NOVEMBER 2023

Dear Church,

Let us seek the real joy giver!

28 Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, 29 “Come,see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah? – John 4

A man repeatedly went to a psychiatrist seeking treatment for his depression. One day, the
psychiatrist asked him to visit the local circus and watch a clown, who could gladden the hearts of
thousands in the city. The man then confessed to the doctor that he was the clown in that circus
who desperately needed real joy in his soul. Where can one find real joy? Who is the source of our real joy?
The Samaritan woman at the well had not been able to find real inner joy in her life despite having lived with six different men. Throughout her whole life, this woman had flirted with happiness which was temporary and depended solely on her state of mind at that time. These repeated episodes in her life journey exhibit her search for something that she could rely on and for a permanent solution. We can see her other struggles, because of her immoral lifestyle, that she was allowed to go to the well only during hot afternoons when no one was around there to fetch water. In such a pressured life both from within and from the outside, she must have been a
desperate woman seeking for real joy. She would not have expected that the Saviour would be
waiting for her at the well to quench her thirst permanently and offer her hope for a brighter
future. Jesus gave her real eternal joy that permeated her innermost being.
Another angle of the story explains that the Messiah, in compassion, walked all the way to Samaria to reach this vulnerable woman. This was to reveal to her where that unquenchable joy can be obtained. People now days are not content to serve in a small community, but it is to remind us, that for one soul, the Saviour put so much effort and found the suitable time to meet with her. The outcome was marvelous, she was so overjoyed that she left her water pot behind and ran to share the news with all the other people in the city.
God is our real joy giver and we have already received that joy through Christ. This joy is
unshakeable and overflowing. We cannot contain this within us, it keeps bubbling. Let us not get
weary and tired of sharing that joy with one another.

God Bless, Amutha