John 4:1-42

John 4:1-42

Inductive Bible Study, John 4:1-42

The Samaritan Woman TMB 9 Sep 2007

Observation

1. List the geographical places that are mentioned, and locate them on a map if you can find one that covers this time period and location.

3 So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee.
4 Now he had to go through Samaria. 

5 So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 

6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.

https://tools.wmflabs.org/geohack/geohack.php?pagename=Jacob%27s_Well&params=32.211944_N_35.277778_E_type:landmark

2. What time of the day is "the sixth hour"?

https://christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/25243/what-time-is-the-sixth-hour-in-john-4

3. What is the physical state of Jesus when he meets the woman? 

Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon. (Verse 6)

4. What did Jesus say his "food" was?

“My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work." (verse 34)

Interpretation

5. Why were the disciples surprised to see Jesus talking with the woman? Why didn't they ask him to explain?

9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.[a])
What would there be to explain? If they had asked, why do you talk with her, that would raise the question of "Why do you bother so much not to?".

6. Notice how the ideas of "food" and "water" are used. Who is confused by this and why?

Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John— although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee. (verse 1-3)

Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon. (Verse 6)

When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) (Verse 7-8)

The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.[a]) (verse 9)

Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” (verse 10)

“Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?” (Verse 11-12)

Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” (verse 13-14)

The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.” (Verse 15)

Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people,(verse 28)

Meanwhile his disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat something.” (verse 31)

But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.” (verse 32)

Then his disciples said to each other, “Could someone have brought him food?” (Verse 33)

“My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. (Verse 34)

7, In what way was the woman's life disrupted by meeting Jesus? What did he giver her, on the spot, so to speak?

Meeting Jesus had uncovered her sin and had given her, on the spot, a baptism of repentance. (John 3-4)

Correlation
8. This is the first account of the gospel going to the Samaritans. Another is recorded in Acts 8: 4-25. Compare them, and note anything that seems similar and anything that seems different in the two episodes. How might John 4:34-38 be said to relate to this?

Acts 8:4-25

4 Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went. 5 Philip went down to a city in Samaria and proclaimed the Messiah there(similar to John4:39). 6 When the crowds heard Philip and saw the signs he performed, they all paid close attention to what he said. 7 For with shrieks, impure spirits came out of many, and many who were paralyzed or lame were healed. 8 So there was great joy in that city.

9 Now for some time a man named Simon had practiced sorcery in the city and amazed all the people of Samaria. He boasted that he was someone great, 10 and all the people, both high and low, gave him their attention and exclaimed, “This man is rightly called the Great Power of God.” 11 They followed him because he had amazed them for a long time with his sorcery. 12 But when they believed Philip as he proclaimed the good news of the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women. 13 Simon himself believed and was baptized. And he followed Philip everywhere, astonished by the great signs and miracles he saw.

14 When the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to Samaria. 15 When they arrived, they prayed for the new believers there that they might receive the Holy Spirit, 16 because the Holy Spirit had not yet come on any of them; they had simply been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. 17 Then Peter and John placed their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.

18 When Simon saw that the Spirit was given at the laying on of the apostles’ hands, he offered them money 19 and said, “Give me also this ability so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.”

20 Peter answered: “May your money perish with you, because you thought you could buy the gift of God with money! 21 You have no part or share in this ministry, because your heart is not right before God. 22 Repent of this wickedness and pray to the Lord in the hope that he may forgive you for having such a thought in your heart. 23 For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin.”

24 Then Simon answered, “Pray to the Lord for me so that nothing you have said may happen to me.”

25 After they had further proclaimed the word of the Lord and testified about Jesus, Peter and John returned to Jerusalem, preaching the gospel in many Samaritan villages.

John 4:34-38New International Version (NIV)

34 “My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. 35 Don’t you have a saying, ‘It’s still four months until harvest’? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. 36 Even now the one who reaps draws a wage and harvests a crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper may be glad together. 37 Thus the saying ‘One sows and another reaps’ is true. 38 I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor.”

John 4:34-38 may relate because the work that Jesus sowed before Philip's proclamation of the Messiah.

There are baptisms of water and the Spirit in Acts 8.

Simon is not mentioned as being there in John 4.

Application
9. To what extent has meeting Jesus disrupted your life, and with what result? 

I have been the sinner causing disruption! My Savior Jesus Christ has been continually putting back to order and cleansing me! Praise be to God! Should I recount every sin and how Jesus delivered me?! How the life I would have led would be a quickened death?

Meeting Jesus, He has been more than generous with me! He has by a miracle provided to me loyalty and faithfulness in myself, a man who was not. I pray that he will continue to keep me close to him and that our relationship will grow better and that nothing and nobody will come between us. I pray that I and my house will serve him and obey him forever!

Encountering Jesus has broken my jealousy, my greed, my envy and has turned my adoration to the One I can't live without. My creator has allowed my adoration of Him to increase by the abundance of Grace He has shown me. Praise be to God! and may those who are poor rejoice because of what Christ has done!

Meeting Jesus in places where without Him, I would be destroyed has given me a thankfulness and a respect/fear of the Lord who's very name has saved me from temptations, physical dangers, and my own sinful heart!

He has provided a time of rest and has delivered me from an early grave on at least four occasions. Hallelujah! He lives and because He lives, we live and in His love! 

He has given a me joy in service and in honoring my parents. It was not always this way. It was prayed for and it is a God given gift! 

Since all the filth of my life and the disruptions I have caused have been forgiven, the grace He has given has produced Love! Had I not found the Grace of Jesus, bitterness for what has been done to me would have consumed me and I would have been a rotten "hate-fruit". But thanks be to God! I wish to do all within my power to always live in peace an harmony in the abundant Grace the Lord has given! 

My Jesus Christ has paid it all and through his sacrifice on the cross has made me pure and delivered me time after time again from immorality in relationships and has covered over all my sin by his blood!

The Spirit guides me in truth and because of my dishonesty, he has convicted me to tears! And yet again- the Grace of Jesus Christ has swept through my life and redeemed me!

Because of meeting Jesus Christ, I can stand in His righteousness and look at any of those who people speak of as the worst of sinners and can boldly say I have been wicked too- and been redeemed! There is hope for them since there is hope for me!

Meeting Jesus, everything in me is met. With Him and in Him, There is nothing more I need. He is all!

John 4New International Version (NIV)

Jesus Talks With a Samaritan Woman

4 Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John— 2 although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. 3 So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee.

4 Now he had to go through Samaria. 5 So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.

7 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)

9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.[a])

10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”

13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”

16 He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”

17 “I have no husband,” she replied.

Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. 18 The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”

19 “Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”

21 “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

25 The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”

26 Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”

The Disciples Rejoin Jesus

27 Just then his disciples returned and were surprised to find him talking with a woman. But no one asked, “What do you want?” or “Why are you talking with her?”

28 Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, 29 “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?” 30 They came out of the town and made their way toward him.

31 Meanwhile his disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat something.”

32 But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.”

33 Then his disciples said to each other, “Could someone have brought him food?”

34 “My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. 35 Don’t you have a saying, ‘It’s still four months until harvest’? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. 36 Even now the one who reaps draws a wage and harvests a crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper may be glad together. 37 Thus the saying ‘One sows and another reaps’ is true. 38 I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor.”

Many Samaritans Believe

39 Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.” 40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. 41 And because of his words many more became believers.

42 They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”

Footnotes:

1. John 4:9 Or do not use dishes Samaritans have used