Reading for July 11: John 4:16-20

16 Jesus said to her, "Go, call your husband, and come here."
17 The woman answered and said, "I have no husband."
Jesus said to her, "You have well said, 'I have no husband,' 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; in that you spoke truly."
19 The woman said to Him, "Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet. 20 Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship."

John 4:16-20 (NKJV)

Comments:

Yesterday, Jesus told the woman what He had to give, living water, but she could not understand what He meant. She could not see past the physical. Today, Jesus takes her to a place where the spiritual is important. He takes her there by confronting her with her sin. When the woman is confronted with her sin she immediately begins to see things through spiritual glasses, seeing Jesus now as more than a usual traveler and she begins to contemplate how she can approach God.

One of the issues of contention between the Jews and the Samaritans was that the Jews restricted worship to Jerusalem but the Samaritans, because they only recognized the Pentateuch, accepted worship at Mt. Gerizim overlooking the place where Abraham built his first alter. The woman, now being convicted of her sin, realizes that she needs to find the right path to God. Jesus is going to tell her in tomorrow's passage.