Fi Ġwanni 4:21, Ġesù qal lill-mara tas-Samaritan adultera, Int tqima li ma tafx xiex. Dawn il-kliem ta ’Ġesù għadhom applikabbli. Ħafna Kristjani jmorru l-knisja biex iqimu, Filwaqt li ma jafux min verament jaduraw. Taf lil min qima? What did Jesus mean by ‘You worship you know not what,’ what does it mean to worship God according to the Bible, and what is the evidence thereof in your life?
The story of Jesus and the adulterous Samaritan woman at the well
Fi Ġwanni 4 we read the story of Jesus and the adulterous Samaritan woman at the well of Jacob. After Jesus departed from Judaea, because of the Pharisees, and went through Samaria to Galilee, they made a stopover in Sychar (a city in Samaria).
The disciples went to the city to buy meat. U Ġesù, Who was wearied of His journey, sat beside the well of Jacob.
While Jesus sat beside the well of Jacob, a woman of Samaria came to draw water from the well.
Jesus said to the Samaritan woman, Give Me to drink.
But instead of giving Jesus a drink, she asked Him why He, being a Jew, asked drink of her, being a woman of Samaria? Since the Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans.
Jesus answered her, that if she had known the gift of God and Who He was, that asked her to give Him a drink, that she would have asked of Him, and He would have given her living water.
The Samaritan woman didn’t understand the words of Jesus
The Samaritan woman didn’t understand the words of Jesus. She asked Jesus, from where did He get that living water, since He had nothing to draw water with and the well was deep?
She also asked Jesus if he was greater than their father Jacob, who gave them the well and drank from it himself and his sons and livestock.
Whoever drinks of the living water will never be thirsty again
Jesus answered the woman, that everyone who drank of this water would be thirsty again. But whoever would drink of the water that Jesus gave him would never be thirsty again.
The living water that Jesus would give, would become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.
The Samaritan woman desired to drink of this living water of which Jesus spoke.
She asked Jesus to give her this water, so that she would not be thirsty or have to come to Jacob’s well to draw water.
Jesus commanded the Samaritan woman to go and call her husband and come to him again.
Il-mara wieġbet lil Ġesù, that she had no husband.
Ġesù qal lill-mara, that she was right in saying that she had no husband, because she had five husbands. And the one she was having now was not her husband.
Ma tafx, Who you worship
The woman said that she perceived that Jesus was a prophet. She continued and said that their fathers worshiped in this mountain and that the Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship. Jesus replied:
Mara, believe Me, the hour comes, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father. Ye worship ye know not what: we know what we worship: for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, u issa huwa, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeks such to worship Him. Alla huwa Spirtu: u dawk li jqimuh għandhom iqimuh fl-ispirtu u fil-verità
John 4:21-24
The woman answered that she knew that the Messiah, who is called Christ, was coming and when He came He would tell them all things. Qalilha Ġesù, that He was Him, who spoke with her.
The woman believed the words of Jesus and testified of Him
The woman believed the words of Jesus and went to the city to testify of Him. Many Samaritans believed the word of the woman, who testified that Jesus told her everything she had done and wondered if He truly was the Christ. They went out of the city to Jesus.
The Samaritans kept on begging Jesus to abide with them. Jesus gave into their request and remained two days in the city. During those days, many more people believed because of His words.
The Samaritans knew through His words that Jesus was truly the Saviour of the world (John 4).
The words of Jesus and the revelation of the truth brought change in the faith of the Samaritans
The words of Jesus brought a change in the faith of the Samaritans. Jesus was the reflection of God and revealed through His word the Father (l-Alla ta’ Iżrael), il-verità, Jesus being the Messiah, and true worship of God.
The Samaritans thought they feared the Lord God and worshiped Him. Madankollu, Jesus said to the Samaritan woman that she didn’t know Who she worshiped.
What was the evidence that the Samaritan woman didn’t know Who she worshiped? What was the reason why she didn’t know Who she worshiped?
Biex twieġeb din il-mistoqsija, we must look at the people of Samaria and their origin, lives, faith and relationship with the Jews.
What does the Bible say about the relation between the Jews and the Samaritans?
The children of Israel were the twelve tribes of Israel. God delivered them from the power of Pharaoh and led them through the desert to the promised land. All the children of Israel were born under the Law of Moses and lived under the Law and the males were circumcised in the flesh on the eighth day (lill-. Ġenesi 17:9-14; Eżodu 3:8-10; 20; Levitiku 18:2-5; Imħallfin 6:8-10).
The Law of Moses and the prophets made the invisible visible and revealed the God of Israel to the people and made His will and ways known to them.
The Law was a school teacher and kept God’s people safe until the coming of the Messiah (Galatin 3:23-24).
The prevention of defiling the seed of Jacob
One of God’s laws was concerning intermarriage and preventing the holy seed of Jacob from being mixed with the corrupt seed of the Gentiles.
A Jewish man was not allowed to marry a pagan woman and a Jewish woman was not allowed to marry a pagan man. The seed had to stay holy (lill-. Dewteronomju 7:1-4; Esdra 10:3; Neħemija 13:23-30).
Madankollu, during the Assyrian captivity things went wrong.
The seed of the Israelites, who were left behind in the area of Samaria, didn’t stay holy. The Israelites, who stayed behind, didn’t keep the Law of Moses and didn’t stay faithful to the word and commandments of God. Minflok, they were rebellious and sinned against the Lord.
They went their own way and mingled themselves with the pagan colonists in Samaria and intermarried with them. How did the pagan colonists come in Samaria?
The Assyrian conquest of Israel
After the king of Assyria conquered Israel (because they sinned against the Lord their God and did things in secret that opposed God’s will and served idols), Iżrael (the ten tribes of Israel) was deported to other parts of the Assyrian empire and taken into exile. Only a few Israelites (mainly the poor) were left behind.
The king of Assyria filled the land of Samaria with pagans from other conquered countries (Babylon, Cuthah, Ava Hamath, and Sepharvaim) and placed them in the cities of Samaria and dwelled in those cities.
But because they didn’t fear the Lord God of the land and didn’t know the manner (ritwali), the God of the land sent lions among them and slew them.
When they told the king of Assyria this matter, he commanded them to carry one of the priests and let him dwell there and teach the people the manner of the God of the land.
And so a priest from Samaria came and dwelled in Beth-el and taught the people how they should fear the Lord.
Madankollu, every nation still made gods of their own and put them in the houses (shrines) of the high places, which the Samaritans made, every nation in their cities wherein they dwelt.
The people feared the Lord, but served their own gods
They feared the Lord, but also served their own gods after the manner of the nation from among whom they had been carried away. Għalhekk, they did not really fear the Lord, since they didn’t obey the word of the Lord and didn’t keep His commandments, statuti, ordinances and law, which the Lord commanded the children of Jacob, whom He named Israel and made a covenant with.
Although the Lord spoke and warned them, they didn’t listen to the voice of God. They made their own faith which gave them a false security (o.a. 2 Kings 17; 18)
Who were the Samaritans?
The Samaritans were the descendants of the Israelites, who were left behind in Samaria, and the pagan colonists, who lived in the cities of Samaria. Through the mixing of the seed, the Jews considered the Samaritans as unclean.
They had mixed with the Gentiles, and although they feared the Lord God (Jehovah), they served their own gods.
The Samaritans build their own temple on Mount Gerizim
When Nehemiah received the approval of the king of Persia to return to Jerusalem in Judah for the rebuilding of the temple, the Samaritans were not allowed to help. Since their hands were unclean (lill-. Neħemija 2:19-20).
Bħala riżultat, the Samaritans built their own temple on the mountain Gerizim (the mount of the blessing).
The son-in-law of the horonite Sanballat (who was a priest but was removed from the temple (service) f’Ġerusalemm), became the priest of the temple.
The faith and the false doctrine of the Samaritans
Even though the Samaritans had the Pentateuch, their faith and doctrine deviated from the true faith and the original doctrine of the Jews. The reason for this was the influence and blending of the pagan nations and their heathen faith and idolatrous rituals. By changing and adding things, the faith and its doctrine were no longer pure, and the truth was affected by lies.
U għalhekk, through the influence of people and mixing idolatry, God’s pure doctrine became corrupt, which was visible in the unclean and corrupt (midneb) lives of the Samaritans.
Despite the circumcision in the flesh and the sacrifices, the people didn’t do the will of God.
They didn’t obey His word and didn’t walk in His commandments and ways and only kept the religious rituals to please the Lord.
They did their own will and denied God by living after the flesh in the lie, just like this Samaritan woman.
The Samaritan woman had knowledge about God but didn’t do His will
The Samaritan woman had knowledge about the God of Israel and knew by tradition who their father Jakob was. She also knew about the Ġej tal-Messija. But all that head knowledge had no content and meant nothing in her life. She didn’t know anything and walked in darkness.
She thought she believed and knew God and worshiped Him, but her life proved the opposite. Għax, although she confessed the Lord with her mouth and spoke about the fathers of the people of Israel, the woman did things that opposed God’s will (kmandamenti Tiegħu).
The fear of the Lord was not present in the woman’s life, but she did her own will and lived according to the lusts and desires of her flesh.
Ġesù kien jaf dan. Jesus knew through the Spirit that the Samaritan woman had several relationships with men and had been intimate with five men. And even now, the Samaritan woman was not married but lived together with someone who wasn’t her spouse. (Aqra wkoll: X'tgħid il-Bibbja dwar l-għajxien flimkien mhux miżżewweġ?).
The woman had knowledge about the God of the land of Israel and spoke piously to Jesus about their fathers and worship, while in reality she didn’t know Who she worshipped.
Jesus was spiritual and saw the works of the adulterous woman and confronted her with her sinful life. Jesus said to the woman that she didn’t know Who she worshiped.
You worship what you don’t know
Jesus knew that if she (and the Samaritans) truly knew the God of Israel and feared and worshiped Him, she wouldn’t have lived in sin with five men, and she would not still live in sin with a man.
If she knew God and feared Him and worship Him, then she would have made a choice to submit to the God of Israel and do His will by obeying His word and walking in His commandments.
Then the Samaritan woman wouldn’t have lived with six men, but then she would have chosen one man and would have stayed faithful to her spouse and the marriage covenant.
He that walks in his uprightness fears the Lord: but he that is perverse in his ways despises Him
Proverbji 14:2
Feelings are unreliable and a bad advisor
Feelings come and go and are not reliable. You can’t build upon feelings, since they are unreliable. People who make decisions based upon feelings and rely on and build upon feelings, shall be deceived. Because feelings don’t lead to righteousness and heaven, but to sin and hell.
Marriages that are built upon feelings won’t stand. Because there will be a moment that the feelings will change and then what do you do?
Għalhekk, so many marriages end up in a divorce, because people who say they are Christians are carnal and enter a marriage covenant from their flesh instead of the Spirit in obedience to God’s Word according to His will.
When difficulties and problems arise and/or something happens that is not according to the will of the other person or one of them has feelings for another person, then they easily break their marriage covenant and continue their lives and repeat the former thing.
They do this while they confess God and Jesus with their mouth and speak pious words, just like the adulterous Samaritan woman.
If Christians would really know and believe the God they confess, many lives would be different
If they would truly know and believe the God they confess, then they would not have done what they did. Then they would have been obedient to the words and commandments of God (il-kmandamenti ta’ Ġesù; il-kelma ħajja) and live within the framework of the Bible.
Then they would not be prideful and not exalt themselves above God and His Word by doing their own will and living according to their own insight, knowledge and carnal feelings, x-xewqat u x-xewqat.
Wara kollox, għandhom nidem and laid down their own lives in magħmudija tal-ilma and crucified the will of the flesh.
Permezz tal-magħmudija bl-Ispirtu s-Santu, Christ lives in them. Bħala riżultat, they shall live according to His will, as the Bible says.
Madankollu, many Christians are not born again and have not laid down their own life and (ix-xogħlijiet ta) the sinful flesh.
Many Christians don’t have a personal relationship with Jesus. They don’t live after the Spirit in Christ in obedience to the Holy Spirit within the framework of the Bible and don’t take God’s counsel, but live outside of Him.
Nies, who call themselves Christians through tradition
They call themselves Christians through tradition, because they are born and raised in a Christian home and go to church. In church, they sing, itolbu, listen to the sermon, fellowship and when the church service is over they return to their house, where they pick up their own lives. A life that doesn’t differ from the lives of people, who don’t know God and don’t worship Him.
They worship but don’t know Who they truly worship. Because if they knew Who they worshiped their lives would be totally different.
They would have believed in Jesus and His redemptive work and feared the Lord God and yielded to His will. Then they would be filled with the Holy Spirit and walk holy and righteous and be a witness of Jesus Christ and worship God in spirit and in truth.
Many Christians don’t know Who they worship just like the Samaritan woman
Many people call themselves Christians and say they believe in Jesus and confess God with their mouth and speak religious words and cite Bible verses but don’t know Who they truly worship, which they prove through their disobedience to God’s word and sinful life.
Just like the adulterous woman, who adhered a false faith through tradition and as a result lived in sin, which proved that she didn’t know Who she worshipped. Until… she had a personal encounter with the true Jesus Christ, il-Messija, Who revealed the truth to her and spoke words of spirit and life.
‘Kun il-melħ tal-art’
Sors: KJV, Bible Zondervan’s Pictorial Dictionary
