Bible Gateway passage: John 4:7-26 - New International Version (2024)

⁷When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?”^{(A) 8}(His disciples had gone into the town^(B) to buy food.)

⁹The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan^(C) woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.^[a])

¹⁰Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”^(D)

¹¹“Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? ¹²Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well^(E) and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”

¹³Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, ¹⁴but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst.^(F) Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water^(G) welling up to eternal life.”^(H)

¹⁵The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty^(I) and have to keep coming here to draw water.”

¹⁶He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”

¹⁷“I have no husband,” she replied.

Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. ¹⁸The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”

¹⁹“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet.^{(J) 20}Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain,^(K) but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”^(L)

²¹“Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming^(M) when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.^{(N) 22}You Samaritans worship what you do not know;^(O) we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews.^{(P) 23}Yet a time is coming and has now come^(Q) when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit^(R) and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. ²⁴God is spirit,^(S) and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

²⁵The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ)^(T) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”

²⁶Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”^(U)

Footnotes

1. John 4:9 Or do not use dishes Samaritans have used

Cross references

1. John 4:7 : Ge 24:17; 1Ki 17:10
2. John 4:8 : ver 5, 39
3. John 4:9 : S Mt 10:5
4. John 4:10 : Isa 44:3; 55:1; Jer 2:13; 17:13; Zec 14:8; Jn 7:37, 38; Rev 7:17; 21:6; 22:1, 17
5. John 4:12 : ver 6
6. John 4:14 : Jn 6:35
7. John 4:14 : Isa 12:3; 58:11; Jn 7:38
8. John 4:14 : S Mt 25:46
9. John 4:15 : Jn 6:34
10. John 4:19 : S Mt 21:11
11. John 4:20 : Dt 11:29; Jos 8:33
12. John 4:20 : Lk 9:53
13. John 4:21 : Jn 5:28; 16:2
14. John 4:21 : Mal 1:11; 1Ti 2:8
15. John 4:22 : 2Ki 17:28-41
16. John 4:22 : Isa 2:3; Ro 3:1, 2; 9:4, 5; 15:8, 9
17. John 4:23 : Jn 5:25; 16:32
18. John 4:23 : Php 3:3
19. John 4:24 : Php 3:3
20. John 4:25 : Mt 1:16; Jn 1:41
21. John 4:26 : Jn 8:24; 9:35-37