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Jesus, Our Example
19
Though He was a Jew, Jesus mingled freely with the Samaritans,
deliberately disregarding the Pharisaic customs and prejudices of
His nation. He accepted the hospitality of this despised people,
slept under their roofs, ate at their tables—partaking of the food
prepared and served by their hands—taught in their streets, and
treated them with the utmost kindness and courtesy. And while He
drew their hearts to Him by the tie of human sympathy, His divine
grace brought to them the salvation that the Jews rejected.
Personal Ministry
Christ neglected no opportunity to proclaim the gospel of salva-
tion. Listen to His wonderful words to that one woman of Samaria
who came to draw water as He was sitting by Jacob’s well. “‘Give
Me a drink,’” He said, surprising her by asking a favor of her. He
wanted some cool water, but He also wished to open a way by which
He might give her the water of life. “‘How is it,’” the woman asked,
“‘that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?’
For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.”
Jesus answered, “‘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. ... Whoever drinks of this water
will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give
him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become
in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.’”
John
4:7-14
.
How much interest Christ manifested in this one woman! How
earnest and eloquent were His words! When the woman heard them,
she left her water pot and went into the city, saying to her friends,
“‘Come, see a Man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this
be the Christ?’” We read that “many of the Samaritans of that city
believed in Him.”
Verses 29, 39
. And who can estimate the influence
that these words have had on the work of soul winning in the years
that have passed since then?
Wherever hearts are open to receive the truth, Christ is ready to
instruct them. He reveals to them the Father and the service accept-
able to Him who reads the heart. For such, He uses no parables. To