The Force of Living Water

“The water that I will give will become... a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.”

In last Sunday’s gospel Jesus drew on the image of wind to convey a spiritual truth.  Today’s reading draws upon another basic element – water.  Jesus launches into a conversation with a woman who has come to a well to draw a day’s supply.  He is thirsty and asks her for a drink.  This simple request launches a lengthy conversation that covers a wide array of subjects.  At one point Jesus proclaims that he is the source of Living Water and that whoever drinks of him will never thirst again.

Thirst – and we are talking deep thirst – would have been a common experience in that region in that era.  It is still a common experience in many parts of our world today.  Our access to clean drinking water, as well as the abundance of beverages of choice, is a blessing we could easily take for granted.  I was so pleased last year when we rallied together to raise nearly $2,000 for the creation of family wells at remote locations in other countries.  We understood the connection between clean water and quality of life.  It is nice to know that somewhere two or three families or farms or small villages have a way to satisfy their thirst because of our Lenten offering from 2013.

As I meditated on today’s lengthy gospel lesson I kept thinking about a slightly different property of living water.  Not only does it quench thirst, but over time it also has the ability to break down, break through, and smooth out what stands in its way.  Erosion.  Images of erosion vary from the glorious splendor of the Grand Canyon to washed out sections of road on the Outer Banks after a tidal surge.  Have you ever walked barefoot in a steam of rushing water and felt the smooth rocks beneath your feet?  Over time, moving water has worked away all their rough edges. 

Not long ago I watched a cable documentary that tried to determine the origin of Noah’s flood.  It theorized that after the last ice age a huge body of water covered most of central Canada and the upper Great Plains.  All of this water was held back by dam made of ice.  When that blockage gave way, the water rushed forth at an enormous rate in volumes we can scarcely imagine.  It raised ocean levels worldwide by a significant amount; creating the English Channel, the Black Sea, and other bodies of water we take for granted.  Water literally changed the face of the earth.

I think this is a helpful way to look at the encounter Jesus had with the woman at the well.  Think of all that it broke through, moved away, and reshaped.

·   Men did not speak to woman, but Jesus engages this woman in conversation.

·   Jews did not speak to Samaritans and vice versa on account of long-standing ethnic hatred, but Jesus foregoes all of that.

·   Moral objections are raised – the woman has had multiple relationships – and they are swept away.

·   Questions about the practice of religion are brought up – where is the right place to worship? – and dismissed.

·   That the woman came to the well alone at about noontime indicates she was an outcast in her community.  She was not welcome when all the other women normally gathered in the cool of the morning at the well.  And yet, she leaves her conversation with Jesus, returns to the village, and tells everyone about what she has found.  She is reconciled with the people who have pushed her away.

·   The villagers come to the well to meet Jesus and decide to invite him to stay in their town – something that was unthinkable at the time.

No obstacle, no barrier, no impediment can stand in the way of Living Water for long.  Eventually the water will overcome it and make its way toward its eventual destination.  From this encounter we learn that the destination of the Living Water that is Jesus looks like this:

·   It is a place where people find the true and living God not because they are good enough, but because God is gracious beyond all measure.

·   It is a place where broken relationships give way to a reconfigured community; a community where Jesus is always a welcomed guest.

·   It is a place where each person is respected regardless of age, gender, class, ethnicity, or moral integrity.   

To live in this kind of place is never to thirst again.  It is a world we are moving toward inch by inch, choice by choice, carried on our way by the gushing flow of Living Water.

I have enjoyed the brief mediations in this year’s Lenten Devotional from Episcopal Relief & Development.  March 17^th’s entry was written by Moses Deng Bol, a bishop from the South Sudan.  He described how in that part of the world “women are the marginalized of the marginalized”:

Official government statistics say 98 percent of women in the region cannot read or write.  Although a few girls go to school, most will not complete their education.  They will likely be married off for a dowry.  The dowry may be paid in stolen cows, a practice fueling current tribal conflict in South Sudan.

The bishop goes on to note:

Yet we rely on these same women to provide food, manage our homes, and raise our children.  They are such a central part of our society, and, I think, these women are the key to unlocking a better future for South Sudan.

March 19^th’s devotional described how an association of women in southwest China, empowered by a microloan, have come together to create better lives for themselves and for their community.  They are now at a point where they are making a profit and using this money to provide better care for the elderly, for children, and for poor families.

These stories, among many others, evoke for me the image of Living Water as running water that removes barriers and overcomes obstacles on its way to a good and godly destination.  I am looking forward to making a contribution to efforts like these at the end of Lent as we collect change for micro-development projects.  Just as last year’s effort addressed water as thirst, this year’s work focuses in figuratively on ‘water’s’ ability to transform.  It is a tangible way that you and I can be connected to Jesus the source of Living Water.

Today I am most mindful of the final barrier that Living Water will overcome, the barrier of death itself.  Death is the great darkness in the future that each of us must face, and with the sudden passing of Stephanie Freel, that darkness seems especially close today; not only to us, but to our children who have lost a Sunday School teacher and mother of one of their own.  Our faith is that nothing – nothing – nothing – can stand it the way of the gush of Living Water, not even death itself.  We rejoice that Stephanie has been welcomed to that place were she will never thirst again even as we recognize that a different kind of water pours forth from our eyes in the form of tears. 

Today I am grateful for the power of Living Water to overcome all things on its course to a Holy Destination.  And I pray that the One who was thirsty as he sat beside a well so long ago will come to us and comfort us with a Living Water we so desperately need.

Jesus said, “The water that I will give will become... a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.”