“Now he had to go through Samaria. So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon. When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” John 4:4-10
Our purpose as Christians is to seek and save the lost; wins souls for Christ. That can be difficult if we are picking and choosing who we are seeking. We can instruct our children to stop living sinful lives and start being like us, Christians. We can sit in Church meetings and get a list of names of people who have been delinquent and divide up the names and make telephone calls. We can hire staff to seek and save the lost and train volunteers.
Jesus created the model of our work with the Samaritan woman that He met at the well. This woman appeared at a well just outside of the town in which she lived. Jesus knew who she was; how she had been living her life; he even knew she was currently living with a man to whom she was not married. He could have really unloaded on her; after all, He was the Son of God.
Rather than seize the opportunity to use what He believed to condemn this woman for how she was living, Jesus shows us that offering hope to the lost is the better choice. Whenever I see a photo of people around a well in Haiti this story comes to mind. These two girls at the well at Eglise Lutherienne in Cap Haitian probably come from homes where vodou is practiced and a neighborhood with souls that need to be saved. The water in this well in Cap Haitian is free for them and this gift, while not the living water Christ has to offer, is a gift of life for their thirsty lives. They are not drinking out of the ditch; they are drinking on territory that is dedicated to Jesus Christ.
The school is filled with young missionaries that you have helped to prepare as they are blessed with a Trinity/HOPE feeding program and daily are given the Word of God that makes its way into the neighborhoods of Cap Haitian. You and I didn’t choose to feed these kids, God did. It wasn’t our plan reach out to these two children by the well; it was His plan to use the children in the school to do that. He chose you to help, you had a choice. Thank you.
Dear Heavenly Father, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown. Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior. Amen.
May God be with you…Jay