Exodus 17:1-7
Romans 5:1-11
John 4:5-42
“Thirsting for Reconciliation”
Thanks to Jessica Bonish for pointing out that today is International Women’s Day. International Women’s Day (IWD) has been celebrated on March 8th for the last 115 years. It commemorates women’s fight for equality and liberation along with the women’s rights movement. International Women’s Day gives focus to issues such as gender equality, reproductive rights, and violence and abuse against women. Spurred by the universal female suffrage movement, International Women’s Day originated from labour movements in Europe and North America during the early 20th century.
So, it seems very appropriate that the Gospel reading from the lectionary today is about Jesus having a conversation with a woman. We hear about Jesus breaking the cultural norms of his day by engaging with a foreign woman, demonstrating his respect and care for all people, regardless of social status. But at the same time, we may note that the Gospel writer doesn’t include her name, which happens much more frequently with the women characters than it does for the men.
However, even if we don’t get to know who the Samaritan woman was, the detailed story makes it clear that Jesus knew her. Not that he had met her before, but he just knew her. He knew about her past and her present circumstances – that she’d been married several times before, and that she was living with someone who wasn’t her husband now. Towards the end of the story, she tells her neighbours that she met a man who told her everything she had ever done!
But before all that, Jesus simply treats her with respect. He asks her for a drink of water in the heat of the day. He speaks to her about spiritual water that will bring lasting satisfaction. He engages in discussion when she points out their religious differences. And he tells her that he’s the Messiah that both the Jews and the Samaritans were hoping would come from God.
Nineteen hundred years before International Women’s Day would be conceived in 1911, before women gained the right to vote in Canada in 1918, and before women were declared “persons” under the law in Canada in 1929, Jesus engaged with a woman beside a well in Samaria. He saw her, he loved her, and he shared the good news with her.
Of course, the obvious theme in this morning’s readings, prayers, and music is the gift of water. From the Book of Exodus, we heard about the Israelites thirsting for water in the wilderness and how God led Moses to a spring of fresh water to keep them all alive.
And in the Gospel text, the meeting place beside Jacob’s well is highlighted. Although the woman came to the well to fill up her bucket with physical water, Jesus offers her what he calls “living water” – spiritual water, or we might just say the Holy Spirit, that will nourish her in a different way.
Many a preacher has spent time talking about physical and spiritual thirst, encouraging their congregations to look for spiritual nourishment during this season of Lent. After all, it’s a season in which we are invited to set aside some physical pleasures in order to devote ourselves to spiritual things. To all who are thirsty, Jesus offers “living water” that will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.
Certainly, I do hope that each of us is taking up the opportunity to be nourished by the Spirit in these days. Especially when we have difficulties in life, or when we are worried about the state of the world, we need the hope and peace that comes from the assurance of God’s Spirit within and around us. Our practices of prayer, Scripture study, worship, and service are important ways for us to remember the Spirit and to be nourished and encouraged by it.
But I noticed something else in the Gospel story this week. When the story begins, Jesus is the one who is thirsty.
Jesus had just arrived at a city called Sychar, and he sits down beside a well to rest from the tiring journey. When a woman arrives at the well to draw water, he asks her for a drink of water. He has no bucket, so he needs her help to quench his thirst.
But we noticed in Bible study this week that there’s never any mention of her actually giving him a drink. At first she objects to the request, pointing out that Jewish men don’t normally talk to Samaritan women. And then they get into their theological discussion about “living water” and how it’s better than the physical water from the well.
And that made me wonder if Jesus’ thirst was not just the physical kind associated with a dry mouth and a slight headache. I think, perhaps, he was even more thirsty for sharing the good news of God, for breaking down barriers and building bridges between people. After all, when his disciples come back from the market with food for him, Jesus tells them that he has food to eat that they do not know about.
No, he hasn’t received physical food from someone else already. Rather, he explains that his food is to do the will of God who sent him and to complete God’s work. That’s why I think that the more urgent thirst that Jesus was experiencing that day was the thirst to connect with a share the good news with the Samaritan woman. I think he was thirsting for reconciliation.
When Jesus engages in conversation with the Samaritan woman, the SALT Lectionary Commentary points out that he is breaking two taboos at once: one against a religious teacher speaking with a woman in public, and the other against Jews and Samaritans interacting on such intimate terms. Both the woman and the disciples are somewhat surprised and scandalized by Jesus’ approach to her, as two fault lines of social division – gender and religious/ethnic sectarianism – are brought front and centre.
Jesus doesn’t explain to anyone why he feels it’s okay to interact with a woman like this. He simply breaks through the social barrier and does what he believes to be right. You may remember other times when he touches excluded lepers, associates with known sinners, and heals people on the Sabbath day even though it is against the religious law. He is very practiced at breaking down barriers.
And then, after he gets the woman into conversation and shows that he both knows her and accepts her, he builds a bridge across the ethnic and religious differences that might have kept them apart.
She’s the one who brings up their differences: “Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain,” she reminds him, “But your people say that the place where people should worship is in Jerusalem.” And it makes me think of many an ecumenical or interfaith dialogue in which details about where we worship, or how we worship, or what name we use for God, or some other detail is used to argue that there’s absolutely no way that our two groups could be in relationship.
Now, Jesus doesn’t quite say that both groups are right about the proper place to worship. He does claim the special relationship that his people have with God and tells her that salvation is from the Jews. But he also makes it clear that salvation is not for the Jews alone. He tells of a time to come when the location of worship won’t be so important – the true worshipers will worship God in spirit and in truth. And the Spirit of God, the “living water” that he offers is for Samaritan women too.
When I think of Jesus in this encounter, I’m reminded of one of the Beatitudes in Matthew’s Gospel. Jesus said, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” I think that was the kind of thirst that Jesus experienced most strongly during his ministry – that aching need to break down barriers and build bridges between people, as well as between people and God, in order to make things right and good.
The Apostle Paul, in his letter to the Church at Rome emphasized Christ’s ministry of reconciliation and peace. He was writing to a community of first century Christians comprised of both Jews and Gentiles, and he explains that Christ’s ministry was first and foremost about reconciliation – about making peace between God and all God’s beloved children in the world.
Paul calls the diverse community of Christians to unity and peace with each other because regardless of their different backgrounds, Christ has reconciled them all to God. In another letter to the Galatians, he writes, “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”
As we continue through this Lenten season, I hope that our spiritual thirst will be quenched by a sure sense of the Holy Spirit’s presence and guidance in our lives. But most of all, I hope that we will know and remember Jesus’ thirst, Jesus’ aching desire, and Jesus’ strong determination to draw close to us and to reconcile us to God and our neighbours.
May Jesus’ thirst be quenched as we receive his gift of “living water” and live in response to the Spirit’s guiding today and always.