At the Well: Get Dirty

Jesus broke through cultural taboos to speak to the woman, and her response to His doing so is the type of response many of us fear when we consider witnessing. John 4:9 says:

“Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, ‘How is it that you, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?”

Translation: she’s offended. She knows Jesus shouldn’t be speaking with her, and she tells him. I believe, however, that the source of her claimed offense is different than what she says. What she’s really wondering is how can someone clean, like a Jewish rabbi, speak to someone unclean like her? This is a profound statement, and shows a problem those of us in the Christian community have allowed to arise.

Many who are unsaved look at those who are saved, and believe we consider them unworthy of us. They are nothing more than those who need to come to our way of thinking to be considered clean. When we address them they can wonder why we perfect Christians can talk to fallen sinners. They claim offense largely because of the social boundaries we ourselves have put in place. This is what the Samaritan woman did. She was a social outcast already, and her offense was largely for Jesus’ sake, and not her own. She believed He should consider Himself too good to speak with her.

Many we witness to can think the same about us. They can think those of us who are clean, or saved, can become dirty when we talk to those who are dirty, or unsaved. They get offended because things we’ve said and done tells them they should. As I’ll discuss in later entries Jesus didn’t let this stop Him, and neither should we. He spoke to unsaved people, and didn’t let this Samaritan woman scare Him away because she decided to get offended.

We need to make sure unsaved people know we don’t think we are better than they are. All that separates us is we’ve accepted a truth they haven’t yet. We should be willing to address them to make sure they accept that truth.