4:27
The disciples returned. They were puzzled, perhaps even a little scandalised at what Jesus had been doing. Why did He speak to a woman, and to a Samaritan woman at that? Jesus does not fit any of our stereotypes. We must never make an image of God, be it a physical image or a mental image, for that image will be a very poor representation, and in many ways hopelessly wrong. Moreover, when we make an image we are in control, we fashion and form it. But we need God to reveal Himself to us. He is the only one who can tell us what He is really like.
4:28-30
The woman left for two reasons. One, because the disciples had returned and she would not want to be with alone with an all male group; secondly to tell people what had happened. Prior to this she may well have been something of a recluse, someone who was not respectable, but now Jesus had come into her life. When Jesus comes into our life He restores our dignity, and when His life truly takes hold of ours we want to communicate it.
The thing that had struck her most about Jesus was that He told her “all that she ever did”. Clearly Jesus had not done this in a literal sense, but He had gone to the heart of her life. She apparently didn’t feel confident enough to say that Jesus was the Messiah, or maybe she couldn’t quite believe it herself. However, the people went out to see this Jesus. People want to know about Jesus when they see the effect He has on our lives.
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