Either All of Us Matter or None of Us Do

Today’s Gospel story is remarkable for the unlikeliness of the encounter between Jesus and the Samaritan woman in the first place. Much has been made of the hostility between Jewish and Samaritan people in Jesus’ context. Those who might otherwise be kindred spirits had long since withdrawn from each other on account of ancient differences. And just like neighbors who can’t learn to get along, segregation persists despite the peoples’ proximity. The author of John puts it plainly: “Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.”

That is to say nothing of the rigid gender expectations. In the world of the New Testament, a public conversation between a man and woman is an aberration, to say the least. Notice that it’s the difference in gender, and not the woman’s ethnicity, that astonishes the disciples upon their return to the scene at Jacob’s well.

As we might expect, however, social barriers don’t stand in the way of Jesus. “Give me a drink,” he asks, less forcefully than the text might suggest. Recall that Jesus, exhausted from his journey, is resting beside the well. But absent a jar of his own, he relies entirely on the woman, the only other soul in sight, to quench his thirst. So Jesus’ initial request, surprising as it may be, is an act of healthy vulnerability.

And for her part, the Samaritan woman engages him earnestly, raising the issue of the divide between them: “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?” Yet even this question serves to transcend the conventional boundary, inviting further interaction.

I love Rachel Held Evans’ imaginative retelling of this story in Inspired, her book about the Bible. In Evans’ account, the Samaritan woman notices Jesus as she approaches the well, but she presumes he will ignore her: “I drew closer, spied the knotted tassels on the fringe of his coat confirming he was a Jew, and felt a rush of relief. Good. We won’t have to talk. A man in this country rarely speaks to a woman. A Jew to a Samaritan? Never.”[1]

Of course, Jesus surprises her with his directness, and more importantly, his attentiveness: “[In the course of our conversation] he crouched down and looked me straight in the eyes,” the woman says, “seeing me in a way no man had ever seen me before.”[2]

In fact, each step in their interaction leads Jesus and the Samaritan woman closer to mutual understanding. Each partner affirms the other’s dignity despite their differences. Each partner expresses real needs and raises real questions without shame. Each partner listens not only to respond, but to comprehend. It’s a holy encounter,[3] by which the two establish an unlikely connection. And together they discover a new well, so to speak, a source of nourishment for beloved community: a sense of kinship that is established not by blood or creed but by the knowledge of our shared humanity and the God who loves us all.

What would it look like to replicate that kind of interaction? What would it mean to truly see one another in a world where we tend to look past?

Pastor Robin Meyers takes a walk in his neighborhood early on Sunday mornings prior to finishing his preparations for church. In the darkness of predawn, he wonders what might be going on in the lives of the people living nearby, neighbors who will forever be strangers. He acknowledges that their stories are varied and complicated, filled with heartache and fear and exhaustion and stress. He wonders about ruptured relationships and child abuse and unpaid bills and skeletons in the closet.

One day he returns to his computer and marvels to himself: “What a strange job I have been given: to stand up in front of people and try to tell them the secrets of their own hearts, much less to be honest about my own.” And he proceeds to write a prayer for the community gathered in Jesus’ name at his church, a prayer he includes in his book, Saving God from Religion:

[“A Prayer for the Forgotten,” pp. 142-3]

[1] Inspired: Slaying Giants, Walking on Water, and Loving the Bible Again, 142.

[2]Ibid. 144.

[3] See Karoline Lewis, “Holy Conversations,” www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=4839.