Dear Friends,

This is the fourth message in a series on Jesus encounter with the woman at the well recorded in John 4.

It is noon, the hottest part of the day. It is the time that early Christians believed carried the particular temptation of acedia, the noonday demon–a physical lassitude, mental boredom and apathy that lulls one into dropping his or her spiritual guard and giving way to the desires of the flesh. Those of us who spend the day peering into monitors and hunched over desks can relate.

I don’t know about you, but it gives me great comfort to know that my Savior knows the exertion, the weariness, the heat and the sweat that marks the human struggle in this world and tempts us to quit or settle for the cheap and the easy. “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb 4:15-16).

The danger of temptation is rarely in the big crisis, in the clear-cut choice between good and evil. Rather, it is in the banal and dreary passages of our existence that flesh finds the need for indulgent action irresistible.

It is hot. Jesus is tired. He sits down on the stone lip of a well dug by his ancestor Jacob for his household and flocks. It is full of cold, sweet water, but Jesus has no vessel and rope with which to reach it. What to do?

This is the Son of God. He is a co-creator with the Father, and One who “sustains all things by his powerful word” (Heb 1:2-3). He created the waters as the elixir of life for his creatures. He set free the springs and the fountains and brings the rains and the snows to the slopes of Mount Hermon, and looses the Jordan in glorious spring flood. He is the rock that gave water to his people in their long desert journey (1 Cor 10:4). “Even the wind and the sea obey him” (Mark 4:41).

One can almost hear the whispered taunts of the tempter–“If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread” (Mt 4:3). “You who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God come down from the cross. . . He saved others; he cannot save himself” (Mt 27:40). “If you can command the rains and the snow, why not bring the water up to you?”

And why not bring the water up with a word of Divine power?  Hadn’t Jesus already proved his faith in forty days in the desert? Hadn’t he resisted Satan’s appeals by obedience to the Word of God (Matt 4:4)? Is it a sin for a thirsty man to have a drink of water?

It depends on how that water is obtained.

Jesus Christ is most often portrayed to us as dynamic, powerful, active and on the move. We are exhorted to keep up with him, but struggle with despair and hopelessness when we find ourselves unable to do so. We find ourselves weary and listless in the heat of the day, bored with our routines, ashamed of our weakness, wondering why we have to “go back to the well” again and again to obtain what we cannot seem to sustain in conformance to his example.

Then we find him here waiting at the well, and we wonder why? What hope is there for our thirsty selves if our Savior must also wait and suffer the limitations of the human condition? 

An unguarded strength can be our greatest weakness. The temptation of Jesus is to exercise his divine power (Matt 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-12). Jesus, in his incarnation as a human, surrendered his divine strength so he could completely identify with us. “He had to become like his brothers and sisters in every respect, so that he might be a faithful and merciful high priest in the service of God, to make a sacrifice of atonement for the sins of the people. Because he himself was tested by what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested” (Heb 2:17-18, Msg). 

Jesus describes the source of his strength: “Very truly, I tell you, the Son can do nothing on his own; but only what he sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise” (John 5:19).

Thirsty and yearning, Jesus yields his strength, sits down by the well and waits upon the will and empowerment of the Father to flow in and through him. That is precisely what it means to “Be still and know that I am God” (Ps 46:10).

In the same way, we must yield our human strength and best intentions to God. As the Apostle Paul famously put it, “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,

When you approach your well in the middle of a long, difficult day, tired, thirsty, hungry and alone, and needing refreshment just to trudge on — take heart! Jesus is already there before you and waiting. His secret is our secret–we share the same Father — “God, for whom and through whom everything was made, chose to bring many children into glory. And it was only right that he should make Jesus, through his suffering, a perfect leader, fit to bring them into their salvation. So now Jesus and the ones he makes holy have the same Father. That is why Jesus is not ashamed to call them his brothers and sisters” (Heb 2:10-11).

Instead of searching desperately for a rope and a bucket and a strategy to get to the water you crave, sit down beside Jesus with a heart turned prayerfully to the Father and wait for the salvation of the Lord. Your need will not be denied, but it may be filled in a most unexpected way.

Are you open to anyone or anything that the Father sends you in answer? That is the question we take up next.

“O taste and see that the Lord is good. Happy are those who take refuge in him (Ps 34:8).

Under the mercy of Christ,

Kent

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Please note that the content and viewpoints of Mr. Hansen are his own and are not necessarily those of the C.S. Lewis Foundation. We have not edited his writing in any substantial way and have permission from him to post his content.

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Kent Hansen is a Christian attorney, author and speaker. He practices corporate law and is the managing attorney of the firm of Clayson, Mann, Yaeger & Hansen in Corona, California. Kent also serves as the general counsel of Loma Linda University and Medical Center in Loma Linda, California.

Finding God’s grace revealed in the ordinary experiences of life, spiritual renewal in Christ and prayer are Kent’s passions. He has written two books, Grace at 30,000 Feet and Other Unexpected Places published by Review & Herald in 2002 and Cleansing Fire, Healing Streams: Experiencing God’s Love Through Prayer, published by Pacific Press in spring 2007. Many of his stories and essays about God’s encompassing love have been published in magazines and journals. Kent is often found on the hiking trails of the southern California mountains, following major league baseball, playing the piano or writing his weekly email devotional, “A Word of Grace for Your Monday” that is read by men and women from Alaska to Zimbabwe.