Hello, my friends,

I often go to write these newsletters with a really heavy heart. There’s just so much to despair over. Too much. It is overwhelming. It can often feel as though there isn’t anything that will stop the endless spiral of chaos, corruption, and injustice we are witnessing. We are also seeing the age-old intersection between the three Abrahamic religions, Judaism, Islam, and Christianity, being put under the microscope yet again with the continued joint attacks on Iran from Israel and the United States, which continues to claim to be a “Christian nation.” In light of this context, I want to invite you to reflect with me on “the woman at the well” from John 4:5-42 and perhaps find some encouragement that even in our world today, curiosity can still transcend coercion.

Recommended Resources:

​-Prophetic Lament: A Call for Justice in Troubled Times by Soong-Chan Rah. This book has been so timely. Focusing on the role of lament in the process of confronting unjust power in our world. It's been really helpful.

​-The Junia Project I wanted to share one of my favorite online resources. This project highlights women in the Bible and gives wonderful resources on how to respond to the ways the Bible is often used to uphold patriarchy.

​-Why Do The Wicked Prosper? I wrote this article back in January. Seems relevant today given the state of the world. In it, I invite us to ponder the passages of scripture that ask God why the wicked prosper.

​-The Damage of Hopelessness In this article, I explore the origins of the rapture in the context of American history and how the factors that led to the belief system can help us understand how to respond to it today.

​-There is no “battle of Armageddon” in the book of Revelation. Given the recent public dialogue about the war in Iran and the End Times, I wrote this article and sent it out midweek. I wanted to share it here in case you missed it.

Curiosity Over Coercion

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I have hyperlinked John 4:5-42 here. I encourage you to go read it before moving on as I will be covering a lot of contextual details.

Context

Throughout Israel’s history, wells were where pivotal figures met their future spouse. Abraham’s servant meets Abraham’s future daughter-in-law at a well (Genesis 24:10–61). Moses meets his wife at a well (Exodus 2:15-22). And of course, Jacob, who the well is named after, Abraham’s grandson, meets his wife at noon at a well (Genesis 29:1-20).

In each of these passages, a man is traveling to a foreign land, he meets a woman at a well, and they have a conversation about water. Once water is brought up from the well, the woman leaves and goes back to her community to tell them about the man. The community then welcomes the man and extends hospitality to him. Then the event concludes with a marriage. In the first century, when a story involved a well, the audience would know that a romantic relationship and marriage were most likely where the story was headed.

Given this context, it makes sense why Jesus would talk with the woman about her marital status (4:16-18) and why the disciples were stunned and objected to him speaking to a woman at the well (4:27), even though he had spoken to many women before without them making such a fuss (11:1-44; 20:11-20). So, the early readers would have this background narrative in mind when they heard this story of Jesus and would expect a marriage to come, only to be met with a surprising twist and the absence of a marriage. Jesus is the bridegroom (3:29), but the wedding is not for here and now.

Tragically, the Samaritan woman at the well is often presented as someone who has made poor moral choices, primarily because she is living with a man whom she is not married to. Many have speculated that she is at the well at noon because she has become a social outcast in her community because of her life’s choices, but the story doesn’t support this presentation. At the end of the passage, we see the community respond very positively to her and her encounter with Jesus (4:30), and John even tells us that many Samaritans believed Jesus primarily because of her testimony (4:39). So, to see her as a social outcast seems out of place.

Also, women at that time could not legally divorce their husbands. Even wealthy Roman women, who did have the legal right to initiate divorce, had to get permission from their fathers. This option would not be available to a poor woman from a Samaritan village. This is why Jesus preaches so forcefully on divorce in Matthew 19. Men had the legal right to divorce their wives, often no matter how flippant the reason. In that context, this could disenfranchise women, forcing her to beg, into prostitution, or worse. It was often used as a way for men to satisfy their lust while harming women in the process, which is why Jesus focuses on men when he says, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the beginning. I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery” (Matthew 19:8-9). All this to say, this context makes it much more likely that the Samaritan woman went through five marriages, each one ending in death or her husband divorcing her.

It is also important to note the political and social divide between Samaritans and Jews, which stemmed from centuries of religious, political, and ethnic conflict, peaking with the Samaritan establishment of a rival temple on Mount Gerizim and their, from a Jewish perspective, tainted heritage after the Assyrian conquest. Jews often viewed Samaritans as apostates, heretics, and half-pagans. The Samaritan woman speaks to this very tension as well as the tension between men and women in verse 9 by saying, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” Followed by John telling us emphatically that, “Jews do not associate with Samaritans.”

Jesus is transcending cultural, political, ethnic, patriarchal, and religious boundaries in this one encounter and conversation.

Nicodemus and The Woman At The Well

With Jesus just having a conversation with the Pharisee Nicodemus in the previous chapter, John intentionally puts the two side-by-side for his readers to see the differences and similarities. Nicodemus differs from the Samaritan woman in gender, class, status, ethnicity, and religion. Nicodemus prompts the conversation with Jesus at night (3:2), while Jesus prompts the conversation with the Samaritan woman at noon (4:6). Yet the conversations they have with Jesus are quite similar. Jesus introduces new topics through wordplay, such as“born again” and “living water.” Both Nicodemus and the Samaritan woman are confused by Jesus and ask him to elaborate. Nicodemus stops speaking after his confusion, while the Samaritan woman asks Jesus for the water he is speaking about, even though she interprets what he is saying differently. The purpose of placing these two conversations side-by-side is to show how Jesus will be welcoming, hospitable, and open to discussing deeply important truths with anyone who seeks him.

What does this have to do with today?

I can’t help but think of the political and ethnic tensions that shaped the context of Jesus’ conversation with the unnamed Samaritan woman, and how it feels like we see the same kinds of tensions shaping our context today. We are seeing the extremes of the Abrahamic religions on the world stage, shaping national leadership and policy. We have witnessed Zionism and religious nationalism shape how political leaders in both modern-day Israel and the United States relate to Judaism and Christianity. We have seen Islamic extremism shape the political leaders of Iraq and Iran. The clashes between these extremes are causing so much harm, death, grief, and despair for so many around the world.

Witnessing such extremism, especially by those of us who consider ourselves part of an Abrahamic faith, like Christianity, it can feel as though there is no hope in transcending these differences, even within our own faith group, let alone those from other Abrahamic faith groups.

Yet we find hope in these two side-by-side conversations. We see a Pharisee becoming curious about Jesus’ compassionate way, to the point of risking his status among his peers by going to meet him. We see a Samaritan woman, who worships the same God, but with a different version of the scriptures, and in a different temple become so curious through Jesus' hospitality that these differences don’t seem as insurmountable to her. Jesus met them both in their moments of curiosity with compassion, not coercion.

I think this is such a powerful lesson for us all right now. While extreme versions of Abrahamic religions are literally going to war with one another. While corruption, violence, and injustice continue to shape political and religious leadership in our country and beyond. Many people may be starting to question their preconceived notions about beliefs they never thought they would question. Their trust in leaders and movements they once had may be shaken for the very first time. They may find themselves curious for answers.

The challenging question for us today, especially those of us who follow Jesus, is whether we will be able to meet them there in their curiosity, even among political, status, and religious differences, with compassion, or will we choose coercion because of those differences?

Many are seeing such extreme conflict in our world today as apocalyptic signs. What if, instead, we treated the vast differences among us as a well of water where a new relationship can be forged, bringing about a new world of possibilities?

While this may seem so illusory right now, the truth is that there is always more hope in curiosity than coercion. Seeking out curiosity in ourselves and in others is a practice of keeping that hope alive.

Now I'd like to hear from you! Did you find this helpful? What thoughts came to your mind as you read? Feel free to respond to this email and share your thoughts with me. I look forward to reading them. A Lent Day Devotional: I wrote a daily devotional in hopes to provide a companion for people seeking to follow Jesus through the season of Lent. There is also an audiobook version. You can read more about both below: $20.00 When Love Gets The Last Word: A Lent Devotional Each day of this Lenten devotional will focus on a portion of scripture and invite us to reflect on our lives and our... Read more Get it now! ​ $20.00 Audiobook: When Love Gets The Last Word. Each day of this Lenten devotional will focus on a portion of scripture and invite us to reflect on our lives and our... Read more Get it now! ​ Ways to support: If you'd like to support this project, you can do so through one-time-gift of any amount you feel is right. You can also subscribe through a $5/mo, $15/mo, or $25/mo. Several others have also asked for a recurring gift option that is different from the ones offered here, like this one. If you'd like me to set up a different option for you, please just send me an email with the word "support" in the subject line. As always, I really want to thank all of you for reading and for all the ways you support me and this project every single week. I'm thankful for the ways we are building this together and hope it creates a lasting, positive change in our world along the way! I sincerely appreciate you all, Ben Remember, you can now view this and all previous newsletters as well as invite friends to join through this link: https://benjamin-cremer.ck.page/profile.

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