Me: Prodigal, what are you doing?
Prodigal: It is a hot, humid day and I need refreshing at this fountain. Then I think I am going to grab a bite to eat.
Me: That reminds me of the story of the Samaritan woman and I like how Ravi Zacharias in his book Jesus Among Other gods explains it.
In John 4:1-42 Jesus has a conversation with a Samaritan woman and in that dialogue, he had tried to open up the understanding of the disciples minds to what made up the form of life and what constituted its substance. In fact, He had a brilliant lead-in, had they but listened. Evidently the disciples missed His point.
They had their lunch bags in their hands and so were completely preoccupied. He was talking to a socially ostracized and desperate woman whose life has been used and abused till she had no sense of self-worth left. They chided Him for talking to this outcast. “You must be hungry.” they said. “Is it not time to eat?”
“I have food to eat that you know nothing about. My food is to do the will of My Father.”
There is the first remarkable pointer. If I am to be fulfilled, I must pursue a will that is greater than mine-a fulfilled life is on that has the will of God as its focus, not the appetite of the flesh.
He went on to say: “Open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest” John 4:32-35
Here is our next clue. Maintaining the metaphor of food, He pointed to a hunger that was universal and that went beyond bread and water–a distinctive hunger of universal proportion. Every sentence of His response had food in it, but of a different kind. There was hunger everywhere, He said, and food enough for all. But it was not wheat or water. It was Christ Himself, the Bread of Life and the spring of living water. The Samaritan woman grasped what He said with a fervor that came from an awareness of her real need.
The transaction was fascinating. She had come with a bucket. He sent her back with a spring of living water.
She had come as a reject. He sent her back being accepted by God Himself.
She came wounded. He sent her back whole.
She came laden with questions. He sent her back as a source for answers.
She came living a life of quiet desperation. She ran back overflowing with hope.
The disciples missed it all. It was lunchtime for them.
John 4:23
But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him.
Jennifer Van Allen
www.theprodigalpig.com
www.faithincounseling.org
