Have you ever been tired and thirsty? I mean dog tired and bone dry. And I don’t mean just physically thirsty or tired. Have you ever been so inwardly tired and soul thirsty that no matter how much sleep you get or how much you have to drink or eat, nothing seems to refresh us or fill us? That’s what we have in today’s Gospel: Two thirsty people who meet at the well one day. One gets a drink of water and the other gets a drink of life.

One comes up to get a jug of water…but is thirsty inside. The other is tired and thirsty and needs a drink…and is also the well of life.  The woman at the well has water but is thirsty. Jesus who is thirsty, knows the woman’s thirst and quenches it where it really counts…down deep in her spirit.

This is one of those Gospel stories where there’s a whole lot going on.  It’s a lot like the encounter Jesus between Jesus and Nicodemus that we heard last week. In the Gospel of John, we are being taught that to know Jesus is to know God; and to believe in Jesus—to trust him, to understand him, to listen to him—is to be changed from the inside out. So he puts together two stories of two different people to get this across.

The first one, in John chapter 3 is with Nicodemus. The second one is with the woman at the well in Chapter 4.

Here is a piece of (probably useless) trivia for you: There are only three times that Samaritans appear in the Gospels: twice in Luke and once in the Gospel of John.  But those Samaritans, they sure do get around! Whenever you hear about a Samaritan in the Gospels, a little light should go off and say, “Difference Ahead!”

So, last week we heard the famous encounter between Jesus and the Pharisee Nicodemus. He came to Jesus, and he learned that if he was to really understand what God was up to, he would need a new identity, a new way of being, a new way of seeing and knowing both God and the world. This new identity, if he took it on, would feel like being born from above. It would feel like the breath of God.

Today, Jesus encounters a Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well and, once again, we hear the same thing: if she is to really know how to worship God in Spirit and truth, then she will have to put on a new identity…one grounded in God. This would feel like drinking new, fresh, cold water from a well that never ends. It would be refreshing and clean and new… all the time!

In Nicodemus, we saw a man who was a reformer seeking the heart of Judaism, a leader of the Jewish temple council, but who already knew that being Jewish was more than a building. Still, he was looking for more. The woman at the well is a person that Jesus should not even have been talking to.

Nicodemus speaks to Jesus at night. Jesus speaks to the woman at noon.

Nicodemus begins the conversation. Jesus initiates the conversation with the woman at the well.

Nicodemus has deep a theological conversation with Jesus. Okay... they are both rabbis and they are peers. Today, here is Jesus having an intense theological conversation with a woman— and, what’s more, a foreign woman, far from the center of Jewish life and tradition!

We don’t know right away where Nicodemus goes after his talk with Jesus but wherever it is, it is far away—back into the night, I guess-- but the woman goes and brings a whole town to Jesus. She becomes the first, or one of the first evangelists and apostles. She tells what she has seen and heard.

Here's another tidbit for your trivia file. The Gospel doesn't name the woman, but tradition does. In Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic circles, she is known as St. Photini, and because she told Jesus' story to others, she is considered an evangelist and even an apostle. 

In John chapter 3, we hear Jesus talk about the spirit blowing where it will and for the need for people to be born from above.  Today, in John chapter 4, we hear of the spirit welling up inside of us and quenching our deepest spiritual thirst.

Both the woman at the well and Nicodemus understand that Jesus is a prophet. They both understand that he has a special insight and a connection to God.  Nicodemus knew that…he read the papers or heard the stories…he was expecting God to send a Messiah or at least a prophet. But for the woman at the well, this was brand new information. She needed a little help. Let’s see what happens here.

Tired from his journey to Samaria, Jesus sits down at Jacob’s well, but he has no cup or bucket with which to draw water. The disciples have gone off to town to buy some food and has left him alone.

Enter Photini, carrying a bucket—actually both a bucket and a water jar.  She is about to carry between 5 and 10 gallons of water and then carry it back to her village in the middle of the day. That is five pounds per gallon plus the weight of the big clay jar. Without even a mule to share the load. In the first century, as in much of the world today, hauling water is woman’s work. In most of the world today, people—mainly women—have to walk one, two or more miles two or three times a day to get safe, useable water. There is nothing particularly special about Jesus asking her for water. He is a man asking a woman for water. Because getting water is woman’s work.

But she and Jesus get into a discussion as deep that well and as important as his conversation with Nicodemus. They talk about their different backgrounds, their different religious traditions. And while she can give Jesus some water, he is offering to quench a much deeper thirst. He meets her at the point of her greatest need…and he breaks down a few barriers in the process.

Jesus knows her story…he knows her heart…and he is meeting her as an equal!  No matter how matter how complicated her past is….it doesn’t matter. She can drink from living water. No matter what mountain she thinks God is to be worshipped on, she can worship in spirit and truth.

Photini may be the opposite of Nicodemus in every way, but they are alike in only one way that matters: they are both in need of life deep down inside. They both need birth from above and to drink living water.

And as different as these two people are, there is one difference that counts: she not only gets who Jesus is, she is the one who does something about it. She is the one who tells people.

To this day, the Samaritan woman is honored in many cultures. In southern Mexico, La Samaritana is remembered on the fourth Friday in Lent, when water flavored with local fruit and spice and is given to commemorate her gift of water to Jesus. As I said, he Orthodox know her as St. Photini. In Russian orthodoxy, she is Svetlana, which means "equal to the apostles," and she is honored as apostle and martyr on the Feast of the Samaritan Woman.

She is remembered because when she recognizes the Christ her identity changes. She leaves her water jar behind and goes and finds her friends and neighbors.

Jesus breaks down the barriers of gender and nationality and the woman is bold enough to both remind Jesus of what separates them -- he a Jew and she a Samaritan -- and of what connects them -- their ancestor Jacob. She is audacious and spars verbally with Jesus and in the process she experiences him as prophet and, more than that, the Messiah. And she takes that news to her village, her family, her people. Both in the encounter and in the telling, she is changed from the inside out.  Two people at the well meet each other’s thirst.

On another day, also about noon, Jesus will face death and again confess his thirst. On that day, only vinegar will be offered -- in mockery. The gift of his living water will not be apparent to the one holding that sour sponge. But today, when Jesus and the Samaritan woman meet, they conspire to bring life out of death. The water they offer each other, water that quenches the thirst of body and soul, holds the gift of life for all.

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Scripture for the Third Sunday in Lent, Year A, March 8, 2026

Here is the bulletin for St. John's Episcopal Church, Clearwater, Florida for March 8, 2026

Here is the website for St. John's Episcopal Church, Clearwater, Florida 

Here is video of the worship service and the sermon at St. John's, Clearwater, March 8, 2026

Learn more about the Diocese of Southwest Florida here