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26th July 2026
SundayReflection
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Marshall Segal
President & CEO of Desiring God.org
The Samaritan woman
.... John 4 v 1-26
Before we get into this story and the conversation with the Samaritan woman here in John 4, I want you to see something unusual and beautiful about Jesus.
It doesn't matter who you are - Jesus has something to say to you.
It was true with Nicodemus, and it's true here with this woman, and it'll be true here - if we have ears to hear him.
It's the sixth hour (probably about noon), the hottest part of the day.
No one draws water at noon in Samaria.
They come earlier or later in the day, when it's cooler.
So, this is Mrs Bad Word.
And as we'll find out in a minute, she's there at the well in the hottest part of the day for a reason.
She is likely ashamed to be around the other women because of all the men she has been with.
Imagine refusing someone something as small and critical as water simply because of their ethnicity.
That's how malicious this rivalry was.
But Jesus isn't offended.
He answers, "If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, 'Give me a drink,' you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water".
She's confused, of course, so she says, "Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep.
Where do you get that living water?
Are you greater than our father Jacob?
In other words, "This water has been just fine, and for hundreds of years.
To which he replies, "Has this water really been enough for you?
And if it has, why do you have to keep coming back here like you do?"
It might be hard for us to feel what this would have meant in that day.
We have clean water everywhere we turn, coming out of every tap in our homes.
In other words, "Give me this eternal water service, gallons just showing up at my house every day.
I don't want to come out here over and over and over again.
I hate coming out here in the heat of the day.
Please give me some of this special water you're telling me about."
"Jesus said to her, '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"
"You think your sins are too great, too bad, too many.
This woman is in the Bible to tell you that's not true."
So, we're not really talking about water at all, are we?
Her well is men.
She has been trying to quench her thirst for love, for security, for life, in the arms of romance.
She's thirstier than she was before she met the first guy.
Sin is the anti-well, the anti-fountain.
And some of you are drinking there every day.
Maybe you're like this woman, and you've thrown yourself into relationship after relationship.
Maybe your wells are online, in the dark places of the Internet.
Maybe you're fostering some bitterness or anger.
The first time you put in your bucket, you got enough for a drink.
And then a little less.
Now you're scraping the dirty bottom for a thimbleful, for a drip of water.
But you're so thirsty, so you keep trying.
Whatever it is, put it down and walk away. Don't drink there anymore!
Come to the fountain of life, and you'll never be thirsty again.
All you have to do is ask.
Did you hear that?
"If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, 'Give me a drink,' you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water."
Why would he give it? Because you asked. All you have to do is ask!
Right here in these verses is a well, a spring - and it will never fail you.
You don't even need your bucket anymore, because the well is inside of you.
"The water that I will give him will become in him" - in you - "a spring of water welling up to eternal life".
So, which well will you choose?
What's keeping you from asking?
What's between you and the fountain right now?
In this story, Jesus overcomes three great hurdles, three great barriers, the kinds of barriers that might be keeping you from coming to the fountain.
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This is an edited version.
The full article is avaiable on request
"Marshall Segal"
serves as President & CEO of Desiring God.
He's the author of Not Yet Married: The Pursuit of Joy in Singleness & Dating.
He graduated from Bethlehem College and Seminary, and serves as an elder at Cities Church.
He and his wife, Faye, have three children and live in Minneapolis.
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