Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.”

The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.”

Jesus said to her, “You have well said, ‘I have no husband,’ for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; in that you spoke truly.”

The woman said to Him, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship.”

Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

The woman said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When He comes, He will tell us all things.”

Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am He.” (John 4:16-26)

Jesus had a way of disturbing people. He regularly stepped beyond the bounds of social norms. A good Jewish man, married or not, did not commonly spend time alone with an unrelated woman. And the Jewish people were so loathe to be with Samaritans that they would walk extra miles just to avoid them altogether. For him to be alone at a well with a Samaritan woman was positively weird, and she realized that.

Then Jesus invaded her privacy. He commented on details about her life that a stranger, especially a stranger who was Jewish, shouldn’t have even known, let alone brought up. Realizing that he must be some kind of prophet, she asked him a question about one of the many things that divided the Samaritans and the Jewish people: where should they worship?

Jesus’ answer to her question focused on a more important issue: who could worship and what worship was. Despite what she and the Jewish establishment believed about Samaritans being excluded from God, they weren’t. God was accessible to anyone who truly believed.

Her recognition that the Messiah would someday make everything clear prompted Jesus to reveal himself to her. Jesus’ message of the kingdom was for all human beings, everywhere, even those that everyone else thought didn’t matter. Jesus loves the people you hate.

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