Basic HTML Version
Jesus and the Woman With Five Husbands
109
disciples entreated Him to eat. They saw Him silent, His face beam-
ing with light, and they feared to interrupt, but they thought it their
duty to remind Him of His physical necessities. Jesus recognized
their loving interest and said, “I have meat to eat that ye know not
of.”
The disciples wondered who could have brought Him food. He
explained, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to
accomplish His work.” RSV. To minister to a soul hungering and
thirsting for truth was more comforting and refreshing to Him than
eating or drinking.
Our Redeemer hungers for the sympathy and love of those whom
[121]
He has purchased with His blood. As the mother watches for the
smile of recognition from her little child, which tells of the dawning
of intelligence, so does Christ watch for the expression of grateful
love, which shows that spiritual life is begun in the soul.
The woman had been filled with joy as she listened to Christ’s
words. Leaving her waterpot, she returned to the city to carry the
message to others. She forgot her errand to the well, she forgot
the Saviour’s thirst, which she had purposed to supply. With heart
overflowing with gladness, she hastened to impart to others the light
she had received.
“Come, see a man, which told me all things that ever I did,” she
said to the men of the city. “Is not this the Christ?” There was a new
expression on her face, a change in her whole appearance. “They
went out of the city, and came unto Him.”
As Jesus still sat at the well side, He looked over the fields
of grain spread out before Him, their tender green touched by the
golden sunlight. Pointing His disciples to the scene, He employed
it as a symbol: “Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then
cometh harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look
on the fields; for they are white already to harvest.” As He spoke, He
looked on the groups coming to the well. Here was a harvest ready
for the reaper.
The Cycle of Gospel Harvesting
“He that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life
eternal: that both he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice