The Wrong Well

She Came At Noon. Not The Cool Of The Morning When The Other Women Gathered. Noon. The Hottest, Loneliest Hour. Because She'd Learned That Being Around People Cost More Than The Heat Did.

I Get That.

I Don't Come To My Wells At Noon Because I'm Brave. I Come Because I've Already Been Burned By The Morning Crowd. By The Version Of Me That Tried To Be Known And Got Used Instead. So I Stopped Trying To Be Known And Started Just, Managing.

 Managing The Thirst. Managing The Loneliness. Managing The Image. Filling My Bucket With Whatever's Available And Calling It Enough.

But Here's What I Keep Skipping Over In This Story: She Had Five Husbands.. Five. That's Not A Punchline! That's A Woman Who Kept Going Back To The Same Source Expecting It To Finally Be The Thing That Filled Her. Five Times She Thought, "This One. This Will Be It." Five Times The Well Ran Dry.

And I Want To Judge That…

….. Until I Count My Own Wells.

? The Approval I Keep Drawing From.

? The Productivity That Makes Me Feel Like I Exist.

? The Way I Scroll At Midnight Looking For Something I Can't Even Name.

? The Busyness I Use To Avoid The Silence Where God Actually Speaks.

? The Version Of Ministry That's Really Just Me Trying To Feel Significant.

If I’m Being Honest, I've Been Back To Those Wells More Than Five Times.

When He Engages With This Woman, Jesus Doesn't Open With A Lecture, He Opens With Thirst. "Give Me A Drink." He's The One Who's Supposed To Have Everything, And He Asks Her For Something. That's Not Weakness, No, That's The Most Disarming Thing He Could've Done.

Here’s What I Think Many Of Us Miss. He Meets Her At The Well She's Already At, Not The One She Should've Been At.

And Then He Says The Thing That Has Me Check Myself Every Time: "Everyone Who Drinks This Water Will Be Thirsty Again."

Not "You're Broken For Being Here." Not "You Should've Known Better." Just The Plain, Devastating Truth: This Water Doesn't Last. You Already Know That. You've Known It Every Time You Came Back.

I've Known It Too. Every Time, I Drink, I'm Satisfied For A Minute, And Then The Thirst Comes Back Stronger Than Before. And Instead Of Asking Why, I Just Go Back To The Well. Faster. More Desperate. Telling Myself This Time Will Be Different, Like I’m Chasing Satisfaction And Somewhere I became Willingly Ignorant To The Fact That It Won't Be Different. It Never Is. That's The Definition Of A Broken Cistern.

The Woman Leaves Her Jar At The Well. That Detail Is So Small It's Easy To Miss. She Came To Fill It. She Leaves It Empty. Because Somewhere In That Conversation She Realized She'd Been Carrying The Wrong Container To The Wrong Source Her Whole Life, And The Only Thing Worth Running Back To Town For Was The News That She'd Finally Found The Real One.

I Want To Leave My Jar Too.

Not The Jar Of "I'll Try Harder This Lent." Not The Jar Of "I'll Manage My Habits Better." The Jar Of Self-Sufficiency. The Jar That Says I Can Figure Out My Own Thirst If I Just Find The Right Combination Of Things To Fill It With.

Lent Is Forty Days Of God Saying: You're Thirsty. Stop Pretending You're Not. Stop Going Back To The Wells That Leave You Empty And Dryer Than Before! The Water I'm Offering Doesn't Run Out. But You Have To Actually Want It More Than You Want The Ache Of The Wrong Well.

The Question Isn't Whether I'm Thirsty. I'm Always Thirsty. But Finally Asking What Am I Willing To Leave Behind At The Well?