John presents us with a dramatic, even theatrical, encounter. Jesus is described in very human terms, sitting at the well, exhausted from his journey. The woman too is very human. Her appearance at the well at about noon, long after the other village women would have replenished their water supply for the day, may indicate her isolated position in local society. She was shunned because of her many sins. Yet it is she who becomes a missionary to her people.
Water becomes the sign by which both baptism and faith are explained to us. Water is the means, but the Holy Spirit flowing into us is the reality. There is a vital connection between the flowing of water and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. The living water of which Jesus speaks brings not only awareness of her sin to the woman but forgiveness, hope in the person of Jesus as the Messiah, and faith in his words. The water Jesus offers is not something that human effort can achieve. It is pure gift of God, water which, when drunk, become: within a spring of life. Jesus is referring in the first place to his own words of salvation, words that are spirit and life, because whoever listens to them and lives by them will continue to share in God’s life The water has a deeper meaning a symbol of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit enables us to understand the words of Jesus and to respond to them with a willing heart.