Amid enormous uncertainty, and great fear for what is coming next regarding the Corona virus outbreak, it is comforting to hear Jesus speak with the Samaritan woman. He explains to her that the water that is from Jesus, the living water, which we access in baptism, enables us to have a “spring of water welling up to eternal life.” Indeed, the living water is the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.
One of the themes that occur throughout the Bible is God choosing the most unlikely people to be His messengers of salvation. Jesus continues this trend as he chooses fisherman, a tax collector, and a zealot as part of his inner circle of disciples. Today, we read about an extremely unlikely interaction as Jesus encounters a Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well.
The Jews and the Samaritans had a contentious relationship, even to the point of armed conflict at times. There was a deep division between them, especially as it relates to where the true temple was.
Jesus mentions, as he speaks with the Samaritan woman, that she has had five husbands and is currently with a man who is not her husband. Jesus is engaging with someone who is not only an enemy of the Jewish people, but who has also, most likely, been cast out by her own people. As the disciples return and see Jesus speaking with her, they are surprised. It is then that the woman leaves her water jar behind and goes into the town and invites those who are there to come and see.
While she is out in the town proclaiming the gospel to all who will listen, the disciples fuss over Jesus and insist that he eat, and when Jesus refuses, they begin to wonder if someone else has beat them to the punch and fed Jesus while they were not looking.
Jesus, as he always does, uses this as a teaching moment for his flock. Jesus lets the disciples know that he receives his sustenance from doing the will of the Father. Then he says this, “Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for harvest. Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and 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.”
Immediately after Jesus says this, John tells us more about the Samaritan woman’s testimony to the town. Because of her testimony, because of her evangelism, many from that town decide to drop what they are doing and go to meet Jesus. Jesus and his disciples stay there for two more days, and more and more people believe in him. More and more people receive the living water that is Jesus.
Often, I see disciples of Jesus, in the Bible and today, taking too much time to act, overthinking the task before them, and becoming paralyzed by over-analysis. The Samaritan woman, however, completely understands Jesus’s call. She recognizes that Jesus’s invitation to accept him, as the messiah, is not an individual call for her only, but a community-wide call to all the Samaritans in the nearby town. In accepting Jesus, and receiving the living water that is his word, she is remade, reborn, and becomes the laborer Jesus needs to bring in the harvest.
The Samaritan women labors, without a strategic plan, without fear of failing, and through total faith in Jesus. Because of this, Jesus tells his disciples, “Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.” The harvest is being brought to Jesus and to the disciples, by this unlikely ally, so that they may enter into the harvest, and bring more disciples into their fold. John then tells us many more believed in Jesus, and the Samaritans declared that Jesus, a Jew, their rival, is “indeed the Savior of the world.”
Jesus uses an unlikely ally to make new Christians. Today, we have an unlikely ally helping us engage the world in a way that we, the church, and we at Redeemer, have only scratched the surface. Today as we livestream, and this week as we continue to have Redeemer’s Online Campus meet the needs of our community here, and far off, remember this is a time to let everyone know how much each of us needs Jesus. We have an opportunity this week for the church to make many new Christians, an opportunity to allow Jesus to make this a teaching moment for us.
Jesus says today, “the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” Jesus tells us that we do not need to be in the temple proper to worship him. While it is the bounden duty of all Christians to be present in Church for the sabbath Mass, whether it be Saturday night or Sunday morning, we must not forget that the temple of the Holy Spirit is humanity itself, and we must protect that temple in times of great concern, times like today. Take heart, and worship the Lord in spirit, wherever you are, take time to give yourself to Jesus, all your fear, anxiety, anger, frustration, happiness, and joy; place them at the feet of Our Lord. We continue to be the Church, even when we are unable to meet in the building we call the church, never forget this, and as we continue to navigate through these uncertain times, hold Jesus close, be empowered by the Holy Spirit, and keep laboring for Our Lord. Remember, he will often use the most unlikely people and situations to build up the Kingdom of God.
Sermon preached by the Rev. Christian M. Wood
Church of the Redeemer
Sarasota Florida
3rd Sunday of Lent
15 March 2020