Water

The hour was about noon.  When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Give me water to drink.”  The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew.  How can you ask me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?”

            Jesus replied: “If only you recognized God’s gift, and who it is that is asking you for a drink, you would have asked him instead, and he would have given you living water.”  …

            “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again.  But whoever drinks the water I give him will never be thirsty; no, the water I give shall become a fountain within him, leaping up to provide eternal life.” 

This brief excerpt comes from the longest conversation Jesus held with an individual that we have recorded in scripture; the Samaritan woman at the well.  John 4:4-42.

She walks to the well at noon, the least likely time others will be there.  She can avoid others.  Others can avoid her.  She lives anonymously with a poor reputation.  She is the village benchmark for “failure.”

Standing at the well in the mid-day sun, Jesus takes the first step.  He ignores the custom never to speak to such a woman in public.  In the center of town in broad daylight, he initiates conversation.  She is the wrong gender, the wrong culture, has a scandalous reputation.  Jesus offers living water.  She doesn’t ask.  Jesus has no “failure” category.

Jesus knows her past and offers her a future of new life!  He makes the offering visible to her and to us in so many ways!

Water is quite unique in that in its solid form, ice; it floats on its liquid form.  Would it not be for this unusual property, life as we know it would not exist on earth.  Most solid forms are denser than their liquid forms and sink in their liquids (i.e. Frozen solid alcohol sinks in liquid alcohol.  It does not float.)  Plankton, the most prolific food source on earth, depends upon ice floating and insulating the waters below it so that organisms may grow and multiply.  If this was not the case, lakes and oceans would freeze from the bottom up and life would eventually cease.  New life springs from these waters!  Our lives spring from the waters Jesus offers!

The human body is over 65% water.  We are basically bodies of running water.  We take it in.  It runs through us.  We’re physically integrated into the universe, into creation.

 During his baptism, did Jesus lay back into the hands of the Baptist as if he was surrendering, dying?  Did the water smother the sins of the human race as Jesus submerged?  And when John lifted Jesus’ head from the water, was the face of Jesus beaming with life and joy?  Father, Son, and Holy Spirit were all present at baptism – new life revealed, given freely!

Water can …

Introduce the Holy Spirit, baptize

Wash away sin

Drown, overwhelm

Quench thirst

Extinguish fire

Carry us

Wash away disease, heal

Form tears

Bless

Dissolve flavor

Sooth, comfort, refresh

Storms, flood

Green our deserts

Trickle, fall, splash

Be converted to wine

Water is so pervasive, its rarity like its sacredness escapes us.

            Water connects us to the Divine!

When the wine ran short, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.”  And Jesus said to her, “Woman, how does your concern affect me?  My hour has not yet come.”  His mother said to the servers, “Do whatever he tells you.”  ….

     Jesus did this as the beginning of his signs at Cana in Galilee and so revealed his glory, and his disciples began to believe in him.  John 2:1-11.

The disciples only began to believe in Him.  Though Jesus converted the water to wine during the intimate ceremony of the wedding feast, this act was not enough!  I, too, am like the disciples, only beginning this process of coming to build a relationship with Jesus.  I, like the Samaritan woman, like the guests at the wedding feast; I need the waters Jesus offers.  AND I need it in its many forms and actions; to savor it, see it, feel it, hear it.  I need to accept it, relish it often. 

“Do whatever he tells you!”