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Mystery and Wonder of Water JOHN 4:5-15
Today, continuing the Lenten theme of Mystery and Wonder, we consider the Mystery and Wonder of Water. Our bodies thirst for water. Our spirits thirst for God. Chad and Azi, who were just baptized, felt a spiritual need, a thirst for God. Chad, a Baptist and Azi a Muslim began reading the Bible every day out loud to each other. When they felt the need for a church, they found our church and began coming every Sunday since last summer either in-person or online. A few weeks ago, Chad’s children, Maxim and Mila were baptized. This afternoon Chad and Azi intend to participate in the Membership Orientation and become members of our church. We rejoice in their decision to quench their thirst for God by being born anew in the Spirit and becoming members of our church family. And I rejoice and thank God for the honor of baptizing Azi. In all the long years of my ministry, this is the first time I have baptized a Muslim! Our spirits thirst for God. Jesus used water as an illustration of our need of God. Astronauts in space look down on the earth. What color is earth? Blue. As far as we know, planet Earth is the only blue planet—2/3 covered with water. Two men crossed the Atlantic Ocean on the Queen Elizabeth. One evening they sat on the top deck surrounded by 360 degrees of water. The moon reflected brightly off the water. One impressively said, "Look at all that water!" The other looked around and said, "Yeah, and that's only the top!" Survival-course teachers warn their students that while they can exist for weeks, even a month, without food, unless they find water in four or five days, they are doomed. We are dependent on water. Life without water is impossible. It is the vast oceans of our world that have made it possible for life forms to develop on our planet. The word water comes from the Arabic word for luster and splendor. Not only is the sight of water refreshing, the sound of water is relaxing and renewing. Water is nature's jewelry. Water is the sparkling, transparent elixir of life. Jesus used water as an illustration of our need of God. Our bodies thirst for water. Our spirits thirst for God. Water is used in baptism which we witnessed earlier to symbolize there is no life without God. In today’s Scripture lesson, Jesus was traveling through Samaria. Samaria was a region between Judah in the south and Galilee in the north. Jews had no dealings with Samaritans stemming from a Civil War centuries before. Then Samaria was conquered and invaded by Assyrians who settled down and married Samaritans. Not only were they enemies, Jews considered intermarriage an abomination. The mystery and wonder is that Jesus not only talked with a Samaritan, he talked with a woman and men did not talk with women publicly. Not only was she a woman, she was a woman of questionable reputation. We know she was ostracized by women of her community because she came to the well at noon! Other women would have come to the well at the beginning of the day. This woman had to come by herself, but what a treat was in store for her! The conversation with the Samaritan woman at the well is the longest recorded conversation with Jesus in the Bible. And, in John's Gospel, the first person to learn that Jesus was the Messiah, was not a Jew, not a man, but a woman, a Samaritan woman, a woman of questionable reputation, a woman who was ostracized by the other women of the community, and she was a woman who was not intimidated by Jesus. When Jesus talked about living water, she said, “Where do you get water? You don’t even have a bucket. Do you think you are better than our ancestor Jacob?” Jesus broke all the rules, which Jesus loved to do. He offered this impudent Samaritan woman living water! With words of mystery and wonder, Jesus said, “Everyone who drinks of this water (perhaps pointing to the well and her bucket,) will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing fountains of eternal life.” Never thirsty again! When we realize how dependent we are on water for life, we can understand why droughts frighten us! May we be as concerned about spiritual drought. Spiritual drought is not as obvious as our need for water. We know when we are thirsty. There are obvious signs-- the throat is dry, then parched, energy lags, fatigue strikes, the head begins to ache, dehydration leads to illness. The signs of spiritual drought are not as apparent but they are recognizable-- lack of joy, bitterness, resentment, anger, feeling sorry for ourselves, loneliness, isolation, self-centeredness, turning in on one's self, greed, excessive competition, and feeling disconnected from our roots so we shrivel up, dry up like a prune-- wrinkled and comatose! Spiritual drought! The good news is there is water to drink, living water gushing up to eternal life. The incident with the woman at the well began with Jesus asking her for a drink of water. Jesus was thirsty. Jesus needed help. He had no bucket with which to draw the water out of the well. Jesus was in need. Maybe that surprises you. Maybe you thought God was self-sufficient, independent, not needing anything from us! Imagine! Jesus needed water. Jesus needed a bucket. God has needs. God needs your worship. God needs your love. In the book of sermons, God's Trombones, James Weldon Johnson images God sitting down on a rock after the earth, vegetation, and animals were created, and saying, "I'm lonely. I'll make me a man." God wants a relationship with you. The heart of Christianity is not an intellectual understanding of God. The heart of Christianity is a relationship with God. Sound familiar? I preached it last Sunday! Our spirits thirst for a relationship with God. We were created to be in relationship with God. When we are disconnected from God, our spirits thirst, a spiritual drought. To thirsty people, Jesus comes with a drink of water, a drink of the Holy Spirit, and says, "Those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty." When I was a youth, I liked to go to the Red Rock summer camp meeting, which was a gathering of old-time Methodists who preached the second blessing. According to John Wesley, our relationship with God is a two-step dance: salvation and sanctification. Salvation is the experience of being saved by Christ when we confess our sins and receive Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. Sanctification is the experience of being sanctified when we commit our lives wholly and completely to God, when we ask the Holy Spirit to sanctify us, to make us holy disciples, to drink deeply of the living water so that we will be never thirsty again. Take a drink of living water. Notice what happens when you drink water. You can't talk! Probably what is hardest for people today is to be silent. We surround ourselves with noise, and even when we pray, we talk God to death! Be silent. Listen. Take time. Drink slowly. Sip, savor, enjoy. Take deep breaths. Visualize Jesus giving you living water and then hugging you. Visualize Jesus looking you in the eye, and telling you, "I love you. I want to fill you with the Holy Spirit." Drink it in. Let the Holy Spirit flow through your mind, flow your body to the tip of your toes. Hold nothing back. Without reservation, let the living water flow through you to every dried up place, every prune, every problem, heartache, worry, sin, and shame. Let the living water cleanse, purify you and fill your entire being with peace, joy, and thirst-quenching living water. © 2023 Douglas I. Norris |