Just about every
morning shortly after we fill up our dog Dutch’s water bowl- he lumbers over to
the bowl and takes a really long drink—now I am not talking thirty seconds or a
minute- I’m talking 2-3-4 minutes. He laps and he laps and he laps up the
water- he drinks an awful lot- it gets especially loud when he’s wearing his
collar because for three minutes all you hear is his metal tags banging off the side of the bowl-
Ka-cling-Ka-cling-Ka-cling.
Don’t worry he doesn’t
have diabetes- He’s just thirsty-- I think he just choose to drink his fill of
water in one sitting.
All life needs water.
As you know human being can’t go very long without water. Under normal circumstances a healthy human
being can expect to live only about 3-5 days without water. In harsh
environments our survival time without water decreases. We are made of water-
65% of us is water. Water helps rid our bodies of toxins, bad things-- it aids
in the digestion of food. If we go to long without water our bodies begin to
shut down, we get a head ache, our mouth dries out, we urinate less, our skin
loses its elasticity- as we dehydrate our blood thickens and eventually without
any water our organs fail.
Without water we find
ourselves on the other side of the grass.
So It’s no wonder the
Israelites are cranky grumbling in the
desert, no wonder their shaking their fists Moses—why did you take us out Egypt—
they are thirsty and the lives are in danger--it’s no wonder that after a long
walk through desert Jesus first stop would be at the well
They need water!!!Their
survival depends on having good fresh water to drink- just like their survival
depends on nutritious food and being sheltered from the elements- and clean air
to breath. If humans don’t have access
to these things eventually we will die.
But what about our
spiritual lives? What is it that keeps
our spiritual lives from withering and dying? What hydrates our spirit?
Jesus talks to the
Samaritan woman today about a type water he offers—a water that can’t be found
by turning on the tap- it can’t be found in a bottle of Poland Spring- it can’t
be bought with dump trucks full of money.
It’s a living water, a water that quenches the soul’s deepest thirsts.The conversation about
living water, so intrigues the woman at the well that she says to Jesus- “Sir give me this water- so that I may
never be thirsty again!” She desires to drink this water that Christ offers.
Sir, give me this water
It’s interesting what
Jesus does next—he doesn’t say here have a drink but rather he invites her to
go and get her husband.—Her response is—“But I have no husband.”“That’s right you have
had five husbands and the man you are living with is not your husband either.”
Immediately, we hear
condemnation on Jesus lips in that moment, but we need to be careful-I’m not
sure that Jesus is condemning her.- he doesn’t say go and sin no more-- in fact, this woman might have be a victim-
she might have been barren, unable to have children- someone who would have
been disposable by her husbands because she couldn’t bear children.
This part of the story is
Jesus establishing himself as a prophet as someone from God, it establishes him
as someone who can see things that the rest of us can’t, it establishes Jesus
as someone who would have access to living water, access to the spirit of God
and it establishes Jesus as one who goes to those on the margin the vulnerable,
the downtrodden.
What about us? What is our response to an
opportunity to drink living water? Have
we asked Jesus for it? Have we said, “Sir
give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty again?” Have we accepted the cup that Jesus holds out
to us?
Paul in his letter to
the Galatians speaks about something called the fruits of the spirit- those things, those attributes that come
into our lives when we’ve been in touch with Spirit -when we’ve taken the cup
of living water that Jesus offers and pressed it to our lips to drink. Paul says that the fruits of God spirit are
things like love, and joy, peace, and patience, and kindness, and goodness,
faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Those are the things that spring
from the living water that Jesus extended to the Samaritan woman and extends to
us.
A Church goer wrote a letter to the editor of a
newspaper and complained that it made no sense to go to church every
Sunday. "I've gone for 30 years
now," he wrote, "and in that time I have heard something like 3,000
sermons. But for the life of me, I can't
remember a single one of them. So, I
think I'm wasting my time and the pastors are wasting theirs by giving sermons
at all."
This started a real controversy in the
"Letters to the Editor" column, much to the delight of the
newspaper’s editor. It went on for weeks
until someone wrote this clincher:
"I've been married for 30 years now. In that time my wife has cooked some 32,000
meals. But, for the life of me, I
cannot recall the entire menu for a single one of those meals. But I do know this. They all nourished me and
gave me the strength I needed to do my work.
If my wife had not given me these meals, I would be physically dead today. Likewise, if I had not gone to church for
nourishment, I would be spiritually dead today!" When you are DOWN to nothing..... [the man
wrote] God is UP to something! Faith
sees the invisible, believes the incredible and receives the impossible! Thank God for our physical AND our spiritual
nourishment!
Today we will be nourished
by living water- the words of this liturgy are meant to fill the cracks within
us, the hymns that we sing will as we penetrate our souls, the sacrament of
bread and wine will put our lives in the cross hairs of Holy God. Living water
will be offered.
May our prayer be today "Sir, give us this
water to drink, so that we might never be thirst again."
And may we drink from
the cup Jesus offer- not only so that we might be filled, but also that that we
can take the jar filled with living water with us and press it to the lips of
our friends, our neighbors and offer them a bit of this life giving water- so
that they might know what it’s like never to thirst again.
Sir- give us this water
so that we might not be thirsty!!
AMEN
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