God is close to the brokenhearted (Isaiah 57:15; Isaiah 66:1-2, Psalm 34:17-18, Psalm 138:6), but I rejoiced to see it clearly demonstrated when Jesus had encountered a broken, confused, and nameless Samaritan woman at a well:
·
John 4:25–26 The woman said to him, “I
know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will
tell us all things.”
What had led to this affirmation about the coming Messiah, then followed by
Jesus’s forthright disclosure of His Messianic identity, “I who speak to you am he!” And why not
to the learned Nicodemus, a member of the Sanhedrin, who had previously come to
Jesus, looking for answers:
·
John 3:1–2 Now there was a man of the
Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night
and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no
one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.”
Clearly,
Nicodemus was a seeker, yet Jesus humiliated him:
·
John 3:10–12 “Are you the teacher of
Israel and yet you do not understand these things? Truly, truly, I say to you,
we speak of what we know, and bear witness to what we have seen, but you do not
receive our testimony. If I have told you earthly things and you do not
believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things?”
This made me marvel even more at Jesus’ words to the unnamed
woman to whom Jesus revealed: “I who speak to you am he!”
Why had Jesus revealed Himself so plainly to the woman but
not as directly to Nicodemus? At first, it hadn’t seemed that the woman amenable.
After the woman complied and offered Jesus water from the well:
·
John 4:13–14 Jesus said to her, “Everyone
who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water
that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give
him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
The woman seemingly answered sarcastically: John 4:15
…“Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here
to draw water.”
Rather than Jesus answering, “It’s not a matter of either
living water or liquid but both,” He turned the focus on her:
· John 4:16–18 …“Go, call your husband, and come here.” The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.”
Initially, she must have felt embarrassed and exposed before
Jesus and tried to change the subject:
·
John 4:20 “Our fathers worshiped on this
mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to
worship.”
Jesus then corrected her misguided understanding of the Biblical
faith: John 4:24–25 God is spirit, and those who worship him must
worship in spirit and truth,” and not necessarily in certain location. The
woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ).
When he comes, he will tell us all things.”
Jesus was now ready to make His most profound and stirring
disclosure: John 4:26 “I who speak to you am he,” and with these words,
this degraded thirsty woman was transformed into perhaps the greatest
evangelist to the Samaritan people.
Why her? When we realize that we are nothing, we are enabled
to see that the promised Messiah is everything, the understanding that
is slowly made evident to all of His servants:
·
Galatians 6:3 For if anyone thinks he is
something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself.
What a blessing to know that, without the Messiah, we too
are like this degraded Samaritan woman who had gone through five husbands!
However, in the Messiah, we are co-heirs with Jesus:
· Colossians 2:8–10 See to it that no one
takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition,
according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ.
For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled
in him, who is the head of all rule and authority.
Again, why her?
·
Luke 18:14 …For everyone who exalts
himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Any who exalt themselves have fallen to self (or Satanic)-deception.
However, this debased woman had little choice but to admit that she was a
sinner, whose only qualification was that she had met Jesus.
