Exodus 17: 1–7 / Psalm 95 / Romans 5: 1–11 / John 4: 5–42
This is the written version of the
homily composed for Flohr’s Evangelical Lutheran Church (ELCA) in
McKnightstown, Pennsylvania for Sunday, March 8, 2026, by Fr. Gene Tucker,
Interim Pastor.
“JESUS: TABOO-BREAKER & BRIDGE-BUILDER”
(Homily
text: John 4: 5-42)
Notable people, down through time, are
often known for some courageous action they took during their lifetimes. One of
the qualities that history regards as being especially noteworthy is the ability
to challenge accepted beliefs, and especially beliefs that had lost their
worthwhile purpose, or were wrong to begin with. Another quality that we regard
highly is the ability to bridge gaps between individuals or between peoples and
nations.
Jesus’ actions during His earthly
ministry fit into both categories, for Jesus was (is) a taboo-breaker. He was (is)
also a bridge-builder.
We have excellent examples of both
qualities in our Gospel text for this morning, which relates Jesus’ interaction
with an un-named woman in the Samaritan city of Sychar.
We might begin with Jesus’
taboo-breaking actions:
Avoiding Samaria and avoiding
Samaritans: This is the first taboo that Jesus
deliberately challenges. Observant Jews, 2,000 years ago, avoided going through
the region of Samaria entirely. If they had to go to Jerusalem for one of the
major festivals from the region of Galilee, which is located in the northern
part of the Holy Land, they would take a long detour around Samaria, going east
and then south down through the Jordan Valley, or else they would go along the
Mediterranean seacoast, and then eastward to the Holy City.
The reason for this avoidance has its
roots some eight hundred years earlier. To understand the commonly-held mindset
during the time of our Lord’s ministry, we need to back up to examine history.
In the year 722 BC, the Assyrian army conquered the region of Samaria (then
known as the Northern Kingdom of Israel). Once the conquest was complete, the
Assyrians deported much of the population, and then they re-populated the area
with people from other places. The result was a people of mixed racial and ethnic
heritage.
That was the basis for the hatred that
Jews – back in that time – bore toward the Samaritans. To observant Jews,
Samaritans were racially impure.
But notice that John tells us that
Jesus deliberately chose to go through Samaria. (John also tells his audience
that Jesus had nothing to do with Samaritans, underscoring the radical nature
of Jesus’ behavior.)
Men and women in the society of that
time: This
aspect of Jesus’ actions might surprise us, but in the society of the time, it
wasn’t customary for a man to address a woman whom he did not know in public.
In the context of accepted social
behavior in that society, the Samaritan woman seems a bit surprised that Jesus,
who was a Jew, is speaking with her.
Another taboo is challenged.
The woman’s history: During the course of the
back-and-forth with the Samaritan woman, the topic of her husband comes up. The
Samaritan woman says, “I have no husband”, to which Jesus replies that she,
indeed, has spoken the truth, for the fact is that she has had five husbands,
and the man with whom she is currently living, isn’t her husband.
(Over the years, there’s been a lot of
speculation about the woman’s place in the community of Sychar…did she come to
draw water from the well at midday because she was somewhat of a pariah? Was
she someone who’s “checkered past” was notorious to the point that people
avoided her? We don’t know the answers to those questions, but it seems
possible that that was the case.)
If, indeed, the woman’s lifestyle and
marital history was an impediment to her acceptability, Jesus shows no
willingness to ignore her. Nor does he castigate her for her past. (Now, at
this point, we need to be careful, I think, for it’s possible that the woman
has had five husbands due to the simple fact that each of her husbands had
died. John doesn’t elaborate on the nature of her history.) The fact of her
marital history aside, it’s also worth noting that Jesus didn’t castigate the
woman for her living arrangements with a man to whom she wasn’t married.
Another taboo is broken.
The place where worship is to take
place: The last off-limits subject that passes
between the Lord and the Samaritan woman is the subject of where proper worship
is to take place.
Jesus’ declaration of the truth of the
woman’s history and her current living arrangements (Jesus’ ability to know
things that only God would know is a common theme in John’s Gospel account)
leads the woman to open the topic of the coming of Messiah.
As part of this part of the
conversation, she asks Jesus to resolve a longstanding dispute between Jews and
Samaritans: That dispute had to do with the proper place for the holy mountain
which was regarded as the dwelling place of God. Was that proper place to be in
Jerusalem, or was it to be on Mt. Gerazim, the holy place for Samaritans?
Jesus affirms the centrality of the
place that Jews would occupy in God’s plan for the salvation of humankind. But
then, he upsets the accepted beliefs of the time, telling the woman that, going
forward, it wouldn’t be on any particular holy mountain where the proper place
for the worship of God would take place. Instead, the worship of God would take
place in the depths of the human heart. No special place would figure into such
worship.
The taboo of place-worship is now
broken.
Tallying up the taboos that Jesus has
shattered, we come to four of them.
Now, let’s turn our attention to the
other aspect of this encounter: Jesus’ ability to build bridges across societal
and other divides.
As Jesus deliberately ignores the
taboos of the age, in the process, Hs is reaching out to someone who would,
otherwise, be unreachable.
As a result, the Samaritan woman’s life
is forever changed. Moreover, she becomes a far more effective evangelist for
the coming kingdom of God than Jesus’ own disciples are in this situation.
If we notice the foundations for the
taboos that existed between the Jews of the time, 2,000 years ago, and the
Samaritans, we find that the basis for the deep hatred of the Samaritans was
based on some secondary aspect of who the Samaritans were. Their racial history
was something that was secondary to their identity as God’s specific creation.
The woman’s identity as a woman was secondary to her identity as a child of
God. Her marital history and her current living arrangements didn’t erase her
value (in God’s sight) as someone God could love. The Samaritans’ regard for
Mt. Gerazim was eclipsed by Jesus’ declaration that holy mountains didn’t
matter anymore…the only altar that God wanted to erect was in the human heart.
We, today, are the Lord’s ambassadors,
God’s evangelists. As we go about sharing the Good News of God in Christ, we
will encounter people in all sorts of conditions and situations. We will need
the Holy Spirit’s influence and guidance to be able to look beyond the
secondary aspect of those we encounter to see their value as God’s creation.
For each person is God’s specific and intentional creation. The Lord seeks to
be in relationship with each one of these. The divine intention is to initiate
a deep, personal and enduring relationship, whereby the Lord takes up residence
in the human heart. And the purpose of this indwelling presence is to change
lives, much as the Samaritan woman’s life was forever changed as she met the
Lord by the well in Sychar.
AMEN.
