Well inside

Hot sun. Long walk. Sore heart.

"May I have a drink?"

Why in the world is he talking to me. "Oh uh... Just curious, why are you asking me? I mean I'm what some of you refer to as a dog, and even worse, I'm a woman. Your kind doesn't usually like to have anything to do with my kind."

"If you knew God and the person talking to you, you would have asked him to give you a drink. And you would have gotten water like you can't find anywhere else. Living water."

"Um pardon me sir, but you forgot to bring anything to get the water out with. I mean I can understand if you've never been here before, then you wouldn't know that this well is really deep. I still haven't found the bottom of it. And where do you propose to get water better than this? This is Jacob's well. Jacob, the great patriarch, the one who saw angels and spoke to God. I guess maybe that's one reason I still come here. I mean of course I need water. Can't live without it. But I guess, too, I figure if Jacob stood here once up on a time maybe his God stood here too and left some sort of holiness here somehow. Maybe I hope that someday I'll reach the bottom of this well and find Him, at least a lingering fragment...

Have you ever heard about Jacob? Well of course you have. So I guess you don't need me to tell you, if you think your bigger and better then Jacob, there's some people around here who might laugh. Jacob's pretty respected and revered."

"Oh daughter, you don't have to come to Jacob's well to be satisfied. Haven't you found that you keep having to come? It's never enough? You can't live off a Jacob's God. But if you would take and drink of the water I have to offer, it would satisfy truly. It would become your own well inside. A well by which a God who wants to be your God would love to rest and talk with you."

"...I'd like that. Would you give me this water so I don't have to come here anymore?"

"Go and bring your husband."

"Um... I don't have one."

"I know."

Head down in shameful silence.

"This well isn't the only place you've sought fulfillment. All five husbands have left you. Broken and empty still. But even though you know they hold no promise you find yourself stuck in this cycle, with self-worth so low now you let men use you without commitment."

"You know, not even some of the people in town know as much as you just told me. I take back what I said earlier. Maybe you do rank as high as Jacob. And I've been wondering about something for a long time. I mean, I'll confess, even though it's not popular with everyone these days, I am searching for God. And since you seem to know something about Him, could you tell me, my ancestors worshiped there on that mountain. But your people say God is to be found in the temple at Jerusalem. Who's right?"

"Let me let you in on something. Pretty soon you won't find God in this mountain or at the temple in Jerusalem. You all don't even know what you're worshiping. We do. Salvation will come from the Jews. But let me tell you, an event is about to happen that will shatter the way everyone who is really finding God worships. An event that will shift the whole picture of God. An event that will show what He is really like. And what He really thinks of you. God doesn't want people to worship Him as a thing or as a place.  Not as some God who shadowed the life of a man now dead, but as He is in truth...a real present reality. He wants worship from your heart. He wants one on one relationship. Not between Himself and a mass of people. Not as a God who found a select few from the past as worthy of His blessing. But as a God who finds each and every soul a place He longs to linger. Even you, the dog woman. He wants the worship in your heart."

"Hmm... I'm not sure I understand all you just said. But I know one event everyone, and I'll admit even I am looking forward to is the coming of the Promised One, the Messiah. He's supposed to be able to explain everything. I know it's probably too much to hope for, but I hope to meet Him..."

"You have. I am that event. Oh daughter, let me dig in the soil of your soul. A well deep and pure and sweet. A well inside. And let me fill it."

Running. Free.

"You've got to come. He's here. It's got to be Him. He talked to me like He knew me through and through. To me! And now there's a well inside. I can't hold it in."

.... 

Two days later.

....

"Thank you. We believe too. We're now drinking our fill, not out of your well, but from the one He dug. The well inside."