John 4:1-42 (woman at well)

This passage occurs in the Revised Common Lectionary, Year A, Lenten Cycle (most recently March 2026); in the narrative Lectionary, Year 4, Lenten Cycle.
 
Summary:  Chapter 3 and 4 couldn't be more opposite:  man vs woman; Pharisee Jew vs sinful non-Jew (a dig at the Samaritan people, Jews intermixed with five other tribes); night vs day.  There is fertile ground here for many sermons.  What struck me this time was the continuity in both chapters regarding the notion of salvation, and life -- it is found in Christ; it begins now here on earth. 

A question this text leaves me pondering:  How does Jesus convert her?  He says to her brutal truth:  her religion isn't complete and she is a sinner.  What converts her?  What converts all of them?  Simply his word of promise?  Actually, he is only proclaimed as savior after he stays with her.  I suggest it is also his vulnerability, his admission that she can help him and finally, his willingness to be with her and with them.  To evangelize entails meeting people where they are, but also staying where they are until they are ready to move ahead.  This passage demonstrates a profound truth about cross-cultural evangelism and listening -- it begins with acknowledging the gifts of the other, not rebuking their sin.

Low hanging fruit:
ωρα εκτη (sixth hour, 4:6)  This means noon.  Don't miss the obvious symbolism.  Nicodemus comes at night (chapter 3); the woman comes in the day (chapter 4).

γυνη Σαμαριας (Samaritan women, 4:7)  Again, don't miss the obvious symbolism.  Samaritan woman means total outsider; someone powerless in the whole system.  Obvious symbolism again:  Nicodemus gets a name; this woman doesn't.

Δός, from δίδωμι (give!, 4:7)  Jesus today asks -- commands -- the woman to give her water.  In an age of deep tribalism, when we assume the stranger has nothing to offer, Jesus comes along and acknowledges that the other, the stranger, the foreigner, the non-Jew, has something to offer him.  This is a profound orientation for mission!

Slightly more interesting:
αἰώνιον ("eternally," 4:14)  This really struck me.  The word for forever or everlasting in Greek means "of the eons."  When we hear "forever" we assume this means "life after death," but nothing grammatically or even theologically in John's Gospel, certainly in this chapter, suggests this.  This word definitely has the sense of that which has no end, but it also has a sense of that which has no beginning.  This is a continuing theme in John's Gospel:  life in Christ begins now and continues even through death.  Or another way of reading it more literally -- another era, another time has begun when we are in relationship with Christ.

ου μη (no, no - meaning never 4:14)  These two negative words together produce an emphatic "No!"  What I am curious about though is the fact that even after I've met Jesus I have encountered periods of profound "dryness" spiritually.  Times in my life in which my prayers are the prayers of lament in the Psalms.  I struggle with the idea that either a) I will not be spiritually thirty again or b) that I have some wellspring in me that will always nourish me.  I struggle with this.  Two thoughts

• Jesus is the one that gives the water, not our own efforts.
• We still need water, we just have our own pool to drink from, that Jesus has given us.

σωτερια ("salvation" in the sense of saving, preserving, delivering, 4:22; σωτηρ 4:42)  Christians again assume that salvation means heaven, specifically life after death.  The word in Greek means saving, simply delivering, including if not primarily a very earthly sense.  John's Gospel includes resurrection and this is ultimate salvation, but Jesus' ministry includes bodily life on earth.

μενω ("abide" 4:40) This is theme word in John's Gospel.  For some, it was enough to hear Jesus, or even just hear the woman's testimony.  But for many, the trust/belief only started after he abided with them.  This is a reminder that to me that the promise is truly incarnational.  In order for us to do better evangelism, we have to meet and STAY with people where they are.

κοσμος ("world" 4:42) A reminder that even though salvation comes FROM the Jews it is FOR the world...see last week's post -- http://lectionarygreek.blogspot.com/2014/01/john-31-21-nicodemeus.html  The world doesn't love God!

κεκοπιακως ("labored", 4:6 and 4:38) John describes Jesus as having labored.  First, this is interesting because it reminds us that Jesus was a human who worked and got physically tired!  Second, Jesus tells the disciples that they will harvest where others have labored (same word!).  Perhaps Jesus acknowledges here that others have gone before him in their prophetic ministry?  This passage should cause us to be more humble when people we know do convert -- we are reaping where others labored.  Also, it should comfort us when people do not convert -- we are laboring where others will reap.

Romans 5:1-11

This passage (or portions of it) occur frequently in the Revised Common Lectionary, including Holy Trinity Sunday in Year C.

Summary:
The English reader will catch what Christ does:  In an unjustified act of love, Christ justifies us and the Holy Spirit pours out love into every aspect of life.  The Greek helps the reader see when this all happens.  For example, whenever Paul refers to Christ's death in this passage, he uses the aorist tense.  This allows him to reference this event with great subtlety.  Yet the past event of Christ's death is not without present and future implications:  Having peace, having access, standing in grace and boasting in hope. Faith is connecting the past event of our justification and our current reality of peace, grace and even pride in God with the future hope of our salvation.

(Challenge:  Go through and highlight each verb in a different color based on tense. A very interesting pattern emerges, especially with the aorist tenses…It may be tough to explain in a sermon, but for your own personal good, this is a worthwhile exercise.)

Key Words:
διακιαωθεντες ("make right," passive aorist participle of διακιοω, 5.1)  Paul begins the whole train of thought with the verb “justify.” Because it is in participle form, most translators make it an adverbial phrase, “Since we are justified…” But I think any phrasing here loses a bit of steam. It can and should just read: “Justified therefore by faith we have peace with God through our lord Jesus Christ.”  In other words, Paul does not mess around, but simply begins with justification.  Also worth noting that the verb justify, as always, is in the passive.  We do not justify ourselves; only God justifies.  It is also in the aorist, pointing toward an event in the past, namely, Christ's death.

A further note on the meaning of the word:  The verb justify in English often means to make an excuse for or rationalize away.  This distorts the English ear from hearing Paul's intended words!  The word justify in Greek here means to make right, with a heavy sense of bringing into right relationship.  In fact, the Greek word διακιοω may fairly be translated into English as "righteousness" or "justification."

This idea that God granted us righteousness through Jesus, was the central focus for Luther.  While people do not articulate Luther's problem of a lack of righteousness before God, we still live in a world hungry for right relationship with God and with others.  Unfortunately, we have robbed God of his judgment role, but not gotten rid of the role of judgment in our lives; we simply have transferred it to other people - our boss, our neighbors, our family, our kids, the person down the street with the nice car.  It seems that true peace, acceptance of ourselves, God's role in our lives and fellow humans, requires us to let God be the judge...the only judge...the only judge in whom there is mercy.

εκ πιστεως ("of faith" 5.1)  We are justified out of or as a result of faith; See my post on Romans 1 for more about translation issues with this phrase .  Fine, but whose faith is Paul talking about? Jesus or ours? This is a trickier question in Paul’s letter to the Galatians. In this case though, especially in light of 4.24, I would argue Paul seems to be speaking about the faith of humans in God.

καυχωμεθα  ("boast", from καυχαομαι, 5:2, 3, 11)  Only Paul boasts; James specifically tells us not to!  Clearly we are not supposed to be braggarts, but Paul is okay with us boasting in the Lord.  Have you bragged about God recently?  As Psalm 107:32 says, "Let them exalt him in the assembly of the people and praise him in the council of the elders."

δoθεντος (διδωμι, aorist participle, "give" 5.5) Paul uses an interesting tense here with the word “given” in that “we are given the Holy Spirit.” One would have expected a present or perhaps a perfect tense, but Paul again puts it in the aorist. Throughout this section, Paul is using the aorist tense to point toward the event of our justification – the cross.  It might seem that Paul is suggesting we get the spirit at Christ's death.  However, the spirit is not given to us in Christ's death, but rather through our Baptisms, as Paul will suggest in 1 Cor 12:13.  I believe Paul here is setting up his argument in Romans 6, that our Baptism and Christ's death are linked.

συνιστησιν ("present" or "demonstrate"  5:8)  This verb is significant not for its meaning, but for its tense. The cross was not but IS a show of God’s love for us. A reminder than even though it is a once and done matter, we always need this demonstration of God’s love.

σωθησομεθα  ("will be saved", future passive of σωζω, 5:9)  The verb save is in the future here. The cross did not save us but will save us! In fact Paul generally avoids the idea of salvation as a past activity, but views it as a present, on-going reality that will reach culmination in the future. Yes, the cross did save us from hell.  But it did more than this!!!

οργης ("wrath" from οργη, 5:9)  The word God is not used here; although it is hard to understand where the wrath comes from if its not from God.  Perhaps this omission of God from wrath is the ultimate reminder of the hiddenness of God.  We can avoid saying it -- and perhaps we must avoid preaching it? -- but it is always there.

κατηλλαγημεν (aorist form of "reconciliation"; 5.10) Reconciliation (katallass-oo) is a beautiful thing!  When I first wrote this blog post almost 20 years ago, I wrote "reconciliation, the favorite metaphor of liberals."  I think what I was getting at is that reconciliation can be described in terms of a movement of God's love that doesn't require the death of Jesus or the death of the sinner.  Worth pointing out: Reconciliation required Jesus’ death.  

That said, reconciliation is clearly more of a relational than judicial term.  This is not to argue against forensic justification, but that Paul wants to press beyond simply an easing or erasing of previous sins/tension in the relationship.  Too often forgiveness on the cross can become a past event that gives a future hope, rather than leading to what Paul sees it as, namely a past event with a future hope that creates a present reality.

Grammar Review:  Past tense:  Aorist, imperfect and perfect

This passage is an excellent passage to examine verb tenses. Go through and highlight each verb in a different color based on tense. A very interesting pattern emerges, especially with the aorist tenses…It may be tough to explain in a sermon, but for your own personal good, this is a worthwhile exercise.

Moreover, Greek has three ways to speak about past action.  Technically, four, but the pluperfect is rarely ever used.  The most basic way is through the aorist.  The aorist describes an event.  Within in a narrative, this normally describes a simple action most easily translated by the simple past (Christ died).  The aorist can be more flexible than this, but 90% of the time, it is describes a simple event that occurred in the past.  In geometric terms, think "point."

The imperfect describes an event start started in the past and whose action continues.  "Jesus began to teach them" or "Jesus was preaching."  In geometry, think a "ray."  The emphasis here is on the on-going and past nature of the action, rather than the present situation.

Most interestingly, Greek's perfect tense functions in a past-present manner.  It refers to a completed past action than still has a present impact.  Like "I got dressed."  The action is past but the state of being continues.  So in this passage, the love is poured out (5.5); the love is still flowing from our hearts.  The past action creates the current state of love that is being poured out. 

The perfect tense is almost always the most interesting because the writer is intentionally connecting two time frames in a manner difficult to convey in English.  However, in this section the aorist might be the most interesting because Paul uses it always to refer to Christ's action on the cross.