AN UNEXPECTED HARVEST

“Many of the Samaritans of that town believed in Him because of the woman’s testimony, ‘He told me everything I ever did.’ So when the Samaritans came to Him, they urged Him to stay with them, and He stayed two days. And because of His words many more became believers. They said to the woman, ‘We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Saviour of the world.'” John 4:39-42 (NIV).

What an amazing conclusion to an unusual encounter! Once again John had a story to tell that ended with a new wave of faith in Jesus as Messiah and Saviour. 

It’s almost as though His words to His disciples were prophetic. The woman was the first-fruit of a harvest that was waiting to be reaped in an unlikely region through which He travelled on His way to somewhere, but she was the key to that harvest.

What was it in the woman’s testimony that captured their attention and their imagination?  One simple statement, ‘He told me everything I ever did.’ Jesus was no fortune-teller. It was much more than just His words that captivated her. What He knew and disclosed to her was the wedge that opened up her locked and barred spirit because it revealed His heart for her.

His words were not intended to embarrass or condemn her. They were part of a disclosure that revealed not only what He knew about her unsavoury life but also what He understood about her empty heart. It was His invitation to come to Him because He could give her water that would quench her thirst forever.

Her fellow towns-people were intrigued by her testimony, but they were even more intrigued by the transformation in her. She was very different from the woman they knew and despised. Something had happened to her that had caused her to lose her fear of them. She approached them without shame despite her testimony. There was something in Jesus’ words that had set her free and she was desperate to share it with her erstwhile “enemies”.

The people of Sychar were not only willing to listen to her story; they also wanted to hear this remarkable man for themselves. Here was an unlikely harvest ready for reaping. Why should they, the people of a race that was despised by the Jews, listen to a Jewish man? Racial prejudice runs very deep and it works both ways.

The miracle is that Jesus transcends prejudice. In His earthly circumstances He might have been born a Jew and raised in the Jewish culture and religion, but He never participated in their attitudes and issues. Jew though He was, He represented another kingdom and another culture. He did not represent a Jewish God or a white man’s God or a black man’s God or any other group’s God. He came to reveal the God of heaven.

He is the Son of God, the Creator of the universe and Father of all the variations in the human race. There is only one race. The prejudices human beings develop are based on superficial external differences, not on our essential unity as members of the human race created in the image of God.

The apostle Paul confirmed the unity of the human race: “From one man He made all the nations that they should inhabit the whole earth; and He marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands.” Acts 17:26 (NIV).

Jesus’ message is to the world; it transcends geographical, language and cultural boundaries and invites all people everywhere to return to the Father from whom they are estranged because of sin. The woman needed a Father to heal her wounded heart and so did the people of Sychar who were no better than she.

Everyone, regardless of our experience of an earthly, imperfect father, needs to know the Father and to return to His house where we can live as accepted and beloved children of God, and Jesus came to take us to Him.

Have you come home to Him? Why are you waiting?

Acknowledgement

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.