Hide and Seek

John 4:1–42

Phrases that spoke to me today:
• Give me a drink
• You have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband
• whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again
• Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did

Applying the Word to My Life:
One of my closest friends from grade school and I used to just show up at each other's houses. No plan, no coordination — if I wasn't at his house, he was at mine. Our families knew each other. It was just how those years worked.

We got into a fight one day. It escalated the way things can when you're that age, and I ended up punching him. He didn't see it coming. We were both surprised it happened. We parted ways and didn't talk.

What kept me away wasn't anger — the anger went away pretty fast. It was shame. I had convinced myself that one stupid moment had ended the whole thing, and the longer I let that thought sit, the more certain it seemed. I didn't want to test it and find out for sure.

We lived in a small town. In a place like that you can only avoid someone for so long. Eventually we were going to end up in the same place, and we did. It was awkward. I apologized. And then we went right back to what it had always been.

I could have done that the next day.

It has been this way since the garden. When we are ashamed, the instinct is not to run toward God but to manage our exposure — to wait until we are pushed back rather than walking back ourselves.

The woman in this reading came to the well at noon. Typically water was drawn in the morning — when it was cooler, and when it was social, the kind of daily rhythm that holds a community together. She came at noon, alone, in the heat. Not because noon was convenient. Because the morning involved other people, and she wanted to avoid them all.

Jesus was already there when she arrived. He asked her for water. She was immediately wary — He was not supposed to be talking to her, and He knew the rules as well as she did. He kept talking anyway. The conversation went somewhere she didn't expect. At some point He told her that He knew everything about her — all of it, the whole history she had been carrying around. He was not using it as a weapon. He was telling her that He already knew, and He was still sitting there, still talking, still offering her something. What He offered was water that ends the thirst entirely.

He knew everything about her. He told her. And He kept talking. What breaks hiding open is not being found out — it is finding out that He already knew, and He is still there.

The woman who came to the well at noon to avoid everyone ran back to town and told everyone. The person most turned in on her own shame became the one who brought the whole community out to meet Him.

I could have gone back to my friend the next day. The moment I walked back in, the friendship was right there — exactly as it had always been. What I spent weeks protecting myself from was never the real risk. The real cost was the weeks themselves.

Whatever we are carrying, Jesus is already sitting there knowing everything. The question is whether we are willing to stop hiding and show up.

My Response for Today:
Today I will name one place where I have been staying away out of shame and take one step back.