[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":90},["ShallowReactive",2],{"\u002Farticles\u002Fgoing-through-samaria":3,"\u002Farticles\u002Fgoing-through-samaria-surround":79},{"id":4,"title":5,"author":6,"bibleBooks":8,"body":13,"columnName":61,"date":62,"description":63,"extension":64,"image":65,"meta":66,"minRead":67,"navigation":68,"path":69,"postType":70,"publication":71,"publicationUrl":65,"seo":72,"stem":73,"topics":74,"__hash__":78},"blog\u002Farticles\u002Fgoing-through-samaria.md","Going Through Samaria",{"name":7},"Dave Faust",[9,10,11,12],"Acts","John","Nehemiah","Luke",{"type":14,"value":15,"toc":57},"minimark",[16,24,39,42,45,48,51,54],[17,18,19,23],"p",{},[20,21,22],"em",{},"\"And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth\""," (Acts 1:8).",[17,25,26,27,30,31,34,35,38],{},"An oxymoron is a combination of contradictory or incongruous ideas. Examples include: jumbo shrimp, well-preserved ruins, dead livestock, voluntary taxes, drive-thru window, fighting violence, biggest piece of minutia, and 12-ounce pound cake. From the Greek ",[20,28,29],{},"oxus"," (\"sharp\") and ",[20,32,33],{},"moros"," (\"dull\"), the very word ",[20,36,37],{},"oxymoron"," serves as an example of concepts that normally don't fit together.",[17,40,41],{},"\"Good Samaritan\" sounded like an oxymoron in Jesus' day. To the Jews, Samaritans were anything but good. Jesus' story about neighborliness was pointed and paradoxical in large part because the hero was from Samaria. The first-century historian Josephus wrote that Samaritans were \"evil and enviously disposed to the Jews\" and caused them \"many mischiefs.\" The animosity dated back to the days of the kings when the tribes of Israel divided geographically and theologically. The Jews looked down on the Samaritans as a mixed race resulting from intermarriage of the remnants of the 10 tribes of Israel with the heathen nations who moved into their land when Samaria fell in 722 B.C. Tensions escalated when some Samaritans attempted to frustrate the Jews' efforts to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem (Nehemiah 4:1-23).",[17,43,44],{},"After centuries of political separation and racial strife, by the time Jesus walked the earth the relationship between the two groups was so bad that the Bible flatly states, \"Jews do not associate with Samaritans\" (John 4:9). Taunting him with the worst labels they could find, Jesus' enemies called him \"a Samaritan and demon-possessed\" (John 8:48). The hostility of one Samaritan village made Jesus' disciples so angry they wanted to destroy it (Luke 9:51-55).",[17,46,47],{},"Yet when Jesus decided to travel to Galilee, the Bible says he \"had to go through Samaria\" (John 4:4). The shortest way from Judea to Galilee led directly to the north through Samaria, but most Jews avoided going that way. Instead, they would take a longer route that stayed outside the borders of Samaria, preferring the inconvenience of extra hours on the road to the prospect of unpleasant encounters with people they despised.",[17,49,50],{},"Why, then, did Jesus \"have to go\" through Samaria? Not because his travel itinerary dictated it, but because love compelled him. He had to go through Samaria precisely because others wouldn't go there.",[17,52,53],{},"He had to go through Samaria because of one particular woman who came at mid-day to draw water from the well. They sat and talked for a while, to the considerable surprise of Jesus' disciples. He offered her \"living water.\" He probed the personal details of her life. (She had been married five times and was now living with a man without the benefit of marriage.) They discussed what it means to worship God. Jesus revealed himself to her as the Messiah, and then she brought many others from her town to encounter the Lord for themselves (John 4:7-42).",[17,55,56],{},"All of us need to go through Samaria. We can't avoid it if we follow Christ. We must intentionally go where we will interact with people who are racially and culturally different from ourselves. We must make room for them in our hearts and in our churches, share the living water with them, and do whatever we can to serve them. No excuses. No taking another route to avoid it. After all, \"unloving Christian\" may be the harshest oxymoron ever spoken.",{"title":58,"searchDepth":59,"depth":59,"links":60},"",2,[],"First Look","2008-11-02","*\"And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth\"* (Acts 1:8).","md",null,{},3,true,"\u002Farticles\u002Fgoing-through-samaria","column","The Lookout",{"title":5,"description":63},"articles\u002Fgoing-through-samaria",[75,76,77],"Biblical Theology","Christian Unity","Spiritual Formation","E2lOKxE2LuT79gpDaA3aMym5Z1W9MPPmWvFX1jFZ8z4",[80,85],{"title":81,"path":82,"stem":83,"description":84,"children":-1},"Going Steady","\u002Farticles\u002Fgoing-steady","articles\u002Fgoing-steady","Remember Aesop’s fable about the tortoise and the hare? The fast but overconfident hare learned the moral of the story: “Slow and steady wins the race.”",{"title":86,"path":87,"stem":88,"description":89,"children":-1},"Going Through the Emotions","\u002Farticles\u002Fgoing-through-the-emotions","articles\u002Fgoing-through-the-emotions","We know Abraham for his faith, Joshua for his leadership, Esther for her courage, and Job for his patience.",1790466153208]