Transcript
It was graduation weekend of 2004. The sun was blazing and we had been outside for what felt like hours as the crowds of people dressed in their Sunday best filled the academic circle at Campbell University. I was dressed in white as a junior class marshal and Jared, who was a year ahead of me, was graduating with his BA in psychology and a minor in religion.
I caught his eye as he approached me in his black regalia and he said, look at this. What are you talking about? I replied. I peered down into his hands and there was a little piece of paper and the graduation program.
And there it was on the little slip of paper that you’re supposed to hand to the professor calling out the names over the loud speaker. It was clearly spelled out for everyone to see J-A-R-E-N, N, Jaren. I flipped through the graduation program until I found his name and it was printed wrong there too.
Truth be told, I was probably madder than he was, but he simply scratched it out and wrote it correctly on the paper so that they would at least call him by the right name as he walked across the stage. I stood silently and smiled politely as I ushered people to their seats that morning, thinking that that was it until the keynote speaker stood up to make their speech. Now, honestly, most people probably never remember the message that is delivered at graduation, except this time the speaker’s entire message was on the importance of a name.
He went on and on about how much weight your name carries and how important a good name is. By the end of graduation, I was livid and I was quite determined that they were not only going to reprint his diploma and the laminated wallet-sized version that they give to go along with it, we were also going to get 10 new copies of the program so that our keepsake edition would be spelled correctly. If a name was so important, then it only seemed right that they would honor the message that they preached.
Well, they did. New copies of everything were printed and they were delivered in a week or so, hot off the press, but it left a mark that I never forgot. It drove home the importance of something that day that I hadn’t really thought about before.
Names do matter. It matters what people call you. For many of us, our names were chosen specifically.
They tell about a part of us, a family lineage, a name that might have been passed down for generations. Perhaps there is a story that goes along with your name. Names are a part of our identity.
They distinguish us from one another and they set us apart. In essence, our names really do matter. Well, you can imagine my surprise as I was preparing for our lesson today and in doing so began doing a little more research on this woman at the well, one of the longest conversations that Jesus has in the Bible and the longest that he has with any woman.
And it was about two weeks ago that I realized she had a name. All this time, all these years of attending Bible school and GAs and seminary and classes on women in church history, and nobody bothered to tell me that this woman had a name. So go ahead.
I will wait. Get your pencils out and turn to John chapter four in your Bibles. I’m going to give you her name.
You can pencil it in, in the margins. Her name was Fotini. Now it probably was not pronounced quite that country, but it was Fotini and I’m going to spell it P-H-O-T-I-N-I.
It means the enlightened one or the luminous one. In the Eastern Orthodox Church, they have known this and have celebrated this for almost 2,000 years. Where have all of my Sunday school teachers been my entire life? Holy tradition says she was given this name later by the apostles at her baptism when she became a baptized follower of Jesus.
And lest we think that a name that was given to you is lesser in some way, I am reminded we have the same tradition of calling Simon Peter and Saul Paul. The woman at the well had a name for everyone for the past 2,000 years to call her, and her name was Fotini. Y’all, when I discovered that a few weeks ago, I began to wonder what else in this passage there was that I might have overlooked for so long.
What have I been blind to that I just did not know was there? I began to look at each commentary and book and podcast with wonder and intrigue and anticipation. And so I want to invite you this morning to hear this story through a different lens. I want to invite you to join me as we dip into this and uncover some fascinating moments and the ripples that they might have on our lives today.
So not only did she have a name, she represented many barriers that had to be broken, and one of the biggest barriers was that of gender. When Jesus chose to walk through Samaria instead of around it, he was choosing to go through what was deemed as enemy territory. Now, Jews and Samaritans, they don’t mix.
They were like oil and water. The fact that Jesus was talking to anyone, let alone a woman, was big. Men did not initiate conversations with unknown women, and a Jewish rabbi would not have had a public conversation with a woman, not to mention a Samaritan woman.
That would have brought a fear of ritual contamination. So that is why the idea of actually drinking from her water ladle would have been even more of a concern for her. Now, add in the fact that this was at a well, and this was the next time that my mind was blown.
Jesus was at the well with a woman. This would have evoked images for first century readers that we don’t readily pick up on today. They would have read this passage and noticed the similarities between other betrothal stories in the Old Testament.
Biblical men who met their wives at the well, Moses, Isaac, Jacob, after all, this was Jacob’s well. First century readers may have expected another boy meets girl story, but this back and forth about water was more than just a playful and flirtatious conversation. It was full of eschatological imagery of the bridegroom and his bride.
Unlike the previous Old Testament stories, this woman was the least likely they expected to be at the well. The one no one saw coming in the story. Now, let me be clear.
Jesus was not looking for an earthly bride. Once the first century readers would have realized who Jesus was, they also would have realized that he was making it known that his bride, the church, was for everyone, even the marginalized, the outcast, the enemy, the other of society, the one that nobody expects or sees coming. And he chose a Samaritan who was a woman to bear witness to who his church would be.
Meeting at the well was a cultural symbol that is often lost on us in the Western world. Another barrier was Fotini’s past. Many scholars write her story as one of ill repute.
I grew up hearing it as one of scandal, five husbands, what a shame. And then as I got older, I realized that women had no rights of divorce. They were treated merely as property.
They were at the will of men and the system of that time. There were many reasons that she could have had multiple husbands, death, famine, war, you name it. If it had been because of scandal, the next man in line as the kinsman redeemer would not have chosen to marry her for it would have brought shame upon him and his household.
If she had been at fault in some way, she certainly wouldn’t have had husband number three or then four or then five eager to take her in marriage. The reality is we don’t know why she was married multiple times, but nowhere in this passage does Jesus condemn her or call her a sinner or ask her to repent. Nowhere does he judge her or say go and sin no more.
He simply sees her. Now I can hear some of y’all saying, well, what about the fact that she was at the well in the middle of the day? Wasn’t that because she was avoiding all the other women who would go in the morning or the cool of the night? Didn’t she want to avoid all of that gossip? Well, according to Leander Keck, who is the professor of biblical theology emeritus at Yale Divinity School, the reason that John tells us it’s about noon has nothing to do with the time of the day that she is actually drawing water and more to do with the marked contrast to all that proceeded in the gospel, especially what happens in chapter three. Now remember last week when we were talking about chapter three and Nicodemus, the religious elder who comes and sees Jesus in the middle of the night secretly wondering what to believe? Now here we are in chapter four, a woman not yet named coming to Jesus in the light of the day, willing to believe and spread the truth.
The literary transition highlights this swing from the religious elite that hides to the poor and ordinary who seek in the day. The contrast is stark. Night to day, named to unnamed, ranked or lowly, belonging or outcast, unbelief or belief.
This woman had nothing to hide, nothing to lose, and the time of day foreshadows her own darkness to light journey. Now another cultural barrier that she represents is proper worship. Jerusalem and Samaria had been at odds for hundreds of years with the height of their disagreement over the best place to worship.
Samaritans had built a temple up on the top of Mount Gerizim near them, and the Jews thought that the only proper place to worship was in Jerusalem. One war, the Jews went and destroyed the Samaritan shrine, and the battle between the two had left bitter hard feelings and mistrust for generations. So when Fotini questions Jesus about which mountain they should worship, she must have been shocked to the core.
Jesus said, believe me, a time is coming when you will not worship the Father on the mountain here nor in Jerusalem. A time is coming when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit.
Folks, it wasn’t about holy geography. It was about people over customs, relationships with the Father, not a place. In one sentence, Jesus tore apart the either-or option and replaced it with a higher way that unified instead of divided.
We aren’t so different today with our cultural barriers. We live in a world of differences where people are treated differently based on their gender, their past, where they come from, and where they worship. A few weeks ago, about 20 of us from First Baptist went to the movie theater to see a film that had just come out called I Was a Stranger.
It was the story of a Syrian doctor and her daughter that were fleeing the war-torn city of Aleppo through Turkey and Greece. Along the way, their story intertwined and became dependent on interactions with other people who were also making life-changing decisions. A soldier who had to determine where his true allegiance stood.
An illegal smuggler that was trying to save his own child. A poet and his wife and their three young children who lived in a refugee camp. A Greek coast guard captain that had to choose between duty and mercy.
The official trailer said their paths collide on a night in the Mediterranean where survival is uncertain and humanity is revealed in its rawest form. Even still, I was not prepared for the harshness, the inhumanity, the vulnerability, and the truth that was on display in that screen. It was a story of fear, of longing, of searching, of trust, and redemption.
I did a quick search to see if it was based on a true story and the response came back. It was based on 14 million true stories. This wasn’t some long time ago in a faraway place.
This war has been in my children’s lifetime. In a country that I was in last year. Each person in this film represented barriers that had to be overcome just like Fotini represented barriers in her time.
Both stories, Fotini’s and the Syrian refugees, faced barriers that mankind created. It makes me wonder, what are the barriers in our world today that Jesus would break down? Are we responsible for creating them? Who is it that you feel like doesn’t belong? If you can think of a person or group that you would exclude, then friends, you’ve created a barrier, not torn it down. What makes you think twice before helping someone that look and acts completely different from you? Can we name that or are we so blind to it in our everyday life? We all know folks who choose one church over another and we get caught up in customs and traditions like worship styles and numbers.
Whether we like what the preacher says or if our toes get stepped on, could it be that the problem isn’t the local church but whether we’ve stopped worshiping in spirit and in truth? Jesus broke the barrier with Fotini. She was enough as a Samaritan, as a woman, as a follower of God. He broke the barrier of place and systems and people and worship.
And if we want to call ourselves Christians, literally little Christs, if we want to be Christ followers, then we have to start breaking down these barriers and not adding to them. So as I was studying, Fotini had a name and she represented these barriers, but then she learned his name. Verse 25 and 26, the woman said to him, I know that the Messiah is coming who is called Christ.
When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us. Jesus said to her, I am he, the one who is speaking to you. Okay, again, this is a pencil moment.
Y’all, in the Greek, Jesus’ words are literally I am. Not I am he. It is an absolute.
There is no predicate there. It is a small difference. Instead of saying I am he, the Messiah, he says I am.
He is referencing the great Yahweh, the name of God from Exodus 3. John 1 says, in the beginning was the word and the word was God and the word was with God. And here, only four chapters later, we see Jesus verifying this very saying, saying I am. That small change is the difference between confirming Fotini saying, yeah, it’s like you said, versus saying I am all of that and so much more.
I am the very one that is to be worshiped in spirit and truth. I am not on the mountain in Gerizim or in Jerusalem, but I am with you and I go before you and I stand behind you. I am.
In that moment, Fotini had a name, but now so does Jesus. When I read that, it took my breath away. I had to stop and put down my pencil.
To me, this is that moment that Jesus, without a doubt, revealed who he was. God incarnate. There is no parable.
There is no guessing. He straight up said, I am. So she had a name.
She represents barriers. She learns his name and she had a purpose and a legacy to fulfill her immediate purpose. Once she learned Jesus name was to run and tell the entire village the good news.
Don’t you know she was shocked? I can imagine her backing away slowly at that point as the disciples began to approach. She left her jar behind, taking off trotting and then running back into town. She finally got it.
This living water that had been offered, she now knew who it was that had offered it. It didn’t just mean fresh running water like a spring instead of the still well water to drink. She knew that this living water meant life giving water, the kind that sustains like an Isaiah 55, which she had probably heard recited since childhood.
Asking her for water, knowing her past, revealing her identity, she found hers. Later on, verse 39 through 42 tells the rest of her story. Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony.
He told me everything I ever did. So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them and he stayed two days. And because of his words, many more became believers.
They said to the woman, we no longer believe just because of what you said. Now we have heard for ourselves and we know that this man really is the savior of the world. Her testimony changed the lives of many, many people in that village.
And because she shared her story one person at a time, she was bold. She was on a mission and she was determined. Maybe there was a little fiery red in her hair.
We don’t know, but she was a light in the dark. And it is no wonder that they gave her a name that meant enlightened, luminous one. Now we don’t have the rest of Fotini’s story in the Bible, but like many of the disciples and apostles and early Christians, we have church histories and traditions that have been passed down and Fotini’s legacy is quite impressive.
She went on to be baptized where she received her name and she was also given the title equal to the apostles. She converted her five sisters and her two sons and together they set out on a mission to share Christ with as many people as they could. It is said that she had a vision of Jesus sending her to Rome to convert Emperor Nero.
So while in Rome, the story goes that she managed to convert Nero’s daughter and court, which enraged the emperor even more, causing her and her family to face torture, imprisonment, and ultimately violent deaths. As Kara Quinn, author of Know Your Mother’s writes, Fotini eventually was martyred by being thrown in a dry well. The irony being she already had the living water.
Friends, we do a disservice to ourselves and we sell our own faith short when we think we’ve got it all figured out because we’ve heard the story a thousand times. What does your name mean? If history had to give you a name based on your beliefs and your actions, what name would history give you? What would your legacy look like if your name was your story? Will you pray with me? Lord, may we be worthy of carrying your name wherever we go. May we be your light in this world.
Amen.
