Frameworks:
John's Gospel, chapter 4
(The
objective of these ‘Frameworks' is to provide an easy-to-read
layout of the text in order then to use these individual verses
for verse-by-verse study or meditation. To focus each
verse we have also added in italic a description of what is happening)
CHAPTER
4
v.1-26
Jesus Talks with a Samaritan Woman
v.27-38
The Disciples rejoin Jesus
v.39-42
Many Samaritans Believe
v.43-54
Jesus Heals an Official's Son
v.1-26
Jesus Talks with a Samaritan Woman
v.1-6
Arrival in Samaria
v.1,2
(Jesus hears of the Pharisees)
Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining
and baptizing more disciples than John— although in fact it was
not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples.
v.
3 (so he leaves Judea and returns to Galilee)
So he left Judea and went back once
more to Galilee.
v.
4 (this required going through Samaria) Now
he had to go through Samaria.
v.
5 (he came near Sychar) So
he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground
Jacob had given to his son Joseph.
v.
6 (he stopped at a well) Jacob's
well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat
down by the well. It was about noon.
v.7-15
Jesus talks to the woman about living water
v.
7 (when a Samaritan women comes he asks for water)
When a Samaritan woman came to draw
water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?”
v.
8 (the disciples had gone to town for food)
(His disciples had gone into the
town to buy food.)
v.
9 (the woman points out he's a Jew) T
he 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.)
v.
10 (he speaks about living water) 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.”
v.
11 (she questions him) “Sir,”
the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is
deep. Where can you get this living water?
v.
12 (she speaks of their ancestry) Are
you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank
from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”
v.
13,14 (Jesus speaks of living water he can provide)
Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks
this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water
I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will
become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
v.
15 (she asks for this water) The
woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won't get
thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”
(Note:
if she is to receive from him she needs to face herself)
v.16-19
Jesus confronts her lifestyle
v.
16 (he speaks about her husband) He
told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”
v.
17 (she confesses she has no husband) “I
have no husband,” she replied. Jesus said to her, “You are right
when you say you have no husband.
v.
18 (Jesus speaks [word of knowledge] about her true
situation) The fact is, you
have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband.
What you have just said is quite true.”
v.
19 (she recognises revelation) “Sir,”
the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet.
v.20-26
They talk about worship & the Messiah
v.
20 (she hedges the argument to worship) Our
ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that
the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”
v.
21 (Jesus speaks about her future openness to God)
“Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe
me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither
on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.
v.
22 (he prods about their history) You
Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do
know, for salvation is from the Jews.
v.
23 (he speaks of the present, a new worship)
Yet a time is coming and has now
come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit
and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.
v.
24 (it's all about spirit) God
is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in
truth.”
v.
25 (she tentatively wonders about the Messiah)
The woman said, “I know that Messiah”
(called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything
to us.”
v.
26 (he acknowledges that is he) Then
Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”
v.27-38
The Disciples rejoin Jesus
v.
27 (the disciples return) Just
then his disciples returned and were surprised to find him talking
with a woman. But no one asked, “What do you want?” or “Why are
you talking with her?”
v.
28,29 (he witnesses back in the town) Then,
leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said
to the people, “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever
did. Could this be the Messiah?”
v.
30 (so townspeople come to see) They
came out of the town and made their way toward him.
v.
31 (the disciples are concerned for him) Meanwhile
his disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat something.”
v.
32 (he says he has food) But
he said to them, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.
v.
33 (they wonder) Then
his disciples said to each other, “Could someone have brought
him food?”
v.
34 (his food is doing his Father's will) “My
food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to
finish his work.
v.
35 (he says harvest time is there) Don't
you have a saying, ‘It's still four months until harvest'? I tell
you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for
harvest.
v.
36 (it's time for it all to come together to bring
salvation) Even now the one
who reaps draws a wage and
harvests a crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper
may be glad together.
v.
37 (usually it takes two roles) Thus
the saying ‘One sows and another reaps' is true.
v.
38 (their role is to be harvesters) I
sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done
the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labour.”
v.39-42
Many Samaritans Believe
v.
39 (many Samaritan believed) Many
of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the
woman's testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.”
v.
40 (he stayed two days there) So
when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them,
and he stayed two days.
v.
41 (many more believed) And
because of his words many more became believers.
v.
42 (hearing for themselves they believed) They
said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what
you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this
man really is the Saviour of the world.”
v.43-54
Jesus Heals an Official's Son
v.
43 (he then left for Galilee ) After
the two days he left for Galilee.
v.
44 (yet implies he is ore believed in an alien culture)
(Now Jesus himself had pointed out
that a prophet has no honour in his own country.)
v.
45 (in Galilee he is welcome because of what he
had done in Jerusalem) When
he arrived in Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him. They had seen
all that he had done in Jerusalem at the Passover Festival, for
they also had been there.
v.
46 (he again visited Cana where there is a need)
Once more he visited Cana in Galilee,
where he had turned the water into wine. And there was a certain
royal official whose son lay sick at Capernaum.
v.
47 (the man begs Jesus for help) When
this man heard that Jesus had arrived in Galilee from Judea, he
went to him and begged him to come and heal his son, who was close
to death.
v.
48 (Jesus implied the man struggled because he had
not been in Jerusalem) “Unless
you people see signs and wonders,” Jesus told him, “you will never
believe.”
v.
49 (the man persists) The
royal official said, “Sir, come down before my child dies.”
v.
50 (Jesus said it was done. The man believed)
“Go,” Jesus replied, “your son will
live.” The man took Jesus at his word and departed.
v.
51 (his servants came and told him his son was healed)
While he was still on the way, his
servants met him with the news that his boy was living.
v.
52 (he enquired when it had happened ) When
he inquired as to the time when his son got better, they said
to him, “Yesterday, at one in the afternoon, the fever left him.”
v.
53 (he realises it was when Jesus declared it)
Then the father realized that this
was the exact time at which Jesus had said to him, “Your son will
live.” So he and his whole household believed.
v.
54 (the second ‘sign') This
was the second sign Jesus performed after coming from Judea to
Galilee.