The Food You Do Not Know
Introduction: Two Different Wavelengths
We come now to a moment of glorious, divine interruption. Jesus has just finished a conversation with the Samaritan woman that has upended her entire life. He has offered her living water, exposed her sin not to condemn but to heal, and revealed Himself as the Messiah who will establish true worship. It is a moment of high spiritual drama, the salvation of a soul, the dawn of a new mission to the Gentiles. And right at this peak, the disciples return from their lunch run. And they are completely, utterly, and almost comically clueless.
What we have in this passage is a collision of two entirely different realities. The disciples are operating on the physical plane. They are concerned with social decorum, religious taboos, and their growling stomachs. Jesus is operating on the spiritual plane. He is concerned with the will of His Father, the salvation of souls, and a harvest that is ready for the reaping. The disciples are looking at their watches; Jesus is looking at eternity. They are thinking about bread; He is thinking about bringing in the sheaves.
This is not just a quaint historical detail. This is a perpetual challenge to the Church in every generation. It is entirely possible to be in the immediate vicinity of a mighty work of God and be completely oblivious to it because your mind is preoccupied with lesser things. It is possible to be a disciple of Jesus and still be thinking like the world, measuring success by the world's metrics, and prioritizing the world's concerns. This passage calls us to lift our eyes, to get on the same wavelength as our Master, and to understand what truly nourishes, what truly satisfies, and what truly matters in the economy of God.
The Text
And at this point His disciples came, and they were marveling that He was speaking with a woman, yet no one said, “What do You seek?” or, “Why are You speaking with her?” So the woman left her water jar, and went into the city and said to the men, “Come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done; is this not the Christ?” They went out of the city, and were coming to Him. Meanwhile the disciples were urging Him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.” But He said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” So the disciples were saying to one another, “Has anyone brought Him anything to eat?” Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to finish His work. Do you not say, ‘There are yet four months, and then comes the harvest’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, that they are white for harvest. Even now he who reaps is receiving wages and is gathering fruit for life eternal; so that he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. For in this case the saying is true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’ I sent you to reap that for which you have not labored; others have labored and you have entered into their labor.” From that city many of the Samaritans believed in Him because of the word of the woman who bore witness, “He told me all the things that I have done.” So when the Samaritans came to Jesus, they were asking Him to stay with them; and He stayed there two days. And many more believed because of His word; and they were saying to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves and know that this One is truly the Savior of the world.”
(John 4:27-42 LSB)
The Scandalized Disciples and the First Evangelist (vv. 27-30)
We begin with the return of the disciples.
"And at this point His disciples came, and they were marveling that He was speaking with a woman, yet no one said, 'What do You seek?' or, 'Why are You speaking with her?'" (John 4:27)
They walk up and the scene stops them in their tracks. Their Rabbi is talking to a woman. Not just any woman, but a Samaritan woman. And not just any Samaritan woman, but one who came to the well at noon, which tells you everything you need to know about her reputation. Their minds are reeling from the sheer number of cultural and religious boundaries being trampled. A respectable Jewish teacher did not speak to a woman in public, let alone a Samaritan, let alone a woman like this. They are marveling, but they are marveling at the wrong thing. They are scandalized by a breach of etiquette while a soul is being brought from death to life. Their spiritual sensors are completely offline. Yet, to their credit, their awe of Jesus outweighs their shock, and they hold their tongues. They know enough to know that He operates by a different set of rules.
While they are stuck in their traditionalist paralysis, the woman is a flurry of motion.
"So the woman left her water jar, and went into the city and said to the men, 'Come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done; is this not the Christ?' They went out of the city, and were coming to Him." (John 4:28-30)
Notice the first thing she does: she leaves her water jar. This is a beautiful, symbolic detail. The very reason she came to the well, the mundane, earthly task that defined her daily burden, is now completely forgotten. She has tasted living water, and her thirst for earthly water is no longer the priority. This is what true conversion looks like. The urgent displaces the important. Her shame is gone. The woman who came to the well alone to avoid the accusing glances of the other women now runs back into the city, not to the women, but to the men at the city gate, the very men who were likely part of her sordid history.
And what is her message? It is not a polished sermon. It is raw, personal, and utterly compelling. "Come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done." She doesn't hide her sin; she puts it on display as evidence of Christ's supernatural knowledge. Her brokenness becomes her testimony. She doesn't make a dogmatic pronouncement but asks an irresistible question: "Is this not the Christ?" She is the first evangelist to the Gentiles, and her method is simply to point to her own encounter with Jesus and invite others to have their own. And it works. The whole town starts coming out to see Him.
Spiritual Food, Spiritual Fields (vv. 31-35)
As a river of seeking Samaritans flows toward them, the disciples choose this exact moment to talk about lunch.
"Meanwhile the disciples were urging Him, saying, 'Rabbi, eat.' But He said to them, 'I have food to eat that you do not know about.' So the disciples were saying to one another, 'Has anyone brought Him anything to eat?'" (John 4:31-33)
The contrast is staggering. A spiritual harvest is literally walking toward them, and the disciples are focused on sandwiches. They are completely tone-deaf to the spiritual reality unfolding. Jesus uses their physical concern to teach a profound spiritual lesson. "I have food to eat that you do not know about." Just as He spoke to the woman of "living water," He now speaks to His disciples of secret food. And just like the woman, they take Him with a deadening literalness. "Who brought him food? Did someone get takeout?" They are still earthbound, unable to lift their eyes.
So Jesus spells it out for them.
"Jesus said to them, 'My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to finish His work. Do you not say, 'There are yet four months, and then comes the harvest'? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, that they are white for harvest.'" (John 4:34-35)
Here is the mission statement of the Son of God. What nourishes Him, what sustains Him, what energizes and satisfies His soul, is perfect obedience to the Father. His work is His food. Our fallen tendency is to see obedience as a grim duty, a chore to be completed so that we can get on with our real lives. For Jesus, obedience is His life. It is His sustenance and His joy. Then He commands them to change their perspective. He quotes their farmer's proverb: "Four months, then the harvest." This is the world's timeline. It is predictable, slow, and requires patient waiting. But Jesus cancels that timeline. "Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes." Stop looking at your feet, at your stomachs, at your calendars. Look up! And what do they see? They see the Samaritans, dressed in their light-colored robes, streaming across the fields toward them. The fields are already white. The harvest is not in four months. The harvest is now.
The Joy of a Shared Harvest (vv. 36-38)
Jesus then explains the dynamics of this supernatural harvest.
"Even now he who reaps is receiving wages and is gathering fruit for life eternal; so that he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. For in this case the saying is true, 'One sows and another reaps.' I sent you to reap that for which you have not labored; others have labored and you have entered into their labor." (John 4:36-38)
The work of the kingdom is not drudgery; it comes with immediate wages. The wage is not money, but the joy of "gathering fruit for life eternal." And this joy is communal. The sower and the reaper rejoice together. This is a crucial principle. We are all part of a much larger project. Jesus tells the disciples that they are being sent to reap a harvest they did not sow. Who did the sowing in Samaria? The patriarchs sowed there, when Jacob dug his well. The prophets sowed there, when they spoke of a day when God would gather all nations. John the Baptist sowed, preparing the way. Even this woman, in her own broken way, has just sown the seed. The disciples are now stepping into a field prepared by others. This is a great encouragement and a great warning. We must not take credit for the harvest, for we are often reaping where others have labored in tears. And we must not be discouraged if we only seem to be sowing, for others will come after us to reap, and we will all rejoice together before the throne.
From Testimony to Truth (vv. 39-42)
The passage concludes with the result of this encounter, the fruit of the harvest.
"From that city many of the Samaritans believed in Him because of the word of the woman who bore witness, 'He told me all the things that I have done.' ... And many more believed because of His word; and they were saying to the woman, 'It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves and know that this One is truly the Savior of the world.'" (John 4:39, 41-42)
Here we see the two stages of saving faith. The first stage is initiated by the testimony of a witness. The woman's simple, honest word brought them out of the city. Her witness was the necessary catalyst. God delights to use the foolish things of the world, the testimony of broken people, to call others to Himself. Many believed because of her word.
But their faith did not stop there. They came to Jesus and heard Him for themselves. He stayed with them two days, teaching them. And as they listened to His word, their faith was grounded in a new and deeper reality. This is the second and essential stage. They graduate from a second-hand faith to a first-hand faith. They say to the woman, in effect, "Thank you for the introduction. You got us here. But now we have heard Him for ourselves." True, saving faith is never dependent on the persuasiveness of the evangelist; it is a direct encounter with the person and Word of Jesus Christ.
And look at their confession. These despised Samaritans, these half-breeds, arrive at a stunningly profound Christology. They declare Him to be "truly the Savior of the world." Not just the Jewish Messiah, not just the king of Israel, but the Savior of the world. They understood the universal scope of His mission in two days, a lesson the disciples themselves would struggle with for years to come. This is the glorious harvest, white and ready, that the disciples almost missed because they were thinking about lunch.
Conclusion: Lift Up Your Eyes
So what are we to take from this? The application is sharp and clear. First, we must ask ourselves what our "food" is. What truly satisfies and motivates us? Is it the accomplishment of God's will, or is it the pursuit of our own comfort and security? Are we sustained by His work, or are we just trying to get through our Christian duties so we can get back to our real lives?
Second, we must hear the command of Jesus: "Lift up your eyes." We are all prone to a kind of spiritual myopia, focusing on our own little world, our own problems, our own schedules. Jesus commands us to look up and look out. The fields are white. God is at work all around us. People are ready to hear. Our neighbors, our coworkers, the people in our city, are the harvest field. We must stop making excuses and procrastinating with our farmer's proverbs about "someday." The harvest is now.
Finally, we must understand our role. We are to be like the woman at the well. We are not called to have all the answers or a perfect theological system memorized. We are called to leave our water pots of worldly concerns behind and simply say, "Come and see what Jesus has done for me." Our testimony is the catalyst. We bring people to Jesus, and then we trust that His Word, the living Word, will do the true work of salvation. And when it does, we will all rejoice together, sower and reaper, in the presence of the one who is truly the Savior of the world.