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So he came to a Samaritan town called Sychar, near the land that Jacob had given to his son Joseph.

Jacob’s well was there. Tired from his journey, Jesus sat down by the well; it was about noon.

Now a Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her:

“Give me a drink.”

His disciples had just gone into town to buy some food.

The Samaritan woman said to him:

“How is it that you, a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan and a woman, for a drink?” (For Jews, in fact, have no dealings with Samaritans.)

Jesus replied:

“If you only knew the gift of God! If you knew who it is who is asking you for a drink, you yourself would have asked me, and I would have given you living water.”

The woman answered:

“Sir, you have no bucket, and this well is deep; where do you get that living water?

Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us this well; he drank from it himself along with his sons and his cattle?”

Jesus said to her:

“Those who drink of this water will be thirsty again;

but those who drink of the water that I shall give will never be thirsty, for the water that I shall give will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

The woman said to him:

“Sir, give me this water so that I may not be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”

Jesus said to her:

“Go, call your husband and come back.”

The woman answered him:

“I have no husband.”

Jesus replied:

“You are correct to say, ‘I have no husband’;

for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you said is true.”

The woman then said to him:

“Sir, I see you are a prophet.

Our ancestors came to this mountain to worship God; but you people say that Jerusalem is the place to worship God.”

Jesus said to her:

Believe me, woman, the hour is coming when you shall worship the Father, but that will not happen on this mountain or in Jerusalem.

You people worship what you do not understand; we worship what we understand, because salvation is from the Jews.

But the hour is coming—and is already here—when true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and truth, for that is the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.

God is Spirit, and those who worship him must worship in Spirit and truth.

The woman said to him:

“I know that the Messiah (that is the Christ) is coming. When he comes, he will tell us everything.”

Jesus said to her:

“I am he, the one who is speaking to you.”

Just then, the disciples returned and were surprised that Jesus was speaking with a woman; however, no one asked, “What do you want?” or “Why are you talking to her?”

Then the woman left her water jar and ran to the town. There, she said to the people:

“Come and see a man who told me everything I have done! Could he be the Messiah?”

So they left the town and went to see him.

Meanwhile, the disciples urged him:

“Rabbi, eat.”

But he said to them:

“I have food to eat that you don’t know about.”

The disciples wondered:

“Has anyone brought him food?”

Jesus said to them:

“My food is to do the will of the one who sent me and to finish his work.

You say that in four months there will be the harvest; now, I say to you, look up and see the fields ripe and ready for harvesting.

People who reap the harvest are paid for their work, and the fruit is gathered for eternal life so that sower and reaper may rejoice together.

Indeed, the saying holds true: One sows and another reaps.

I sent you to reap where you didn’t work; others have worked, and you are now sharing in their labors.”

In that town, many Samaritans believed in him when they heard the woman who declared, “He told me everything I did.”

So when they came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there for two days.

After that, many more believed because of his words

and they told the woman:

“We no longer believe because of what you told us; we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is the savior of the world.”