John Chapter 4

From The Open Bible Project

4:1 Therefore when the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John

• (1) This balance is to be kept in doing our duty, that neither by fear are we terrified from going forward, and neither by rashness procure or bring dangers upon ourselves.

4:2 (although Jesus himself didn't baptize, but his disciples),

4:3 he left Judea, and departed into Galilee.

4:4 He needed to pass through Samaria.

4:5 So he came to a city of Samaria, called Sychar, near the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son, Joseph.

• (2) Christ, leaving the proud Pharisees, communicates the treasures of everlasting life with a poor sinful woman and stranger, refuting the gross errors of the Samaritans, and defending the true service of God, which was delivered to the Jews, but yet in such a way that he here calls both Samaritans and Jews back to himself, as one whom only all the fathers, and also all the ceremonies of the law, regarded, and had respect for.

4:6 Jacob's well was there. Jesus therefore, being tired from his journey, sat down by the well. It was about [11] the sixth hour [See John Footnotes 11].

• (a) Even as he was weary, or because he was weary.
• (b) It was almost noon.

4:7 A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink."

4:8 For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.

4:9 The Samaritan woman therefore said to him, "How is it that you, being a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?" (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.)

• (c) There is no familiarity nor friendship between the Jews and the Samaritans.

4:10 Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, 'Give me a drink,' you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water."

• (d) By this word "the" we are shown that Christ speaks of some excellent gift, that is to say, even about himself, whom his Father offered to this woman.
• (e) This everlasting water, that is to say, the exceeding love of God, is called "living" or "of life", to make a difference between it and the water that should be drawn out of a well: and these metaphors are frequently used by the Jews.

4:11 The woman said to him, "Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. From where then have you that living water?

4:12 Are you greater than our father, Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank of it himself, as did his children, and his livestock?"

4:13 Jesus answered her, "Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again,

4:14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never thirst again; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life."

4:15 The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water, so that I don't get thirsty, neither come all the way here to draw."

4:16 Jesus said to her, "Go, call your husband, and come here."

4:17 The woman answered, "I have no husband." Jesus said to her, "You said well, 'I have no husband,'

4:18 for you have had five husbands; and he whom you now have is not your husband. This you have said truly."

4:19 The woman said to him, "Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet.

4:20 Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship."

• (3) All the religion of superstitious people stands for the most part upon two pillars, but very weak, that is to say, upon the perverted examples of the fathers, and a foolish opinion of outward things: and to refute such errors we have to turn to the word and nature of God.
• (f) The name of this mountain is Gerizim, upon which Sanabaletta the Cuthite built a temple with the permission of Alexander of Macedonia, after the victory of Issica: and he made high priest there Manasses his son in law; Josephus, book 11.

4:21 Jesus said to her, "Woman, believe me, the hour comes, when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, will you worship the Father.

4:22 You worship that which you don't know. We worship that which we know; for salvation is from the Jews.

4:23 But the hour comes, and now is, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such to be his worshippers.

• (g) This word "spirit" is to be taken here as it is set against that commandment which is called carnal in (Hebrews 7:16), as the commandment is considered in itself: and so he speaks of "truth" not as we set it against a lie, but as we take it in respect of the outward ceremonies of the law, which only shadowed that which Christ indeed performed.

4:24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth."

• (h) By the word "spirit" he means the nature of the Godhead, and not the third person in the Trinity.

4:25 The woman said to him, "I know that Messiah comes," (he who is called Christ). "When he has come, he will declare to us all things."

4:26 Jesus said to her, "I am he, the one who speaks to you."

4:27 At this, his disciples came. They marveled that he was speaking with a woman; yet no one said, "What are you looking for?" or, "Why do you speak with her?"

4:28 So the woman left her water pot, and went away into the city, and said to the people,

4:29 "Come, see a man who told me everything that I did. Can this be the Christ?"

4:30 They went out of the city, and were coming to him.

4:31 In the meanwhile, the disciples urged him, saying, "Rabbi, eat."

4:32 But he said to them, "I have food to eat that you don't know about."

• (4) We may have care of our bodies, but in such a way that we prefer willingly and freely the occasion which is offered us to enlarge the kingdom of God before all necessities of this life, whatever else they may be.

4:33 The disciples therefore said one to another, "Has anyone brought him something to eat?"

4:34 Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of him who sent me, and to accomplish his work.

4:35 Don't you say, 'There are yet four months until the harvest?' Behold, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and look at the fields, that they are white for harvest already.

• (5) When the spiritual corn is ripe, we must not linger, for so the children of this world would condemn us.

4:36 He who reaps receives wages, and gathers fruit to eternal life; that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together.

• (6) The doctrine of the prophets was as it were a sowing time, and the doctrine of the gospel, as the harvest: and there is an excellent agreement between them both, and the ministers of them both.

4:37 For in this the saying is true, 'One sows, and another reaps.'

• (i) That proverb.

4:38 I sent you to reap that for which you haven't labored. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor."

4:39 From that city many of the Samaritans believed in him because of the word of the woman, who testified, "He told me everything that I did."

• (7) The Samaritans most joyfully embrace that which the Jews most stubbornly rejected.

4:40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they begged him to stay with them. He stayed there two days.

4:41 Many more believed because of his word.

4:42 They said to the woman, "Now we believe, not because of your speaking; for we have heard for ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world."

4:43 After the two days he went out from there and went into Galilee.

• (8) The despisers of Christ deprive themselves of his benefit: yet Christ prepares a place for himself.
• (k) Into the towns and villages of Galilee, for he would not live in his country of Nazareth, because they despised him, and where (as the other evangelists write) the efficacy of his benefits was hindered because of their being incredibly stiffnecked.

4:44 For Jesus himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own country.

4:45 So when he came into Galilee, the Galileans received him, having seen all the things that he did in Jerusalem at the feast, for they also went to the feast.

4:46 Jesus came therefore again to Cana of Galilee, where he made the water into wine. There was a certain nobleman whose son was sick at Capernaum.

• (9) Although Christ is absent in body, yet he works mightily in the believers by his word.

(l) Some of Herod’s royal attendants, for though Herod was not a king, but a Tetrarch, yet he was a king in all respects (or at least the people called him a king) except that he lacked the title of king.

4:47 When he heard that Jesus had come out of Judea into Galilee, he went to him, and begged him that he would come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death.

4:48 Jesus therefore said to him, "Unless you see signs and wonders, you will in no way believe."

4:49 The nobleman said to him, "Sir, come down before my child dies."

4:50 Jesus said to him, "Go your way. Your son lives." The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him, and he went his way.

4:51 As he was now going down, his servants met him and reported, saying "Your child lives!"

4:52 So he inquired of them the hour when he began to get better. They said therefore to him, "Yesterday at the [12] seventh hour, [See John Footnotes 12] the fever left him."

4:53 So the father knew that it was at that hour in which Jesus said to him, "Your son lives." He believed, as did his whole house.

4:54 This is again the second sign that Jesus did, having come out of Judea into Galilee.