Sychar

Scripture speaks of a city called Sychar. Although it is mentioned only once, the passage is one of the most important for telling us fundamental truth about our Lord, about our way of evangelism, and about our way of worship.

John tells us in chapter 4 of his Gospel that Sychar was not far from a well once dug by Jacob. We have no record in scripture of the digging of the well, but we are told that Jacob met with his brother Esau, after many years of mutual distrust, and then camped near the city of Shechem. Following on from this, he bought from the sons of Hamor, the father of Shechem, a plot of ground where he set up an altar and called it El Elohe Israel, Gen. 33. 18-20. Presumably, he dug a well there and eventually passed the property on to Joseph.

There has been much debate over the centuries as to the whereabouts of this well and the ‘city’, called a town in more recent translations. A Greek Orthodox church has been built in that area, that denomination claiming it to be the area of the well upon which our Lord sat. Today, that well is situated half a mile from the present town of Nablus. It stands on the eastern edge of the valley which forms the pass between Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim. It is said that ‘it is fed by no spring, nor is the water conducted to it along the surface. Its supplies depend entirely upon rainfall and percolation’.¹ Since Shechem is twelve to twenty-five metres above the surrounding valley floor, and the water may not have ever reached to the brim, the woman of Samaria was correct in asserting ‘the well is deep’. Whether this well is the one Jacob dug is still a matter of debate.

Our Lord sat beside the well at Sychar awaiting a Samaritan woman. She, coming alone and at an inconvenient time for many, was startled that this man, who was very evidently a Jew, should speak to her. He asked of her a drink of water. Our Lord engaged her in a conversation about spiritual refreshment, not literal. She did not seem to understand this. In John chapter 4, we see the progress in spiritual understanding of the woman. She met one whom she perceived to be only a man, then recognized Him to be a Jew. It was when Christ revealed that He knew something of her way of life that she was startled, ‘Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet’, v. 19. Then, He revealed to her that He was more than a prophet, and she believed Him to be Christ, the long-awaited Messiah. In returning to the nearby village and testifying of her encounter with the Christ, many came out to meet Him and she became an evangelist and missionary, ‘Come, see a man, which told me all things that ever I did: is not this the Christ?’ v. 29.

This encounter is of fundamental importance to our understanding of our Lord. It is at Sychar that more of His humanity is revealed to us: He was thirsty and, wearied by His journey, sat at the side of the well. Scripture often reveals to us the realities of the human body of our Lord. He slept in a boat, being weary; He was hungry; He was thirsty; He wept; He suffered terrible wounds before and at His crucifixion; He bled; He died. Without these glimpses one could imagine, as did heretics in New Testament times, that He was not a real man but that He only appeared to have a human body. Belief in the deity of our Lord and His humanity is of absolute importance for a believer. The Spirit of God through the Apostle John insists on it. ‘Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: and every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world’, 1 John 4. 2, 3. John bears clear witness to our Lord’s humanity and the reality of His body, ‘That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life’, 1 John 1. 1. And our Lord reminds us of the body that is still His, His glorious body, ‘handle me, and see; for a spirit doth not have flesh and bones, as ye see me have’, Luke 24. 39. The tired body of our Lord, sitting beside a well, is clear indication that He was ‘found in fashion as a man’, Phil. 2. 8.

It is at Sychar that we also see our Lord working in fulfilment of an eternal plan. He deliberately went out of His way to meet this woman. It was part of God’s sovereign plan for her and for Samaria. Our Lord ‘must needs go’ through Samaria on His way to Galilee, v. 3, 4. This was not usual for a Jew. Many Jews avoided Samaria, crossing the river Jordan before its borders, passing it through Perea on its east bank, re-crossing north of Samaria. The Samaritans had a mongrel religion, a mix of the Jewish worship of the one true God and paganism, stemming from the re-settlement of pagans in the area in the time of the exile to Assyria. The woman herself is surprised to speak to one who was very evidently Jewish. Yet God, in His sovereign grace, had dealings with her and our Lord sat on a well awaiting her arrival. The appointment had been made in eternity.

It is at Sychar, too, that we see the importance to our Lord of the individual. He goes specifically to meet one woman. It would be wonderful to see crowds converted to God, but often it is the one who is significant. Through her, many Samaritans believed; Philip was caught up by the Spirit, taken from a scene of great revival to the back of beyond to meet one Ethiopian who would no doubt preach the gospel to his people; Ananias was instructed to go to a street called Straight to meet a man who would be one of the greatest evangelists of his day. Our Lord made one visit to Gadara to exorcise a man who would prove to be an evangelist to his people, Mark 5. At this first visit the people of the area begged Christ to leave. They did not want their pockets emptied with more slaughter of pigs! When our Lord returns, Legion has done his work and Christ is welcomed by them. This time in Decapolis, where Legion lived, they brought someone to Christ for healing. The result was they ‘were beyond measure astonished, saying, He hath done all things well’, Mark 7. 37.

Then again, at Sychar we see the immensity of God’s grace. Even the Lord’s disciples are surprised by Him. Upon their return they ‘marvelled that he talked with the woman’, v. 27. This woman would not have been welcome to the Jews let alone her own society. This is evidenced by the fact that she drew water from the well at a time when other women would not be present - at midday, in the heat of the sun - and that her marital history left a great deal to be desired, by modern standards let alone those of biblical times. A more recent translation renders our Lord’s comment to her as, ‘You don’t have a husband. You have already been married five times, and the man you are now living with isn’t your husband’, CEV. That would have been scandalous in those days. That our Lord was prepared to go out of his way to meet a ‘mere woman’, a Samaritan woman (‘the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans’) and an immoral Samaritan woman at that should speak volumes to us. No-one is beyond God’s grace, whether we approve of their way of life or not.

And finally, and most importantly for us, it is at Sychar that we learn something vital about our way of worship. As non-conformist, Protestant evangelicals, we take from this incident fundamental truth. It is at Sychar that we learn that, ‘God is … Spirit: and they that worship him must worship … in spirit and in truth’, v. 24. The woman of Samaria asked whether worship was place-based - in Samaria or in Jerusalem. Worship in Judaism had been centred around the tabernacle, then the temple, then synagogues, and it was so in Samaria too where the Samaritans had their own temple dedicated to a mongrel form of Judaism. Our Lord replied that one could worship God anywhere. Christendom teaches that churches and cathedrals are the places where worship is to be centred - around an altar in a place sanctified for worship, and conducted by priests who alone have the authority to lead worship and ‘say Mass’. The recovery of biblical truth from scripture translated into the lingua franca of a country - German with Luther, English with Wycliffe and Tyndale - made people realize that worship need not be confined to one religious centre. And so our Gospel Halls, Mission Halls, and meeting places take on a fundamental importance to us. Yet, they are mere buildings, not sanctified or dedicated in any way, not ‘holy places’ or ‘houses of God’ but halls in which the local church can meet to worship in spirit and in truth.

Sychar may have been a small ‘city’ and only mentioned once in scripture, but what truth our Lord revealed when He was there!