What does Jesus see? What do His eyes behold? He sees the world full of sinners. He has come to proclaim His messianic salvation to one of those in the Samaritan woman at the well (Jn 4). She has lived a rough life. Despite her Samaritan commitment to the Mosaic law her adherence to the ten commandments has been less than perfect. Though she does not know to whom she speaks, there is no doubt that Jesus certainly knows with whom He is speaking.

Yet to her He does speak, in a kindly, loving, embracing fashion. He even asks of her the impossible, the culturally inappropriate act of drinking from her contaminated water vessel. She even chides Him for His friendliness, "why would you, a Jew, seek a cup of cold water from me a mere Samaritan? Is that why you sent your friends into town? I know very well that we can have no friendly conversation. Our cultures are at odds. You are from over there. I am from over here where Jacob drew water. We worship differently than you do. What can you possibly offer to me, a Samaritan, and what would you desire from me, that I could give?" She's right, you know.

The disciples were aghast when they return from their shopping trip. Jesus was chatting up the Samaritan woman, this outcast. What could He possibly be seeing in her? But that's the point. There's nothing in the woman that makes her worthy of the Messiah. Luther's catechetical dictum is exactly right here: "I believe that I cannot buy my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to him..." But her value to Jesus is not in her quality but in her need. Jesus refuses to give up on her. Jesus refuses to give up on sinners; sinners like us. Jesus would not abandon her to her prejudices, to her culture, to her depravity, to life with her sixth man, and who was no husband.

This tenacity, this seeing of the need of the desperate sinner is entirely characteristic of God's own nature. Not because some neat theological textbook tells us what the attributes of God are, but because God has revealed Himself in the words of Holy Scripture; displaying His very heart that we might see what He sees in a world in desperate need; even if the world does not recognize that need.

There is no way to know what God's heart is like; there is no way to know what His eyes see apart from what He tells us He sees, apart from what we see Him doing for our sakes. He chases the Samaritan woman that she might see what He sees in her; calling her to repentance. He chases the Samaritan woman that she might see what He sees from the vantage point of the cross: a world full of fields white unto harvest cleansed clean by the blood spattered down. That blood runs in cleansing rivulets from Skull Hill and washes a world of filth away. This is what Jesus sees.