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Sunday, July 27, 2008
Water Walking and Reaching Out
8th in a series on The Uniqueness of the Gospel of John
By Rev. Dr. Harvey C. Martz
John 4:1-30 The Good News Bible
1 The Pharisees heard that Jesus was winning and baptizing more disciples than John
2 Actually, Jesus himself did not baptize anyone; only his disciples did.) 3 So when Jesus heard what was being said, he left Judea and went back to Galilee; 4 on his way there he had to go through Samaria.
5 In Samaria he came to a town named Sychar, which was not far from the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob's well was there, and Jesus, tired out by the trip, sat down by the well. It was about noon. 7 (A Samaritan woman came to draw some water, and Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink of water. 8 His disciples had gone into town to buy food.) 9 The woman answered, "You are a Jew, and I am a Samaritan—so how can you ask me for a drink?" (Jews will not use the same cups and bowls that Samaritans use.)
10 Jesus answered, "If you only knew what God gives and who it is that is asking you for a drink, you would ask him, and he would give you life-giving water."
11 "Sir," the woman said, "you don't have a bucket, and the well is deep. Where would you get that life-giving water? 12 it was our ancestor Jacob who gave us this well; he and his children and his flocks all drank from it. You don't claim to be greater than Jacob, do you?" 13 Jesus answered, "Those who drink this water will get thirsty again,
14 but those who drink the water that I will give them will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give them will become in them a spring which will provide them with life-giving water and give them eternal life."
15 "Sir," the woman said, "give me that water! Then I will never be thirsty again, nor will I have to come here to draw water." 16 "Go and call your husband," Jesus told her, "and come back." 17 "I don't have a husband," she answered. Jesus replied, "You are right when you say you don't have a husband. 18 You have been married to five men, and the man you live with now is not really your husband. You have told me the truth."
19 "I see you are a prophet, sir," the woman said. 20 "My Samaritan ancestors worshiped God on this mountain, but you Jews say that Jerusalem is the place where we should worship God." 21 Jesus said to her, "Believe me, woman, the time will come when people will not worship the Father either on this mountain or in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans do not really know whom you worship; but we Jews know whom we worship, because it is from the Jews that salvation comes. 23 But the time is coming and is already here, when by the power of God's Spirit people will worship the Father as he really is, offering him the true worship that he wants. 24 God is Spirit, and only by the power of his Spirit can people worship him as he really is."
25 The woman said to him, "I know that the Messiah will come, and when he comes, he will tell us everything." 26 Jesus answered, "I am he, I who am talking with you."
27 At that moment Jesus' disciples returned, and they were greatly surprised to find him talking with a woman. But none of them said to her, "What do you want?" or asked him, "Why are you talking with her?"
28 Then the woman left her water jar, went back to the town, and said to the people there,
29 "Come and see the man who told me everything I have ever done. Could he be the Messiah?" 30 So they left the town and went to Jesus.
Today we are about halfway through the series of sermons on the Gospel of John and I hope you are enjoying some of the stories that are only in John’s Gospel—stories like the one we just heard which is never mentioned in Matthew, Mark or Luke, stories like the ones from the past two weeks in Cindy’s and Jerry’s excellent sermons on the woman brought to Jesus whom Jesus refused to condemn and the rich story of the blind man who became an advocate for Jesus when the legalists started to judge and criticize Jesus.
John’s gospel is different from all the others: Jesus tells people who he is: I am the light of the world, the bread of life, the good shepherd, the resurrection and in today’s passage—I am the living water who will quench the thirst you have that you try to satisfy in shallow things. John’s gospel has almost no parables but John has living Christ who tells us that if we love one another and learn to serve as he serves, then we will show that we are his followers—that is how people will know. We will remind ourselves of that when we commission our youth at the end of the 11:05 service for the fifth or sixth mission trip this summer!
Today’s story is full of scandal and is almost PG-13 rated. It would have been shocking for Jesus’ friends because Jesus is associating with the wrong kind of people again and is letting himself be seen as not religious enough, not pious enough, not reverent enough by the standards of the legalists.
Jesus and his friends have been in the area of Israel around Jerusalem and now they are headed back home to Galilee to the town of Capernaum which is his headquarters for most of his ministry. This is about a 70 mile trip and to get back there they have to travel through enemy territory—Samaria. They stopped in a Samaritan town and while his disciples leave him sitting on the cover of Jacob’s well they leave to go and buy food. It is noon time and when a Samaritan woman comes to the well to get some water Jesus asks her for a drink.
In that single sentence, Jesus has stepped across five boundaries and has created an enormous scandal with his disciples! Do you know what the five rules are that he has broken?
Who are the Samaritans? They represent 500 years of animosity between themselves and the Jews. They are some of the people who intermarried with pagans when the Assyrians conquered part of Israel and by intermarrying they broke God’s law. They were seen by religious Jews as mongrels, half breeds, impure. When the Jews returned to Jerusalem from exile in Babylon 500 years before Jesus, the Samaritans tried to prevent them from rebuilding the temple and the city. There is hatred now between Jews and Samaritans and that is the scandal in one of the most famous stories Jesus tells in the gospel of Luke about an injured man who was passed by when the ministers saw him lying on the road but his mortal enemy came by and helped him and paid for his recuperation. We know that story as the story of the Good Samaritan but in Jesus’ time there was no such thing.
Jesus and his friends have walked into Samaritan territory, he has stopped to sit at the well at noon, a woman comes there and he asks her for a drink from the jar she has brought with her. This is shocking. She is shocked. Jesus’ friends are shocked when they return.
Jesus has broken some rules. He is talking with a Samaritan. He is talking with a woman in public—an absolute no-no. Men did not talk with women in public! Women were looked down on. Jewish boys were taught this prayer as they grew up: I thank you God that you have not created me as a gentile or as a Samaritan or as a woman. Remember that when we see what this woman does at the end of the story. The third scandalous thing Jesus does is to ask her for a drink from the leather bucket she has brought with her—Jews and Samaritans certainly don’t drink from the same vessel. The fourth thing he does wrong is to humble himself by asking for her help. We already know by this chapter in John’s gospel that this is the messiah, the word of God incarnate, the savior of the world who has been sent into the world not to condemn the world but so that people might have LIFE. He is asking for help. Can you ask for help? It is important for us to be able to receive, to be in an interdependent relationship with people. None of us is self sufficient. None of us gets by without others helping us. Can you ask for help? Can you be a gracious receiver as well as a generous giver?
Now Jesus is sitting on the five foot diameter wooden well cover of historic Jacob’s well asking for help from a female who is his enemy—but there is one more scandal.
Why is she here all by herself at noon? The village well was a gathering place for the women of the village who would come there in the morning or evening not only to get water but also to visit, to talk together. She is here by herself at noon because she is an outcast. She could have been married five times and been a widow five times but the fact that she is living with a man she is not married to is a scandal in ancient times and Jesus accepts her and visits with her and even offers her the living water that will quench her thirst forever. He honors her and is gracious with her. This is so like Jesus.
Then there is the kind of fascinating conversation between them that we heard in the story of the blind man from last week: he tells her what he can sense about her and what does she do? She changes the subject and asks him a question about theology!! It would be like Jesus saying to one of us, tell me about why you were just fired and we would say, Jesus, what do you think the Bronco’s chances are this year??
They do talk theology—about where God should be worshiped at Mt. Gerizim, the site favored by the Samaritans or at the temple in Jerusalem and Jesus does something else shocking: he downplays the importance of the temple—no really good Jew would do that! And says that God is spirit and it is hard to keep God under control in just one place. Then she says that we will surely know the right answers when the messiah comes to us, and Jesus—this is unique in the gospel of John, so different from Mark’s gospel—Jesus says, “Here I am. I am the one who’s been talking with you!”
The disciples show up at that moment and are shocked to find Jesus talking with a woman. She leaves her leather bucket and water jar and runs back to the village to tell people what has happened to her: come and see the man who has told me everything I have ever done! Can he be the messiah? She had become the first female minister/evangelist. Some churches still believe that women can’t be clergy; there is an argument in the Anglican Church meeting in the last few days and that meeting is controversial for several reasons but one is that some congregations are totally against women leaders in the church. It is in the Bible—this woman gives her testimony and people come from her Samaritan village to see about this messiah for themselves. She becomes an evangelist!! She is just like the disciple Andrew. She has encountered the one who gives life and bread and life-giving water and she tells her friends—come and see for yourself. Many of you have done that—so many of you have offered that invitation that we are voting today to expand our space and our ministry so we can accommodate the people who need to be here and whom God is calling to be here.
Jesus winds up staying in enemy territory for another two days so that other people in that village will come to know the savior of the world and have abundant life.
In the next couple of chapters in John’s Gospel he goes back and forth from Galilee to Judea. Then from his adopted home town of Capernaum, he and his disciples go in a boat across the Sea of Galilee to THE OTHER SIDE. This is a code in the gospels. They are traveling from the northwest end of Lake Galilee into more enemy territory—Gentile territory, unclean territory. Jesus doesn’t abide by those purity rules. Jesus lives by the words of the song we began with—all are welcome in the family of God. Samaritans, gentiles, pagans, democrats, republicans, libertarians, women, men, gay or straight, everybody gets invited to bring their hungers and their thirst and let God feed and nourish our souls and our bodies and heal our hearts.
Jesus is preaching in Gentile territory—the other side of the lake. This is where in another gospel he sees the man with mental illness who is sitting naked in a cemetery and makes him well. These were three ancient taboos in that sentence—mentally ill, sitting naked, in a cemetery. Jesus looks at the crowd around him and asks his friends where they can buy food for all these people. The disciple Phillip says that’s impossible—it would take six month wages to feed this crowd. But Andrew, our namesake Andrew has another idea! (We learn the most about Andrew from the gospel of John—earlier he has brought his brother Peter to meet Jesus) Now he brings a small boy to meet Jesus and says here’s what we have, we have this young man who has five little loaves of barley bread and two fish and he is willing to share what he has! Isn’t that a great scene? A child comes with his meager lunch and says, “It’s not much but Jesus you can have it if it will help!” It reminds me of our children six weeks ago bringing their jars of change to the altar table on Commitment Sunday for the new building we will vote again on today, bringing their offering here and several of you have told me that was the most moving part of the whole day—seeing our children do what this boy did in the gospel of John: here Jesus, here is what we have, it’s not a lot in the grand scheme, but if it helps, we want you to have it.
So Andrew brings a child who is willing to make a sacrificial gift. Tam Curfman wrote a terrific children’s musical based on this story: The Boy Who Shared His Lunch. Our children performed this a few years ago.
When the crowd sat down, Jesus took the bread, said a prayer of thanks, and then gave it to his friends to give to the others. Do you hear the echoes of a communion service here???? The prayer he said is the one he said at the Passover meal, the one we use every time for communion—Blessed are you Lord God, King of the universe, who brings forth bread from the earth. The food was distributed and there was enough, even with some left over. This miracle of the feeding of the multitudes is one of the few stories that shows up in all four gospels—not many stories appear in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John but this one does. It must have been a very important story for the original Christians. It tells us that Jesus is the bread of life who wants to satisfy our hungers. We don’t know how it happened and we said a couple of weeks ago that is the wrong question to ask about miracle stories.
The right question is, What did it mean? What does it tell us about Jesus and what he wants for us. It could have happened in some rational ways: some people think that when the crowd saw what the six year old boy had done that they were inspired to do the same thing—to share the food they had brought with them also; people would not have traveled to hear Jesus without bringing some food along with them-some pita bread, some cheese, a few olives, perhaps a small fish. For some people that would have been miraculous also for them to get beyond their own self absorption and self centeredness and fear and to be willing to SHARE WITH OTHERS!! Do you know people like that who are so into themselves that it would be a miracle for them to share with someone else—to dare to be generous?
Jesus feeds the crowd and then he withdraws from them because he saw that they were about to worship him and make him king! He went away to the top of the mountain by himself and his disciples got back into the boat—nighttime was approaching—and they set off from gentile territory to go back across the water to Jewish territory, except that after they had rowed three or four miles, a storm came up and they were being tossed around and were frightened and then they saw Jesus coming to them across the water and they were terrified, but Jesus said, “It’s me—don’t be afraid”
Water means lots of things in the Bible. Jesus says one time that the rain falls on the just and unjust. The rain is a blessing in the Bible—to receive rain in a desert land is a blessing. I offered that quote three weeks ago at an outdoor wedding for Adrienne Seidle of our congregation as we had just gathered everyone at the front for the ceremony to began and the sprinkles began as well.
Water in the Bible in a thirsty desert land is blessing and lots of passages invite people to come and drink and let their thirst be satisfied. But water also means danger in ancient times. In the dark and troubled sea is where the monsters live and to be on the sea, even the Sea of Galilee in a small boat is terrifying. And in the book of Genesis, when God began to create the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and the spirit of God was moving across the face of the deep chaotic water and what God did was to tame and to calm the stormy waters.
What this story means is that Jesus is able to walk with us on top of the waters of darkness and chaos and danger and turmoil in our lives and when we ask him into the boat with us, things get better, things get calmer, the storms of life will not overwhelm us because he is with us—
Emmanuel—God with us. We are never alone.
There was an article in last Monday’s USA Today about gospel singer and five time Grammy nominee Marvin Sapp. His anthem titled Never Would Have Made It has become a crossover hit. It is not only number one on the Gospel music charts for the past 39 weeks but it is also a hit on the urban adult contemporary charts. He wrote the song right after his father died last year. Marvin Sapp is the pastor of Lighthouse Full of Life Center Church in Michigan and he said that the Sunday after he buried his father, he did not think he could preach but instead this song just came to him and he used the music to be a witness to God’s power to bring us through the dark and tumultuous times of life. Here is a brief clip of that song that tells us about Jesus coming to us in the storms of life.
MARVIN SAPP LYRICS
Never Would Have Made It
Never would have made it, never could've made it, without you I would have lost it all, but now I see how you were there for me
And I can say Never would have made it, Never could have made it, Without you
I would have lost it all, But now I see how you were there for me and I can say I'm stronger, I'm wiser, I'm better, much better,
When I look back over all you brought me thru. I can see that you were the one that I held on to And I never [Chorus] - Never would have made it
Oh I never could have made it [Chorus] - Never could have made it without you
Oh I would have lost it all, oh but now I see how you were there for me
I never [Chorus] - Never would have made it
No, I never [Chorus] - Never could have made it without you
I would have lost my mind a long time ago, if it had not been for you. I am stronger [Chorus] - I am stronger
I'm wiser [Chorus] - I'm wiser
Now I'm better [Chorus] - I'm better
So much better [Chorus] - Much better
I made it thru my storm and my test because you were there to carry me thru my mess
I'm stronger [Chorus] - I'm stronger
I'm wiser [Chorus] - I'm wiser
I'm better [Chorus] - Much better
Anybody better [Chorus] - Much better
I can stand here and tell you, I made it. Anybody out there you made it
I'm stronger [Chorus] - I'm stronger
I'm wiser [Chorus] - I'm wiser
I'm better [Chorus] - Much better
Much better [Chorus] - Much better
I made it, I made it, I made it, I made it, I made it, I made it, I made it, I made it
Never would have made it [Chorus] - Never would have made it
Never could have made it [Chorus] - Never could have made it without you
I would have lost my mind, I would have gave up, but you were right there, you were right there
I never [Chorus] - Never would have made it
Oh I never [Chorus] - I never could have made it without you.
Someone need to testify to sombody next to them and tell them I am stronger, I am wiser,
I'm better, much better. When I look back over what he brought me thru. I realize I made it because I had you to hold on to, now I am stronger, now I am wiser, I'm better, so much better. I made it. Is there anybody in this house other than me that can declare that you made it. Tell your neighbor, never would have made it. Never would have made it. tell them never could have made it. Never could have made it. Never could have made it without you. Never would have made it. Never would have made it. Never could have made it. Never could have made it without you. ( http://www.LyricsTop.com)
By the way the name of Marvin Sapp’s album fits right into the stories from John’s Gospel today-the title is “Thirsty”.
Jesus comes on the water to his terrified friends in the boat being tossed about by the waves and he tells them some words that show up 365 times in the Bible—why that number do you suppose? 365 times God says to us through Christ and through others in the Bible—Don’t be afraid. Is there anyone here who needs to hear those assuring words today? Anybody here who is feeling scared, who is uncertain, not sure of the next chapter of life and nervous about it, who is being tossed around by the darkness and the waves and the storms? Jesus goes it one better. Can you hear him? “Don’t be afraid—it’s me. I am with you. You can make it with me by your side. Don’t be afraid. It’s me.”