March 6

Date: March 6, 2026
Read: John 4:4-26

Devotion:

Jesus’s ministry led him to different places and different people. In John 4, Jesus and his disciples are in Samaria and they stop for food. The disciples go to find something to eat while Jesus remains waiting at a well. The time is midday, and a woman comes to the well to draw water. What Jesus, and anyone from the ancient world would have immediately understood, was that women came to the well together in the early mornings to draw water while the water was still cool. If this woman was coming to the well in the hotter part of the day it is because she was not welcomed to be around the other women. Jesus, as a Jewish man, should not be interacting with this woman because she is an outcast from society and she is a Samaritan. The Jews and Samaritans were in conflict with each other as both groups viewed themselves as the true people of God. No other Jewish man would be engaging with a rejected Samaritan woman, but Jesus only sees someone in pain and offers her a way to true life.
Jesus asks the woman to give him a drink from the well, and offers her the way to salvation in exchange. Jesus tells her that he is the true water that can forever quench her thirst because his water will fill the woman’s soul. She will no longer be bound to sin, but she will have eternal salvation with Jesus. Where sin brings hopelessness, meaninglessness, and death, Jesus’s living water provides cleansing, refreshing, and life. This Samaritan woman was given a chance to change her life by accepting Jesus as the source of living water, and she took it. Jesus saw her as more than a woman with a bad reputation, he saw her as one whose soul thirsted for freedom from the bonds of sin. Thanks to her encounter with Jesus, the Samaritan woman was finally able to leave her life of sin and have the water which gives eternal life.

Reflect:

Have you ever been so thirsty that you felt like no matter how much water you drank, it was never enough? After my father’s cancer treatments, he experienced extreme dry mouth from his radiation treatments. He constantly needed water with him because the thirst was unbearable. No matter how much water he drank, his mouth was still dry. Luckily for my father, they make products now which counter his dry mouth, but this is how our souls feel without Jesus filling us with his true, living water. There is no truth, religion, or purpose that can quench our soul’s thirst apart from Jesus. Only through following Jesus and putting aside sin can our soul be nourished. When our time on this earth is over, we will get to fully experience the depth of Jesus’s living water as we get to spend eternity worshiping him in heaven.

Pray:

Dear Jesus, thank you so much for giving your life as a sacrifice for our sins so that we can drink of your living water. Thank you for seeing us in our pain and giving us a path to true life. Help us to see those around us who are in also in pain and in need of your life-giving water. Thank you for loving us enough to want to save us from our sin, and to offer us a place with you in eternity. We love you so much Jesus. In your name we pray, Amen.