Refreshed for Living

¹ Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was making more disciples and baptizing more than John ( ² although Jesus’ disciples were baptizing, not Jesus himself). ³ Therefore, he left Judea and went back to Galilee. ⁴ Jesus had to go through Samaria. ⁵ He came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, which was near the land Jacob had given to his son Joseph. ⁶ Jacob’s well was there. Jesus was tired from his journey, so he sat down at the well. It was about noon. ⁷ A Samaritan woman came to the well to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me some water to drink.” ⁸ His disciples had gone into the city to buy him some food. ⁹ The Samaritan woman asked, “Why do you, a Jewish man, ask for something to drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” (Jews and Samaritans didn’t associate with each other.) ¹⁰ Jesus responded, “If you recognized God’s gift and who is saying to you, ‘Give me some water to drink,’ you would be asking him and he would give you living water.” ¹¹ The woman said to him, “Sir, you don’t have a bucket and the well is deep. Where would you get this living water? ¹² You aren’t greater than our father Jacob, are you? He gave this well to us, and he drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.” ¹³ Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, ¹⁴ but whoever drinks from the water that I will give will never be thirsty again. The water that I give will become in those who drink it a spring of water that bubbles up into eternal life.”