Third Sunday of Lent (Year A)
Sunday, March 19, 2017
Theme: Living Water
Reflection: Today’s lessons brought me back to a workshop I attended in early 2015, just after I joined
our church council. The presenter was Rev. Dr. Eric Law, from the Kaleidoscope
Institute in Los Angeles (http://www.kscopeinstitute.org),
speaking about sustainable churches – strengthening relationships internally
and with the broader communities we serve.
The
discussion was just one piece of a day of meaningful worship, planning with new
council members, idea-sharing with other churches and fellowship. I returned
inspired.
But the one
point of the day that stuck with me, and continues to do so, is summed up in
four words: Don’t stop the flow.
Eric Law said
the Body of Christ needs to support the gifts within the church and in the
surrounding area: the flow of resources getting to the right places, the flow
of truth allowing leaders to act, the flow of relationship letting people get
things done, and so on. Each of these “Holy Currencies,” eight in all, Law
said, are part of the kingdom at work.
We stop the
flow when any groups of people are left out of the conversation. We stop the
flow when sources of funds are left on the table. We stop the flow when facts
are not shared that result in poor decision making. And on and on. As we
discussed, Eric Law kept coming back to these four words: “Don’t stop the
flow.”
Jesus would
have liked Eric Law. Paul and Moses and the Psalmist, too.
Moses led the
Israelites into the wilderness. The goodness of God provided them with safety,
sweet water and manna. Now, once again, the Israelites were grumbling. They
were thirsty. Instead of taking heart from a pattern of God’s provision, they
were fighting and making Moses feel threatened. He appealed to God, and water
and the Israelites’ trust kept flowing.
The Psalmist
encouraged the people to keep praising and obeying, rather than becoming
hard-hearted. For losing faith in God would stop the flow.
Don’t block
the flow by getting hung up on works and differences, Paul told the Romans.
Grace is a free gift, accessible to all by faith. God’s love is the supreme
“Holy Currency” poured out to all.
And then
comes the model of the flow himself – Jesus. His disciples left him at Jacob’s
well to go get lunch. It was mid-day and they figured Jesus could use a couple
hours of rest. Women, the family water-gatherers, already had come to draw
water in the cool of the morning. They wouldn’t return for hours. No one would
want to walk miles carrying water in the mid-day sun.
Unless a
woman wanted to be alone.
Jesus and the
Samaritan woman probably surprised each other. The woman expected to get her
water and be on her way. Jesus, resting, expected hours of down time. Seeing a
Jewish man, the woman said nothing and began to pump her water.
“Give me a
drink.”
The flow
would have stopped between the woman and any Jewish person, especially a Jewish
man. But not Jesus. He saw the woman, not as an enemy, but as a child of God,
yearning to be seen and have a purpose. Jesus engaged her in a conversation
about living water, and her life. She was so impressed with her encounter with
Jesus that she brought her village, first to meet Jesus, and then to believe in
him as the Messiah. John’s first evangelist was a Samaritan woman!
Jesus never
stops the flow. Not ever. She’s a woman and Samaritan. To Jesus, that’s not an
obstacle, it is a possibility.
Blind?
Deaf-mute? Lame? Leper? Dead? None of these stops Jesus from healing them and
bringing them into community. Jesus himself, crucified and buried? Nothing
stops the flow.
If death
itself didn’t stop the flow of life and love for Jesus, what is stopping us
from reaching out to our neighbors? Is it money, resources, time, energy,
leadership, divisions?
If we truly
follow in the way of our Lord, we can overcome any obstacle that stands in the
way of loving and caring for our neighbors.
Just don’t
stop the flow.
Faith App: It is easy to get bogged down in our
suffering, starting our day with the challenges and “musts” of the day ahead.
This week, start each day with contemplation and words of gratitude, as Richard
Rohr says, praying “until you come to Yes.”
HYMN/SONG SUGGESTIONS
I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say,
ELW
332/611
Glorious Things of You Are Spoken, ELW 647
Praise the One Who Breaks the Darkness,
ELW 843
As the Deer Runs to the River, ELW 331
Tree of Life and Awesome Mystery, ELW 334
O Blessed Spring, ELW 447
Crashing Waters at Creation, ELW 455
Guide Me Ever, Great Redeemer, ELW 618
When Pain of the World Surrounds Us, ELW 704
Spring of Life, Kristian
Stanfill
In this life we will find
We will be yearning
In this life we will find
The world won't satisfy
In this life we will find
That we will be empty
Without you
Chorus
Jesus you're the well
That won't run dry
Jesus you're the drink
That satisfies
Living water spring of life
Jesus you're the well
That won't run dry
The Well, Casting
Crowns
40 Days, Matt Maher
Faithful, Chris Tomlin
Sovereign Over Us, Michael W. Smith
LESSONS
Exodus 17:1-7 Strike
the rock, and water will come out of it, so that the people may drink.
Psalm 95 Do not harden your
hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness.
Romans 5:1-11 God’s
love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.
John 4:5-42 Jesus said to her, “Those who drink of the
water that I will give them will never be thirsty.”
Summary of
the Lessons: Everyone endures challenges in this life – it
is part of our human condition. Our suffering is not God’s will or punishment
or a test. Our maturity as disciples can be seen in our character in our
trials: do we quarrel, grumble, or become hardened, or do we keep looking for
God’s living water and let it flow through us?
OPENING LITANY based on Psalm 95
L: Gather round,
everyone, and join in the song;
C: Sing out in worship to
our God beyond compare.
L: Praise to the sculptor
of Denali and Death Valley --
C: Praise to the artist
of the Great Plains and Great Lakes.
L: Gather together, to
our Creator give thanks,
C: The source and
supplier of our living water;
L: Every day, providing
all that we require –
C: Watchful over us as a
shepherd with a flock.
L: Gather and listen, be
grateful for God’s gifts;
C: Not like the
Israelites at Meribah and Massah,
L: Demanding and
disobedient, God left them to wander –
C: Forty years in the
desert, outside the Promised Land.
CONFESSION
L: Lord, how lost we
become when our hearts go astray,
C: When we’re dry in our
suffering, alone with our pain,
L: Bring us to the living
water of community and hope,
C: Send us your presence,
the Lord among us again.
L: Lord, how weary we are
when we’re on the outside,
C: Worn from the journey,
yet finding no place to rest;
L: Bring us to the living
water of inclusion and grace,
C: In your Body show us
the Lord among us again.
L: Lord, we are bitter
when we harden our hearts,
C: Grumbling to the
world, and miserable inside.
L: Bring us to the living
water of reconciling and joy.
C: By your love we will know the Lord among us again.
(Silent
reflection)
L: In our confession, we
pray together,
C: Most Merciful God …
You’ve never failed to provide everything we need. But leave it to us to
quarrel and test you, complaining that you didn’t quench our thirst soon
enough, or fill our buckets full enough. So we wander away again and again,
running after today’s splashy and sparkly things that leave us empty tomorrow.
Lead us back to your living waters, Lord, and satisfy us in body, mind and
spirit.
Hear this
Good News: God’s love has been poured
into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. We are
reconciled with God through the life, death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Your sin has been forgiven, washed away in the flood of God’s grace.
In the name
of…
Amen.
PRAYER OF THE DAY
L: We pray together,
C: Faithful God … Thank you that your
grace-filled living water is an artesian spring: pure, refreshing and
everlasting. Surprise us with its abundance, God, as you wash us clean and
satisfy us, reassuring us that you always are with us. Then send us out,
overflowing with compassion for your people and all creation. Amen.
COMMUNION BLESSING
L: We pray together,
C: We give you thanks, most gracious God, for
the wellspring of joy in this bread, the fountain of grace in this cup. Send us out, filled to overflowing from this
meal, so we cannot help but let your love flow through us, covering everyone we
reach throughout our week ahead. Amen.
SENDING
L: Make a joyful noise to the Lord!
C: Dive deep into Christ’s living water;
L: Bathe in the pool of abundant grace;
C: And splash God’s love everywhere!
L:
Go now, refreshed and restored, to love and to serve the Lord.
C:
Thanks be to God!
First Reading Exodus
17:1-7 (NRSV)
Setting
the Scene: Moses
has led the people away from Egypt, and through the Red Sea. God has provided
manna to eat and sweetened the bitter water. By now, the Israelites should have
gained some trust in God’s provision.
From the wilderness of Sin the whole congregation of the
Israelites journeyed by stages, as the LORD commanded. They camped at Rephidim,
but there was no water for the people to drink. The people quarreled with
Moses, and said, “Give us water to drink.” Moses said to them, “Why do you
quarrel with me? Why do you test the LORD?” But the people thirsted there for
water; and the people complained against Moses and said, “Why did you bring us
out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and livestock with thirst?” So Moses
cried out to the LORD, “What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready
to stone me.” The LORD said to Moses, “Go on ahead of the people, and take some
of the elders of Israel with you; take in your hand the staff with which you
struck the Nile, and go. I will be standing there in front of you on the rock
at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it, so that the people
may drink.” Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. He called the
place Massah and Meribah, because the Israelites quarreled and tested the LORD,
saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?”
Second Reading Romans 5:1-11 (NRSV)
Setting
the Scene: Paul
continues to teach the fledgling church at Rome the basics of Christian
beliefs, that works aren’t the way to gain God’s grace.
Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with
God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this
grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that
suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character
produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been
poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.
For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for
the ungodly. Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person—though
perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die. But God proves
his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us. Much
more surely then, now that we have been justified by his blood, will we be
saved through him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies, we were
reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more surely, having been
reconciled, will we be saved by his life. But more than that, we even boast in
God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received
reconciliation.
Gospel John 4:5-42 (NRSV)
Setting
the Scene: Our
Lenten sojourn into the Gospel of John continues. After Jesus talks with
Nicodemus, he and the disciples leave Judea and head for Galilee, taking them
through the rival territory of Samaria. But again, Jesus sees people differently.
So he came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of
ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and
Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon.
A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her,
“Give me a drink.” (His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) The
Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a
woman of Samaria?” (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.) Jesus
answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to
you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you
living water.” The woman said to him, “Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is
deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our ancestor
Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?”
Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water 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 up to
eternal life.” The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may
never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”
Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come back.” The
woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying,
‘I have no husband’; for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now
is not your husband. What you have said is true!” The woman said to him, “Sir,
I see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you
say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.” Jesus said to
her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father
neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You worship what you do not know; we
worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming,
and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and
truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him. God is spirit, and
those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” The woman said to him,
“I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When he comes, he will
proclaim all things to us.” Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one who is
speaking to you.”
Just then his disciples came. They were astonished that he was
speaking with a woman, but no one said, “What do you want?” or, “Why are you
speaking with her?” Then the woman left her water jar and went back to the city.
She said to the people, “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever
done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?” They left the city and were on their
way to him.
Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, “Rabbi, eat something.”
But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” So the
disciples said to one another, “Surely no one has brought him something to
eat?” Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete
his work. Do you not say, ‘Four months more, then comes the harvest’? But I
tell you, look around you, and see how the fields are ripe for harvesting. The
reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so
that sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, ‘One
sows and another reaps.’ I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor.
Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.”
Many Samaritans from
that city believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything
I have ever done.” So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay
with them; and he stayed there two days. And many more believed because of his
word. They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we
believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world."
