John 4 - ESV Gospel Transformation Study Bible

4:1–15 The world of sinners loved by God includes not just respectable insiders seeking truth (Nicodemus) but broken outsiders running from the truth (the Samaritan woman). None of us are beyond the need of God’s grace and none of us are beyond the reach of God’s grace. Jesus has come to seek and to save both the “found,” those who presume they already have a relationship with God, and the “lost,” those who realize they don’t.

This interchange between Jesus and the Samaritan woman shows us that eternal life isn’t just about our life in heaven when we die; it is also about the life of heaven “welling up” (v. 14) in us while we live. Jesus’ conversation is designed to help this woman see the realities of “heaven” despite the realities of her sin and shame, but he also intends for her discovery to affect her community and culture. The gospel is not ethereal or abstract; it concerns people and place. The woman was shocked that a Jewish man would speak openly to a Samaritan woman. Here Jesus confronts racism and sexism. He has come, as the old hymn says, to “make his blessings flow far as the curse is found.”

4:16–26 The gospel is bad news before it is good news. The living water of grace is sweet only to those who know the bitter taste of their sin. Whether this woman literally had gone through several marriages or was just given over to a life of promiscuity (the specifics of her sin make no difference), she needed what Jesus alone can give. She had been a poor steward of her thirst—a thirst only Jesus can satisfy. She had spent most of her life running to broken cisterns that hold no water (Jer. 2:13), now she is offered the only water that will satisfy her, and us—the grace of the gospel.

By nature, we are allergic to grace. We resist it. Like this woman, we look for ways to avoid Jesus. She turned Jesus’ pursuit of her heart into an evasive conversation about different perspectives on worship. In his mercy Jesus met her right there, for ultimately, all of life is about worship. To what or whom do we give the attention, affection, and adoration which rightfully belong to God? We can make idols (substitute gods) out of anything—relationships, religion, anything. But even changing the subject to worship puts Jesus once more in the spotlight, for he himself is the only one worthy of our worship.

4:27–38 Nicodemus and the Samaritan woman were both part of the prepared harvest for which Jesus came. As disciples of Jesus, we follow him into a great grace story that has secured the salvation of men and women “from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages” (Rev. 7:9). All of history is bound up with God’s commitment to redeem his covenant family through the work of Jesus.

4:39–43 The gospel comes to us in order that it might run through us. Having believed on Jesus, the Samaritan woman went back to her community to share the good news with her family and friends. In doing so, she gives us the paradigm of a good testimony. Jesus is the hero of her story. She drew attention to the One who exposed her sin and gave her life; and in doing so, she invited her friends to do the same. The gospel is personal, but it is not private.