First in verses 7-8, she tries to push Jesus away through false humility:
7When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, "Will you give me a drink?" 8(His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
9The Samaritan woman said to him, "You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?" (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.a]">[a])
It seems to me that what she's really saying isn't "I'm not worthy" so much as "Who do you think you are, bothering me like this? Usually people like you know well enough to leave people like me alone". If that seems a little judgmental, it's probably because I'm projecting the way I often behave towards God onto this situation. I say "God I don't deserve you", but what I really mean more often than not is "God, I don't want to talk to you right now" or even "God, I don't think you're good enough to deal with my unholiness".
Maybe I'm stretching this interpretation a little. But notice in verses 10-11 she questions Jesus's
honesty and ability
10Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water."
11"Sir," the woman said, "you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his flocks and herds?"
From this it seems that first of all, she doubts Jesus's ability to follow through on his claims. But more importantly, she's "calling Jesus bluff". That is to say, she thinks that Jesus is all talk and so she has no trouble calling him out on the boldness of his claim.
Of course, Jesus doesn't back down on his statement. Instead, he doubles-down, offering her even more than he did before. Not only is God always as good as his word, he's always better than it, willing to go above and beyond our expectations.
13Jesus answered, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life."
15The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water so that I won't get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water."
The woman's reaction is again one of skepticism. But at this point she's in too far to admit she was wrong, so still not believing, she tries to out-bluff Jesus by making demands of him. Of course, this is never a good idea, and Jesus responds by asking her to take a step of faith.
16He told her, "Go, call your husband and come back."
17"I have no husband," she replied.
Jesus said to her, "You are right when you say you have no husband. 18The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true."
I imagine that getting one's husband to come talk to some crazy guy at a well isn't the most comfortable situation to be in. So she does what we do a lot of times to get out of a situation we don't like, she lies. But, of course, this is Jesus she's talking to... not someone to be easily fooled.
Jesus doesn't just call her a liar, however. Instead Jesus responds in love, congratulating her for her "honesty", while at the same time affirming that he is in control.
What the woman does next is what a lot of non-believers (and believers too) do when they're confronted by something they don't want to be. They immediately turn to their favorite controversy in hopes of avoiding the real subject. Current favorites are "the problem of evil" or "Why don't Christians love gays" or "I believe in God, just not religion", but the point is never to ask an honest question. No one who asks one of these questions is looking for an answer, they're just trying to deflect attention away from the real issue.
19"Sir," the woman said, "I can see that you are a prophet. 20Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem."
21Jesus declared, "Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth."
Of course, there's no question too hard for Jesus, so he has no trouble giving an answer for this one. More importantly, he redirects the conversation back to the heart of the matter--namely, the condition of the human heart.
The woman's final response is another common one among both believers and non-believers, namely to simply throw up our arms and say "Oh, it's all over my head!" Or, another way of putting it, maybe religion is okay if you're a scholar or a prophet, but normal people should be exempt from the requirement of thinking too hard about religious questions.
25The woman said, "I know that Messiah" (called Christ) "is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us."
26Then Jesus declared, "I who speak to you am he."
What the woman is interested in isn't really that the Messiah will explain everything. She's interested in the fact that she will do it LATER. In other words, she can keep going about her life the same way she always had and worry about religious questions at some vague point in the future.
Jesus responds to this the same way that he responds to her the same way he responds to all of us, be reminding us that the place is here, and the time is now. All of the excuses we use to put of being in a meaningful relationship with Jesus are just that, excuses.
When the woman at the well finally runs out of excuses, she immediately becomes a powerful witness for Christ, as we see in verses 39-42. I think this is the moral of the story. If we are just willing to stop arguing and trust in God, he will accomplish great things through us.
