My eldest granddaughter will use ten sentences when one would have covered it. In contrast, my youngest will never knowingly use a complete sentence if one word will do. But this week, she’s been really bothered about the conflict with Iran and has asked lots of questions about what we’re seeing in the news.
So, it felt right to explore if there was something in today’s Gospel that might speak to our current situation. And I think that, whilst the story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman does not offer a political strategy, it does illuminate patterns of encounter, humility and truth-telling that are relevant whenever communities are locked into cycles of hostility. So, let’s pray…
Crossing inherited hostility
The conversation at Jacob’s well begins with a reality known by everyone at the time: ‘Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.’ (John 4:9)
The division between Jews and Samaritans had lasted centuries and involved political conflict, religious disagreement and mutual suspicion. This mirrors something that also shapes tensions involving Iran: long histories of mistrust, ideological conflict, and competing narratives of threat and identity.
Jesus’ action here is simple but radical: he intentionally crosses the boundary. He sits at the well of a people that his community regarded as enemies.
The lesson here is that peaceful change rarely begins with systems; it begins with people – someone choosing to cross a boundary and start a conversation.
Beginning with shared human need
And Jesus begins with the simplest of requests: ‘Give me a drink.’ It is a small moment, but it reframes the encounter. Instead of beginning with accusations or arguments, Jesus begins with shared human need. Everyone gets thirsty.
In any modern conflict, including those involving Iran, people on all sides share experiences – experiences of fear for their families, grief for their dead and longing for safety and dignity.
Recognising common humanity does not resolve political disputes, but it prevents the dehumanisation that allows violence to escalate.
But we can also frame that opening scene slightly differently. A rabbi asks something of someone who has learned to expect very little kindness. Jesus begins not with teaching, but with dependence.
This matters. Jesus does not approach her as a problem to be fixed. He approaches her as someone from whom he is willing to receive.
Honest disagreement without dehumanisation
But Jesus does not avoid theological disagreement. When she raises the dispute about where God should be worshipped, Jesus responds: ‘You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know.’ (John 4:22) This is striking because Jesus combines respectful engagement with honesty. He neither flatters nor condemns.
This is a vital lesson for international conflicts. Dialogue is often assumed to mean suppressing disagreement, but John 4 suggests something different: truthful speech without contempt. Communities can acknowledge profound differences in belief or politics while still recognising each other’s humanity.
Moving beyond the fight over sacred places
The Samaritan woman then raises a dispute that was deeply political and religious: ‘Our ancestors worshipped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.’ (John 4:20)
Sacred geography often lies at the centre of conflict. Land is never just land; land carries history, identity and faith. But Jesus responds by shifting the focus: ‘The hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem… but in spirit and truth.’ (John 4:21–23)
Jesus does not deny the importance of history, but he refuses to let the argument about sacred territory define the relationship with God.
In modern conflicts, including tensions involving Iran and the wider Middle East, this insight challenges the belief that God’s purposes are tied exclusively to national or territorial claims.
An aside
I want to just pause there briefly and dip back into the sermon that I originally wrote before the conflict, because ‘God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth’ is one of the most profound theological statements in the whole Gospel.
This is not some theoretical doctrine. It is spoken to a woman whose life has been shaped by exclusion – religious, social and personal. Jesus is telling her that access to God is no longer controlled by place, purity, or pedigree. Worship is not about being in the right place or having the right past. It is about truth, lived truth, held open before God.
And then, astonishingly, Jesus does something that he rarely does quite so directly. When she says, ‘I know that Messiah is coming,’ Jesus replies, ‘I AM he – the one who is speaking to you.’ So, the first person to whom Jesus explicitly reveals his identity as Messiah is not a disciple, not a priest, not a righteous insider, but a Samaritan woman, with an uncertain past, whom he’s just met at a well.
Listening as transformation
Back to today’s sermon. Another striking feature of the story is that Jesus allows the conversation to unfold slowly. The Samaritan woman questions him repeatedly: ‘How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me?’ ‘Where do you get that living water?’ ‘Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob?’ Jesus listens and responds.
In conflicts where rhetoric becomes hardened, listening often disappears. Yet the story shows that transformation comes through patient dialogue, not instant victory.
The unexpected peacemaker
Towards the end of the story, the Samaritan woman becomes the bridge between communities: ‘Many Samaritans from that city believed because of the woman’s testimony.’ (John 4:39)
She is an unlikely messenger: a Samaritan, a woman and socially marginal. Yet she becomes the first missionary to her people. Not just one or two people, but a whole city. In Orthodox tradition, she is given a name: Photine or Photini – the enlightened one. They also made her a saint.
In modern conflicts, peace often emerges not from amongst the most powerful but from ordinary people who live across boundaries – journalists, aid workers, scholars, religious leaders, and families who refuse to accept permanent hostility.
The possibility of changed perception
The story ends with the Samaritan people saying: ‘We have heard for ourselves.’ (John 4:42) Direct encounter changes their understanding.
Conflicts like those involving Iran are often sustained by second and third-hand narratives about the enemy that go unchallenged. When communities encounter one another directly, stereotypes can begin to unravel.
A spiritual insight for a political crisis
But the deepest lesson of John 4 may be this: God is already present at the well before the conversation begins. Jesus arrives tired, thirsty, and waiting. That image suggests something important for moments of international crisis. Even in situations shaped by fear and violence, God’s work may begin in quiet encounters rather than dramatic interventions.
A final reflection
John 4 does not solve geopolitical conflict. The realities surrounding Iran involve complex issues such as nuclear policy, regional alliances, and security fears. But the story does remind us that hostility between peoples is not inevitable. It shows that change can begin when someone crosses a boundary, speaks honestly, listens patiently and recognises the humanity of the other.
In the Gospel, the turning point is almost disarmingly simple: a tired traveller sits beside a well and asks a stranger for water. At that small moment, a centuries-old divide softened just a little.
It would be nice to say that relationships between Jews and Samaritans were fixed from that point on, but, historically, the conflict between the Jews and the Samaritans never did resolve through any dramatic reconciliation. Instead, it slowly dissolved over time through changing historical circumstances.
But I think that this makes the story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman even more striking. In a region marked by deep wounds and long memories, the encounter at the well offers us something different: a moment of genuine encounter across a seemingly permanent divide.
Most of us here don’t operate on an international stage, so I wanted to finish with a blessing that makes all this a bit more personal because Jesus still meets us at metaphorical wells – in ordinary places, as part of what may seem to be our usual daily routine, in moments of fatigue, in lives that often do not fit neat categories. And when we are met there with truth and mercy together, we too may yet become witnesses – not because we were ready, but because grace found us…
A Blessing at the Well
May you have the courage
to come to the well at noon,
when the sun is high
and nothing hides in shadow.May you not turn away
from the cracked earth of your own thirst,
nor from the empty jar
you carry in plain sight.And when you arrive,
may you find Another waiting –
tired enough to understand your weariness,
thirsty enough to ask you for a drink.May his asking
undo your defences.
May his seeing
be free of judgment.
May you dare to speak
the truth of your life
without shame.May living water
stir beneath the surface of your heart –
a quiet spring
rising without rope or bucket,
clear as mercy,
deep as belonging.When old names cling to you,
may you hear instead
the name Love calls you by.When worship feels far away,
may you discover
that spirit and truth
meet you exactly where you stand.And when you know
the astonishment of being seen,
may you leave behind
the jar of yesterday’s thirst
and run light-footed
toward those you once avoided,carrying the simple invitation:
“Come and see.”May the Christ who waits
beside every well
turn your thirst into blessing,
your loneliness into communion,
and your story into a spring
that will not run dry.
Amen.
‘Crossing boundaries’ was delivered by Ian Banks at St Margaret’s, Heywood on 8th March 2026. It was based on John 4:5-42.