Water at the Well
I’m told Sychar is on a hill. Jacob’s well was a short distance from the village. The woman at the well was from Sychar. Yes, the woman looking for water. And then Jesus unexpectedly tells her about living water. Immediately, she leaves and goes back up the hill to tell the town about her discovery. She tells everyone about the one who she thinks could be the Christ. Then John 4 states “They came out of the town and made their way toward him” (v.30).
I like to envision this scene as a huge number of people running down the hill toward the man who dispenses living water. I can imagine the bodies in the distance descending down the hill and Jesus looking up to see them coming for water… or living water…or to see the Messiah.
It took us nine hours to drive to Marti in the Samburu region of Kenya. It hadn’t rained in years in Marti. We were drilling a well. It was a short distance and downhill from the village. We were also planting a church. We found a church building that was about half built before it was abandoned. It seemed like the perfect place to have our church gathering. It was only a few hundred feet from where we were drilling. We had a good crowd—even the chief showed up. I preached on Lamentations. It seemed appropriate because they had shed a lot of tears in this area because of a lack of water and the resulting famine. But I couldn’t wait to get to that little statement by Jeremiah when he says, “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases.”
Ultimately, I told them about the hope they have in Christ. Many started believing in Christ. Some wanted to follow Him. Others wanted to be baptized. I told them that they could when we got some water. My projection was that we would hit water in about a week. You can imagine the excitement.
They lined those cans up to form a queue in order to get water. It looked like there were hundreds of those containers lined up. I knew better than ever why CRF drills water wells. Water is life. On this very day, water and living water had come to Marti.
But water didn’t come in a week. It came that afternoon. The word spread up the hill. Yes, there was water, but there was also living water at the bottom of the hill. As I looked up the hill, I could see all kinds of people running down the slope coming from Marti. It looked like little yellow dots because they were all carrying a yellow water can.
