How what you say could create curiosity that leads to abundant life
By Dean Collins
What we say matters. It’s not only the words but also the motives behind our words that matter. In fact they matter so much that not just what we say but what we assume or project on someone may bring detriment or blessing. The truth is that people often sense our attitudes, including our biases and our prejudice. It may very well be that what is sensed opens or shuts down the conversation. There is both a sender and a receiver in every communication, and both sides have the potential to sabotage or create life.
Being known
One of the more familiar stories in Scripture that demonstrate this potential is found in John 4. This conversation starts with just two people but results in two days of dialogue with the whole community. It all started because Jesus was thirsty. I’m remembering two times the Gospel writers tell us Jesus said he was thirsty. The first was at noon on a hot day of travel at a well in Samaria, and the other was from the cross just before Jesus died. In each case, we can assume Jesus was genuinely in physical need of water. But I think it’s also fair to assume he lived in a perpetual thirst for bringing life to all humankind.
When we get to the end of chapter 4 we learn that “many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony.” “He told me all I ever did,” the woman said to her friends. There is no indication in Scripture that Jesus gave a detailed account of this woman’s life. Yet she felt completely understood. Jesus hit the high and low points of her journey, and she knew he knew not only her past but saw her future. And she believed him. Being known by Jesus changes us, changes our story, and changes our hearts in ways we are compelled to tell someone.
Examining the past
Usually when we read this story or hear a sermon about this woman at the well, we focus on Jesus telling the woman to go and get her husband. “I have no husband,” she claims, and Jesus replies, “You are right, you’ve had five husbands and the man you are living with now is not your husband.” When we hear this, we immediately rush to judgment. But Jesus doesn’t speak judgment, and the woman doesn’t appear to feel judged or dismissed. She seems to feel validated. And unlike the woman caught in the act of adultery in John chapter 8, Jesus doesn’t say, “Go and sin no more.”
Jesus doesn’t speak judgment, and the woman doesn’t appear to feel judged or dismissed.
This woman’s past may have not been scandalous at all. She may have been a victim of many men who simply got tired of her and divorced her. Women did not have the ability to divorce. It was a man’s world. She may have experienced the death of one or more husbands. She may have been involved in a Levirate marriage where, for the sake of property being kept in the family when there wasn’t an heir, the brother of the deceased married the widow. She may have been in that situation with the man she wasn’t yet married to because of his age or stubbornness. Jesus knew her situation. The woman knew her situation. We do not, but our tendency is to assume the worst. I wonder how many times our attitudes prevent life-giving conversations.
Moving beyond curiosity
First this woman thought Jesus to be a prophet, but as the conversation continued, she came to understand he was more than a prophet. He was a Savior. And she wanted everyone in her community to meet this Messiah.
What Jesus said first to this woman and throughout the conversation moved from curiosity to confirmation. When she ran back to those in her town, her words also created curiosity. When the Samaritans came to meet Jesus, their curiosity became a request: “Come and stay with us.” They wanted more. Jesus spent the next two days offering more. He offered living water. And this town in Samaria drank freely and discovered their salvation.
I don’t know who you will encounter today. I don’t know who God will put in my path, either. Whoever it is, I hope we can engage in conversation that doesn’t include judgment but instead creates curiosity, even thirst, for the one who has given us forgiveness of sin and abundant life. You never know if your encounter today might even change an entire community.
Your time with God’s Word
John 4:7-30, 39-42, 44-45 ESV
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