Lift up your eyes and look on the fields, that they are white for harvest.

John 4:4-42 (NASB) from the daily reading in the One Year Bible (link on links page) 

⁴ And He had to pass through Samaria. ⁵ So He *came to a city of Samaria called Sychar, near the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph; ⁶ and Jacob’s well was there. So Jesus, being wearied from His journey, was sitting thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour.

The Woman of Samaria

⁷ There *came a woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus *said to her, “Give Me a drink.” ⁸ For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. ⁹ Therefore the Samaritan woman *said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask me for a drink since I am a Samaritan woman?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) ¹⁰ Jesus answered and said to her, “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.” ¹¹ She *said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with and the well is deep; where then do You get that living water? ¹² You are not greater than our father Jacob, are You, who gave us the well, and drank of it himself and his sons and his cattle?” ¹³ Jesus answered and said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again; ¹⁴ but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.”

¹⁵ The woman *said to Him, “Sir, give me this water, so I will not be thirsty nor come all the way here to draw.” ¹⁶ He *said to her, “Go, call your husband and come here.” ¹⁷ The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.” Jesus *said to her, “You have correctly said, ‘I have no husband’; ¹⁸ for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; this you have said truly.” ¹⁹ The woman *said to Him, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet. ²⁰ Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and you people say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship.” ²¹ Jesus *said to her, “Woman, believe Me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. ²² You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. ²³ But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. ²⁴ God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” ²⁵ The woman *said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming (He who is called Christ); when that One comes, He will declare all things to us.” ²⁶ Jesus *said to her, “I who speak to you am He.”

²⁷ At this point His disciples came, and they were amazed that He had been speaking with a woman, yet no one said, “What do You seek?” or, “Why do You speak with her?” ²⁸ So the woman left her waterpot, and went into the city and *said to the men, ²⁹ “Come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done; this is not the Christ, is it?” ³⁰ They went out of the city, and were coming to Him.

³¹ Meanwhile the disciples were urging Him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.” ³² But He said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” ³³ So the disciples were saying to one another, “No one brought Him anything to eat, did he?” ³⁴ Jesus *said to them, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to accomplish His work. ³⁵ Do you not say, ‘There are yet four months, and then comes the harvest’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, that they are white for harvest. ³⁶ Already he who reaps is receiving wages and is gathering fruit for life eternal; so that he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. ³⁷ For in this case the saying is true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’ ³⁸ I sent you to reap that for which you have not labored; others have labored and you have entered into their labor.”

There are many valuable nuggets we can find in this brief account of Jesus and the Samaritan woman. First we see how God sets up devine appointments. Encounters with Christ are not random occurrences that involve luck and being in the right place at the right time. Encounters with Christ are divinely orchestrated. God is the one who seeks us. He is always looking, like the shepherd for his lost sheep. The circumstances of Jesus encounter with this woman were intentional. It says that it was about the sixth hour. Most of the women would have come to the well early in the day. This woman though was an outcast, she wasn't well received by the other women, yet it was this sinful woman that Jesus was destined to meet at such a time as this.  

In verse 9 we see another example of how Jesus reaches out past the barriers that divide people. The woman's response when Jesus asks her for a drink shows her acknowledgment that this is an unusual encounter.    the Samaritan woman *said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask me for a drink since I am a Samaritan woman?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.)     Jesus starts to speak to her of spiritual things, referring to Himself as living water.   The woman has not yet received a revelation of Christ and so she tries to understand this spiritual truth Jesus is speaking of in finite natural terms. She says:  “Sir, You have nothing to draw with and the well is deep; where then do You get that living water?  You are not greater than our father Jacob, are You, who gave us the well, and drank of it himself and his sons and his cattle?”

We then see Jesus begin to reveal Himself to her. He speaks with spiritual knowledge of the realities of the woman's life.   He *said to her, “Go, call your husband and come here.” ¹⁷ The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.” Jesus *said to her, “You have correctly said, ‘I have no husband’; ¹⁸ for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; this you have said truly.”     The woman recognizes that this knowledge comes from God.  She says: “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet."

Jesus then shares a spiritual truth with her. He says:  an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. ²⁴ God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”    The woman's mind is now opened up to spiritual things. She acknowledges that their is a Messiah, who will come as Christ and declare all things. Jesus then gives this sinful woman the full revelation of who He is. He reveals Himself as Christ, the Messiah, the Savior, her savior.  

The disciples return and the woman leaves to share her testimony with the people of the town. There is within Jesus interchange with the disciples a vital truth for all of us as we serve and minister for the Lord.

 the disciples were urging Him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.”  But He said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.”  So the disciples were saying to one another, “No one brought Him anything to eat, did he?”  Jesus *said to them, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to accomplish His work.

Today's text began by saying: Jesus, being wearied from His journey, was sitting thus by the well. The journey was wearisome, but doing the work of the Father was life giving. It was like food to sustain Him. There are times as we serve and minister for God that we too may become weary. Particularly if we put  our programs  and our plans ahead of our passion. We can become so bogged down with the work of the church that we don't have the time or energy to do the work of the Father. Doing the will of the Father should and will be life giving, it is meat to sustain us. If we are weary and burned out perhaps we have spent too much time and energy on the journey and not followed the passion and privilege God has given us to work with Him.

Jesus says to each of us today, just as He said to the disciples:     Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, that they are white for harvest.  Whether we are called to sow or reap, God has orchestrated and ordained divine appointments for each one of us every day. The woman at the bus stop as you wait with your children may be like the Samaritan woman. It could be an encounter at work or in the grocery store. Perhaps as you visit a sick fiend in the hospital the divine appointment set for you today could be a doctor, a nurse or a housekeeping staff member. It could be another patient or another visitor. God places these divine appointments along our way each and every day. Doing His will and His work is never wearisome, it is life giving meat for our souls.

Jesus says:      Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.(Matthew 11:29)    Working and walking in the will of God, with Jesus is both life giving and restful.

I didn't include the last part of today's text in the original reading. I think it's important for us now.    From that city many of the Samaritans believed in Him because of the word of the woman who testified, “He told me all the things that I have done.” ⁴⁰ So when the Samaritans came to Jesus, they were asking Him to stay with them; and He stayed there two days. ⁴¹ Many more believed because of His word; ⁴² and they were saying to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves and know that this One is indeed the Savior of the world.”

Through the testimony of the one woman, the one with whom Jesus had a devine appointment, many of the people of the town also received a revelation of Christ, the Savior of the world, their Savior. We may never kmow the full outcome of the divine appointments we have with people. But, as they see Christ revealed in and through us, He will be faithful to complete the work of the harvest, sending others to reap where we have sown. 

Today Jesus says:   Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, that they are white for harvest.

May He find us faithful.