with a woman tossing dirty water into the street. She felt her cheeks burn with familiar shame as the surprise registering in the woman’s eyes quickly gave way to judgment and disgust.

So easy for her to judge, she thought. What does she expect me to do? Live in a cave? Starve?

A moment later she left Sychar behind. She slowed her pace a bit and turned onto the path to the well. The sun beat down on the top of her head covering, and rivulets of sweat coursed down her scalp, neck, and back. Then she turned the corner, and the well was in sight.

But there was a man sitting on the capstone of the well— and not just any man. A Jewish man. She paused at a distance, waiting for Him to notice her and move away— as custom dictated— so that she might come to the well to draw water. He turned to look at her and then away again, but He did not move.

She groaned in frustration. She looked at Him, back at Sychar (from where no help would come), and then at the empty jar in her arms. Water she needed, and water she would have! What was propriety to her anyway?

She took a deep breath, unfolded her bucket, and moved decisively to the well. She set her water jug against the base of the well before busily focusing her attention on positioning the two crisscrossed sticks in the mouth of the leather bucket to keep it open while it was being filled. Then she began to attach the rope.

He turned to her.

“Will you give me a drink?” He asked (John 4:7).

She was incredulous.

“You are not only a man, but a Jewish man. I am a Samaritan woman, and You are asking me for a drink? How is that going to work? Isn’t everything about me, even my little bucket, a bit too defiled for You?”1

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” (John 4:10).

She leaned against the well and sighed in exasperation.

“Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and this well is deep. You can’t even draw from here, much less get spring water. Are You greater than our father Jacob? By the way, he gave this well to us, to the Samaritans, not to the Jews. And Jacob himself drank from it. And his sons and his livestock did too.”2

He answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 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” (John 4:13–14).

She thought for a moment of the women who passed by her window morning and evening on their way to the well, their happy companionship, the comfort and protection of their friendships. Then she thought of her own hot, lonely walks to the well day after day at noon, with no one to help her even lift the full, heavy jar to her head.

She laughed ruefully. “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water” (John 4:15).

Very quietly He answered her, and His words swept away all pretense.

“Go, call your husband and come back” (John 4:16).

She stiffened, took a deep breath, blinked back tears, and began to lower the bucket into the depth of the well.

“I have no husband,” she replied.

With great tenderness He answered her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true” (John 4:17–18).

She tugged at the rope again and again until her leather bucket broke through the surface of the well, splashing water gently on the capstone. She leaned down and poured some of it into her jar.

“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet” (John 4:19).

She handed the bucket to Him so He could drink and seized the moment to change the subject.

She wiped away a tear with the back of her hand and motioned to Mount Gerizim in the distance. “Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem” (John 4:20).

Embarrassed, she was simply attempting to deflect attention from her shame. It never seriously occurred to her that He would join her in a theological discussion, treating her as an equal, yet that is exactly what He did.

“Woman,” He replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth” (John 4:21–24).

She stared at Mount Gerizim and pondered the man’s words. Such complicated matters. Who can understand them? Suddenly she was overwhelmed with longing for the One the Samaritans called the Restorer, the Messiah. When He came, He would explain these things and make all things new.

With a deep sigh, she said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”

Then He declared, “I, the one speaking to you— I am he” (John 4:25–26).

Just then there was a noise on the pathway behind her. She turned to find several more Jewish men approaching. A couple of them had loaves of bread in their hands.

His companions.

And they were obviously stunned to find Him speaking with her, a Samaritan woman. They approached cautiously and then stood silently, awkwardly to the side.

She turned from them and back to the man sitting on the well. She looked into His eyes for a long moment.

How long had it been since someone had treated her with dignity? Kindness?

She, the one accustomed to being used and discarded? She, who was so familiar with scorn? She, who walked to the well alone in the heat of the day?

Restorer. . .

Without a word, she turned and ran toward Sychar, leaving her water jar at the well. When she burst through the gate, the city was awake again, the streets filled with her neighbors. She had to tell them— convince them— to come see this man at the well, but how? What could she say to get them to listen?

Suddenly it occurred to her! She would need to use the only thing she had— her reputation.

She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and stepped from the shadows of her past into the purpose of her future. With a loud voice, she called, “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?” (John 4:29).

All around her, activity ceased. Baskets and jars were lowered to the ground. Hands were wiped on aprons, and donkeys were tied to posts. Then they all followed her to the city gate. This time the entire town accompanied her on the path she had walked so many times alone. Messiah, the Restorer, had come.

Prayer

Restorer of all,

Thank You for looking past my guilt, my failures, and my shame to call forth in me all that is beautiful— for the glory of Your name. No matter how devastating my choices, You hold out hope for the promise of my future. You, my gentle Redeemer, the great I Am, make all things new. Restore me again.

Amen.

1. Author’s paraphrase.

2. Author’s paraphrase.