We have become water snobs. We all have our preferences when it comes to bottled water. Our forefathers would never believe that we are paying almost two dollars for “bottled water,” much less, selling it as a commodity. I mean is not water free? Can you not simply go to the well and get it?

Water is essential for human life. Experts say that a person can go approximately three weeks without food but only three to four days without water.

In the Bible, we see many references to “water” as a metaphor; one is the Holy Spirit’s work inside the believer.

In the Bible, we read a story about a Samaritan woman who went to a local well to draw water for the day. Upon arriving at the well, she meets Jesus, and they begin to talk. She is surprised that He, a Jew, is talking to her, because of the cultural biases of their day. It was well known that the Jews and Samaritans hated one another, and they went to great lengths to avoid each other.

When the woman asked Jesus why He was talking to her, much less asking her for a drink of water, He used the opportunity to turn the conversation where He intended all along.

Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water” (John 4:10).

The woman asks Jesus to give her “this water,” thinking it some “magical” water that would keep her from having to come to the well every day. To which Jesus responds by asking the woman to “Go get your husband.” A statement that probably seemed odd and irrelevant to the woman, but not Jesus.

Perhaps with a change of attitude and a defensive tone, the woman says, “I have no husband.” Then Jesus proceeds to tell her that He knows that she has no husband and, in fact, that she has had five husbands and the man she “now has” is not her husband. In other words, she was living with a man that was not her husband, or she was having an adulterous affair with some other woman’s husband. But either way, Jesus knew it.

The woman, probably desiring to change the subject, tells Jesus that she perceives that He is a “prophet” because He was able to tell her things about herself that He could not have known without the revelation of God. She mentions that one day the Messiah will come and “tell them all things,” and when she said that Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you, am He.”

Upon hearing that, God opened the woman’s spiritual eyes, and she realized that Jesus was the Son of God, the promised Messiah. The woman, leaving her water pot at the well, went back into her city and told everyone about her encounter with Jesus. The Bible says, “And many of the Samaritans of that city believed in Him (Jesus) because of the word of the woman who testified, ‘He told me all that I ever did.’” (John 4:39)

That woman still had to go to the physical well every day to draw her water to live. But I am sure, every time she went to draw physical water from that well, she remembered fondly, her encounter with the Lord Jesus Christ and His forgiveness, love and acceptance of her.

The woman had been seeking that kind of love and acceptance her whole life through the many husbands and relationships that she had, but that day, her heart was filled to overflowing with the love of God – living waters! And she would never be the same.

Friend, have you tasted the living water? It may cost us two dollars for a bottle of water in this day, but just as it was in Jesus’ day, you can still go to the well of heaven and draw living water for free. Once you have tasted the living water, no other water will do.

To learn more about this living water go to – www.peacewithgod.net

 

Lisa Hannan lives in Valdosta with her husband, attorney Miles Hannan, who has been practicing law in Valdosta for more than 30 years. She has a B.S. in psychology from Valdosta State University. You can find her at www.lisahannan.org.