My beloved brothers and sisters in Our Risen Lord, God and Savior,
CHRIST IS RISEN! TRULY HE IS RISEN! ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ ΑΝΕΣΤΗ! ΑΛΗΘΩΣ ΑΝΕΣΤΗ!
All this will come in due course. Meanwhile the Lord, before His Passion and Resurrection, was preaching the Good News of the Kingdom and showing His Disciples that those worthy of faith and of Eternal inheritance offered by Him would not be chosen just from among the Jews but from the Gentiles as well. "Then," according to the Gospel reading we have heard today (John 4:5-42), "cometh He to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacobe gave to his son Joseph. Now Jacob’s well was there." He calls the well "a spring," because it was a source of running water, as will become clear from what follows." It was Jacob;s well because he dug it. The place which Jacob gave Joseph was called Shechem. As he was breathing in Egypt and disposing of his property he said to Joseph, "Behold I die: but God will bring you again unto the land of your fathers. Moreover I have given to thee Shechem as a special portion above thy brethren, which I took out of the hand of the Amorite with my sword and with my bow" (Genesis 48:21-22). So Shechem was later inhabited by the Tribe of Ephraim, Joseph’s firstborn son, and the Ten Tribes of Israel, ruled by the apostate Jeroboam, settled the surrounding area.
"Jesus therefore," it says, "being wearied with his journey sat thus on the well and it was about the sixth hour" (John 4:6). The time of day, the effort required and the place would make anyone with a body like ours sit down. So, confirming that He had a human body, and foreseeing the good that would result from His action, "He sat," it says, "thus on the well." He simply sat down on His own like any other traveller, "For His disciples were gone away unto the city to buy meat" (John 4:8). While He was sitting alone by the well, "There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water" (John 4:7). As man, the Lord was thirsty, and saw that someone who was naturally coming to quench her thirst. As God, however, He also saw that her heart was athirst FOR THE WATER OF SALVATION, although she did not know Him Who could give it to her. So He hastened to reveal HImself to her longing soul for, as it is written, He Himself longs for those who long for Him (cf. Psalm 9:10; Proverbs 7:15). He started from a point where He would be well received and said to her, "Give Me water to drink" (John 4:7). Being intelligent, and understanding just from His clothes, His appearance and His outward behaviour that He was a Jew Who kept the law, she replied that she was amazed that He should ask a Samaritan woman for a drink, since the Jews hadnot dealings with the Samaritans because they were Gentiles (pagans). Using this as a starting point, the Lord began to disclose Himself by saying to her, "If thou knewest the gift of God, and Who it is that saith to thee, Give Me water to drink; thou wouldest have asked Him, and He would given thee LIVING WATER" (John 4:10).
It is evident that had she known Who He was, she would have asked at once and would have partaken OF THE TRUE LIVING WATER, as later, once she had found out, she did to her benefit. The council of the Jews, by contrast, crucified the Lord of Glory after they had questioned Him and clearly heard Who He was (1 Corinthians 2:8). But what is God’s gift? For He said, "If thou knewest the gift of God" (John 4:10). If we ignore everything else, was it not a great gift and grace that God incarnate did not find abhorrent people whom the Jews loathed and with whom they would not share even a drink of water? But who can comprehend the fact that He held them so dar that He not only received what they gave Him, but shared with them His Divine Gift of grace? (But why do I say gifts of grace? For He offered Himself and made believers acceptable vessels of His Divinity, since there is no other way they would have within them A WELL OF WATER SPRINGING UP INTO ETERNAL LIFE, AS HE PROCLAIMED WITH FORESIGHT.) Whose mind is capable of apprehending this? What words can express the excellence of this gift?
Since the Samaritan woman did not yet understand how great THIS LIVING WATER WAS, she was puzzled initially as to how He Who was addressing her could find the water He was promising, since He had nothing to draw with and the well was deep. Then she endeavoured to compare Him wo Jacob, whom she referred to as their father, attributing honor to her nation on account of their place, and praised the water from the well, as if no better water could be found. When she heard the Lord saying that the water that He would give would become for the one who received it A WELL SPRING UP INTO LIFE, WITH A SOUL FULL OF LONGING AND ON HER WAY TOWARDS FAITH, THOUGH NOT YET ABLE TO LOOK DIRECTLY UP AT THE LIGHT, SHE UTTERED THE WORDS, "Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not, neither come hither to draw" (John 4:15). The Lord, Who still wished to uncover His identity gradually, told her to call her husband. When the woman, concealing her circumstances and eager to receive the gift, said that she had no husband, she heard how many husbands she had had since her girlhood and was accused of not now having a husband. However, she was not annoyed by this criticism, but realized immediately that the one speaking to her was a Prophet, and turned to greater subjects.
(Resources: The Homilies)
(To be continued)
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"Glory Be To GOD
For
All Things!"
+ Saint John Chrysostomos
+ + +
With sincere agape in Christ’s Glorious and Life-Giving Resurrection,
The sinner and unworthy servant of God
+ Father George
The Eastern Orthodox Christian Ethos 