The woman saith unto him, I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things. Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am he. And upon this came his disciples, and marvelled that he talked with the woman: yet no man said, What seekest thou? or, Why talkest thou with her? The woman then (therefore) [because the disciples had come] left her waterpot, and went her way into the city…” (John 4:25-28)
The woman then left her waterpot… Her leaving it shows that her natural human errand is forgotten or neglected as of no great importance compared with this encounter with the man who sat on the well. She was so penetrated with the great truths which Jesus had announced that she forgot her errand to the well and returned to the city without the water for which she came out!
How exquisitely natural! The presence of strangers (the disciples, now returning with lunch to share with Jesus) made her feel that it was time for her to withdraw, and He who knew what was in her heart and what she was going to the city to do, let her go without exchanging a word with her in the hearing of others. Their interview was too sacred, and the deep emotional effect on the woman was too overpowering to continue in the presence of others. But this one happening―she left her waterpot―speaks volumes. The living water was already beginning to spring up within her. She found that man does not live by bread nor by water only. She found water of such a wondrous virtue that elevated people above meat and drink and the vessels that held them and all human things. In short, she was so moved, so transported by her encounter with Jesus that she forgot everything, and with her heart running over with the tale she had to tell, she hastens home and pours it out.
Think about this possibility. It is possible she withdrew, in courtesy to Christ, that he might have no interruption to eat his dinner. She was delighted and thrilled with her conversation with Him, but she would not be rude; everything is beautiful in its season. Her thoughts might have been such that when one good work was done, she applied herself to another. When opportunities of getting good cease, we should seek opportunities of doing good; when we have done hearing the word, then is a time to begin speaking of it. Think of this … She left her waterpot. She might have left it in kindness to Christ that He might have water to drink with his lunch.
No doubt she knew that she would be able to make more haste into the city to carry the good tidings of her ‘Jesus encounter.’ This forgotten waterpot stands as the symbol of spiritual release from the slavery of toil. The woman of Samaria came to Jacob’s Well that day in the performance of a task that must have been very irksome to her. This is suggested in her remark, “Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not, neither come hither to draw.” After all, most people desire to get away at times from the waterpots of life. They seek to escape from those tasks and occupations which become toilsome, tedious…bothersome.
The woman of Samaria forgot her waterpot because she found a new wellspring of life in Christ. Her new acquisition of the ‘living water’ from Him literally transformed her life and satisfied her deepest needs.
Why not sit down at the well and just have a little talk with Jesus? You will never be the same again!
Francis Mason Pastor Mason“
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