This morning, I think I’ve reached the end of my little journey through John 4 (although I know it’s a story I’ll return to again and again because it always seems to have something new to teach). It started with sitting at the well. Then came the words, “You have nothing to draw with…”
And now, as our time with the Samaritan woman ends, she’s no longer sitting at the well. She’s running back to town.
And she’s saying something remarkably simple: “Come and see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?” (John 4:29).
“Come and see.” The Samaritan woman isn’t the only one to say those words.
Jesus says them first. In John 1, two of John the Baptist’s disciples begin following Jesus out of curiosity. When they ask Jesus a question, Jesus says, “Come and see.” It’s an invitation.
Then, a little later, Philip finds Nathanael and tells him he’s found the one Moses and the prophets wrote about—the Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth. Nathanael isn’t impressed. “Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?” Philip doesn’t argue or try to prove his case. He simply says: “Come and see.”
Now here’s this Samaritan woman. She’s just had an extraordinary conversation with Jesus. He knows things about her that he shouldn’t know. He’s seen through her defenses, the walls she’s built to protect herself. He’s spoken to the deepest places in her life.
Does she completely understand who he is? Not really. Her words still carry a question mark. “Could this be the Messiah?” She doesn’t have all the answers. She doesn’t have years of Bible study behind her. She doesn’t even have certainty.
What she has is an encounter. A “chance” meeting with Jesus that has touched her soul and changed her life. And that is enough to make her say: Come and see.
I find that encouraging.
Because I can spend a lot of time worrying about whether I know enough. I still have questions. There are aspects of my faith I can’t explain. What if someone asks me something I don’t know? What if I don’t have the “right” words?
But then, as I read these words and ponder them, I realize that Jesus doesn’t ask us to have all the answers. Sometimes all he asks is that we share the truth about what we’ve experienced.
Come and see. Come and see what Jesus has done in my life. Come and see what happens when you sit with him. Come and see what happens when you bring him your emptiness, loneliness, or pain. Come and see what happens when you share your joy. Come and see … and bring your uncertainty and your questions.
It doesn’t take an expert. It doesn’t take certainty. Maybe faith isn’t about having something brilliant to say. Maybe sometimes it’s simply having the courage to say: “I don’t know all the answers. But I’ve met Jesus. Come and see.”
And perhaps that’s the invitation for us today. Not to have all the answers or to win an argument. Not to convince but to invite. And then let Jesus do what only Jesus can do.
Because ultimately, the invitation isn’t: Come and see how much I know. It’s simply: Come and see Jesus.
There’s a little spiritual journey in the past three days: be still enough to encounter Jesus; be open enough to admit our emptiness; and be courageous enough to invite someone else into the encounter. What do you think?
