Bringing Life

John 4:39-42

July 21, 2024 • Mount Pleasant UMC

I’ve been thinking about what it might take for a whole city or town to host a party and the images that keep coming to my mind are when a sports team wins a championship—like the World Series or the Super Bowl. There’s a pride that takes over and brings people out to celebrate in a big way. Later this summer, we might see some of that when Olympians return home from Paris with gold, silver and bronze medals. Or, in a whole different direction, I also thought of the pictures I’ve seen when cities used to celebrate the end of a war or the soldiers who came home. Ticker-tape parades and keys to the city being handed out—all sorts of ways people will celebrate when something big happens. In our passage this morning, we read about a whole town coming together to have a party for a whole different reason. Jesus has come to town, and that’s a reason to celebrate!

For the last few weeks, we’ve been looking at stories of parties in the Bible as we’ve been preparing for this week’s Vacation Bible School which is called “Start the Party.” And while we haven’t looked at all the parties in Scripture (that would take a while), we have considered how Jesus entering the story always creates a party. Or at least he did then. Don’t you wish he still did today? Today when we mention his name, it can cause all sorts of controversy and consternation. But not then. When Jesus came to a town named Sychar, people celebrated.

The short passage we read this morning is actually the end of a much larger story, on that’s probably very familiar to many of you. It involves Jesus and the disciples traveling through forbidden territory. Well, maybe not forbidden, but certainly not territory where any good Jew would normally go. Samaritans and Jews had a long history of hatred and bitterness toward each other and generally did not have anything to do with each other. That included not going through each other’s territory. Most people, to get from Galilee to Judea, would cross the Jordan River and go the long way around Samaria (through modern Jordan). It would be like going down to Kentucky and then west and back north to get to St. Louis in order to avoid Illinois. That’s the sort of thing people normally did to avoid ritual “contamination.” But then again, as we’ve seen, Jesus often did things that were not “normal” and maybe considered a bit crazy. As I said at the beginning of this series, Jesus often preferred to hang out with the outcast, and that’s a choice he makes again in this story.

So while Jesus and the disciples are passing through Samaria, Jesus decides to take a rest at a well while the disciples go ahead to grab some lunch. Except Jesus doesn’t really need the rest. John, the author, says Jesus “had” to go through Samaria (4:4), which we know he didn’t geographically. So it seems as if he “had” to go through Samaria just to meet this one woman from the nearby town of Sychar. She comes to the well at noon because she’s an outcast, a woman who (we discover) has been married and divorced five times (4:18). And she is currently living with a man who is not her husband. She doesn’t come to the well in the morning, when most people do, because she’s probably the one they are talking about when they gather at the well. She comes at noon, in the heat of the day, and most days it’s quiet then. No one else around. No one is there to point at her or gossip about her. Usually. But not today.

When she arrives, Jesus is there. She doesn’t know him, but she knows by the way he’s dressed that he’s Jewish. Her preference would be to get her water and go, but he begins by asking her a question which leads to quite a wide-ranging conversation. Jesus asks her for a drink, which, again, is something he should not have done. He shouldn’t be talking to a Samaritan and he shouldn’t be talking to a woman, and on top of all that, he shouldn’t be asking to drink out of a bucket or anything she has touched. Anything she has touched is considered unclean, and she pretty quickly reminds him of that. But Jesus tells her that she will want to talk to him. He has “living water” that she will want. The woman is intrigued, and so they cover a lot of topics. Jesus lets her know he knows about her past, and so she tries to change the subject to talk about religion. Where is the right place to worship? Jerusalem or Mount Gerazim? Who’s right about this—Jews or Samaritans? She keeps trying to change the subject. Every time Jesus gets to close to hitting a nerve, she goes to another topic. Finally, she sort of throws in the towel, trying to put Jesus off by saying, “I know that Messiah (called Christ) is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” And that’s when Jesus drops the biggest surprise of the day on her: “I, the one speaking to you—I am he” (4:25-26). He’s not usually that direct about his identity, but here he has to be. It’s these words that are going to change this woman’s life.

The disciples are on their way back to pick Jesus up at this point, probably to bring him lunch (which I personally think they picked up at the local Chick-fil-A), when they see him talking with this woman. However, John points out, they know better than to ask Jesus what he’s doing (4:27). The woman, who leaves her water jar behind (which was, you remember, the reason she came to the well), runs back to town and starts telling everyone she sees that she thinks she has found the savior, the Messiah (4:28-29). And so the people from Sychar listen to this woman, someone they would have shunned just an hour earlier, someone they were used to ignoring. What makes them listen to her this time? Could it be that she has been so radically changed in a moment? She went to the well a discouraged, disheartened and disenfranchised outcast, but she’s come back energetic and excited about this man she met at the well. And not in the way she’s usually excited about a new man. No, this is definitely different. I think it’s when they hear the word “Messiah” that everything changes. We’re told that many people believed in Jesus based on this woman’s testimony (4:39). They came out to see him in person because of what she told them about him.

As a side note: it’s hard to believe, honestly, that people could read this story and still say women shouldn’t be preaching the good news. The very first preacher outside of Jesus in the Gospels is a woman! And she convinces a lot of people to put their faith in Jesus, so much so that they go and ask the man at the well to come and stay in their town for a while (4:40). Now, not only is Jesus talking with and associating with Samaritans or passing through their land. He’s staying in their town, perhaps in an inn or in a guest room in one of their houses. And he’s teaching them so that more of them believe. He’s teaching Samaritans! As if the Jewish religious leaders weren’t already upset with Jesus, this was probably enough to push them over the edge. This rabbi from Nazareth ignores the laws and associates with sinners. There’s no way he could be a man of God!

So Jesus goes to stay in Sychar. He stays there for two days (4:40). And John says, “Because of his words many more became believers” (4:41). And what is it they believe? Here’s what they say: “We know that this man really is the Savior of the world” (4:42). Now, we read that and think nothing of it. Of course, we know, Jesus is the Savior of the world. He came to give his life to save people from their sins and to save them from eternal death, to bring life abundant (John 10:10) and everlasting. We know that. In fact, in just the previous chapter, there is that famous verse that rounds out Jesus’ conversation with the Pharisee Nicodemus. It was the very first verse I memorized as a kid in Sunday School: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (3:16). We know this. But it was a radical declaration for these Samaritans, and more than that, it was a radical thing to say with Roman soldiers probably nearby. In that time, many of the Greek gods were referred to as saviors, but putting Jesus on the level of one of those gods wasn’t the dangerous part. This was also a title that the Roman emperor had begun to use for himself. Because of the so-called “peace” that Rome had forced on the known world, the emperor had come to be called the “Savior of the World.” The dangerous part was putting Jesus on the same level as the emperor. In many ways, the people of Sychar are saying, “Everything we hoped for in Rome we have found in Jesus. Rome is not the savior; Jesus is” (cf. Wright, John for Everyone—Part One, pg. 50; Barclay, The Gospel of John—Volume 1, pg. 171). We miss how dangerous it was to declare your allegiance to anyone other than Rome in those days, and what a precarious position this put the town of Sychar in. And all of this came about because of the woman’s testimony.

A testimony is a powerful thing. And it’s one of those words we throw around in the church world without necessarily knowing what it is. We think of it as our story, and so sometimes people will tell their whole life story and call it their testimony. A testimony certainly overlaps and connects with your life story, but it’s not your whole life story. It is that part of your life which points to Jesus, a “witness to the working of God,” and personally I’ve heard a lot of so-called “testimonies” that point more to the person themselves than to Jesus. In the case of this woman, her testimony points to and brings about belief in Jesus. We should always be asking: does my testimony do that? Does my story point to Jesus or to me? The original word in the text is martureo, and you can hear in that our word “martyr.” We usually think of a martyr as someone who loses their life because of their faith, but the original word just means “witness.” It refers to someone telling what they know in the power of the Holy Spirit and it always points back to Jesus. So does your testimony do that? Do you have a testimony? Does your life help other people see and come to believe in Jesus (cf. Walt, Behold, the Man, pgs. 63-64)?

And we want that to happen because, as our bottom line today says, “Jesus is the life of the party.” Now, when I hear someone described as “the life of the party, “ I think of the person who is maybe the loudest, the most entertaining, the one who gets everyone else excited or who makes everyone laugh. The life of the party. But that’s not what this means, not in this context. Oh, I do think Jesus was a lot of fun at parties. He was always getting invited to dinner parties and gatherings, and children wanted to be around him. Someone who was sour or dismal wouldn’t get invited or be welcomed into such spaces. Children don’t want to be around mean people. I think one of the great contributions of the series The Chosen is picturing Jesus as a fully authentic human being. Yes, he is the Son of God, but is also fully human. He laughed and smiled and enjoyed life. I think Jesus would always be the life of the party in that sense.

But I think in this passage, in this story, there’s another sense in which Jesus is the life of the party, and it has to do with that word “life.” There are three different words in the New Testament that are usually translated as “life.” One such word is bios, from which we of course get “biology.” Bios refers to physical life, the breathing, the heart beating, the physical activities that you do in your body. The second word is psuche, and you can probably guess that we get the word “psych” or “psychology” from that word. Psuche refers to what some call “soul life.” Jesus uses that word in Matthew’s gospel when he says, “For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it” (16:25). Psuche refers to the mind, the emotions, the will—all the things that sort of make us who we are, our personality and our characteristics. But there’s a third word you need to know, a word that refers to the spiritual life. That word is zoe, a word that is often used as a name today. Zoe is not about physical life, and it’s not about the life of the mind. Zoe is about the uncreated, eternal life that God has and that he gives to us. It’s everything in us that will live forever; it’s the most essential part of who we are and who we are becoming. It’s described at the beginning of John’s gospel, as John describes Jesus this way: “In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind” (1:4). The kind of life that lights up the world, lights up all of humanity. And, later on in John’s Gospel, Jesus uses the same word to describe himself: “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full” (10:10) or “abundantly” (KJV).

Have it to the full—in other words, without Jesus, we are only living partial lives. We have bios life; we exist physically. We have psuche life; we think about stuff, feel emotions, we make decisions. But without the kind of life Jesus brings, zoe, we are incomplete. There’s a part of us that is missing. Jesus brings life to the full; he is that missing piece. Think again about the woman at the well. When she runs back toward and then into town, twice in this passage she describes Jesus this way: “He told me everything I ever did” (4:29, 39). She and Jesus had been talking about her physical and her emotional life, and when they get to spiritual issues she tries to change the subject. But Jesus won’t let her because that’s exactly what he’s come to fulfill in her life and in yours and mine. So when she says, “He told me everything I ever did,” she’s acknowledging that Jesus somehow filled every part of her with hope and joy and gladness. Somehow he completed her in a way no other person had ever been able to do. He gave her a new kind of life and she can’t wait to tell others about it. Jesus is the life of the party. He’s the one who puts true life into the party.

But as with any kind of life, we have to feed and nurture that life. Otherwise it will die. Bios needs food. Psuche needs intellectual stimulation like reading and study and good conversations. How do we feed zoe? If zoe is the life of the spirit and Jesus is the life of that party, then we feed that part of our life with the things Jesus did, things that connect us to him. Things like worship. The Gospels tell us Jesus went to worship regularly; it was his custom (cf. Luke 4:16). He regularly gathered with the people of God to show his devotion. Over the years, I’ve heard people say they don’t need to show up for regular corporate worship, that they can worship God on the mountains or on the golf course. And while I understand that God’s name is spoken quite frequently on the golf course, I don’t think it’s the same thing. There is something important that happens to our soul when we worship with others, when we get our eyes off ourselves and onto something and someone higher. One of the beautiful things about coming together is that when we are feeling weak, we can lean on others who are strong, and when they are weak they can lean on us when we are strong. I remember a time when I was going through a difficult time and I couldn’t seem to find my voice to sing. I couldn’t find the strength to open my mouth and join in song. And I love music. I love singing. I just couldn’t. So instead I listened as others sang; I allowed them to be my voice until I found my own again. That, I believe, is part of what the writer to the Hebrews meant when he said told us to not give up meeting together, but to encourage one another (10:25). We feed our soul with worship.

Another thing Jesus regularly practiced was prayer. Over and over again in the Gospels, especially when things are getting really busy, Jesus is said to go away, maybe up into the hills or off to a solitary place, for prayer. On the last night before his crucifixion, he spent his final hours of freedom in prayer. Now, we get little snippets of the words he used in prayer, and we know he taught his disciples to pray what we call “the Lord’s prayer,” but we don’t know really how he spent those all night prayer sessions in the hills (cf. Luke 6:12). I’ve been learning more and more that prayer is not so much about asking for things or getting what we want; there’s room for that, certainly. But prayer is more about spending time in the Father’s presence. It’s a conversation with the one who loves us more than anyone else. It’s a friendship, and we know it’s hard to have a conversation with someone you don’t spend time with or that you never talk to. When you’re with a dear friend and you’re having a conversation, it feeds your soul. Even more is our soul fed by time with God thought prayer.

Jesus also served others. Aside from the preaching he did, most of the rest of his time was meeting human need. He healed people, gave them food to eat, met their physical, emotional and spiritual needs. And in one of his last addresses to his disciples, he called them to do the same. It’s not about the healing; we generally don’t have that power. It’s about doing what we can to meet the need that presents itself. We serve others for the sake of honoring Jesus. Service feeds our soul.

And one more practice I’d like to lift up, one more thing that feeds our zoe, and that’s sabbath. Sabbath is the practice of taking one day out of seven to rest; it’s the model established in the very story of creation and it’s included in the Ten Commandments given to the people of Israel. There have been times in our history, of course, when people have been rather legalistic about Sabbath, and some of us can remember when stores and restaurants weren’t open on Sunday. The funny thing is that Sunday is not the Sabbath. In the Bible, the Sabbath is Saturday, the seventh day. Sunday is the Lord’s Day, the day of resurrection. But no matter the day, being legalistic about the Sabbath is not the point. It’s not about making a list of rules, of do’s and don’ts. Jesus said, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27). In other words, Sabbath is a gift, a time of rest, of ceasing from your regular work in order to reconnect with friends, family, church and God himself. There isn’t supposed to be a list of things you can and can’t do on the Sabbath or even on the Lord’s Day. The point is doing something, usually different from your regular type of work, that renews and fills your soul, that feeds your zoe.

So, those are just a few practices that allow us to feed our life in Jesus because he is the life of the party. He is life. And I pray he is your life. Because he is the only life that matters. He said himself, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). And guess what word he uses for “life” there? Yep, zoe. He is the life of the party. He is the only life that matters. So will you trust him with your life? Will you allow him to be your life? Let’s pray.