Sermon for the Third Sunday in Lent

February 24, 2008

Exodus 17:1–7
Psalm 95
Romans 5:1–11
John 4:5–42
Year A
I.N.I. (In the name of Jesus)

Today’s gospel begins a series of three stories in three weeks designed to deepen our conversion to baptismal waters.

Since ancient times, these stories were told to adult catechumens as a demonstration of Jesus’ call to living waters (today, about the woman at the well), a call to healing of soul, body, and spirit (next week, about healing the blind man), and a call to the new life that is beyond death (in two weeks, about the raising of Lazarus from death).

In the ancient practices now reclaimed, this progression of stories, with its accompanying rites of welcome and preparation, come to a climax at the Three Days that lead to Easter, and are sealed at the Vigil of Easter in the culminating act of immersion into the church’s bathtub, the font, where the newborn neophyte emerges as a totally converted part of the community. Dying to sin, rising to new life. Rejecting the world’s wiles, and affirming love of God and neighbor. Or my favorite image, rubbing shoulders with others who are alive in the Spirit, so that the Spirit can be passed around as in the kiss of peace.

This ancient process of prayer and renewal has been so compelling, that others who are already part of the church, already baptized, want to take part in it themselves, like it was so wonderful the first time that we want to experience it again. Or, on the other hand, we are so forgetful and distracted from the ways of God that we use the time of Lent to reclaim our identity in the community of the baptized.

Conversion, therefore becomes not a linear progression from point A heathen/evil doer to point B Christian/holy roller, but an ongoing, up and down, round and round, process of becoming grounded in who we are meant to be, and when we turn aside away, come to the Third Sunday in Lent, we turn around, return to the font, reclaim the grace and love of God.

Rather than coming to faith from nowhere kind of conversion, it’s more like a conversion van, where something that’s already there gets a total makeover. Or like an outdated piece of technology that with the aid of a converter, becomes more vivid.

You may have noticed this long gospel today, that has the longest extended conversation between Jesus and anybody, and in this case, the body was that of a woman (red flag: Strange and lonely men do not speak with strange and lonely women, really, there were no chat rooms in Jesus’ day, only arranged marriages and social connections based on who you knew). And this woman was a Samaritan (red flag: the Jewish community of that day thought Samaritans to be some kind of kooks, people who claimed to worship the same God but were more like third cousins, twice removed, who didn’t have a clue). So you have a woman (red flag #1) who was a Samaritan (red flag #2), and the time was the middle of the day (#3), when the local watering hole would be deserted, because it was really hot, and no self-respecting woman would traipse to get her supply of water (early morning or late at evening would be better, socially respectable, and practical), so this woman was avoiding contact with others because of her reputation.

So anyway, what’s up with Jesus and this woman?

In this story, every time the social conventions and religious assumptions get obliterated in the action and conversation at that well (red flags be damned), the woman gets drawn in seeing something that she did not see before. Every time, the woman, who gets credit for hanging in there rather than running away or dismissing this crazy guy who asks her for a drink, every time she offers an opinion or an observation or asks a question, Jesus creates a space for conversion.

Forget the water from this well, I’ve got living water.
Forget your thirst for this standing well water, I’ve got water that gushes and gives life forever.
Forget locating your hopes on this mountain or that city, but set your sights on something that is beyond and above your experience.
Forget your waiting for the Messiah, he’s right here in front of you.
At the end of the story, the converted woman of Samaria leaves her water jug empty and runs to the village to share this living water, no longer ashamed of herself or her choices, but something altogether new because of her encounter with the one who spoke truth and pointed to deeper truths, truths that satisfy hunger and thirst beyond a dry mouth at the heat of day.

Here’s what I want to know. Can I be filled up wherever I feel empty, if only I come to understand food and drink differently? Can I know my hunger and thirst for something more than this life, and discover the Christ right in front of me offering himself as living water?

More….What if we believe that God gives us all we need? What if we abandon the daily lugging of the water jug, and instead hang with Jesus, rather than run away or reject his invitation to eat and drink something that’s a lot more satisfying than what we’re eating and drinking usually?

What if we stopped our complaining about what we don’t have, making snap judgments about others’ life choices, and instead sought conversion to the ways of God that listen, really listen, and speak truth, deep truth, so that lines of battles become erased?

I’m a classic worry wart. My elementary school teachers wrote often, regularly on my report card overconscientious. I wonder too easily what others think of me. I must be crazy to be a pastor, where the classic cartoon shows the pastors family eating supper, and others passing by looking at them, as the family at the dinner table is contained in a huge fishbowl.

I am judged by the company I keep. As a “man of God,” people are looking for me as a paragon of virtue. People catch themselves swearing when I walk in a room.

I don’t want to be known as a goody two shoes. I don’t want simply to be liked. What I want, in my heart of hearts, is to be connected to a life that meaningful and true and not rich in things, but in relationships, in reconciliation, and in a mutual turning toward God’s call to new life.

If you agree, then maybe together we can be on the road to conversion.

Like in the story of the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well, this may mean obliterating a few social conventions. This may mean conversation with people who we wouldn’t think we would get much out of, only to be surprised as we spend time with them. This may mean that in our church, in this church, we hang with each other and with Jesus in a way to understand more clearly what we are doing to quench thirsts and satisfy hungers. This may happen through a tool called NCD, Natural Church Development. This may happen as we improve communication and media in our publications, website, and corner sign.

But it will only happen if all of us allow our awareness of Christ right in front of us to change us, so that we are no longer Samaritan women, pastors in a fish bowl, or whatever you feel you are, but all children of God full and satisfied with the living water welling up to eternal life.

I.N.I.

The Rev. Timothy J. Keyl, Pastor
Christ the King Lutheran Church
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