Faithful Exiles: Finding Hope in a Hostile Worldናሙና

When Jesus meets the Samaritan woman, she’s alone at the well in the middle of the day. Why did she show up at the hottest time of day? We can’t be sure, but she was probably avoiding the townsfolk who treated her with disdain. As Jesus gently reveals, she had five previous husbands and was likely viewed as a person of ill repute.

As Jesus moved toward her in mercy, the Samaritan woman received him as the long-awaited Messiah. It’s easy for Christians to become familiar with this movement of grace. In our brokenness, Jesus knows us and seeks us. With the cultural winds blowing fiercely against us, we must not lose this Christian instinct of mercy. Jesus dignified the Samaritan woman in deep conversation, showing her his love.

This encounter with Jesus then leads to her daring apologetic: “Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?” ( John 4:29). Such bold, public proclamation would be unorthodox for a first-century woman, let alone a woman likely maligned by her neighbors. The bold witness of the Samaritan woman teaches us a truth sometimes deemed too simplistic: the key to apologetics isn’t pithy answers or irrefutable arguments but a sense of awe in Jesus that can’t be silenced.

When we speak of what Jesus is doing in us, it opens the door for people to consider Jesus for themselves. This isn’t argumentative apologetics; it’s an apologetic spirituality rooted in encountering Christ. Our witness, our apologetics, will have no pulse and no power apart from a life-giving experience with Christ that shapes us day after day. This is what we learn from the woman who came to the well an exile, encountered Life, and with great joy spoke of being known and loved.