“I am a Samaritan woman…yes, the Samaritan woman.  It still amazes me that there is anything to tell about me.  Yet my story seems to have remained alive for centuries.  There is certainly nothing extraordinary about me.  Yes, I had five husbands.  Yes, I lived with a man without benefit of marriage.  I do not imagine things have changed so much that it doesn’t still happen.”

“The Jewish leaders found my religion abhorrent.  Neighbors found my lifestyle abhorrent. If truth be told, I didn’t like myself or what my life had come to all that much either.  However, one day everything changed, and it happened during a simple conversation with a man at Jacob’s well.”

“My custom was to go for water in the heat of the day when no one else would be around.  I chose to draw water at that time to avoid the women from town.  It was just easier to put up with the heat than it was to put up with their haughty rejection.  But that day, for the first time in a long time, I did not feel rejected!  In fact, when the man started visiting with me, I just felt…well…normal.  I did not even realize until after the fact that he had given me respect and kindness, though he was also honest about my situation.”

“He asked me for a drink of water.  Righteous men never addressed women alone, and especially a woman like me.  Then he started talking about living water.  I wondered if the heat had made him loose his senses so I went along with him.  ‘Sure’, I said, ‘If I never had to come and draw water from this well it would be a great blessing.’  I wondered what he was up to so I reminded him that he had nothing to draw water with, so how was he going to get the water.”

“Just to let him know that I was not ignorant of the Patriarchs I told him that our father Jacob had dug the well, and I challenged him.  Did he think he was greater than Jacob was?”

“Suddenly he asked me to call my husband.  I told him the truth…that I had no husband.  However, he told me that I did not have a husband and that I was living with a man who was not my husband.  How could he have known?  I realized he was a prophet, and he began talking about true worship and how the Messiah would bring true worship.”

“’I know the Messiah is coming,’ I told him.”

“Then he said, ‘I am the Messiah.’  And I realized who he was!  It was the truth! How else could he have known all about me?  I left my bucket at the well and ran through the town telling everyone I met that the Messiah had come. I told them what he had said to me.  ‘If you do not believe me,’ I said, ‘go to the well and see for yourselves.’”

“Soon everyone in town was heading toward the well, asking questions and listening to his teaching.  We begged him to stay and he was with us for two more days.  Many people from our area believed him.  The people joined me in my belief that he is the Savior of the world.  They confessed that they came to hear him because of me, but that they now believed for themselves.”

“I no longer cared what others thought about me.  The Messiah gave me a blessing.  He had revealed himself to me, and he told me that one day we would all worship the Father in spirit and in truth.  I know he is the Savior, my Savior, and I will worship him forever.”

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This story is found in John 4:1-42