Jesus and the Woman of Samaria (3): George Hutcheson

John 4:10. Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give Me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of Him, and He would have given thee living water.

Note: These are the “Doctrines”, or lessons, as edited, that Hutcheson (1626-74) draws from this verse, in his Exposition of the Gospel of John.

1. In His meekness Christ’s passes over much perverseness which He finds in His own people at the time of their conversion, and by His goodness He overcomes their sin. This reply to the woman teaches as much.

2. Ignorance of Christ, and what He has given and is ready to give, is a great ground of sinners’ wrong behaviour towards Him; for Christ finds this lack here: “If thou knewest . . .”.

3. Christ is then known rightly and savingly when He and all that He has are looked on as freely gifted to the world by the Father (as well as by Himself) and made theirs by offer, to be embraced in the due order. Therefore He is named “the gift of God”, as is expounded in the following words.

4. Christ being rightly known, it will add to His commendation in an awakened heart that He is at the pains to come unto them, and to go before them with offers of Himself, and especially that He stooped so low as to take on their infirmities. Therefore it is added, as an entrancing consideration: “If thou knewest . . . who it is that saith to thee, Give Me to drink” – that the Messiah, compassed with infirmities, should be at her hand.

5. When Christ is rightly known, as offered to the world for the salvation of lost man, it will beget a thirst after Him and set souls to seek by prayer to have it supplied, and they cannot stay away from Him. They will see Him seeking sinners, rather to give to them than to receive from them; for “if thou knewest . . . thou wouldest have asked of Him,” rather than have refused Him a drink of water.

6. Christ has better things to give sinners than anything He can ask from them, or they can offer Him. Particularly, the well of life is Christ’s to dispense as He will; for, instead of her water, He has “living water” to give her.

7. Christ, who makes offers of grace before we seek it, will not refuse it to them who ask for it; nor will former sins hinder their being accepted who come to seek grace; for even to this wicked woman He says, “Thou wouldest have asked, and He would have given thee living water”.

8. The grace of Christ, communicated by the Spirit, is compared to “water”, not only that He might allude to her water, but to point out its cleansing and fructifying virtue, and that it will quench the thirst of a burnt-up soul. And it is compared to “living water”, springing (as in Gen 26:19), because it has an enlivening, quickening virtue, and because of its constant endurance unto eternal life (as in v 14).