Today’s story is about a woman who had been married five times. In addition, her current “significant other” was not her husband. I have known a few multiple marriages over my ministry, but I don’t think I’ve known anybody who’d been married five times. Anna Nicole Smith was in the news a lot this past week. I don’t even think she’s been married five times. 

I read a story about a widowed man who moved into a retirement center. He sat down to dinner on the first night at a table with three women. One of the women kept staring at him across the table, long and hard. Finally she said to him, “You look just like my third husband.” The man was just a bit startled. “How many times have you been married?” he asked. She replied, “Twice.” 

This is most likely a sad story about a troubled soul. She was someone apparently unable to sustain a relationship. She had low self-esteem, a low sense of self-worth. (Have you heard about the paranoid man with low self-esteem? He thought nobody important was out to get him.) 

She dragged this low self-esteem around with her like a heavy ball and chain. It affected every aspect of her life. 

Here was a woman, unable to make marriage work. She had been with five husbands. She was working on number six. Some might say she was multi-tasking. I read one definition of multi-tasking that said this: “Botching up several things at one time.” She had either botched or been cruelly used in five marriages. 

She was lonely and socially outcast. She was the target of anger. Think about this quotation: “Everybody has to be somebody to somebody to be anybody.” This woman was essentially nobody to anybody. 

She came to the well outside the city at about noon. Just in that small detail we have a clear clue where this story is going. She was apparently shunned from drawing water at the well inside the village. She had to go several hundred yards outside the town. Moreover, she had to go in the heat of the day. She needed to be there when no one else was there. Everybody else would know it was foolish to go in the heat of the day to draw water from the well. It would be like choosing to vacation in Phoenix for the month of July.  

At the well she met a man. She didn’t expect to meet anybody there. He was alone at the moment. We are told that the disciples had gone into town to buy lunch. This man remained behind. He was tired. He was sitting by the well. She knew he was not a member of her community. He was not someone with whom she had had any previous acquaintance. He was certainly not one of her previous husbands. This man was a stranger to her. His name was Jesus. 

He asks her for a drink. She immediately activates her low self-esteem and ethnic heritage. “Why do you, a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan, for a drink?” She leaves a couple of things unsaid, but she may have thought them. One would be this: “Rabbis are not to converse with strange women.” A second might be, “You obviously don’t know me or my history.” 

But the conversation continues, initiated and pushed by Jesus. They engage in a conversation about water—specifically about living water. She doesn’t understand. He has no bucket with which to draw water from the well. Eventually Jesus says to her, “Go and call your husband and bring him here.” It’s at that point that she says, “I have no husband.” And Jesus reveals what he knows about her. “You are right that you have no husband. You have had five husbands, and the one whom you are now with is not your husband.” 

I read a story about a wedding at which the bride was very nervous. In order to soothe her nerves, the groom ordered a wedding cake with a particular Biblical verse inscribed on the top of the cake. He didn’t actually put the verse; he just put the reference: I John 4:18. That text reads, “There is no fear in love. Perfect love casts out all fear.” 

The baker, however, did not see the “1” in front of the word “John.” So he put on the cake, “John 4:18” instead. John 4:18 reads, “You have had five husbands, and the man you now live with is not your husband.”  I suspect that did not help the bride that day a whole lot! 

Jesus speaks, and the woman realizes instantly that she is known through and through. She experiences the miracle of being known.  

What happened next? Probably there was a strained silence. It doesn’t say so in the text, but that’s my guess. Her whole sad, sorry adult life flashed before her—her flings with love; her failed marriages; her loneliness. She thinks, “How does he know me so well? How can he know me?” The moment is awkward, embarrassing, even frightening. 

She looks at Jesus and says, “You must be a prophet. Are you a prophet?” Do you hear what the Gospel is saying to us here? You and I are known. We are known deeply by God, by Jesus. All of this is reminiscent of what the Psalmist says in Psalm 139, the first three verses:

Oh Lord, you have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up. You discern my thoughts from far away. You search out my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all of my ways.

Our lives are known. We have no secrets from God. 

But note something here. There is no condemnation by Jesus. Jesus does not say to her, “Sister, you are a sinner.” He does not say to her, “You must be a very sick person.” He does not say, “Do you realize that you’ve been divorced five times?” He doesn’t even say, “Lady, you are one troubled soul.” He simply reveals to her that she is known. He simply states the truth. 

All of us have things in our lives of which we are not proud. Some careless, thoughtless act; some wild fling; some important thing left undone; some foolish choice. Maybe it happened when we were teenagers. Maybe it happened later in life. Maybe it happened multiple occasions and times. You have had those moments and those years. I have had those moments and years. They may be secrets to friends or family, but they are not secrets to God. We are known. 

Again, remember the Psalmist: “You have searched me and known me.” 

The miracle is that God does not cast judgment in this instance. God simply lets us know that He knows.  

One piece of the story says to me that Jesus welcomes everyone into his family. There are no exclusions; no exceptions. No one is left out. You have probably been reading the story about the Methodist pastor in Virginia who chose to deny membership to a gay man who related to his congregation. Jesus would not do that. Jesus welcomed all persons.  

I think it was Carl Sandburg who was asked one time, “What is the ugliest word in the English language?” He thought for a moment and then he said, “Exclusive.” Jesus believed all people had the capacity to grow spiritually. He especially sought out those cast out by the “good folks.” 

Jesus will engage anyone and welcome anyone, no matter who you are, even if you happen to have a sordid past or a checkered reputation. You may need to hear that good news today. No matter where you have been, no matter what your personal history, no matter how you may have botched up your life or some part of it, you are never outside Jesus’ circle of promise. Jesus said one time, “The person who comes to me, I will not cast out.” You may be broken, you may be hurting, but you are loved by God. Jesus is open to all who come to Him. 

Jesus simply wants to give this woman a new joy. He wants to give her a better life and a brighter future. Jesus came to give you and me a new joy, a better life, and a brighter future. The miracle of being known is also a miracle of abounding grace. Jesus says, “I can give your life a whole new start. I can give your life a lift. I can give you a new heart. I can give you a new outlook.” 

Max Lucado gives us a humorous image in his book, In the Grip of Grace. Listen to his story.

Most of my life, I have been a closet slob. I was slow to see the logic of neatness. Why make up a bed if you are going to sleep in it again tonight? Does it make sense to wash dishes after only one meal? Isn’t it easier to leave your clothes on the floor at the foot of the bed so they’ll be there when you get up and put them on? Is anything gained by putting the lid on the toothpaste tube tonight only to remove it again tomorrow? I was as compulsive as anyone, only I was compulsive about being messy. Life was too short to match your socks; just buy longer pants! And then I got married.

Denalyn was so patient. She said she didn’t mind my habits… if I didn’t mind sleeping outside. Since I did, I began to change. I enrolled in a twelve-step program for slobs. (“Hi. My name is Max. I hate to vacuum.”) A physical therapist helped me rediscover muscles used for hanging shirts and place toilet paper on the holder. My nose was reintroduced to the fragrance of Pine Sol.

By the time Denalyn’s parents came to visit, I was a new man. I could go three days without throwing a sock behind the couch.

But then came the moment of truth. Denalyn went out of town for a week. Initially I reverted to the old man. I figured I’d be a slob for six days and clean on the seventh. But something strange happened, a curious discomfort. I couldn’t relax with dirty dishes in the sink. When I saw an empty potato chip sack on the floor I—hang on to your hat—bent over and picked it up. I actually put my bath towel back on the rack. What had happened to me? Simple. I’d been exposed to a higher standard. 

The woman is exposed to God’s higher standard. She is known; and she is offered living water. 

Maybe this lady had been hard to live with. Some of us are! Maybe she had hooked up with a series of alcoholics. Maybe each of her husbands had died. Life expectancy at that time in Palestine was not very long. Maybe she had been used up by a series of selfish men. Her pain is deep. She longs for the day when she can go to the well without fear. She longs for the day when she can draw water in town without shame.  

Jesus seems to know her well. He knows the deep need in her soul. He knows her hurt. He knows her heart. Jesus knows her inadequacy from childhood. Jesus knows about the men who cast her aside again and again. He knows her. 

There’s a story about a famous sculptor working on a bust of Abraham Lincoln. A little girl was watching him in his studio. Gradually the face of Lincoln was becoming clear on one side of the stone.  

The child spoke up in amazement and exuberance. “Hey, that’s Abraham Lincoln, our sixteenth President!” The sculptor turned to her and said, “Yes, you are exactly right.” Then the child made the comment that only a child can ask: “How did you know he was in there?” Jesus knew what was inside of this woman. He knew her. He understood her. He offers her new life. Jesus knows and understands you and me. He offers you and me a new life. 

Gradually the woman realizes that this Jesus cannot be an ordinary man. He cannot even be an ordinary rabbi. He has wisdom and insight and gentleness. He knows things and offers a gentleness she has not experienced. 

Suddenly she remembers a word. The word is “Messiah.” In all probability she was not a very religious person. She was not especially well educated. But she remembers hearing something about a Messiah who will come. She says to Jesus, “Sir, when the Messiah comes, these dreams of a better life will come. All of life will take a new shape.” 

Jesus says, “Woman, the Messiah of whom you speak, I am he.” 

Eric Park has written a song about this story. Listen to the closing words of the song as he interprets Jesus’ comments to the woman.

Gentle woman, let this be your day.

I stand before you, the life, the truth, the way.

You are precious in my eyes.

Leave behind your sad disguise.

I’ve come to quench your thirst.

Let me be the first

To bring life-giving water to your soul. 

What do we know about the woman after that day that she met Jesus? Not much. All we really know is this: Jesus is persuasive. He was persuasive to this woman; he is persuasive to me. He makes a difference in her life. He has made a difference in my life. She must have felt a new creation in her soul—a new self, a new outlook. 

Jesus is the highest standard. When you meet him you know that. The woman at the well began to recognize this.  

Edith Wharton says, “There are two ways of spreading the light; to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.” 

Jesus had become Light for the woman at the well. She wanted to mirror! 

So what did she do? She ran to tell others. She ran to tell those whom she most dreaded seeing. She ran to tell those who had scorned her, even abused her. She ran maybe even to tell some of her former husbands. 

And she led them to Jesus. “Come and meet a very special man. Come and meet a man who knows me better than I know myself. Come and meet a man who offered me living water. Come and meet a man who may be the Messiah. Come and meet a man who offers me an extreme makeover.” She says, in effect, “If he did all of this for me, he can do it for you as well.” 

And I say the same thing to you this morning. “He did all of this for me, and he can do it for you as well.” 

Amen.