It was one of the odder conversations I’ve had. We had just moved to New Zealand and were in a temporary house while the church manse we were to stay at was being finished. Being new, I wanted to get to know our neighbors and seeing the one on our left hand side in his yard, I popped my head over the fence to say hello.
I felt welcomed.
He was very friendly and showed interest in who I was and where I was from. I felt welcomed and as though we could become friends. And then a strange thing happened. “This is such a perfect country” he said. “And it would be completely perfect if it weren’t for all the **** immigrants who are flooding in. They are taking our country over. It’s an absolute disgrace.”
On and on he went about how awful immigrants are... And then he stopped, extended his hand to shake, and said, “Lovely to meet you. I hope you will be very happy. Welcome to New Zealand. I’m so glad you are here.”
I was left feeling, “Well I don’t know what that was about. Should I feel insulted and defensive because I am one of these dreadful immigrants ruining the country, or should I accept his welcome at face value?
Slowly it dawned on me. His welcome of me was as genuine as it was warm. He was glad I was in the country, glad I was his neighbor. Even though I was an immigrant, he didn’t think of me as one. Why? I’m not sure. I had told him very clearly where I was from and he had asked me lots of questions about it.
But in spite of that, he didn’t think of me as an immigrant. Perhaps it was because English is my first language and I speak it pretty well, or perhaps it was my skin color, or perhaps it was because I had started by giving him a few lemons off our tree—I really don’t know, but whatever the reason was, he considered me part of “us” not part of “them”.
It’s lovely to belong—to feel part of something.
It’s lovely to belong—to feel part of something, to feel that you fit in. But so very many don’t.
Think of the astonishing account recorded in John 4, when Jesus had a conversation with a Samaritan woman who was drawing water from a well at midday.
If you are versed in the Jewish culture of Jesus’ time, there are enough clues to alert you that this conversation shouldn’t have been taking place. Put them together:
- Jesus was Jewish but was passing through Samaritan territory. Jews and Samaritans hated each other in the way that only “sort of but not really” relatives could—for indeed, the Samaritans had been part of Israel until the conquest of the Northern Kingdom by the Assyrians in 722BC had seen their land decimated and intermarriage with the victorious Assyrians become common. While Samaritans held on to vestiges of Judaism, they had intermarried, worshiped at a different temple, understood the Torah differently, and were beyond the pale so far as the Jews were concerned. Jews and Samaritans kept their distance from each other.
- Second, Jewish males did not engage in casual conversations with women. That would be seen as deeply inappropriate. Realistically, it would have been strange if Jesus started a conversation with a Samaritan man, but for him to do that with a Samaritan woman—well really, what was he thinking?
- Third, this was midday and the woman was drawing water alone. Big clue there. In a highly sociable society, why would she be drawing water in the heat of the day when it was a start of the day task? You didn’t have to be too smart to pick that she was an outsider. The other women wouldn’t talk to her. She was ostracized—forced to go about her life on her own. And soon the reason for that becomes clear.
- Fourth, it wasn’t just that she was an outsider, she was a most dubious outsider. She had 5 previous marriages—seriously 5!—and what was worse, the man she was now living with was not her husband. By the standards of the day she was clearly bad news, not the sort of woman you would want your husband to chat to.
So why does Jesus stop and chat to her?
It’s a good question. Obviously, he wasn’t interested in appearances, because this wasn’t a “look good” moment. People would question his judgment about this.
So why does Jesus speak to her?
Jesus sees her as a woman made in the image of God.
Because Jesus sees her in a way no one else does. While others wrote her off as a dodgy Samaritan woman with a compromised past and an equally compromised present, Jesus sees her as a woman made in the image of God—a woman who in her own way was searching for God and the presence of God. Strip all the trivial surface details away, and you see not a compromised woman, but a wounded image bearer, longing for home, longing for God, longing to belong.
It is the deep empathy of Jesus that helps him see beyond the surface, that helps him to see the God image in her.
In a world divided by “them and us”, “insiders and outsiders”, a new way of seeing is needed. There is how I see the world, and then there is how Jesus sees the world. If I could more often see the world with the eyes of Jesus, what transforming conversations I would have.
Originally published by on Brian Harris' Blog. Republished with permission.
Dr Brian Harris, is based in Perth Australia. After decades of church pastoring and 17 years leading a theological college, he now directs the Avenir Leadership Institute, a future-focused consultancy which helps to shape the kinds of leaders the world needs. Brian is the author of seven books, the latest of which are: Why Christianity is Probably True (Paternoster, 2020) and Stirrers and Saints: Forming Spiritual Leaders of Skill, Depth and Character (Paternoster, 2024).
