Jesus and the woman of Samaria

JOHN 4

By Odon Bulamba (20th June 2003)


We are going to get an exhortation on a very famous passage that is known by nearly every body and it is the story about the Samaritan woman. It is in the book of John chapter four. One day when Jesus was baptising people with his disciples, the Pharisees learned that Jesus was baptising more people than the number of those being baptised by the Pharisees. This created a spirit of hatred and distress in the heart of the Pharisees. The Pharisees started having thoughts to destroy Jesus’ life and because of that Jesus decided to leave Judea to go to Galilee because if he stayed there he might be stoned because the Pharisees would say, ‘how come this man gets all the souls for him, even John the Baptist didn’t baptise that many people’. Jealousy was there.

Jesus decided to leave Judea and he couldn’t go to Galilee without going through Samaria and there were no cars in those days and Jesus didn’t have a horse to walk with. In my country when a chief goes somewhere, people will carry him on their shoulders and the chief will sit on an arm chair and there will be a stick to carry him and he will be carried so the chief doesn’t have to walk. But Jesus was the king more than a chief and yet he walked on his feet where ever he went; what humility.

I think even here in NZ it’s not often we will see our prime minister going from Wellington to Hamilton by foot, even by car she might think she is wasting her time, maybe she thinks she will be very tired if she goes by car and she chooses to use a plane. Before going on the plane this plane must be checked very carefully and check that the pilot hasn’t drunk before starting. There is fear in their lives but in Jesus life there was no fear, especially the fear of death was not there. Maybe you will tell me that when Jesus was arrested and they wanted to throw Him somewhere that He feared, no He didn’t want to die at that time because He hadn’t fulfilled the mission that He had and when the time to die came, Peter tried to defend him and what was Jesus’ answer? ‘Go away satan’ and secondly he said, ‘if I need an army my father who is in Heaven will do something, there will be an army of angels down here. But because the time is here, I have to die and that is it’.

So when Jesus was on His way He arrived somewhere called Sychar and this place is in Samaria. Jesus was tired and he decided to sit by a well and a woman came to get some water and Jesus started talking to her, ‘woman give me water to drink.’ The woman said, ‘I don’t know you, you are a Jew and I am a Samaritan, how can I give you water to drink that is not possible’.

When Jesus arrived in Samaria He left Judea and arrived in another atmosphere, or another climate that is different to Judea’s climate and while on His way He got tired which is normal. It’s like you and me as Christians, the day we were saved we had the courage to be Christians and to read the Bible and to pray and to go to church each time, and there were lots of success in our every day life and there were lots of transformations in different things.

We discovered the joy to be Christians but people around us started to criticise this life. The devil maybe said how come these people keep shaking my kingdom like that, I keep losing souls and they keep speaking about Jesus everywhere and all of a sudden the devil raised an army against you, laziness started coming, tiredness started attacking and we said it’s not good enough to stay a spiritual baby we have to carry on, we must leave Judea to go to Galilee but we cannot spare to go through Samaria.

Once arrived in Samaria we feel tired sometimes with Christian life and sometimes we are disappointed with circumstances and sometimes we ask ourselves does God exist or not because when we ask, we don’t get. We want God to move but it’s not time for God to move so we think it’s time to put this Bible aside and leave it. If God wants to kill me, He can kill me, so be it. It happened to Even with prophets. Jonah too went through that, Moses and others knew difficult situations in their life.

When you are at the end of your limit, this is the time that God moves. When our forces are finished, that is the time that God’s forces start. When our thoughts are limited, it is at that time that God’s thoughts start.

Jesus as God was tired and He was in Sychar. Some versions of the Bible speak about Sycham and it is the same thing. Sychar means liar or drunk and Jesus arrived at Sychar and that is where he will have a rest. Sychar which means liar and Jesus wants to have a rest there. Sychar which means drunk and Jesus wants to have a rest there. Jesus wants to stay there because there is something useful there; a well. If a well had not been there, Jesus could not have stopped at Sychar, He would have gone somewhere else and sometimes we live where the liars and the drunks live but we must look to see if there is a well in their lives or not. Is there a well in their house or not because when we live with drunkards and they need a drink can I give them water instead of beer when I’m there or not.

That is what Jesus wanted to teach us there, Jesus said there it is, I’m going to have a rest and you my disciples go and get something to eat. Jesus who could transform bread and multiply the fish sent the disciples to get food. Him whom the devil said, you can change a stone into bread and He really could do that, He doesn’t want to turn the stones into bread but asks the disciples to get bread. How many times do we send our children into the gospel? How many times do we send our brothers and friends into the gospel, my brother I have a problem, can you find a verse in the Bible that can help me with my problem and your friend will say, maybe you know the Bible better than me, but you encourage them to try to find something that is good for you. When you correct others, help them and advise them, do you send them to find a spiritual food? If you don’t do it, it is time to do it.