A woman runs into town.

“Come and see! Come and see!”

No one looks up. She’s fallen in and out of love so many times that no one much cares what she says. Her judgment about what is worth looking at is, shall we say, uncertain.

“I think I might have found the Christ.”

You can imagine what is running through minds along the street. “That’s what you are calling him now?” “Isn’t that a stretch, even for you?”

“He’s told me everything I ever did.”

The people stopped.

This is a woman married five times. This is a woman keeping house again. This is a woman with denial challenges. This is a woman who goes to get water when no one else will be at the well, no one to ask questions, to shy away, to point. This is a woman with a gaping hole in her self. This is a woman who says, “this time it will be different. This time I’ve changed. Forget all the rest of those times. This time, it will work.”

And this woman comes running into town demanding attention, admitting to everyone that there really has been trouble in her life. And her invitation is to come and meet the man who has seen her heart and still been willing to converse with her.

Her work as an evangelist was powerful. The people from the village stopped what they were doing and followed her to Jesus. Not because she was perfect and polished and newly successful. Because for the first time they could remember, she told the truth about herself.

Kinda makes you wonder, doesn’t it, about why Christians think they need to be perfect? And why that doesn’t seem to work so well?

Maybe we just need to be honest about ourselves.