Wayside Wells

Due to the hot and arid climate almost every aspect of daily life in ancient Israel involved water: agriculture, animal husbandry, cooking, personal hygiene, and of course drinking. Because water was so essential for life, it’s no accident that some important meetings in the Bible occurred at wells.

The tedious task of drawing water each day for cooking and cleaning typically fell to the young women of the household. Of course, the young men knew this and so the well became a place where strapping suitors looked for a prospective wife. In fact, you can see this pattern emerge in the Old Testament.

Abraham’s servant, Eliezer, stopped at a well and met Rebekah there (Gen 24:10-27). She happened to be a perfect match for Abe’s son, Isaac. Then Jacob met Rachel at a well where she came to water her father Laban’s flock of sheep (Gen 29:1-11). Moses, too, met his future wife, Zipporah, at a well when she came with her sisters to water their father’s flock (Ex. 2:15-22).

Each of these scenes from the OT follows a similar literary pattern: A man travels to a foreign land, where he meets a young woman who draws water for him. After meeting with the girl’s family and a happy time of hospitality, a marriage is arranged.

Knowing this pattern is what makes the classic scene between Jesus and the Samaritan woman at “Jacob’s Well” so fascinating. As John 4 opens, Jesus is a foreigner traveling through the land of Samaria. At mid-day He encounters a woman at the well and asks her for a drink. So far, so good. However, the pattern of the story is disrupted. As their conversation unfolds, Jesus reverses the expectation and offers her a drink of living water so that she will never thirst again (John 4:13-15).

The Samaritan woman is thinking physically, but Jesus is speaking spiritually about salvation and the fulfillment that only He can bring a thirsty soul. As the OT pattern of meeting by the well suggests, the topic of marriage does come up in their conversation, but once again Jesus reverses the expectation.

Jesus probed her past and revealed that this woman had been married five times, and the man she was with at the moment wasn’t her husband (4:16-19). Yikes! This is the kind of scandal we expect on Dr. Phil. This woman was indeed thirsty—she longed for love and had sought for it in all the wrong places.

All her past relationships had crashed and burned, but there was something different about Jesus. Unlike other men who wanted something from her, Jesus wanted to give her what her heart so wanted – security, love, forgiveness. Other men had dumped her, but Jesus accepted her despite the sordid background and promised to save her from her endless search for a significant other.

She hadn’t come to the well that day looking for a man, but the Christ found her. In the book of John, this foreign, outcast woman is the first to whom Jesus reveals his identity as Messiah (4:26). She immediately leaves her water jar and shares the good news about who Jesus is with her people. The next element readers expect in the pattern is hospitality. And John delivers, saying that Jesus “stayed with the Samaritans for two days” (4:39-40).  Of course, when they got a drink of that living water, many Samaritans believed in Christ.

The Samaritan woman came to the well that day expecting just another tiring chore, but Jesus reversed her expectation and changed her life. Just so, we may come to a Scripture knowing what to expect, after all we’ve read it and heard sermons about it. I have experienced this many times. Weary and parched, needing a sip of encouragement. In a surprising way, the Lord can speak to us so intimately, like He did this woman, and help us see something we’ve missed all along. In that moment, Jesus gives us a drink from the well that refreshes our soul. It goes down so good that we can’t wait to share it. Thank God for those wayside wells. Those oases where Jesus meets us and refreshes us so we can go and tell. -DM