The human drama surrounding the Crucifixion and Resurrection
never ceases to amaze me. What has come to be known as the last seven sayings
of Jesus gives us insight into both Christ’s humanity and divinity.
Of these last seven sayings, John’s Gospel records three.
Reading John’s description of the scene at the Cross,
it’s as if he writes in a matter of fact way. Contrast this with the
vivid picture he paints of the emotions of those who are “hell bent”
on getting their way at the time that Jesus is brought to trial. This contrast
is important to note, for the emotion we feel as we read the crucifixion drama
can distract us from the everyday thirst that each of us experience and that
is so poignantly highlighted from the lips of Jesus.
Later, knowing that all was now completed, and so that the Scripture
would be fulfilled, Jesus said, “I am thirsty.” A jar of wine
vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk
of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus’ lips. When he had received
the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his
head and gave up his spirit (John 19:28-30).
There is no doubt that Jesus was physically thirsty. The average
adult loses around two and a half liters of water every day through the normal
processes of breathing, sweating, and waste removal. Losing more than this
tips the balance towards dehydration. Mild dehydration may cause someone to
feel only a little thirsty, parched. Severe dehydration can result in death.1
Knowing everything Jesus had physically experienced up to this point, His
thirst and dehydration were very real. But He was also experiencing spiritual
thirst.
Was this spiritual thirst tied to His cry: “My God, my
God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:33-34)? Being abandoned by
God, Christ was experiencing for the first time what it was like to be without
the refreshing source of living water, which had been His basis of spiritual
hydration throughout His earthly life!
Writing his Gospel account, John was very intentional about
what he included as he told the narrative of the Good News of salvation through
Jesus Christ. He chose to write about just seven signs (miracles). He could
have written about more, but these seven were deliberately chosen so that
the reader and or hearer would believe that Jesus is the Christ, and that
believing, they would have life in His name (John 20:30-31). For the same
reason, John chose to record only seven discourses (speeches) of Jesus. Each
speech had the purpose of bringing the hearer into a living relationship with
Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God.
One of these speeches occurred in the midst of a conversation
Jesus had with a woman who came to draw water for her household from a well
outside of the town of Sychar in the country of Samaria (John chapter 4).
This narrative of John’s has all the drama of stories that deal with
“us and them” kinds of issues. A good, righteous, and strictly
religious adhering Jew never went from Galilee to Jerusalem through the country
of Samaria, even though that route was the quickest. Devout Jews disliked
the Samaritan people so intensely that they avoided their territory as much
as possible.2
John tells us that Jesus “had” to go through Samaria
(John 4:4). That is John speak for saying: “others may want to avoid
Samaritans, but Jesus wants you to know that these people matter to God in
a big way, too!” This particular story was also chosen by John because
it highlighted both the humanity and the divinity of Jesus.
John points out that Jesus is in physical distress: “worn
out by the trip, he sat down at the well” (v. 6, tm).3 He is thirsty:
“A woman, a Samaritan, came to draw water. Jesus said, ‘Would
you give me a drink of water?’ His disciples had gone to the village
to buy food for lunch” (vv. 7-8, tm).
From this very human expression of need, “Would you give
me a drink of water?” comes the most amazing discussion about the properties
of living water.
The woman can only think of what it would be like to have literal
water on tap at all times without the need of daily trips out to the well,
filling her jar and carrying it back for household use. But as the conversation
unfolds, Jesus gently reveals to her the kind of water He is offering that
will meet her thirst for God. Note the parallels between this woman’s
encounter with Jesus and the passion narrative as John tells it:
• Jesus’ physical distress (4:6; 19:1ff)
• Jesus’ thirst (4:7; 19:38)
• A note of time: “the sixth hour” (4:7; 19:14)
• A reference made to the completion of Jesus’ work
(4:34; 19:30)
As the story with the woman at the well concludes, Jesus is
called “the Savior of the World.” John is no doubt very deliberatively
recalling this story in order to point to the purpose of Jesus coming into
the world. The purpose visually seen as the Passion unfolds and bursting forth
on Resurrection Sunday!4
Acknowledging John’s use of double meanings throughout
his Gospel, he no doubt was referring to more than physical thirst when he
remembered Jesus saying from the cross: “I am thirsty.” This concept
of having a thirst for God is a common Scriptural metaphor. The psalmist spoke
of his soul being thirsty for the living God (42:1). Isaiah told everyone
who was thirsty to come to the waters and freely drink (55:1). My favorite
word picture is found in Isaiah 12:3-4: “Joyfully you’ll pull
up buckets of water from the wells of salvation. And as you do it, you’ll
say, ‘Give thanks to God. Call out his name. Ask Him anything! Shout
to the nations, tell them what he’s done, spread the news of his great
reputation!’” (tm). Anyone who had grown up in a Jewish home would
have had lots of religious language alluding to this idea of the thirst of
the soul that could only be quenched with the living water that was the gift
of God.5
When Jesus said, “I am thirsty,” He was not only
dealing with the reality of His physical dehydration, and the suffering it
involved, He was also experiencing what you and I experience when we are not
in relationship with God. This relational dehydration can only be satisfied
with living water. It took the woman at the well awhile before she realized
how spiritually dehydrated she was. From her conversation with Jesus, we can
conclude that she was spiritually dehydrated and had let down her bucket into
all sorts of wells, trying to quench her thirst with whatever she found. Then
came the insight that the Person who was offering her water from the well
of salvation was indeed the Christ, and her life would be changed forever.
(For the full manuscript
of this sermon go to www.preachersmagazine.org and click on “Sermons.”)
These last words of Jesus from the cross are a reminder that
each one of us comes to a point in our life when we say with Jesus: “I
am thirsty.” Like the woman at the well, we are invited to drink the
life-giving water that Jesus spoke of in John 4:13-14: “Everyone who
drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give
him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring
of water welling up to eternal life.” Are you spiritually thirsty? Bring
your bucket to the well of salvation; draw some life giving water and drink.
Spiritual re-hydration is yours for the asking.
1. www.bbc.co.uk/health/conditions/dehydration1.shtml, accessed August 7,
2009.
2. New International Commentary on the New Testament, “The
Gospel According to John” by Leon Morris, p. 255)
3. I can still hear my Greek Professor in college, Dr. Mayfield,
pointing out that the Greek actually indicates ‘he sat thus . . . .’
indicating that the way he sat (slumped?) showed Jesus’ weariness—a
very human trait.
4. New International Commentary on the New Testament, “The
Gospel According to John” by Leon Morris, p. 255, quoting R.H. Lightfoot.
5. The Daily Study Bible Series, “The Gospel of John,”
Volume 1, Revised Edition, William Barclay, p. 154.
