This
summer we are looking at the places where Jesus walked and learning from these
locations what it means for us to follow in his footsteps. Today, for us to really understand the way of
Jesus we need to understand a little history, so let’s go back 800 years before
Jesus. The nation of Israel was
conquered by the Assyrian Empire to the north and the King of Assyria, King
Shalmaneser, relocated most of the people of Israel into his home country, but
some of God’s people remained in the land of Samaria. Not wanting the region to become a desolate wilderness
overrun by wild animals, Shalmaneser brought in people from many different
tribes and nations to help populate the area and continue to work the land and
these people began to intermarry with the Israelites who stayed and their
children became known as Samaritans.
So
the Samaritans were half Jewish and many of them carried on the religious beliefs
and practices of the Jewish people but when the people of Israel who were led
away into captivity finally returned – they looked down on the Samaritans. They considered the Samaritans half-breeds
and treated them as social and religious outcasts. The people of Israel would not allow the
Samaritans to worship in the Temple in Jerusalem because they were considered
impure and unclean. In time the
Samaritans built their own temple on Mt. Gerizim in Samaria so they could
worship God themselves and over the years, a longstanding feud formed. Each group saw themselves as being the true people
of God and the others side as being the heretics and so there developed deep
resentment and even hatred between these two groups of people.
In
Jesus day, the division between the Israelites and the Samaritans was so strong
that many good Jewish people refused to even travel through the region of
Samaria. If a Jew was travelling from
Galilee in the north to Jerusalem in the south, they would think nothing of
adding a few days on to their journey in order to travel completely around this
area, but not Jesus. In John 4 it says
that Jesus was making his way from Judea (in the south) to Galilee and in John 4:4 it says He had
to go through Samaria. (emphasis mine)
Now
the truth is Jesus didn’t have to travel through Samaria – no one was forcing
him to take this road and in fact many other people would have traveled a
different road, so Jesus chose to go through Samaria. Jesus made a choice to travel through a
region that was home to people that others saw as social and religious outcasts
and this choice begins to tell us something about the way of Jesus.
So
let’s look at John 4:5-7. Now let’s stop here because there is a lot here
about the way of Jesus we need to understand if we want to follow in his
footsteps. That Jesus chose to travel
through Samaria tells us that he was not afraid to associate with people others
might see and consider outcasts, but it goes deeper than that. Most Jews would not have started up a
conversation with a Samaritan, but Jesus did.
A Jewish man would never have spoken to a Samaritan woman but Jesus did
and no good Jew would take a drink from a cup that a Samaritan woman touched
because both she and the cup would have been considered unclean, which would
make them unclean. That Jesus does all
of this, that he speaks to this woman and asks her for a drink and takes the
drink from her says a lot about how Jesus saw people. Jesus chose to reach out to those who were
considered outcasts because he didn’t see them that way. He saw the outcasts as valuable children of
God.
Now
let’s look at verse 6 because we find out here that this woman is not an
ordinary Samaritan woman. It was the
custom for women to travel to the well together early in the morning before it
got hot, so that this woman is here alone at noon tells us something about her. It tells us is that she was an outcast among
her own people and as we read on in John 4 we find that this is the case. After asking this woman for a drink, Jesus
conversation with her continues, look at John
4:16-18.
So
the woman has had 5 husbands and is currently living with a man who is not her
husband which begins to suggest why she was not welcome to join the other women
at the well. They looked down on her
because of her choices and reputation.
They saw her as a sinner. So not
only was she an outcast, she was a sinner and Jesus knew this, but none of it
kept him away. In this one encounter
with a sinful Samaritan women we see Jesus intentionally reach out to build a
relationship with a woman who is not only a social and religious outcast but a
sinner among her own people.
It’s
important to see that Jesus doesn’t condemn this woman. He doesn’t judge her. Jesus doesn’t put her down or force her to
repent or even tell her to change or ways.
What he does, frankly, is amazing.
Look at John 4:19-26. The first thing Jesus does is take the time
to teach her and then he tells her that he is the Messiah. Jesus wasn’t this clear with his own
disciples! Jesus wasn’t this clear with
the religious leaders or political leaders of his day. It is to an outcast, sinful woman that Jesus
most clearly identifies himself as the Messiah.
I have to be honest and say that I had never noticed that before but
since we talked last week about Jesus revealing himself to the disciples on the
water, it got me thinking about Jesus revealing himself as the Messiah to
different people, and the truth is that it is here that Jesus is the most
clear. To an outcast, sinful Samaritan
woman Jesus is the most clear and again that tells us something about how Jesus
saw people.
So
Jesus doesn’t just choose to travel through Samaria, he chooses to reach out to
those that other people wanted to overlook and ignore. The ministry of Jesus is filled with stories
of him offering hope, help, healing and the fullness of life to outcast and sinners
and the poor. Jesus called a tax
collector named Matthew to be a disciple at a time when tax collectors were
considered to be some of the most notorious and hated sinners in the community because
they were Jewish people who had sided with the Romans. In fact, did you ever stop to think that one
of the gospels, the gospel of Matthew, was written by a man who all the good
religious people would have seen as a sinner?
And
then Jesus went to Matthew’s house for dinner where he ate and drank with all
of Matthew’s friends who were other people the community would have seen as
unfit and inappropriate. And Jesus lifted
up the poor as being righteous and blessed at a time when poverty was a seen as
a sign of God’s curse. Again and again
Jesus made his way among those society deemed unfit and unclean and unworthy
and the truth is that if we want to follow in the way of Jesus we need to make
this our way as well.
To
walk in the footsteps of Jesus means that we need to make choices to
intentionally reach out to those that others might consider social and
religious outcast – the unclean of our society.
To walk in the footsteps of Jesus means that we need to reach out to
those who our world might see as notorious sinners and people who are unworthy
of our time and attention. Now too often
when begin to understand this way of Jesus and want to follow in it, we start by
trying to identify who these people are.
We ask ourselves who the Samaritans and tax collectors, prostitutes and
lepers are today, but I think that’s the wrong way to do it. As soon as we start trying to define who the
outcast and sinners are we starting to pass judgment. We are decided which sin is really bad and
which one isn’t so bad and which behaviors we will tolerate and which ones we
won’t. I don’t think this is the way of
Jesus at all, so let me suggest a fundamentally different way to follow Jesus
in Samaria.
Let’s
look at another encounter Jesus had with a woman the world saw as a
sinner. Luke 7:36-40 and then Jesus said to Simon, 7:44a. Do you
see this woman? To which I am sure
Simon said to himself, of course I see
her. We all see her Jesus and her
reputation goes before her, she is a sinner. In fact, that is what Simon had said to his
friends earlier. What Simon saw was a
sinner, but who Jesus saw was a child of God.
What Simon saw was a woman filled with faults and failures, but what Jesus
saw was the potential and value that God had placed in her. What Jesus saw was a woman who wanted more in
life than what she was experiencing. What
Jesus saw was a woman of dignity and sacred worth who longed for God’s grace
and love. At the end of the story Jesus
says to this woman, Your faith has saved
you; go in peace, which tells us that what Jesus saw was a woman of
faith.
The
reason Jesus reached out to sinners and the outcast and the poor was because he
didn’t primarily see them as sinners, outcast and the poor, he saw them as children
of God. If we are going to follow in the
way of Jesus then we need to start seeing people the way Jesus did. So instead of trying to define who the outcast
sinners are – we need to train ourselves to look at everyone as children of God
who have deep value and worth.
I
want to close with a personal story of how it feels when people see you as an
outcast or a child of God. When I was
the pastor in Altoona, we took our youth group to Impact at Greene Hills and on
the second day of the event a girl in our group came up to one of our leaders
and said that her head really itched and when the leader checked, sure enough –
she had head lice.
We
immediately did everything we needed to do to take care of the problem but as
we were washing everyone’s hair a girl from another group came through our
site, found out what was going on and literally went running from our camping
area screaming “They have lice!!!!” From
that moment on, our group was treated like outcasts. The director of the camp wanted to quarantine
us. They wouldn’t let us eat in the
dining room but instead drove all our meals to us in the campground where I
honestly expected to see them get of their trucks in hazmat suits. And then for the evening session they wanted
us to sit far off on the hill by ourselves.
Needless
to say, I was outraged. I honestly felt
like we were lepers being cast out of society and when I looked at our youth I
began to see in them and feel myself the hurt and pain of being an outcast. I was ready to pack our bags and head home
when finally the nurse on duty for the camp arrived. She had been gone all day and when she got
there she looked at all the camp leaders and said, what are you doing? These
students are fine.
That
nurse was Jesus for me that day because she didn’t see us outcasts that needed
to be cleaned but as children of God who at that moment needed to simply be accepted
and encouraged. It’s too easy to look at
people and see the sin and the problems, but that’s not the way of Jesus, Jesus
looks at people and sees potential.
Jesus looks at people and sees brothers and sisters. Jesus looks at people and sees value and
worth and dignity and that is the way of Jesus.
And that needs to be our way as well.
Next Steps
The Way ~ Samaria
Jesus
travelling through Samaria shows us the
way of Jesus includes reaching out to sinners,
outcast and the poor.
For Study and Reflection:
Sinners
Reflect
on Jesus calling Matthew (the tax collector) to be a disciple (Matthew 9:9-13). What are the implications of Jesus eating at
Matthew’s home and with his friends?
Outcast
Reflect
on Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4:3-42). What
relationship building principles are seen here?
Poor
Why do
you think God chose to enter this world in poverty and intentionally reached
out to those who were poor?
For Action:
1. Ask
God for the ability to see all people the way Jesus did, not as sinners
and outcasts, but as children of God with dignity, value and potential.
2. Are
there people in your life the world might define as sinners and outcasts that
God is calling you to love? What step
can you take to initiate a deeper relationship with them?
3. What
place and or people do you avoid and why?
What would it look like for you to travel in these areas this week?
