Switchtracking

Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. 18 The 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.” 19 “Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”
- from John 4:17-20
 
How do you read the switchtrack in this conversation?
 
Jesus brings up this woman’s relationship history, a history that she has no reason to expect that he knows. She responds with a comment / question about worship: “Where is the correct place to worship?” This is a textbook example of what Shelia Heen and Douglas Stone call “switchtracking” in their excellent leadership book Thanks for the Feedback.
 
One way of reading the conversation says that the woman is just avoiding the subject of her “love life.” Her relationship history was a painful history. In her day and age, having five husbands would have meant being rejected, abandoned, or widowed over and over and over again since women very rarely had the power to escape unhealthy relationships. And the man she was currently with kept her in a vulnerable place by not marrying her. We can understand that she might not have wanted to talk about this with some strange person she met at the public watering hole.
 
But there’s another way to read the conversation, a way that doesn’t undermine the first perspective but rather stands behind it. The woman didn’t take her jug and head home. She stayed to talk with Jesus. And she could have shifted the focus of the conversation in any other direction: the weather, the Hurricanes, the political climate, or even onto Jesus himself – “What brings a guy like you to Samaria?”
 
She chooses to turn the conversation to worship. She opens up about something she’s wondered about and invites Jesus to engage. And he takes her up on her offer.
 
Intense conversations often contain switchtracks like these. They reveal something about the person with whom we’re speaking. What we do with these switchtracks matters.
 
Listen for switchtracks in conversations today. Pay attention to what you do when someone shifts the focus of a discussion. What are healthy and unhealthy ways you respond to switchtracking? How might God use your responses to bless someone this week?

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