Woman at the Well Transcripts
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Transcript, Woman at the Well
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Married five times and still in search of peace, comfort, and security. Then she met a man who said he would be her peace. He would be her comforter and he would be her provider. This man was Jesus. And the woman was a Samaritan whom we know as the woman at the well today, we will expound on the truth and destroy another myth about a so-called bad girl of the Bible. My name is Stephanie Wright. Thank you for joining us today. Let's get started.
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So, today we're continuing with Wives in the Word, Bad Girls Gone Good. But, before we start the presentation today, we're going to do a very short review of last week's bad girl. So, last week we said Mary Magdalene, she was called a prostitute in history, over the pulpit. We've heard it and we've seen it in art and everything, but we pointed out that scripture really does not support that she was a prostitute. Instead, we believe that she and other women had another affliction. They say they believe it was mental illness that was cast out of them. But whether we accept that or not, there's still nothing to support that Mary Mag, I'm going to call her Mary Mag, my sister, was a prostitute. What I did not cover last week was that the reason people tend to associate Mary Mag with being a prostitute is because we are confused about our Marys in the Bible.
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And you could really have a whole study just on the Marys. And they also want to link her with the woman who washed the feet of Jesus, who was a prostitute. And they also want to somehow associate Mary Magdalene with the woman caught in adultery, which I think is a stretch to call someone a prostitute because they are an adulterer. But nevertheless, we decided Mary Magdalene was in fact, the most faithful follower of Jesus. She supported his ministry, not only with her dedicated service but also it is believed she supported Jesus's ministry with her financial resources as did other women from whom Jesus had cast out devils. And, these women traveled with Jesus. So, today we are going to look at another so-called bad girl who was really not a bad girl. We're going to be destroying some myths here, but she got a bad rap, just like Mary Magdalene, that bad girl gone good is the Woman at the Well. Who was this woman?
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Why have people said in books and from the pulpit that she was a bad girl, she has been portrayed as a bad girl because she was married five times and as Jesus said to her, and I'm paraphrasing here, the man you are with now is not your husband. So once again, I have to confess that I too thought she was a bad girl for being married so many times, but this study of wives and women in the Bible has shed new light on things for me. So think about it. Just because a person is married multiple times does not make them a bad person. Does it really now?So how do we make that leap in our reasoning? Really? First of all, God never had any problem with calling folks out. In other words, if they were bad, he said so outright. So let's look at some of these examples of what Jesus did and God did.
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For example, the scribes and Pharisees were likened to whited sepulcres full of dead men's bones. That's what Jesus said about them. God had no problem calling bad women, bad women. Last week, we touched on one of the bad women, Jezebel, who truly was, and she got thrown out of a window and the dogs ate her. And that's in Second Kings, chapter nine. There were plenty of other examples in the Bible of folks, men and women, that God clearly let us know they were evil, but that's not the case with the woman at the well. God points out that she is someone in search of a solution that would be lasting, not having to continuously search, endlessly search for true peace, comfort support. And most of all security. She was constantly looking for that true security in her life and in her spirit.
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So let's go back and look at the history of the Jewish women of that time. And maybe we can get a better understanding as to why this woman may have been married so many times. Jewish women in that time period, more than 2000 years ago and even beyond that, they were treated just slightly above Gentiles, who we know if you were not Jewish, you were look down on, women of that era were just slightly above Gentiles and slightly above slaves. They were married off by their fathers, according to my research, as early as 14 years old. And I didn't know this, but I read that they could even be sold into slavery. Women who were married could be divorced by their husbands. They could own property, but the circumstances surrounding that happening were very unlikely. So let's think back on our study of Naomi and Ruth and how Ruth had to marry Boaz, even though they loved each other, but nevertheless, she had to marry Boaz or she,and Naomi were going to end up out on the street. And think about Jesus
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and what he told John as Jesus was dying on the cross. He looked at John and he told John, "Behold, your mother," and he told his mother, Mary, "Behold, your son." And that's in John, chapter 19. And also think about what Jesus told the Jewish leaders in Matthew, chapter 19, about allowing them to divorce their wives or put away their wives because of the hardness of their hearts. But, Jesus said, that is not the way that it really was intended. So Jesus knew the position that the women were in, in that day. Nothing had changed from the time of Ruth and Naomi, until the time he met the woman at the well. And even up until the time he died on the cross, he knew that women's positions were very insecure and uncertain. The scripture does not say under what circumstances this woman at the well came to have all these marriages. Did her husbands die?
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Did they put her away through divorce? As we previously talked about, the scriptures do not say. Again, as I pointed out last week, I think that this is God's wisdom not to put in there, why she had so many husbands. Because somebody will take and latch onto that and try to use it as a reason to get married or not be married or whatever. God does not always specify why certain things are done the way they are done. And I think that is in his wisdom that he does that. But as previously stated, this woman at the well was most likely married at a young age and they were not necessarily married or promised by their fathers to young men. They could have been married to older men. So she was not necessarily married to a young man. When she was first married, she could have been married to an older man who then died.
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Then she remarried again because remember your position as a woman, you almost always had to have a husband or a man. Did each husband die? Did her husband's divorce her because of adultery? Let's answer that question. Highly unlikely because she would not have had a dowery. She would not have had any money to bring with her into another marriage if her husband had divorced her for adultery because he got to keep any money that the father would have given him if she had been caught in adultery. So it's unlikely that adultery was the reason that this woman had to get remarried again. Being barren also was not the primary reason for divorce. So think about Elizabeth and Zachariah because Elizabeth was barren. We simply do not know. We just do not know. She was a woman in search of an answer to her situation, but we're not just going to gloss over the fact that she was living with a man who was not her husband.
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That's what Jesus said. The man you're with now is not your husband. That does not necessarily mean then, at that time, what it would mean today. Today, we say you're shacking up with someone, but this is how it was explained in another study that I did as far as the Jewish community goes at that time. This is what this author said. As for her current situation, that is her being, living with this man, maybe she had no dowery. Maybe she had no more money. And thus, she couldn't have a formal marriage because that's how they married then. They married through dowery, which means that they got money. Okay? Meaning her status was similar to a concubine. She had no money. She was like a concubine. It's possible that she currently was with an old man who needed care, but his children didn't want to share their inheritance with her.
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So the man she was with, didn't give her a dowery document. That was their marriage document. Perhaps he was already married making her his second wife. So while the ancient Jewish culture allowed it, such an arrangement was against Jesus's definition of marriage as a union between one man and one woman. Okay. That's again, read Matthew, chapter 19. It makes sense then that Jesus would say she wasn't married. Scripture doesn't tell us why she had five husbands. This is what this author says also. And he said, but exploring first century realities helps us imagine how her life might have unfolded. Actually, it is a woman author who brought that forth. Let me ask you this question. How many of us know someone who has been married a number of times? I am sure a lot of us who are listening and watching now know other women who have had multiple marriages, but they're not bad women.
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Second Timothy, chapter two, verse 15, tells us to study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. So we have to be so careful that just because we hear what's coming across the pulpit or what we hear on TV, we need to be sure that we study the word of God. Again, I say, as I heard once, Jesus was the first woman's liberator. We're going to talk about Jesus now in connection with what he did concerning this woman at the well and others, he set all men free, but it was a special freedom he gave to women. And that is the freedom he spoke to the woman at the well, he said, I have come to set you free from whatever situation it was that caused you to be married five times.
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You do not have to keep remarrying to find true peace, comfort, and security. I am your peace, your comfort, your provider. So come drink of this water, not the water from this Samaritan well, but the water from the well of life that I have. Because if you drink of this water that I give you, you shall never thirst. It shall be a well of water springing up into everlasting life. This woman at the well believed what he said. She believed him so much that she went and told everyone in John, chapter 4, verses 39 to 42. And it says, "and many of the Samaritans of that city believed on him for the saying of that woman, which testified. He told me all that I ever did. So when the Samaritans were come unto him, they besought him that he would tarry with them.
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And he abode there too two days. And many more believed because of his own word and said unto the woman. Now we believe." Read John, chapter 4, 39 through 42. This woman went and she proclaimed the word that Jesus gave her. She became a witness. Here, we have another powerful woman, just like Mary Magdalene was, powerful woman. And she went and proclaimed that gospel. So, there's yet another reason to believe she was not a prostitute. Would the people of some Samaria have listened to a prostitute preaching? Probably not. So, this is what I believe is true about this woman at the well, that we have been really misled or not really gotten a good understanding. Let's me not say misled because sometimes - that's why the word of God tells us to study. Jesus was radical when it came to women. He was a radical. He liberated women in his day. The four gospels, Acts, and the writings of Paul not only bear witness of Jesus's divine mission, but also document Jesus's desire to raise the status of women even if it meant challenging the current social practices of the day. This is from an article called, "Sorting Out the Seven Marys." And this article points out some examples of the Savior's breaks with social norms of the day include: 1. conversing with the woman at the well in Samaria (and this is what we talked about today); 2. and bearing witness of his divinity, that's in John, chapter four; 3. invite, this is something else Jesus did, inviting women to travel with him and be his disciples (now that was unheard of back then, that's in Luke 8); 4. publicly expressing compassion to the widow of Nain (both in conversation and in the act of raising her son from the dead, Luke, chapter seven); 5. allowing women who were ritually unclean (you know, you didn't do that back in that day), allowing women were ritually unclean to touch him (that would be the woman with the issue (of blood); 6. and on at least two occasions, allowing women to unveil their heads in public to use their hair, to wash or anoint his feet; 7. Christ also taught with parables whose central figures were women;
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and 8. he allowed a woman to temporarily abandoned certain domestic duties in order to be instructed at his feet. In other words, he got the woman out of the kitchen, praise God, that would be Mary coming and being at his feet and wanting to hear the word while Martha was wrapped up in the kitchen with doing so many things. So we just thank God for Jesus today. Hallelujah. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you Jesus, for setting women free. Thank you Jesus, for setting that woman free, who was at that well and giving her living water. Thank you, God. We thank you right now, Jesus, for all that you have done for women. We thank you God for throwing the covers off of that myth that this woman at the well was a bad woman. She was not a bad woman. We just thank you right now, God, for, for this revelation and for helping us to see the women in the Bible in a different light and in a way that is fulfilling and, and encouraging and inspiring. Hallelujah. Thank you, Jesus. Amen. All right. So that is my message for today, The Woman at the Well." We thank God for his goodness and his mercy. Amen.
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Join us next time as we expound on more truths and destroy myths about another Bible bad girl whose life was transformed by God. This is Stephanie Wright. Thank you for joining us today. Citations: Lynn H. Cohick, “Was the Samaritan Woman Really an Adulteress?” Christianity Today, October 12, 2015; Blair G. Van Dyke and Ray L. Huntington, “Sorting Out the Seven Marys in the New Testament,” Religious Educator 5, no. 2 (2004): 53–84.
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