Lessons From The Woman At The Well

I studied the “Woman at the well” for the first time last year.

I say “studied” because I had read it lots of times before but I only began to see the lessons I saw in it last year.

Recently, God has again been opening up a different aspect of Jesus’ meeting with the Samaritan woman in John 4. It’s basically something He wants me to share at the singles hangout this Saturday.

I’m not free to share my recent discoveries from John 4 yet but I will be sharing lessons I got from my study last year.

Yes, I have a lot of Bible studies that don’t make it to the blog because the time doesn’t seem right for it yet but this just seems so right.

Maybe it’s meant for someone (along with me ofcourse).

My train of thought was a bit random, I remember I wrote the lessons as they came last year but hopefully, you can flow along.

So get out your Bible and let’s study together below..

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John 4

“Jesus realized that the Pharisees were keeping count of the baptisms that he and John performed (although his disciples, not Jesus, did the actual baptizing). They had posted the score that Jesus was ahead, turning him and John into rivals in the eyes of the people. So Jesus left the Judean countryside and went back to Galilee. To get there, he had to pass through Samaria. He came into Sychar, a Samaritan village that bordered the field Jacob had given his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was still there. Jesus, worn out by the trip, sat down at the well. It was noon.”

 

The well is the spirit of God itself. So when the word says Jesus came and sat on the well, he practically came and settled at His own place, His natural habitat, where He was supposed to be. It wasn’t a mistake that He sat on the well in Samaria, that signified him himself. It was who he was to the samaritans if they would accept Him.
Now, the physical Jesus was wearied and He sat on the well like most of us do to receive refreshment..only he wasn’t sitting in a physical well, he was sitting on the well that springs up from God, he had come to the place of refreshment, the place of the Spirit.

 

“A woman, a Samaritan, came to draw water. Jesus said, “Would you give me a drink of water?” (His disciples had gone to the village to buy food for lunch.)

 

There came also a woman of Samaria to draw water from the well too…now, Jesus knew the kind of well he was coming to but this woman didn’t know. She represents a lot of us who actually come to the well of God to draw water but do not know what we are drawing. We do not know the essence and significance of what we come to…

 
And Jesus said to her, give me to drink…ah! He could have asked angels to give Him the water personally, he could have performed miracles to get it but he didn’t. He ironically asked someone for something he didn’t really need her help for.

Why?

As a conversation starter?

As humility?

As doing the needful! He needed that to draw her attention, he needed to ask her to open a conversation with her… what is Jesus speaking to us with in this day?

Is it with that man asking us for 5naira?

Is it with our boss treating us anyhow? What is Jesus drawing our attention with today? Check it.

 

 

“The Samaritan woman, taken aback, asked, “How come you, a Jew, are asking me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?” (Jews in those days wouldn’t be caught dead talking to Samaritans).”
Now, the woman was more concerned about human discrimination, she was surprised that a jew spoke to her, so surprised that her first reaction wasn’t to give him water, it was to ask him how come he was speaking to her? But Jesus was more concerned with what was going on in her soul.

 

“Jesus answered, “If you knew the generosity of God and who I am, you would be asking me for a drink, and I would give you fresh, living water.”

 

Now, the woman was more concerned about human discrimination, she was surprised that a jew spoke to her, so surprised that her first reaction wasn’t to give him water, it was to ask him how come he was speaking to her? But Jesus was more concerned with what was going on in her soul.

He said, oh I wish that you know who is asking you for water. I wish that you know who is sitting here and speaking to you. Oh I wish…

Is God saying the same thing to us today? Is He wishing that we understood the significance of that random person we met?

Is He saying that oh I wish you knew what what is important? It’s not this natural refreshment you need, oh I wish that you knew, your soul needs me! I am speaking to you, your soul needs me.

 

 

“The woman said, “Sir, you don’t even have a bucket to draw with, and this well is deep. So how are you going to get this ‘living water’? Are you a better man than our ancestor Jacob, who dug this well and drank from it, he and his sons and livestock, and passed it down to us?”

 

 

And he told her that he would give her living water IF SHE ASKED, but she still didn’t understand. She was still functioning in the natural. Asking irrelevant questions, “you don’t have a rope, how will you draw this water?” How many of us are rationalizing how God will bring us out of issues instead of just asking Him to save us?

 

Jesus doesn’t brag with things he can’t do, when He says “if only you will ask me” He means it.

He is saying “if only you will just ask, just ask, I will fill your soul, I will fill your spirit, I will give you what you need. What you need isn’t these questions you are asking me, you just need to ask me to come in, to give you the living water, ask and I will do it. Ask!”
And then the woman threw it on his face. She didn’t know who He is but assumed that He isn’t greater than Jacob or Abraham.

Ah! How many times have we actually relegated people we just met to the background? We judge them and size them up and then throw them to the dust.

Who are you?

Are you even up to this or that?

We size up their physical features but we cannot see what their made of, we cannot see their souls. This woman couldn’t see Jesus soul, she didn’t know this was the man who is life himself, the one who Jacob himself bows in deference to. She didn’t know just as most of us don’t know who we are dealing with. We size up with our eyes and sometimes discard the very one we need before they can help us.

 

Jesus said, “Everyone who drinks this water will get thirsty again and again. Anyone who drinks the water I give will never thirst—not ever. The water I give will be an artesian spring within, gushing fountains of endless life.”

 

But Jesus wasn’t offended by that question like some of us would be. It’s like somebody asking “who are you sef”, some of us will feel the need to respond and increase our stance but Jesus didn’t, he knew who He was with or without the woman knowing and he concentrate on what He had to do which was bringing the woman to salvation.
He said, the water I will give you will spring up to eternal life, you have to have what I have for you. You cannot afford not to. The water you come to now will make you thirst again. The water of sex, of wrong relationships, of stealing, of adultery, of masturbation, of enjoying sin, it will make you thirst again, but what I will give you will quench your insatiable thirst for things to fill you up forever. That which I give you need not be refilled over and over again, it fills you once and for all.
Jesus’s water will be in you, in you, springing forth life from within you. You won’t need to depend on humans anymore, it will be in you. Christ himself will be in you.

 

 

“The woman said, “Sir, give me this water so I won’t ever get thirsty, won’t ever have to come back to this well again!” He said, “Go call your husband and then come back.” “I have no husband,” she said. “That’s nicely put: ‘I have no husband.’ You’ve had five husbands, and the man you’re living with now isn’t even your husband. You spoke the truth there, sure enough.” “Oh, so you’re a prophet! Well, tell me this: Our ancestors worshiped God at this mountain, but you Jews insist that Jerusalem is the only place for worship, right?”

 
Now, the woman was thirsty for the water Jesus could give but she still had things drawing her back, she still had questions.

“Ok, Jesus, what do you say about worshipping on a particular mountain?” She had doubts on what will really be expected of her when she comes into the faith, what would I be meant to do? What about these grey areas of confusion?

 

“Believe me, woman, the time is coming when you Samaritans will worship the Father neither here at this mountain nor there in Jerusalem. You worship guessing in the dark; we Jews worship in the clear light of day. God’s way of salvation is made available through the Jews. But the time is coming—it has, in fact, come—when what you’re called will not matter and where you go to worship will not matter. “It’s who you are and the way you live that count before God. Your worship must engage your spirit in the pursuit of truth. That’s the kind of people the Father is out looking for: those who are simply and honestly themselves before him in their worship. God is sheer being itself—Spirit. Those who worship him must do it out of their very being, their spirits, their true selves, in adoration.”

 

And Jesus told her, I tell you, those areas you are bothered about don’t matter, what matters is your spirit. Those are man made expectations, you don’t have to worship God one way or the other. What he needs is your spirit. Worship Him in spirit and in truth.”

 

“The woman said, “I don’t know about that. I do know that the Messiah is coming. When he arrives, we’ll get the whole story.” “I am he,” said Jesus. “You don’t have to wait any longer or look any further.” John 4:1-26 MSG

 

 

The woman was still confused, not ready to follow Jesus and she concluded, “anyway sha, I know that when Jesus comes, He will tell us all these for sure. When the messiah comes, I will know the answer.”
Jesus must have smiled then, she still didn’t know!

And he said, I am he.

Only then did she believe. And even then she still said “this man that told me all I did, is not Him Christ?”

Ah! Some of us are asking questions when we should just accept the truth and the only question we need to ask is to ask God to give us the water, the water from the well, the water from the Spirit. What we should be asking for is the spring that gives everlasting life.
The change we need is Jesus, it’s the water that flows from His well.

It’s the everlasting change He gives. That’s what we need.

When Jesus stops and tarries with you, when he needs you to listen as He speaks to you, open your heart.

 

“Many of the Samaritans from that village committed themselves to him because of the woman’s witness: “He knew all about the things I did. He knows me inside and out!” They asked him to stay on, so Jesus stayed two days. A lot more people entrusted their lives to him when they heard what he had to say. They said to the woman, “We’re no longer taking this on your say-so. We’ve heard it for ourselves and know it for sure. He’s the Savior of the world!” – John 4:39-42 MSG

 

The woman and her kinsmen finally saw that Jesus was the messiah for themselves, you will see it too. You will see it when you worship in spirit and in truth. Yes, open your heart…

 

Prayer:

Heavenly Father, I can see that you’ve been calling unto my heart for as long as I have been alive.

You’ve orchestrated meetings with me, you’ve sent people, and I have refused to listen each and everytime.

I’m so sorry.

My heart is open now. I am ready to drink of you. I am ready to thrive in you.

I’m letting go of everything I’ve been trying to fill your place with. Come into my heart Lord Jesus. Teach me to live in you and increase in you, in Jesus name, amen.

 

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You best believe that I had no idea where this study was going till I came to the end.

I earnestly pray that we had at least one person saying that prayer up there or even if you are born again, I pray we had people re-committing their lives to grow in God.

Jesus calls out to us every day of our lives… He uses people, He uses things, He uses the most unexpected places… He always has things to tell us… Will we tarry in Him long enough to listen?

The year is coming to an end, and somehow people’s fires die during this period… is yours dieing?

Are you still sitting to drink of the well in Jesus?

It doesn’t matter where you sit to drink of Him, your room, your bathroom, your kitchen… just make sure you are still sitting, tarrying with Him to let Him speak to your soul… the well in Him will flow unto you, ensuring that you are never dry.

God help us all in Jesus name, amen.

 

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There’s a second part to this study on my documents and if the time is right next week, I will put it up on next week’s online Bible study.

 

I also put out news on last week’s bible study on my Church’s conference that will be coming up on November 26th-29th

It will be an amazing time in God’s presence. I am all for soaking up in God and I know the end of the year is when people slacken in Christ..no, we can end the year as full spiritually as when we started it.

Of course our pastor Nathaniel Bassey will be at the conference, along with Pastor Chingtok and other men of God.

If you live on Lagos mainland or outside Lagos, don’t worry about that, accomodation is available close to Church, you just have to be willing and available to come sit in and fill your soul at the well.

See details of the conference via the link below and register if you can be there. Your spirit will thank you for it afterwards.

www.theoasislagos.org/greaterglory

 

 

And please share this post via the social media buttons below, let’s get other souls who need the encounter at the well, to come in contact with these words. Thank you.

 

 

Till Our Next Online Bible Study,

Love,

Frances.

 

 

 

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