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  "Will you give me a drink?" He asked the woman. Neither she answered, "Yes I will," nor she said, "Sorry, I'm busy now," but what the asked woman replied was something like, "Are you talking to me?" or even, "How you dare to talk to me?"

The set up could have not been worse; he was a Jewish man, while she was a Samaritan woman. They met in a landmark: a well that Jacob had given his son Joseph. By that time, Jewish and Samaritans had a religious and historical conflict that prevent them to relate each other in peaceful terms. However, the outcome of that harsh started talk was the best.

Jesus was on a journey from Judea to Galilee. Since they had to go through Samaria, they came to the town named Sichar. According to John, the Samaritan woman replied Christ with a question, "How can you ask me for a drink?" Who in the world told that guy it was a good idea to ask her anything? He was thirsty, yes, but he could have waited for his friends to come back with the food they went to get. Nevertheless, Jesus was also concerned about the woman's thirst.

Because, he was engaged in his missionary labor, he told her, "If you knew the gift of God and who is it that ask you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water."

Encrypted in that saying, Christ revealed her who he was: the Messiah. The woman intuited something, so asked "Are you greater than our father Jacob?" Jesus advanced another hint, "Whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life."

She focused on the water; she wanted to have some of that 'living water.' Although she realized her own thirst, she was thinking it was a physical substance. "Sir, give me this water," she replied, "So I won't get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water."

Since she was not able to realize who he was, Jesus changed the strategy. He asked her about her private life and to her answer he completed with the right information that nobody could have given to him. In this way he let her know that he had full knowledge about her. That was something proper of not a common person. So, she said, "Sir, I can see that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place we must worship is in Jerusalem."

The answer of Jesus was fully prophetic and true, "Believe me, woman," Christ told her, "A time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the father in spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth."

To this, since somehow she was aware of the prophesies pointing out to those times, she responded, "I know that the Messiah, the Christ, is coming." Even, she was expecting for his coming as she added, "When he comes he will explain everything to us." Precisely, she got the point. So, Jesus openly affirmed, "I who speak to you am he."

Here there was an interval when the disciples came back from the city and she went to bring the news to her people about the coming of the Messiah.

"Many of the Samaritans believed in Him because of the woman's testimony." However, since they asked Jesus to stay with them for two days, they were able by themselves to listen to Christ and being taught by the Teacher. Afterwards, they said to the woman, "We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world."

That was the excellent outcome of this special encounter.  

Los Altos, California: 2004.