THE CONFERENCE
When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to
her, "Will you give Me a drink?" John 4:7
The meeting and conference here unfolded to us with the
woman of Samaria, is a graphic representation of what has occurred thousand
thousand times since; when the soul is brought into real, though invisible
communion with the Savior. Other moments of our individual histories may be
solemn and momentous, and vast worldly issues dependent upon them; but none
to compare with this. It is death coming in contact with life—the mortal
with the immortal—the finite with the infinite—time with eternity—dust with
Deity—the sinner with the great God. What an impressive, mysterious
contrast, between those two who now met for the first time by the well of
the patriarch! Frowning, lightning-scathed, storm-wreathed Ebal was
confronting close by, the smiling groves and sunshine of Gerizim: but what a
feeble type and image of these living beings standing face to face: impurity
confronting spotless purity: a lost and ruined soul confronting its holy,
yet forgiving Redeemer. It is the gospel in expressive parable.
This prodigal daughter is a striking counterpart of the
prodigal son in our Lord's touching discourse. Like him, she had wandered
from her father's house. In all riotous living she had reveled. She had
probably at that moment around her head and neck and arms, what we have seen
often and again adorning the females at the wells of Palestine, strings of
coins, or, it may be, jewels, (in her case the mementos and rewards of sin.)
But this glittering outer tinsel screened moral beggary and misery within.
She had been feeding on the garbage of the wilderness; and her inarticulate
cry was the echo of his wild plaint, "I perish with hunger!" May we not
imagine her in her hours of deep remorse, (for who, the most degraded and
reprobate, have not these?) brought up as she must have been in the
knowledge of the God of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob—may we not imagine her
saying at times within herself, "I will arise and go to my Father"? We do
not say that any such definite religious longing or aspiration now brought
her to the Well: far from it. As we shall afterwards find, though it may
have been partly dissembled, she affected rather the contrary—lightness of
heart and levity of speech, to the unknown stranger. But that she had
her seasons of deep soul misery and self-reproach cannot be doubted; and
coming as she now did, with a superstitious feeling at least to the fountain
of the patriarch, she would be so far tutored and prepared, by her approach
to that holy ground, for the unexpected converse which awaited her there.
At all events, if this prodigal had at the moment no
thoughts of her Father; her Father—her Savior—her Brother—her Friend,
had gracious thoughts of her. He "saw her afar off and had compassion
upon her." He stripped the meretricious jewels off her head, and put the
ring of His own adopting love on her ringless finger, and the sandals of a
peace she had never known before, on her feet. Yes, and so great was His joy
at finding the long-lost one, that when the disciples came afterwards from
the city to their weary, hunger-stricken Master with the purchased bread,
and with the request, "Master, eat;" we believe, for very joy, He could not
look at the provided earthly refreshment. "I have food to eat," says
He, which the world knows not of"—"This my sister, my prodigal child, was
dead and is alive again; she was lost and is found!"
In adverting, in the present chapter, to some preliminary
features of this conference, we would remark How the Lord Jesus, in His
dealings with His people, adapts Himself to their peculiar character and
circumstances and necessities.
This is specially illustrated in the narrative of the
woman of Samaria, from its juxtaposition in John's Gospel with another
recorded interview of a similar kind—that with Nicodemus. In the one case,
Christ had to bear with a proud Pharisee, a member of the Jewish Sanhedrin,
one at whose door probably could be laid no glaring sin—a man scrupulous in
external decencies, "as touching the righteousness which is of the Law,
blameless." Moreover, in the character of this inquirer there was a
constitutional timidity which is manifest even in the subsequent avowal of
his discipleship. Though he brings costly offerings of his affection and
love for the embalming of his Lord's body, he does not share the bolder
moral courage of his Arimathean brother, in demanding from Pilate the sacred
treasure. Jesus accordingly deals tenderly and sensitively with him, as one
who is the prey of that "fear of man which brings a snare." He meets his
case and its difficulties. He will not wound either his pride or his fears
by challenging him to converse in broad day; but He will open for him His
silent oratory on Olivet. He will permit him and encourage him to steal
there, night by night, to unburden the doubts and misgivings of his anxious,
thoughtful, truth-seeking, candid soul. He who suits the soldier to his
place, and the place to the soldier, who "tempers the wind to the shorn
lamb," will not break this bruised reed nor quench this smoking, flax, until
He bring forth judgment unto victory. "The same came to Jesus by night."
In dealing with the woman of Samaria, again, with her
bold spirit and blunted feelings, there were no such tender scruples to
consult; there was rather a propriety in holding converse with this impure
child of darkness in the blaze of day. She needed the piercing blast
of the north wind, bringing with it sharp convictions of sin; barbed arrow
after arrow was sent through the folds of guilt covering her heart, until
that heart lay broken and bleeding at the feet of her Divine Restorer—while
the other, requiring rather the south wind of tender consolation and
comfort, was led step by step, from the necessity of "the new birth," up to
the sublime unfoldings of the love of God in the free gift of His Son and
the bestowal of everlasting life. The two form a living commentary on the
prophet's description of the Almighty's dealings, "In measure, when it
shoots forth, you will debate with it; He stays His rough wind in the day of
His east wind."
We may gather another affecting and impressive thought
from these two conjoined, yet contrasted cases. They together recall the
truth, already referred to in a preceding chapter, but here brought before
us under a fresh illustration—the unresting love which, while on earth,
Christ had for sinners: that any personal sacrifices He would make, any
personal deprivation He would endure, to save a soul from death, and to hide
a multitude of sins.
In the case of Nicodemus, night by night Jesus willingly
surrendered or cut short His needed rest, that He might calm the
perturbations of one agitated spirit. He would not give sleep to His eyes,
nor slumber to His eyelids, until in that man's heart He found a place for
the Lord, a habitation for the mighty God of Jacob. And in the interview
with the Samaritan woman, as we have seen, the hour of greatest recorded
bodily weariness is with equal willingness alienated from rest, that He may
bring the wanderer to His fold. We have watched the Great Shepherd of the
sheep just terminating a long and fatiguing bodily journey through the hot
valleys of Ephraim. But a soul is to be saved. He suspends needed repose
from toil; and, as it were, with staff in hand, resumes the journey over
rock and hedge and tangled precipice, in order that when His absent
disciples return from their errand to the neighboring, city, He may call
together these His friends and neighbors, saying to them, "Rejoice with me,
for I have found my sheep which was lost." Here is the true covenant Angel
who wrestled with Jacob at the brook Jabbok. "He wrestled," we read, "all
night with him until the breaking of the day." But when day broke, did the
wrestlings of that mysterious visitant terminate with the experience of that
solitary man in the gorges of Jordan? No; daybreak is only a new summons for
fresh efforts and deeds of love. Some new case requires His presence; some
other pilgrim by some other brook, at that early morn, demands His aid and
support. "Let Me go," He says, "for the day breaks." Immediately He takes
His departure. Leaving the patriarch with a new and significant name, the
badge at once of blessing and victory, He speeds His way—on, still
on—saying, to this soul and that in His untiring flight, "O Israel, you have
destroyed yourself, but in Me is your help!"
Another and different thought suggests itself in
connection with the interview at Jacob's well. It is, that this
conference of Christ, the most minutely detailed conference of the Bible,
was with a Woman.
This strikes us comparatively little in our land of
gospel privilege; because, females have been exalted by Christianity, and
Christianity's founder, to the place they were designed by their Creator to
occupy. There is nothing to us strange or unusual in a woman taking part in
a conference about divine things. On the contrary, it is females who now
throng our religious meetings, and are the best and most effective
auxiliaries in every department of practical Christian effort. But it must
be remembered it was far different among the Hebrews. The same social
degradation which characterized the female sex amid pagan nations, and which
is the curse of Orientalism at this moment, was so far at least, and
especially in the age to which we refer, grafted on Judaism. "The Rabbis
forbade her instruction, deemed her incapable of it; first made her
despicable, and then despised her." Even the disciples, those whom we might
have thought had already been taught the creed of a nobler Christian
chivalry, "marveled that He talked with the woman," (ver. 27.)
It was a violation of their conventional ideas talking to her at all; above
all, talking to her about religious themes, the soul, "the gift of God,"
"everlasting life."
But has not Christ, by this very conversation and
interview, inaugurated a new era and warrant for the spiritual activities of
woman: not only conversing with her about her own soul, but sending her
forth a herald of salvation to her fellow-townsmen, and making the Church of
Samaria imperishably identified with her name and labors? To all of us,
therefore, that hour of converse has its sacred—with many, the most sacred
memories of life. Jesus consecrating this female's mission was, in one
sense, consecrating the mission of every mother as she bends over her
infant's cradle, or as she gathers her children around her knee and tells
them of the great salvation.
Yes, if there was one thing more than another that made
Christianity stand out in bold and beautiful contrast with the debasing and
sensual creed of heathenism, it was when the adorable Redeemer removed the
swathing bands and fetters from the body and soul of woman, and sent her
forth from her couch of degradation, earth's ministering angel, "walking and
leaping and praising God." Where would have been the noblest and the best
names in the Church's annals, had female influence, had a mother's tongue,
been gagged, and a mother's prayers been stifled? Where would have been our
Augustines and our Origens, our Zwingles and Luthers, our Watts and Bunyans,
if Christ had not stood by His vacant sepulcher in the morning of His
resurrection, and asking the question before an enslaving world, "Woman, why
are you weeping?" dried her tears, elevated her nature, refined her
sympathies, vindicated her rights, redressed her wrongs, burst her bonds and
set her free!
That hour and that conversation at Sychar were the
first-fruits of a glorious harvest—a prophecy and pledge of unnumbered
blessings, which many a pious son has to thank God for; yes, over which many
a prodigal has to rejoice through the burning tears of a dying but penitent
hour. John Newton, in that dark night at the helm of his vessel, would not
have remembered the hymn which his mother taught him, and which
revolutionized his life, but for the new charter which Christ put into the
hands of the woman of Samaria, and such as she.
And with the same reference, let us read in the touching
story also a prophecy of the future; not as to what Christianity has done
for us and for Christendom, but what the power of Christianity will yet do
for those down-trodden lands where that new and glorious charter was first
written, and where woman is still the soulless drudge, the grinding slave of
unnatural oppression. In no part of Palestine more so than near and around
this very spot where Christ spoke these wondrous words at Jacob's well, is
woman overtasked and degraded—toil her cruel birthright; her dwelling is not
on the sunlit slopes of Gerizim, but amid the frowning curses of Ebal. The
cross has waned and the crescent is triumphant. Since the light of the
Christianity of early apostolic days has there been extinguished—the sacred
name of its Founder become a reproach and a scorn—well may the wailing words
of the noblest in the early band of Jewish females be echoed by her
oppressed successors, "They have taken away my Lord, and I know not where
they have laid Him!" But the day of emancipation is at hand. What
Christianity has done for us, it will yet do for those sitting under the
shadow of death.
It is remarkable that in many of the inspired
prefigurations of Israel's glowing future in the millennial era, the
equality of woman is a specified feature and characteristic, "My sons shall
come from far, my daughters shall be nursed at my side." "Bring my
sons from far, and my daughters from the ends of the earth." Who can
forget that it was a woman, a Jewish woman, who was last at the cross and
first at the grave? Who can forget that it was the women of the early Church
whose devotion and moral heroism evoked Paul's warmest benedictions and
salutations—Phoebe, Priscilla, Junia, Tryphena, Tryphosa, and others in the
honored sisterhood of the faith. So, may we not expect, as one of the bright
features in the ingathering of regenerated Israel that woman, Christianized,
and, by being Christianized, dignified, elevated, and refined, will prove,
like this female of Sychar, a herald of glad tidings—the gentle dove of
peace sent forth with the olive-branch from the true ark of God. In that
lofty Hebrew Alleluia, which is to blend with the Gentile Hosanna in
welcoming in the King of the Jews to His throne on Mount Zion—the metropolis
of a millennial earth—loud amid timbrel and harp will be the voices
of the Miriams and the Deborahs, who, in higher strains than on the Red Sea,
or amid the hills of Kedesh, will "sing the song of Moses, the servant of
God, and the song of the Lamb," and help to carry the glad strain from home
to home, from valley to valley, from city to city, until the whole land will
send up the shout, loud as the sound of many waters, "Blessed is He who
comes in the name of the Lord!" "Rejoice, O daughter of Zion;
behold, your King comes to you!" "Loose yourself from the bands of your
neck, O captive daughter of Zion." You may now be like the bird with broken
wing—a caged captive, unable to sing the Lord's song in a strange land. But
the day is at hand when the Gospel's soaring pinion of life and liberty will
be yours again; when "you shall be as a dove whose wings are covered with
silver, and her feathers with yellow gold."
While we are permitted thus joyfully to remember, that in
Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free,
"male nor female;" the great practical question for
each of us as individuals, is not what the religion of Christ has done for
the world in the past, or may yet do in the world of the future, but what
has that religion done for me? Do we know anything of the
converting and regenerating power which plucked that degraded Samaritan as a
jewel from the crown of the prince of darkness, to irradiate the brow of
Jesus? What grace can do, in changing and transforming the worst and
most hopeless; quickening those who are dead; and animating the groveling
spirit with new motives, new principles, new tastes, new feelings, new
aspirations! That very patriarch at whose well she stood, was himself
once wily, cunning selfish, worldly-minded; his name too truly was Jacob, "supplanter."
But he became a converted man; as much so, and as truly so, as his
degenerate descendant standing at the brink of his fountain. From being the
supplanter, his name was changed into "Israel," "the soldier of God."
And what, in both cases, was the turning point in their
spiritual histories? It was the sight of Christ; the revelation of His
person and character and work. It was on a memorable night, (twenty years
before the wrestling with the Angel at Jabbok,) on the stony pillow of
Bethel, that Jacob received his earliest revelation of redeeming love. The
supplanter dreamed a dream. He saw a ladder planted between himself and
heaven; or, as some think, his dreams took their shape and coloring from the
physical features of his nightly solitude—that these strange, white, grey
stones in the desolate moorland, formed themselves into a colossal
staircase, leading up to heaven; at the base of which the outcast wanderer
slept, angels beckoning him upwards, and the God of Abraham smiling upon him
a welcome. It was a type of Him who was to be revealed as the way to the
Father; "the way and the truth and the life," conducting the most foreign
and outcast into the holiest of all. He rose refreshed and comforted:
"This," He exclaimed, "is the gate of heaven! "And that first and earliest
revelation was completed and confirmed at the memorable night of
soul-struggle, of which we have just spoken, where he wrestled, and
prevailed, and saw the angel Jehovah face to face. What was revealed to him
at first in type, was revealed to the Samaritan woman in visible reality and
by living word. It was the manifestation of Christ in the glory of His
person and fullness of His grace, which demolished in her case, too, the
strongholds of Satan, and redeemed them for the service and glory of her
accepted Savior!
And the same mighty power, the power of the cross, can
vanquish and subdue us—can transform us who were once rebels, traitors,
supplanters, into "soldiers of God." How many, touched by that omnipotent
grace and by the attractions of that cross, are ready to utter the same glad
and grateful testimony—
"See me! see me! once a rebel,
Vanquished at His cross I lie!
Cross—to tame earth's proudest able,
Who was e'er so proud as I?
He convinced me, He subdued me,
He chastised me, He renewed me;
The nails that nailed, the spear that slew Him,
Transfixed my heart and bound it to Him;
See me! see me! once a rebel,
Vanquished at His cross I lie!"