The Woman at the Well

               As I said last week, we’re in the thick of thing in John’s Gospel

—graced week after week with stories of people having profound encounter with Jesus.
These aren’t stories of ordinary life
—but extraordinary life,
being ministered to by God in the flesh!
Being at the right time and place to be face to face with their Creator…

-Last week, Nichodemus came to Jesus at night,
-Today the Samaritan Woman meets Jesus at high noon.

 

Prayer

              She’s a Samaritan…
as John scholar Karoine Lewis, writes, “Samaria would be the last place not the first, expected for Jesus to show God’s love for the world.”

              “Jews don’t share things in common with Samaritans” is an understatement of understatements…
there is a 750-year history of estrangement between these two peoples,
 both religious and ethnic walls between them.

              She’s also a woman… one who has had five husbands…

              You might remember the sermon about a month back,
where I talked about marriage in the ancient world
—how it could be rather brutal,
cut short by a husband dissatisfied by the slightest thing…

              To have had five husbands…
this is a painful tragedy, likely abuse piled atop abuse…
surviving as a woman in a world where women were often considered akin to property…
God help her…

              As close to the center of religious and cultural power as Nichodemus was,
this woman is the opposite…
Yet, paradoxically, there is a night and day difference spiritually
—he comes to Jesus in the night of skepticism;
Jesus comes to her in the blazing sun of trust, relationship, and belief.

 

              Jesus comes to her, by this well, the well of Jacob
—a Well with a history recognized by both their respective cultures
—Samaritan and Jew…

              He asks her for the very thing he is offering
—water…
thirst at high noon quenched
—belief, relationship, and trust, quenched…

              Living water…
a moving stream, reliable, rejuvenating, bubbling up fresh and clean…

 

              Now the entire time I lived in Wyoming,
we were in the midst of a decades long drought
—the only grass I really knew to grow in Wyoming was buffalo grass
—stubbly, brown-grey, and curly…
but when I returned for my 10 year high school reunion
—it was transformed, lush greens and trees returned to health…
 I’d never seen such a thing…
enough snow pack,
enough water to fill dry dead streams,
living water!

 

              And so too on offer to this woman
—her life a dead stream of drought…
quenched…
drink deeply and flourish…
a life more stable and whole than husbands’ disapproval, societal shame, subsistence living.
A relationship with God in the flesh (or to put it another way God with sandals on)

 

              This is too much to hope for,
so she shifts the conversation to controversy
—where to worship God?

              Now, a century previous the Jewish ruler John Hyrcanus had razed the Samaritan’s temple…
so this was yet another bitter point of contention in those 750 years of hatred and conflict…

              “Where ought we worship God?”
Where does the Glory of the Lord reside
—the heft of God in the Holy of Holies in Mt. Zion,
or among the Samaritans on Mt. Gerezim?

              Neither says Jesus
—worship of God is taking place in this very moment,
the Temple is his body before her
—God present with her in that very moment…
the Glory of the Lord in the person of Jesus Christ.

 

              He is Living water… a living temple… shocking stuff…

              He is a prophet
—speaking words truer than fact
—telling of all things.

              He is the I AM
—God’s name revealed to both Samaritans and Jews
—I AM present not as a memory of a burning bush before Moses,
but living flesh and blood ministering to her… to us.

              He is Messiah,
the One Anointed to make all things right.

              He is Savior
—in John’s Gospel she alone names him such
—Savior of the World..

He is the one who saves by being present,
by being with us and for us,
God in sandals, walking alongside us, always with us.

 

She lets go of her jar,
lets go of every smallness of life,
transformed into a luscious living garden.

              She bolts from him once the disciples return,
so she can do what the disciples are slow to do among the Samaritans
—Go and Tell, Invite and Witness.

              She is a minister of the Gospel,
pointing to Jesus
—look! God in Sandals!

              She plants the good news,
trusting that the living water will make it grow.
Plants it among her community,
telling of her encounter with Jesus…

              AND, she does all this
—points to Jesus…
with a Question Mark!

              This is important!

              She knows she’s received living water…
a sustained and lasting experience of God
—but she doesn’t fully understand it…
who does, right?

              These questions don’t stop her
—stop her from telling folk…
She asks questions as a form of Testimony;
her earnest doubt is part of her God conversation.

              “He can’t be the Messiah, can he?”

              There isn’t something tricky or duplicitous in this question…
Before she can explain everything nice and tidy,
she tells about it,
she enters into conversation as Jesus did with her…

              And so can we!
Testify to what we know and don’t know
and trust that the Spirit will move between lips and ears.

 

              And her words, rejuvenated and joyful
—earn Jesus an audience among her people…
he stays with this woman’s neighbors for 2 days…

              No, that’s a bad translation
—Jesus Abides with them…
again, this is John’s point in writing about all of these encounters with Jesus
—Abiding.

              Skin to skin intimacy with God.
Like a babe with her mother.

              So are we.

              Jesus’ Abba, Pappa, Father
—abides with Jesus,
and Jesus abides with us…

              God in sandals with us.
God’s living water,
a sprouting green and pleasant life for the ages…
the Savior of the World savored by us,
abides with us.
Amen.