“Then the woman left her water jar
and went back to the city.”
While many of us know that Lent
is a time of fasting,
its ancient focus and purpose
has largely gotten lost
in popular portrayals —
and devotions.
Lent is not a six-week meditation
on Jesus’ crucifixion.
Nor is it a six-week meditation
on how bad we are
and all the things wrong
we’ve ever done.
The season of Lent focuses us again
on re-learning how to live as one of Jesus’ disciples.
Fasting, the most well known practice,
is done so that we’re ready to meet Jesus
by the well,
to meet him by the font
at the Easter Vigil.
In today’s text from John
Jesus is by a well.
It’s noon, and his disciples have gone into the city
to buy food.
A Samaritan woman,
someone Jewish folk would have seen
as ritually unclean
because of their ethnic lineage
and different worship patterns
comes to draw water.
It’s noon and she’s alone,
but drawing water is usually
a morning and evening activity
done in groups.
Jesus asks her for a drink
which astounds her.
A man is initiating conversation
with a woman
and they’re kinds of people
who do not get along or share.
Jesus tells her
that if she knew who was asking for water
she would have asked for living water.
In a typical fashion of John
there’s a miscommunication that leads to confusion.
She thinks he’s offering her
water that flows
rather than from a cistern!
Except he doesn’t have a bucket.
Jesus uses this miscommunication
to get more explicit.
“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.”
A spring of water gushing up to eternal life
sounds pretty great to this woman,
though she’s still focused on the well
on literal water.
She’s asked for living water,
but Jesus still wants her to know
that he is the living water
that he is the Messiah
whose existence and teaching
lead to eternal life.
To use her words,
Jesus tells her everything she’s ever done.
We don’t know what she’s had five husbands
nor who this new sixth paramor is.
What we know is that her life
is one on the margins
for whatever reasons.
We see this in her coming at noon
and not in the morning.
We see this in her coming to the well alone
and not with the other women of the town
who need to get water too.
In the way that he knows her
this woman knows Jesus
is at least a prophet.
She asks him about worship
and who is doing it right.
While he gives her an answer,
it’s basically that it doesn’t matter.
She understands that!
A prophet-like-Moses is coming back
and will teach them the true right ways
of worshiping God
and of following God’s commandments.
Having taught her about living water,
gotten her to ask for it,
shown her who that he knows her
Jesus then tells her
that he is that prophet.
He is the Messiah.
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.
Jesus is the living water
who knows everything we’ve ever done
and calls us still to the well
of that living water.
The season of Lent focuses us again
on re-learning how to live as one of Jesus’ disciples.
Fasting, the most well known practice,
is done so that we’re ready to meet Jesus
by the well,
to meet him by the font
at the Easter Vigil.
We confess mightily on Ash Wednesday
and pray deeply on the First Sunday in Lent
with the Great Litany.
Jesus has come to bring us
and to be for us
a spring of water
gushing up to eternal life.
Last week we heard
about needing to be born from above
by water and the Spirit.
We’re working our way to the font
the womb of the church.
Today we’re hearing about gushing,
living water,
Jesus’s life and teaching.
Next week we’ll hear
about a man being sent to wash in a pool
and then receiving his sight.
If we need to be reminded of the Good News
of Jesus the Christ,
it’s here.
God dwelling among us
bringing salvation to creation
Jesus is here.
From that reminder
when we have the living water
that gushes, bubbles, and burbles
we’re expected to leave our jars too,
go into town,
and tell people what we’ve experienced.
It’s been a bleak week
if we have our eyes on how our trans siblings
are being portrayed in media
and by legislators.
In some places trans panic
is bleeding into attacks on queerness in general.
It’s been a bleak 18 months
for women’s healthcare choices.
Some places seem committed to hiding the truth
about who our country has been
from its founding
and committed to shutting down
those who would work
for us to live up to our failed ideals.
Belief in Jesus,
even belief that leads to changed behaviors
doesn’t automatically or magically
fix any of that.
Drinking deeply of Jesus
God made flesh dwelling among us
a spring of water gushing up to eternal life
isn’t an easy way out.
It does, however, refresh us.
It keeps us cool and focused
refreshed in the face of bleakness
so that we can go out to love our neighbors
and show them God’s love.
Then the woman left her water jar
and went back to the city. Amen.