Bible Study: November 4, 2026

Prayer

As always, we'll begin with a prayer. Is there any great thing from the past week you'd like to mention for us to praise/pray about? Perhaps a prayer was answered since our last meeting, or maybe something wonderful happened that you want to praise God for by sharing with us? Afterwards, we can also discuss prayer requests for any challenges and for the people we know who are close to our hearts.

Praise

"Come, Ye Sinners, Poor and Needy"

by Joseph Hart

I will arise and go to Jesus,

He will embrace me in His arms;

In the arms of my dear Saviour,

O there are ten thousand charms.

Come, ye sinners, poor and needy,

Weak and wounded, sick and sore;

Jesus ready stands to save you,

Full of pity, love and power.

Come, ye thirsty, come, and welcome,

God's free bounty glorify;

True belief and true repentance,

Every grace that brings you nigh.

Come, ye weary, heavy laden,

Lost and ruined by the fall;

If you tarry till you're better,

You will never come at all.

Let not conscience make you linger,

Nor of fitness fondly dream;

All the fitness He requireth

Is to feel your need of Him.

Passage: John 4:1–42

¹ Now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard, ‘Jesus is making and baptizing more disciples than John’— ² although it was not Jesus himself but his disciples who baptized— ³ he left Judea and started back to Galilee. ⁴ But he had to go through Samaria. ⁵ So he came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. ⁶ Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon.

⁷ A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, ‘Give me a drink’. ⁸ (His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) ⁹ The Samaritan woman said to him, ‘How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?’ (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.) ¹⁰ Jesus answered her, ‘If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, “Give me a drink”, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.’ ¹¹ The woman said to him, ‘Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? ¹² Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?’ ¹³ Jesus said to her, ‘Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, ¹⁴ but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.’ ¹⁵ The woman said to him, ‘Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.’

¹⁶ Jesus said to her, ‘Go, call your husband, and come back.’ ¹⁷ The woman answered him, ‘I have no husband.’ Jesus said to her, ‘You are right in saying, “I have no husband”; ¹⁸ for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!’ ¹⁹ The woman said to him, ‘Sir, I see that you are a prophet. ²⁰ Our ancestors worshipped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.’ ²¹ Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. ²² You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. ²³ But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him. 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’ (who is called Christ). ‘When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.’ ²⁶ Jesus said to her, ‘I am he, the one who is speaking to you.’

²⁷ Just then his disciples came. They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman, but no one said, ‘What do you want?’ or, ‘Why are you speaking with her?’ ²⁸ Then the woman left her water-jar and went back to the city. She said to the people, ²⁹ ‘Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?’ ³⁰ They left the city and were on their way to him.

³¹ Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, ‘Rabbi, eat something.’ ³² But he said to them, ‘I have food to eat that you do not know about.’ ³³ So the disciples said to one another, ‘Surely no one has brought him something to eat?’ ³⁴ Jesus said to them, ‘My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work. ³⁵ Do you not say, “Four months more, then comes the harvest”? But I tell you, look around you, and see how the fields are ripe for harvesting. ³⁶ The reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. ³⁷ For here the saying holds true, “One sows and another reaps.” ³⁸ I sent you to reap that for which you did not labour. Others have laboured, and you have entered into their labour.’

³⁹ Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, ‘He told me everything I have ever done.’ ⁴⁰ So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them; and he stayed there for two days. ⁴¹ And many more believed because of his word. ⁴² They said to the woman, ‘It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the Saviour of the world.’

 Poem

Fill My Cup, Lord

For things that could not satisfy.

And then I heard my Savior speaking—

“Draw from My well that never shall run dry.”

Fill my cup, Lord; I lift it up Lord;

Come and quench this thirsting of my soul.

Bread of Heaven, feed me till I want no more.

Fill my cup, fill it up and make me whole.

-Richard Blanchard.

Ponder

1. Once again, let's open the scene with our senses. What details in John 4 help you feel the heat, the awkwardness, or the surprise of this conversation around the well? What do you notice that you (or someone else) may have skipped over before? You don't need answers, just observations.

2. The scene takes place at Jacob’s well, a place that in Genesis that depicts engagement, marriage, and new beginnings (think Genesis 24:10–21). But this time in John 4, it seems like...more. This is a 'greater covenantal' language. In what ways does Jesus fulfill or subvert those well-scene expectations here in this passage? Who (or dare we say 'What') is getting 'married' here?

3. Things then get deeper still as the story goes on. She wants to stop journeying for unfulfilling water that's always dry. [This may not be what we think...or what we've been taught]. Jesus promises a fulfilling “living water” that never ends. The Samaratian is looking to stop being unfulfilled while the other offers unlimited fulfillment. But wait--didn't we just hear this story...in John 3? What are the things that are similar here between Jesus and Nicodemus and Jesus and the Samaritian?

4. When is a cigar more than just a cigar? The woman 'leaves her jar at the well'...like it's no longer needed. Huh. What's The Gospel of John up to here by adding that part of the narrative? What has she realised that she's lacking and now understands?

5. Next in this story, a group of people that the followers of Jesus never expected come out to see this One, and Jesus calls this 'harvest time.' But what might this story suggest about our congregation’s life together as well in the Western Church....and City Centre Church.... when it comes to our welcome, our conversations across differences, and our worship practices?

6. Where do you think people personally feel most thirsty right now in Surrey and the Lower Mainland? What “wells” do we keep returning to that don’t satisfy, and what can the church do about it?

Purposeful Prayer

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