Jacob’s Well
By Apostle Aje Pelser, Harvester Reformational Church, Cape Town

Jesus needed to go through Samaria and met a woman at Jacob’s well.
The conversation shows us a few transformations that changed the woman’s life.
1. From defilement to cleansing. The gifts of the spirit operated in discernment and word of knowledge. God revealed to Jesus by His Spirit, that she was trying to cover up her past and present situation, but Jesus’ gently revealed the truth.
2. From a limited supply to an unlimited source. The well was deep, and it took an effort to get to the water, the water Jesus gives becomes a spring, note the contrast in yokes – Jesus’ yoke is easy. It is an easier yoke to hear the truth from God, than to persist in a deceptive state. The truth sets you free, but the Truth is also a Person. Receiving Jesus into your life opens up the truth every category of your life. This is also true for ministering in the gifts of the Spirit. Operate in Jesus’ thoughts, words, actions and the truth will flow through you too and set the captives free and bring in the harvest!
3. From being an outcast to the one who introduces them to Jesus a new source of living water! God changes your function in the community when you have an experience with Jesus like this woman had at Jacob’s well. We may be trying to cover things in our lives, but Jesus sees through all our masks. In fact, the world is waiting for the unmasking of the true sons and daughters of God. May God do the same for us as Jesus did for this woman and her community. She went and fetched all her friends and told what Jesus said, then they came to hear for themselves and believed. Later, Philip the Evangelist had a mighty revival there and the apostles followed up to give the gift of the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

Joh 4:6 Now Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied from His journey, sat thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour.
Joh 4:7 A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.”

Joh 4:16 Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.”
Joh 4:17 The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You have well said, ‘I have no husband,’
Joh 4:18 for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; in that you spoke truly.”
Joh 4:19 The woman said to Him, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet.
Gen 33:18 And Jacob came to Shalem, a city of Shechem, which is in the land of Canaan, when he came from Padanaram; and pitched his tent before the city.
Gen 33:19 And he bought a parcel of a field, where he had spread his tent, at the hand of the children of Hamor, Shechem’s father, for an hundred pieces of money.
Gen 33:20 And he erected there an altar, and called it Elelohe-Israel.

The account in Genesis 34 reveals that Shechem is a place of defilement. A derivative meaning is the place of the back our shoulder, indicating a place of burdens or even betrayal;
Schechem is linked to the giving of consent; a portion, and even the shouldering of responsibility. H7928, H7926
It was also a geographical place where Shechem, a Canaanite pursued Dinah, Jacob’s daughter and defiled her. The sons of Jacob destroyed the entire male population and took spoils form the city. Jacob had to move on and God told him to go to Bethel.

Jacob’s well must have been dug while they were on their way to Bethel,
The well itself is 40 meters deep, and perhaps dates to Canaanite times. According to the book of genesis Jacob purchased here a plot of Land (33:19). It is related to Jacob as the book of Genesis states that he bought a land in Shechem (Genesis 33:19). How deep is Jacob’s well in the Bible? 40 meters deep
It is here that Jesus met a woman that had been defiled with multiple relationships, and the gifts of the Spirit operated to show her the way cleanse her past and give her living water. The result of Jesus’ ministry here is a well of salvation that caused much joy in the entire city, once and for all removing the connotation of shame and condemnation and turning the future of the people there towards the hope of righteousness and revival, which the disciples and Philip the Evangelist enjoyed.
Later, when Jerusalem fell, the believers in Jesus found shelter with their former enemies.
Samaritans and Jews had a history of contentious rivalry and war.

https://dannythedigger.com › Jacobs…
JUNE 24, 2016 BY RANDALL NILES
Jacob’s Well in Samaria – The History of the Samaritans
Jacob’s Well still exists in the ancient land of Samaria. Samaria was the land between Judaea and Galilee. In 722 BC, the Assyrians conquered this area and hauled most of the Israelites into captivity. According to Assyrian records, new inhabitants were brought in from the east, forming a new population. This mixture of indigenous Israelites with imported Assyrians is thought to be the beginning of the Samaritan people.

“Later in the 6th century BC, when the Jewish people returned to Jerusalem to rebuild their temple, the new population of Samaritans in the north wasn’t invited to participate.”

Jacob’s Well in Samaria – The Samaritan Woman at the Well
Today, Jacob’s Well in Samaria lies within the monastery complex of the Eastern Orthodox Church in Nablus, a part of the Palestinian West Bank. Jacob’s Well is also about 250 feet from the archaeological ruins of ancient Shechem. Shechem has a long history in the Hebrew Scriptures and was the first capital of the northern Kingdom of Israel.

On one occasion in the Gospels, Jesus had a conversation with a Samaritan woman by a well – Jacob’s Well. This well was already a sacred site at the time of Jesus, since Jacob, the grandson of Abraham, and his family and livestock drank from it.

“According to Christian Orthodox tradition, the Samaritan woman’s story at Jacob’s Well was so powerful that many became followers of Jesus, including her five sisters and two sons. The disciples heard of her experience with Jesus and came to baptize her, giving her the name “Photini,” meaning, “enlightened one.” Thus, the name of the Greek Orthodox Church in Nablus is “St. Photini the Samaritan.” Deep inside this church is the ancient site of Jacob’s Well in Samaria, which has been venerated by Christian pilgrims since the early 4th century AD.”

“Its supplies depend entirely upon rainfall and percolation. Possibly, therefore, the water may never have approached the brim. The woman says “the well is deep.” Pēgē, “spring,” does not, therefore, strictly apply to it, but rather “tank” or “reservoir,” phréar, the word actually used in Gen_48:11 f. The modern inhabitants of Nablūs highly esteem the “light” water of the well as compared with the “heavy” or “hard” water of the neighboring springs. It usually lasts till about the end of May; then the well is dry till the return of the rain. Its contents, therefore, differ from the “living” water of the perennial spring.” [Major Anderson describes it (Recovery of Jerusalem, 465) ]