The following questions relate to Pastor Darren’s sermon concerning the woman at the well. Use the questions below to foster conversations in a small group setting or to simply journal your thoughts on your own time as you work through God’s Word with Pastor Darren.

The sermon points out that Jesus ‘had to’ go through Samaria, using the Greek word ‘dei’ to indicate divine necessity — what does it mean for your own life to consider that God may be intentionally leading you through difficult or uncomfortable places for a purpose greater than you can see?

Jesus chose to reveal himself as the Messiah first to a woman who was a social outcast, a Samaritan, and someone with a deeply painful past — what does this tell us about the kind of people God chooses to use, and how does that challenge the way we evaluate who is ‘worthy’ of ministry or leadership?

The woman at the well had experienced repeated rejection and loss, yet she had not abandoned her faith or her expectation of the Messiah — in what ways does holding onto faith during prolonged suffering look different from simply enduring hardship, and how do you personally maintain that distinction?

Jesus addressed the woman’s spiritual emptiness by first engaging her physical need, then moving to her emotional wounds, and finally revealing her deepest spiritual need — in what order do you tend to address brokenness in your own life, and does that order reflect trust in God or reliance on temporary fixes?

The sermon describes the water jar as a symbol of everything the woman used to try to fill her spiritual emptiness — what are the ‘water jars’ in your own life that you keep returning to for temporary relief, and what would it look like to leave them behind?

The woman at the well avoided the crowds by coming at noon, allowing her shame to dictate her daily routine and isolate her from community — in what ways does unresolved shame shape the patterns and habits of your own life, and how might an encounter with Jesus disrupt those patterns?

After her encounter with Jesus, the woman immediately became an evangelist to the very community she had been hiding from — how does genuine transformation change not just what we believe but how we engage with the people and places we once avoided?

The sermon notes that gossip travels faster in Christian communities than reports of miraculous events, and that we tend to focus on the scandalous while neglecting the miraculous — why do you think this is true, and what would it require of us individually and collectively to reverse that tendency?

Jesus offered living water as a permanent solution to the kind of spiritual thirst that worldly things can only temporarily satisfy — what is the practical difference between seeking Jesus as your primary source of fulfillment and using spiritual disciplines as just another temporary fix?

The woman’s testimony, ‘Come see a man who told me everything I ever did,’ was rooted not in her accomplishments but in being fully known and still valued — how does the experience of being truly known by God, including your failures and hidden struggles, change the nature and boldness of your witness to others?