Better Know Messiah

Today’s reading is John 4:1-26.

 

Jesus asked a woman for some water at a well. Jesus knew this stranger, a Samaritan, like the back of his hand. He knew that she had been married five times. He knew she was currently living with a man who was not her husband. He also knew that, while she worshipped God, she really did not understand God.

 

In fact, Jesus told her, “You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews.”

 

The woman did not know who Jesus was. As the conversation went on, she caught on that he was special. She even called him a prophet.

 

“I know that Messiah is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us,” she continued. With that statement, Jesus told her that he was the Messiah.

 

She had no idea.

 

Most of the Samaritans worshipped the same God that the Jews did. The Samaritans were a mixture of the Jews who remained from the Assyrian exile and the people that the Assyrians relocated to Israel. They were a mixture of races, and they worshipped both the true Lord and many pagan gods brought from places east.

 

More interesting, the Samaritan Bible consisted of the first five books of the Bible, that is, the Pentateuch. They did not believe the other books in the Old Testament were of any significance. They were deprived of the word of the prophets that told of the coming Messiah.

 

It should be no surprise that while she knew Messiah was coming, she knew next to nothing of the Messiah.

 

Today, we not only have the entire Old Testament at our disposal, we also have the New Testament. We have God’s Word in its entirety.

 

It is important that we know Messiah is coming. It is also important that we know who Messiah is and have a relationship with him.

 

What can you do to better know Messiah?