Jean 4:28-30

The woman left her waterpot, and went her way into the city

A woman’s zeal

I. THE ENGROSSING NATURE OF CONVERSION.

1. To meet Christ causes ordinary events to shrink into insignificance. Paul for three days did “neither eat nor drink.” Bunyan “ran about the streets distracted.” Fuller was “so moved that he was unable to pursue his customary avocations.” These were extraordinary cases, but it is impossible to be turned from darkness to light and remain impassive. The adjusting of eternal relationships and attending to immortal interests may well make a man distracted.

2. It were better to renounce all work than to attend to the demands of the soul. To neglect the latter for the former is neither reason nor duty.

3. Religion will afterwards not impede but assist the performance of duty. The woman no doubt regained her waterpot, and cheerfully resumed her domestic toil.

4. All our instruments may become useful illustrations of God’s spiritual work. The waterpot must have been a continual reminder.

II. THE MISSIONARY SPIRIT EVOKED.

1. Religious joy seeks to make others share in it. Every Christian should be a centre of light and usefulness.

2. She wisely acted on the spur of the moment. Had she waited courage might have failed or excuses suggested. Nothing quenches fire like delay.

3. She hasted lest Christ should depart. The waterpot would impede her. Any time would do for water. There are times when Jesus is at the door; if these are neglected He may not return.

III. THE FORCIBLE APPEAL.

1. Attention called to an object of acknowledged importance.

2. An inference suggested from a fact of personal history.

3. An invitation given (Jean 1:46; Jean 1:39).

IV. THE HEARTY RESPONSE. (S. R. Aldridge, LL. B.)

The Woman of Samaria

In the conversion of the woman of Samaria, we have an example of this grace; an example

1. Its freeness: in selecting for its object a profligate creature, not only without her desert, but without her desire.

2. Its sweetness: in having no recourse to violence or terror, but in adopting the most suitable, gentle, and insinuating means to convince and soften her.

3. Its power: in changing her heart and sanctifying her life.

4. Its effects: for here we see grace in its triumph, grace in its glory. No sooner is she enlightened, than she is inflamed; no sooner is she a convert, than she becomes a preacher. However this may be, the character of the persons to whom our Saviour reveals Himself has always scandalized flesh and blood. If the disciples were astonished at our Saviour’s conversation with the woman, their behaviour was dutiful and submissive; they said nothing, but acquiesced in the rectitude of His procedure. And hence I would remark two things. The first regards the advice of Solomon, “If thou hast thought evil, lay thine hand upon thy mouth.” Honour our Lord with our reverence and implicit confidence when we meet with anything in His conduct that seems inexplicable.

Short as the interview was, our Saviour had effectually gained her heart.

1. Perhaps it was from kindness to our Lord and His disciples.

2. Perhaps she left her waterpot from indifference. Wholly occupied now about greater things, she forgot her errand. The feelings of young converts are often very lively.

3. Perhaps, finally, she left it as an impediment to her haste, willing to lose no time in bearing home the welcome intelligence. No sooner is her opportunity of getting good over, than she seizes an opportunity of doing good.

Five things may be remarked.

1. I admire her benevolence.

2. I admire her zeal. See how urgent she is. She even begins with a pressing invitation, “Come.”

3. I admire her wisdom. “Come, see a man who told me all things that I did: is not this the Christ?” “You all acknowledge that Messiah cometh, and that when He is come He will tell us all things.”

4. I admire her honesty. She does not say, He has told me everything pertaining to the worship of God; but “all things that ever I did.” Now, if a person knew your faults, you would wish to have him shunned.

5. I admire her courage. It was no small trial for a plain and wicked woman to go openly and address the inhabitants of the place where she lived, and was perhaps well known, upon a religious subject.

We now conclude, with observing

1. What a real and wonderful change does conversion always accomplish.

2. Divine grace is not an inoperative principle. As the sun no sooner rises than it shines, and as fire is no sooner kindled than it burns, so grace acts as soon as it exists.

3. Behold an apology for what some would deem officiousness. How often do you hear, as soon as any attempt is made to bring people to seriousness,

“Pray do not intermeddle with us. Go to heaven your own way, and leave us to go ours.” Is not charity to the soul, the soul of charity?

4. Be persuaded to resemble this woman. Endeavour to diffuse the savour of the Redeemer’s knowledge, and to bring souls to Christ. It is absurd to complain of a want of opportunities and means. Much is in your power, much more than you are willing to allow. (W. Jay.)

The home missionary

1. The impulse is natural to communicate to others what- ever may have been imparted to ourselves. The successful son sends word quickly home; the soldier of the forlorn hope hastens to communicate intelligence of his safety and success. The shepherd calls his neighbours to rejoice with him, and the father of the prodigal throws open his banqueting halls; Mary Magdalene “departed quickly from the sepulchre” to the disciples to communicate her joy. So with the woman of Samaria.

2. This is ever the result of saving conversion. Christianity must be expansive. The work of the Spirit is a life ever giving.

3. How unlike the selfish, grasping spirit of the world! 4. Christian influence is not confined to the active. The sick Christian may speak with a speechless eloquence. Notice

I. THE WOMAN’S CREDENTIALS.

1. Honesty and outspoken candour. In ordinary circumstances she would have shrunk from such a self-revelation. We should have expected efforts to keep them from Christ lest He should disclose more. But her honest avowal could not but have its weight with her fellow-townsmen.

2. Her earnestness; perhaps at first derided as fanatical, or hypocritical to serve her own ends. But her pleadings are irresistible. Earnestness is the power of the ministry, not charm of intellect or subtlety of reasoning, or sorcery of eloquence, but living words welling up from experience.

3. Her happiness. She had what they all wanted.

II. THE SUBJECT OF HER MESSAGE. She tells what we should have expected her to withhold.

2. She omits what we should have expected her to proclaim--the well, everlasting life.

3. The effective and influential characteristic of the gospel message is not figurative descriptions and metaphysical disputes, but the direct commending of the truth to the conscience, awakening the sense of sin, and thus preparing it for the remedy. In conclusion, notice the power of feeble influences. Never undervalue weak instrumentality. (J. R. Macduff.)

The forgotten waterpot

She came to draw water, and when she had lighted upon the true Well, she after that despised the material one; teaching us even by this trifling instance when we are listening to spiritual matters to overlook the things of this life, and make no account of them. For what the apostles did, that, after her ability, did this woman also. They, when they were called, left their nets: she of her own accord, without the command of any, leaves her waterpot, and winged by joy performs the office of evangelists. And she calls not one or two, as did Andrew and Philip, but having aroused a whole city and so brought them to Him. (Chrysostom.)

With her waterpot on her shoulder she had hitherto been listening to the Lord’s discourse. She was the forerunner of those Bechuan women who would stand for hours together, with their milking-pails in their hands, as if rooted to the ground, whilst Moffat was preaching to them the gospel of the living water. (R. Berser, D. D.)

Sudden conversion

Here was a genuine case. This woman came a prejudiced Samaritan, and left a believing Christian; she came a confirmed sinner, and left a contrite and believing penitent; she came absorbed in the temporalities of life, and left engrossed with eternal solemnities. In the New Testament there are twenty-four cases, including this, of sudden conversion. Let us then never call in question the possibility of a sinner being led to Christ in the course of a few hours. (J. H. Hitchens, D. D.)

The expansive power of Christianity

The work of the Spirit of God in the heart is not a fiction, not a form, but a life. To use the simile of this narrative, it is a fountain not only “springing up” (bubbling up), but overflowing its cistern, and the superfluous supply going forth to gladden other waste places. Not the mass of stagnant water without outlet, but the clear, sparkling lake, discharging its rush of living streams which sing their joyous way along the contiguous valleys, and make their course known by the thread of green beautifying and fertilizing as they flow, Or, if we may employ another figure, let it be the stone thrown into the same still lake. The ripples formed are deepest in the centre. Christianity is deepest in the heart in which its truths have sunk; but its influence expands in everwidening concentric circles, till the wavelets touch the shore. Religion, intensest in a man’s own soul and life, should embrace family, household, kindred, neighbourhood, country, until it knows no circumference but the world! Christianity breaks down all walls of narrow isolation, and proclaims the true brotherhood of the race. Selfishness closes the heart, shuts out from it the rains and dews and summer sunshine; but Christianity, or rather the great Sun of light, shines;--the closed petals gradually unfold in the genial beams: and they keep not their fragrance to themselves, but waft it all around. Every such flower--the smallest that blushes unseen to the world--becomes a little censer swinging its incense-perfume in the silent air, or sending it far and wide by the passing breeze. (J. R.Macduff, D. D.)

God wilt honour zeal

While I was in London there was a man away off in India--a godly father--who had a son in London, and the father obtained a furlough and came right from India to England to see after his boy’s spiritual welfare. Do you think God let that man come thus far without honouring that faith? No. He converted that son. (D. L. Moody.)