3rd Sunday of Lent (Jn. 4:5-42) “What Jesus Sees”

            John is what we might call a conversational Gospel.  We have long discussions between Jesus and people.  Jesus discusses Theology with persons who are named like Nicodemus and Martha.  He also has long conversations with people like the woman at the well.  We might think that Jesus is telling people about God. But in these conversations, Jesus draws truths out of people that they already know.  The woman in today’s Gospel is a perfect example. The Eastern church gives her a name, Pho-ti-ni (the enlightened one).

                The conversation that we hear described in today’s Gospel is an extraordinary one.   Jesus shouldn’t have had anything to do with Photini.  One reason for this is that she was a Samaritan.  We hear that word several times in the Gospel. Who were the Samaritans? 

                The Samaritans were a racial group that lived in central Israel at the time Christ lived.  The nation of Israel was divided into three sections.  Galilee was in the north of the country.  Samaria was in the middle.  Judea was in the south.  Jews in Galilee had to travel through Samaria to get to Jerusalem. But there was such an animosity towards the Samaritans that Jews didn’t even want to walk through where they lived.

                At the time of the exile, hundreds of years before Jesus, the Assyrians had conquered Samaria. When they did, they deported the population and sent outsiders to live there.  Jews intermarried with these foreigners creating what was thought to be an inferior race that claimed to be Jewish but didn’t worship in Jerusalem.  Because of that, they were considered heretics.  The Jews from Galilee and Jerusalem didn’t have anything to do with them.

                Jesus betrayed convention.  He didn’t walk around Samaria as most Jews did when they traveled from north to south in Israel. No, he walked right through it.  Not only that, but he struck up conversations with the Samaritans.  In the case of the woman at the well he even asked her for a cup of water.  Jesus ignored prejudice, against another race, against women in his society.

                Photini was obviously caught up in the animosity between Jews and Samaritans.  For that reason, she reacted with hostility toward our Lord. Jesus wouldn’t walk away from her. He drew her into a conversation. Just as he asked her to draw water out of the well, he also asked her to look inside herself to see the truth.

                The truth was that she was a beloved child of God.  She had been labeled an adulteress because she had been passed around between five men. She had been sexually exploited.  How much ridicule must she have endured from her righteous neighbors!  She thought that Jesus was another person who had arrived in her life to pass judgement.  She suspected that Jesus couldn’t like her because she was a woman and a Samaritan.

                The key moment comes when Jesus quizzes Photini about her bitterness. He seems to say, “I know what your history is, but it doesn’t matter.” My father in heaven knows what has happened to you.  God offers you living water, a new beginning.”

                Photini sees the light.  Another interesting line is uttered when she goes to her friends in the town saying, “He told me everything I have done.”  Jesus helped Photini to regain her self-respect.

                Jesus looks at all of us today.  If we met him in person today, he would be able to tell us our history, the good, the bad, and the ugly.  Whatever our story is, it makes no difference.  Jesus loves us despite the sinful situations that have been a part of our life. We have been forgiven for what we might have done to others.  We can be healed of the wounds that have been inflicted upon us. And that is the truth that can bring light into any darkness, that is the living water that we can drink every day of our life.