A “giving up 200 words for Lent” post

A woman told Jesus she wasn’t married. He agreed and described her marriage history: five husbands, living with a sixth man.

She was impressed with his abilities to describe her life. She started a theology conversation.

Eventually she said, “When the Messiah comes, he’ll explain what to do about worshiping God.” Jesus said, “you are talking to him.”

She ran to get her friends.

Jesus didn’t tell her to change behavior. He wanted her to know who he was. Then, maybe, she wouldn’t keep looking for his love in others’ arms.

He’s still working that way.

His people often don’t.

Jesus asks for a drink

An unnamed woman can’t believe he’s asking.

Jesus says, “If you knew more about me, you’d be asking me for a drink. Of living water.”

She says, in order,

1. You have nothing to draw water with.
2. The well is deep.
3. Where is living water?
4. Are you better than Jacob, our ancestor, who actually watered generations of sheep from this well?

Jesus is making an unorthodox claim and she is trying to figure out what it means. Her responses to Jesus were practical, historical, and appropriate.

Jesus follows up by differentiating between regular water and living water.  With living water you won’t get thirsty. In fact, you will end up with a spring inside that will make you live forever.

That’s what it sounds like. Peculiar.

Unless, of course, you are sitting next to a well in the middle of the morning talking to someone who is coming to the well at a time different than everyone else, perhaps because she is looking for something that will satisfy a deeper thirst.

This unnamed woman, after all, remains involved in the conversation with Jesus. She is tracking through it. It is making sense to her.

How can we tell?

Because she wants some of that water, that soul-satisfying, thirst-quenching, free-flowing water. She asks for it.

It’s easy to forget, steeped in church as we are, lost in structures and steeples and sanctuaries and ceremonies, that Jesus wasn’t selling or recruiting or promoting. He wasn’t convincing or conniving or cajoling.

He was offering what people wanted, deep down, but never hoped that they would actually find.

And he did it without scolding.

How do we know? Because of where this story goes next.

But while we wait for that turn, just a thought:

What are you thirsty for?

Jesus was heading to Galilee, to home.

He was heading away from Jerusalem, away from controversy with religious people. In the process, he walked right into the middle of religious controversy.

He had to go through Samaria.

Samaritans were regarded by Jews as half-breeds, as spiritual wanna-bes. Jews were regarded by Samaritans as uppity, as arrogant, as holier-than-thou.

I tried to think of a way to imagine that trip. Here’s as close as I can get. It would be like a Catholic priest walking into Protestant bar in Northern Ireland during the Troubles and asking for a drink. Religion, politics, prejudice.

Jesus, of course, knew exactly what he was doing. He wasn’t looking for trouble. He wasn’t wanting to start a fight.

He was wanting to start a conversation. He went to Samaria and stopped by a well and sent his disciples into town for food because he knew a woman was coming to get water and he wanted to talk with her.

Ah, but that’s a problem, too. A Jewish man talking with a Samaritan woman. And a rabbi at that.

What would people think? What would people say? What would it do to his reputation if anyone found out?

Jesus didn’t care much about what people thought. He cared about people. And he cared about this particular woman that no one else cared much about. And he made the conversation simple by sitting at a well that would provide a common point of conversation.

This was Jacob’s well. The same Jacob that was called Israel. The same Jacob that the Samaritans and Jews went back to.

Jesus met her exactly where she was living. He didn’t make her come to where he was living. And he asked her for help.

I’m pretty sure he still works that way.

—

Sorry to miss yesterday. I need to have a migraine post that shows up automatically when I can’t show up. But I’m all better now.

John had a niche. He was “the rough looking baptizing” guy. Everyone knew who he was. He had lots of business. (Apparently, many people had to repent.)

Suddenly, there was competition. Jesus and his disciples started baptizing nearby.

John’s disciples came to him and started to complain. “Rabbi,” they said. “That guy you were talking with. He’s getting all the attention.”

“That’s the point.”

John takes many more words, but that’s what he really says.

It still happens. Jesus does something and takes the attention from us.

Our hearts say, “He’s getting all the attention.”

That’s the point. It’s his.