This summer has also been a dry one. Some parts of England, such as Odiham village in Hampshire, did not see rain for more than a month.

But they say that relief is around the corner. In the next week, we are soon to get a drenching. The Met Office is saying thunderstorms are on the way. And it drizzled a little today.

The summer heat is something my family grew up with back in Sydney. The relentless sunshine. Clear blue skies. The heat that bakes into the footpath and seeps through your shoes. That clings to you like spiderwebs and wraps around you as you walk.

It is funny how vital and life-transforming the small everyday things we take for granted can be.

For the first time in three years, it felt like the summers we experienced back home. And I realised again how desperately important water was for life to flourish.

It is funny how vital and life-transforming the small everyday things we take for granted can be.

“Living water.” That is what Jesus said to the woman at the well. He said he was the source of living water.

It is a well-known story from John’s Gospel. Jesus was travelling through Samaria and came to a well. John writes it was the sixth hour. Many scholars claim that was noon – the hottest and most uncomfortable time of day. Others say it was in the evening. Whatever time it was, perhaps it was not the most popular time at the well – because Jesus was alone.

I can almost feel the oppressive heat as Jesus sat at the well, tired and thirsty. He would have waited because he had someone to meet that day.

Along comes a woman whose moral standards were considered no better than that of a prostitute. Shunned by her community, this was the only time she could draw water from this well, safe from the judgment of others.

Knowing the next few moments will change her life forever, Jesus leans over and asks her for a drink.

She must have been used to being ignored. She must have been used to being rejected. Because when Jesus speaks to her, she is surprised and somewhat antagonistic.

“You are a Jew, and I am a Samaritan woman,” she tosses back. “How can you ask me for a drink?”

There were other girls, some even in lower grades, who terrified me when I was growing up.

I know something of that feeling. I went to all-girl schools throughout my childhood and adolescence. The teenage years were particularly tricky. Some girls instinctively knew how to make you feel small with a few choice words and a well-timed snigger. Others could be outright brutal.

There were kind friends, but there were other girls, some even in lower grades, who terrified me when I was growing up. I would escape to the library at lunchtime to avoid them. I would rather be on my own than feel utterly inadequate. Better to be invisible than a target.

Bullied and ostracised? Feeling judged and worthless? God sees you.

This woman had just come to the well to get some water in peace. But Jesus was now asking her for a drink. And it is here he says, “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.”

It is at this encounter he reveals to her, outright, that he is the Messiah.

I am often struck by how God uses ordinary everyday things to call people to him.

Bullied and ostracised? Feeling judged and worthless? God sees you.

For my father’s friend, who ended up devoting his life to God, it was a Korean persimmon tree in a gated garden. Every day after school, its ripe fruit would tempt him. One day he could not stand it any longer. He jumped the fence to steal some. A priest caught him in the act. That tree was in a churchyard, you see.

For me, it was a Buddhist text I bought out of curiosity one lunchtime. I was in my mid-twenties, and I was searching. I went back to work with it. My Christian boss saw it and asked one question.

“I see a lot of different spiritual books on your desk, but I don’t see one on Christianity. Is there a particular reason why?” she asked.

That was all it took. The question made me think. If I was accepting and tolerant of all faiths, it was an oversight not to consider Christianity. So when she invited me to Bible study at her church, I accepted. I had no idea a Buddhist book would lead me to Jesus that day I bought it. But God did.

Likewise, this woman at the well those thousands of years ago would have had no idea she would encounter her saviour that day. She had just come to do something she would have done every day. To do an ordinary chore of drawing water from a well. But she left with the opportunity for her sins to be forgiven and her eternity transformed.

Without water, we will perish. And here is Jesus saying he is the source of living water.

And through her testimony, many others in that Samarian town would come to know Jesus as the Messiah.

“He knew everything about me,” she kept saying. He knew all the sleeping around, the infidelities, the multiple partners, the heartbreak. And yet he still spoke to her and showed her kindness. More than that, it seems Jesus went to the well deliberately to meet her. And he offered her the forgiveness of sins and eternal life.

Three days. Scientists suggest our bodies can survive without water for only about three days. Without water, we will perish. And here is Jesus saying he is the source of living water. One that can quench our thirst and keep us alive forever.

Something to think about as Britain slowly moves away from the summer heatwave and we brace for flash floods and storms.