Be Still at the Point of Your Sin (Lent 35-2014)

I’m so glad today’s passage of Scripture is in the Bible.  It stands as clear proof that Jesus was not afraid of women—He was not afraid to talk to women, to associate with women, to deal with women on an intellectual level, to reason with women, to listen to women, or to risk how others would think of Him by speaking with a woman…alone.

Many modern-day pastors could take a few notes on what it means to be the kind of man that Jesus wants them to be.  The reasons why these pastors fear women are Legion.  Much of it has to do with the fact that we’re women and they associate sin with women.

Jesus, in today’s passage, was confronted with a woman He knew was a sinner.  Worse, she was a sexual sinner—most modern male pastors’ worst nightmare.  Instead of insisting that there be another disciple there to protect Him or vouch for Him, what did Jesus do?  He engaged her in conversation.  Shocking!

Read John 4: 4-30  4 Now [Jesus] 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 the sixth hour. 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. 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” … 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 Christ?” 30 They came out of the town and made their way toward him.

Talking with a woman wasn’t any more acceptable then than it is now.  At the 6^th hour (the heat of the day), when all the disciples had gone to get food, Jesus would have been quite alone.  When the woman came to draw water, did Jesus look at His hands or suddenly be preoccupied with the straps on His sandals or gaze into the distant scenery so He could ignore her existence?  Nope.  Jesus was a real man.  Real men aren’t afraid of women, even ones with a checkered past.

Jesus asked this woman a question to get the conversation going.  He was intent upon turning her from a Samaritan woman of ill-repute into the first woman evangelist (maybe even the first one period, since John the Baptist was a prophet not an evangelist).

Did Jesus wish the opportunity away?  No, He did not.

He delved into the sin issue deeply: “Go and call your husband,” He says.  It had nothing to do with drawing water but everything to do with her being an outcast getting water in the heat of the day.

Maybe it takes a man like Jesus to point a woman to her sin and point her to the Messiah and to explain that the two points can become a line of forgiveness. 

Be Still, woman.  I had something beautiful in mind when I created you.  I didn’t create you or man to be sinners, but to be holy.

Be Still, man.  You’ve blamed woman long enough.  I created woman and called her “good” and “very good.”

Be Still and Know that I AM God.  I want to see both men and women come to the point of their sin, repent, and find forgiveness in Me.  Galatians 3:28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

Be Still and Know that I AM God.  2 Corinthians 6:18 “I will be a Father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.”

Questions for reflection:

1. What difference would it make in the church if men viewed women as relational categories: mother, wife, sisters, and daughters?  In God’s family, what is happening when men and women take sex outside of marriage?
2. How do men and women relate to Jesus in heaven?  Therefore, how will women relate to men in heaven?  Read Matthew 22:29 Jesus replied, “You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God. 30 At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven.
3. Are you willing to meet a person at the point of sin and draw the line of forgiveness by showing him/her the point of salvation in Christ?