Sunday March 7, 2010
            "The Gravity of Shame"

                John 4:5-42 (ESV)
                So he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that
                Jacob had given to his son Joseph. [6] Jacob's well was there; so Jesus,
                wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. It was
                about the sixth hour.  [7] There came a woman of Samaria to draw water.
                Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink." [8] (For his disciples had gone away
                into the city to buy food.) [9] The Samaritan woman said to him, "How is
                it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?" ( For
               Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) [10] Jesus answered her, "If you
               knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, 'Give me a drink,'
               you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water."
               [11] The woman said to him, "Sir, you have nothing to draw water with,
               and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? [12] Are you greater
               than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did
               his sons and his livestock." [13] Jesus said to her, "Everyone who drinks of
               this water will be thirsty again, [14] but whoever drinks of the water that I
               will give him will never be thirsty forever. The water that I will give him will
               become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." [15] The woman
               said to him, "Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to
               come here to draw water."  [16] Jesus said to her, "Go, call your husband, and
               come here." [17] The woman answered him, "I have no husband." Jesus said to
               her, "You are right in saying, 'I have no husband'; [18] for you have had five
               husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said
               is true." [19] The woman said to him, "Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet.
               [20] Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is
               the place where people ought to worship." [21] Jesus said to her, "Woman, believe
               me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you
               worship the Father. [22] You worship what you do not know; we worship what
               we know, for salvation is from the Jews. [23] But the hour is coming, and is now
               here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for
               the Father is seeking such people to worship him. [24] God is spirit, and those who
               worship him must worship in spirit and truth." [25] The woman said to him,
               "I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will
               tell us all things." [26] Jesus said to her, "I who speak to you am he."  [27] Just
               then his disciples came back. They marveled that he was talking with a woman,
               but no one said, "What do you seek?" or, "Why are you talking with her?" [28] So
               the woman left her water jar and went away into town and said to the people,
               [29] "Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?"
               [30] They went out of the town and were coming to him.  [31] Meanwhile the disciples
               were urging him, saying, "Rabbi, eat." [32] But he said to them, "I have food to eat
               that you do not know about." [33] So the disciples said to one another, "Has anyone
               brought him something to eat?" [34] Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will
               of him who sent me and to accomplish his work. [35] Do you not say, 'There are yet
               four months, then comes the harvest'? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that
               the fields are white for harvest. [36] Already the one who reaps is receiving wages
               and gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together.
               [37] For here the saying holds true, 'One sows and another reaps.' [38] I sent you
               to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered
               into their labor."  [39] Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of
               the woman's testimony, "He told me all that I ever did." [40] So when the Samaritans
               came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days.
               [41] And many more believed because of his word. [42] They said to the woman,
               "It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for
              ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world."

 

                Click here to hear Vicar Jon's sermon on this Scripture.