Year A 3rd Sunday in Lent

Text John 4:5-42 – Living Water – God’s energy drink.

Growing in popularity these days are what are called power drinks.

These are drinks that are pumped up with high volumes of caffeine.

You can see children walking to school drinking cans of these believing they are a health drink because they give you energy.

Drinks with the name of V, Mother, Monster and Red Bull, are extremely attractive because people believe they give you an energy shot.

Then there are sports drinks like PowerAde that athletes drink that really are not much more than coloured sugar water.

There is even a clever marketing product called vitamin water with all sorts of different flavoured waters sounding healthy and claiming to be able to improve different types of functions from memory to other body functions.

Many of these drinks are made by Coca Cola, the same company that markets it sugar free colas like Zero as healthy alternatives.

The same company that owns our fruit cannery SPC.

What’s concerning is that people are drinking these as health drinks and ignoring the healthiest of all drinks that God has provided in water.

They are marketed as healthy alternatives to quench our thirst but they don’t do that.

Water is vital for our survival and it is essential for our bodies to function.

And so when Jesus today meets with a Samaritan woman he presents himself as the Living Water she is searching for.

This woman is searching and waiting for Jesus, although like so many others, she doesn’t recognise his presence with her.

“I know the Messiah is coming – when he comes he will reveal all things to us”. (v25)

This woman has lived with much heartache – married 5 times and now living with a man to whom she isn’t married.

An unnamed woman living in a patriarchal society.

As a Samaritan she is one of God’s children rejected by their own people because of how they worshipped God.

But Jesus doesn’t reject her or her people.

As Jesus does on so many occasions, he accepts their invitation to come and stay with them.

Jesus puts aside all the prejudices that separated the woman and the Samaritans and gave them the living water they were waiting and searching for.

This passage challenges us to look at our own prejudices and anything else that holds us back from extending God’s love, grace and mercy to others.

Prejudices than can prevent us from helping others in need.

We live in a society where we don’t even recognise our prejudices.

We call them our rights.

Anything that creates a difference between one person and another becomes a prejudice.

To “pre-judge” someone.

Sometimes we don’t like to help others out and we believe we have a good reason.

They’re rorting the system, they’re jumping the queue, they’ve only got themselves to blame for their predicament, they’re only going to waste it on drugs and alcohol.

These can set up a prejudice in us where we refuse to help because we believe they don’t deserve our help.

Jesus was able to look beyond all of that.

The disciples couldn’t understand why Jesus was speaking with the Samaritan woman –

“They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman”. (v27)

Most of Jesus’ criticism came because of those he reached out to help – “he eats with sinners” (Mark 2:16) was a constant complaint.

She couldn’t help being a woman – she couldn’t help being a Samaritan.

Should that mean she can be refused blessings by God?

But even when they were outcast because of their own choices, Jesus still put aside any prejudice.

Zacchaeus was a tax collector by his own choice – an outcast to his own people because of it.

Zacchaeus knowingly and willingly defrauded people for his own gain – by his own choice.

And like the Samaritans, Jesus chose to stay at his place. (Luke 19:1-10)

Some people are in need because of the choices they make, some have no choice.

That should never be a factor in whom we help and whom we don’t help.

God places all sorts of people before us to share his blessings with.

It’s difficult sometimes.

I’ve been conned by people seeking welfare from me.

I’ve seen people abuse the help we give them.

I’ve heard the complaints at our community meal – “not soup again”.

But we have been blessed by God to be a blessing to others.

God has poured his living water into us so that it can flow to others.

God doesn’t bless us to keep his blessings.

A water tank that collects water is pointless if the water isn’t used.

In fact the water will become stagnant and unhealthy.

But as water is used it is then replaced as the rains come.

Abraham was sent to the Promised Land and told – all nations will be blessed through you (Genesis 12:3)

God’s blessings to others flow through us.

This Samaritan woman received the living water she had been searching for and instead of keeping it to herself she rushes back to her people to share it with them.

And notice that the water jug she brought to collect the earthly water was left behind. (v28)

So too, as we share God’s living water with others we are to leave behind our earthly prejudices despite how warranted and justified they may be.

When it comes to sharing God’s love with others, despite how much we might disagree with their choices or lifestyles, despite how justified we might feel we are in our decisions, we remember what Paul says today:

“God proves his love for US, that while WE were still sinners Christ died for us”. (Romans 5:1-11)

God had, and still has every reason to hold back blessings from us but his love keeps them flowing.

What is holding you back from seeing this reality in your life and sharing it with others.

What prejudice is so deep in us that we can’t even see it or we are justifying it?

Today’s Gospel breaks down all barriers, physical and spiritual.

The physical barriers in that Jesus speaks with an unnamed woman – that’s what the disciples question first.

They were astonished he was speaking with a woman.

What physical barriers are holding us back from extending God’s grace and love to others?

Maybe a lack of trust in God – we need them for ourselves – I’ve worked hard to get where I am.

But remember the parable of the rich fool who after achieving all his blessings decided to build bigger barns and sit back and enjoy them himself.

His life was demanded from him that day (Luke 12:13-21)

But we also have spiritual barriers broken down here.

She is not just a woman but a Samaritan woman.

A people reviled because they worshipped in the wrong way on Mt Gerizim rather than Jerusalem.

She was divorced several times and therefore possibly rejected by her own people.

She drew water by herself – at noon, the hottest time of the day – possibly to avoid others.

Are there some in society that would fit that description?

The dole bludger, the druggie, the illegal immigrant?

Jesus broke down these barriers even with her own people who no longer reject her but listen to her..

The dam wall has been broken and the waters have gone out to all her people.

They come rushing to Jesus and proclaim that “we know that this is truly the Saviour of the World”. (v42)

The “world”!

They don’t hold onto Jesus saying he is “our Saviour”.

Where are our barriers that prevent our message of God’s love from reaching out into the world?

Our mission is to take the gospel into the whole world, not to keep it to ourselves.

Jesus himself said: This gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.

Maybe we are holding back God’s Kingdom and the gospel by our prejudices.

God puts Samaritan women every day in our lives, but do we see them?

As those of us who have been washed by “living waters,” we are sent to share it with others.

A lot of people frightened or uninformed when speaking about their faith.

Let us start by breaking down our prejudices and barriers and reaching out to that person we’d rather not speak with.

Let us share a smile or a welcome with them like Jesus did and let the living water flow from us and onto them.