John 4

Jesus Meets the Samaritan Woman

1 When Jesus realized the Pharisees heard He was making and baptizing more disciples than John

2 even though it was really His disciples doing the baptizing, not Him directly

3 He left Judea and headed back toward Galilee.

4 He had to pass through Samaria.

5 So He came to a Samaritan town called Sychar, near the land Jacob gave to his son Joseph.

6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired from the journey, sat down by the well around midday.

7 A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, “Give Me something to drink.”

8 His disciples had gone into town to buy food.

9 The woman said, “How you, a Jew, asking me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?” because Jews did not deal with Samaritans like that.

10 Jesus answered, “If you knew the gift of God and who is asking you for a drink, you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.”

11 She said, “Sir, You do not even have a bucket, and the well is deep. Where are You getting this living water from,

12 You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us this well and drank from it himself, along with his sons and livestock?”

13 Jesus said, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again,

14 but whoever drinks the water I give will never thirst again. The water I give will become in him a spring of water flowing up to eternal life.”

15 The woman said, “Sir, give me this water so I will not be thirsty or have to keep coming out here to draw water.”

Truth Exposes the Heart

16 Jesus told her, “Go call your husband and come back.”

17 She said, “I do not have a husband.” Jesus said, “You are right, you do not have a husband.

18 You have had five, and the one you with now is not your husband. You told the truth.”

19 The woman said, “Sir, I see You are a prophet.

20 Our people worshiped on this mountain, but you all say Jerusalem is the place to worship.”

21 Jesus said, “Woman, believe Me, a time is coming when you will not worship the Father on this mountain or in Jerusalem.

22 You worship what you do not fully know, we worship what we know, because salvation is from the Jews.

23 But a time is coming, and it is already here, when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. That is the kind of people the Father is looking for.

24 God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

25 The woman said, “I know Messiah is coming, the One called Christ. When He comes, He will explain everything to us.”

26 Jesus said, “I am He, the One speaking to you right now.”

The Disciples Do Not Fully Get It Yet

27 At that moment His disciples came back and were surprised He was talking to a woman, but nobody said, “What do You want?” or “Why are You talking to her?”

28 The woman left her water jar, went back into town, and told people,

29 “Come see a Man who told me everything I have done. This cannot be the Christ, can it?”

30 So they came out of the town and started coming to Him.

31 Meanwhile, the disciples were urging Him, “Rabbi, eat something.”

32 But He said, “I got food to eat that you do not know about.”

33 So the disciples were like, “Did somebody bring Him food?”

34 Jesus said, “My food is to do the will of the One who sent Me and to finish His work.”

The Harvest Is Ready

35 “Do you not all say, ‘Four more months and then the harvest’, Look, I am telling you, open your eyes and see, the fields are ready right now.

36 The one who reaps is already getting paid and gathering fruit for eternal life, so the one who sows and the one who reaps can celebrate together.

37 One plants, another reaps, and that saying is true.

38 I sent you to reap what you did not work for. Others have done the work, and now you stepping into it.”

Many Believe in Samaria

39 Many Samaritans from that town believed in Him because of what the woman said, “He told me everything I have done.”

40 So when they came to Him, they asked Him to stay with them, and He stayed there two days.

41 Many more believed because of His word,

42 and they told the woman, “Now we believe not just because of what you said, but because we heard Him ourselves, and we know this is truly the Savior of the world.”

Jesus Heals the Official’s Son

43 After those two days, He left for Galilee.

44 Jesus Himself said a prophet has no honor in his own hometown.

45 But when He came to Galilee, the people welcomed Him because they had seen everything He did in Jerusalem during the feast.

46 He came again to Cana in Galilee, where He had turned water into wine. There was a royal official whose son was sick in Capernaum.

47 When he heard Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went to Him and begged Him to come down and heal his son, because he was about to die.

48 Jesus said, “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will not believe.”

49 The official said, “Sir, come down before my child dies.”

50 Jesus said, “Go, your son lives.” The man believed the word Jesus spoke and went on his way.

51 While he was going down, his servants met him and said his son was alive.

52 So he asked what time he got better, and they said, “Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him.”

53 The father realized that was the exact time Jesus told him, “Your son lives,” and he believed, along with his whole household.

54 This was the second sign Jesus performed after coming out of Judea into Galilee.