In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Because of the Jews, Jesus had to leave Judea and return to Galilee, which took Him right through Samaria. In the heat of the day, our Lord found Himself at Jacob's Well, in the town of Sychar, alone.
A Samarian woman comes to the well at noon to draw her water. This is strange, because the usual time to draw water was either late in the afternoon or early in the morning, in the cool parts of the day. However, given the dubious character of this woman, she perhaps chose to come when no one would be around, so that she could avoid the piercing glares and wagging tongues of the other women in town. This is what sin does – it isolates each of us from one another. You are afraid to show your face in the marketplace because someone might know what you have been up to in the shadows. I would rather stay home because I do not want to confront those who disapprove of what I do. We avoid each other because we want to avoid condemnation.
Regardless, Jesus asks this woman for a drink of water. He surprises her. After all, Jews have no dealings with Samaritans, and respectable rabbis do not speak to women. Racial tensions confine the message to those who are like us. Fear of the unknown stops us from stepping over the line and crossing the aisle. Worries about impropriety paralyze us from sharing the Good News with those who need most to hear it. The personal shame that you and I each carry prevents us from stepping out into the light and meeting our neighbor where he is, to bring him to where he needs to be.
Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” She again is confused. You do not even have a bucket. How will you draw water from the deepest well in Israel? Are you better than our father Jacob? What is this living water, anyhow?
But the gift of God is not in mere water, but in the water touched by the Word of God. The gift of God is in the holy flood sanctified by our Lord's baptism in the Jordan. The gift of God is in the Word made flesh, who dwells among us. The gift of God is in the flesh of Jesus, which was nailed to the cross. The gift of God is in the water which flowed with the blood from His pierced side, gushing out a life-giving flood from the cross, just as He poured forth His life for ours. The gift of God is in the font, as the water touched by the Word of God flows from the Jordan to the cross into the font and over your head.
And now that living water flows through you. That water does not stand still, but flows from Christ to you, and through you to your neighbor. That living water does not allow your sins to stand against you, but washes them away. That water does not allow the devil to place His mark upon you, but engraves the Name of God upon you. That water carries the love of God to you and through you to your wife, your children, your neighbor.
Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” The water that soothes the body will go away, but the living water that flows from Christ will never dry up or flow away from us. In us that water will fill our deepest wells, and will overflow in love and service to those around us. The love of God will possess us and fill us and drive us along, as a rolling stone tumbles down a swiftly flowing brook.
So the woman says, give me this water, so I won't have to come back here ever again. The living water that Jesus promises sounds great. One drink, and we will never be thirsty again. We need never come back to the well. We can go back to our dark corners and live out our lives without having to face one another.
Except it does not work like that at all. The woman misunderstands what Jesus is saying. The living water that springs up in us is eternal and unceasing, but it does not allow you to stay tucked away in your own little existence. The same stream of water that flows from Jesus to you also flows to me and the person sitting next to you, and to everyone who believes in Christ. In that blessed flood you and I are carried along together, because it is the one Lord Christ who carries us in His grace by the Holy Spirit. We are joined to one another in the communion of saints through Christ, and we are carried along by His love out of our foxholes and into the light of our life together.
This woman, still not understanding, decides to test Jesus with the age-old question – which mountain? The Jews worship in Jerusalem, and the Samaritans worship on Mount Gerizim – which one is the right place to worship? This is the wrong question, right from the start, and Jesus points this out to her. The question is not a matter of where, but how. Where to worship God is irrelevant, ultimately, because there is no place where God is not. “The Church is the congregation of saints, in which the Gospel is rightly taught and the Sacraments are rightly administered.” (AC VII). The Church is not a building built with hands and bricks, nor is it a particular mountain or valley. Rather, the Church is the gathering of sheep who hear the Shepherd's voice and receive the Gifts that come from His hand.
The living water does not flow from us, and we do not get it because we ask for it or because we deserve it. But the living water flows to us because Jesus gives it and because the Holy Spirit has poured it into our hearts. We are carried along on the waters of this blessed flood, and the living waters that spring up in you and me flow out to those who need desperately to be given a drink. The Good News of Jesus Christ forgives your sins and washes you clean, and it carries you out into the light, where you display the wondrous love of God for all to see. Now that is something to set tongues ablaze.
In the Name of Jesus. Amen.
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