Since the beginning of June, and the beginning of the church season of Pentecost (or Ordinary Time) we’ve been looking at the stories of some Bible women and how God met them in the ordinariness of their daily lives. God meets us there, too.
Today we'll meet the Samaritan Woman. Photini is the name given by the Orthodox Church to her. The story is in John 4. Most of us know the story. Jesus is
going through Samaria on his way to Jerusalem and stops at Sychar. This is
traditionally the site of a well which the patriarch Jacob dug centuries
earlier. Jesus sits down near the well while the disciples go into the city to
get food. All this is quite surprising and uncomfortable for the disciples. To
say Jews and Samaritans disliked each other would be an understatement. There
were deep differences in their worship and way of life. Each despised the
other. But Jesus decides to travel through Samaria and pauses at a Samaritan
town. I wonder if we sometimes find ourselves traveling through areas we don't really like and forget that God is there, too.
Photini comes to draw water
later in the day than most of the town’s women. We can speculate about her
reasons and most likely it has to do with her lifestyle. She admits to having
five husbands and to currently living with a man not her husband.
The act of getting water from the well was a daily necessity
before running water. A lot of community building would happen as the women
gathered, visited, and got their water. Photini was outside of that circle. She
came later to the well. And because she did, in that very ordinary, daily task,
her life was changed.
Jesus asks her for water and a conversation ensues with
Photini challenging Jesus several times. She decides he is a prophet and
continues, ‘I know that Messiah is coming. When he comes, he will proclaim
all things to us.’ (John 4:25)
Jesus’ response changes everything. Even though he rarely admits the Messianic ‘secret,’ he tells Photini—a woman and a Samaritan, ‘I am he, the one who is speaking to you.’ (John 4:26) Amazed and transformed, Photini leaves her water jar and runs to tell everyone in Sychar the amazing news that Messiah is sitting at their well.
The rest of the people are impressed enough to ask Jesus to
stay for a couple days. Then they agree with her saying, ‘It is no longer
because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and
we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.’ (John 4:42) I wonder
how Photini felt when they dismissed her witness so cavalierly. Was she angry
or resigned to ‘that’s the way it is’?
Photini had an unexpected encounter with God at the well and it changed her. God is always surprising God’s people. God meets Elizabeth
in her barrenness, Bathsheba in her bath, Ruth and Naomi in their
friendship…the list goes on and on.
Has there been a time in your life when you’ve felt the
presence of God as you do some mundane, daily job?
Do you find it hard to recognize God in the day-to-day?
