Oak Chapel United Methodist Church

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"Give me a drink," Jesus commands the Samaritan woman. It had been a long, sticky morning, and the hottest part of the day was yet to come. Jesus was sitting wearily by Jacob's well, a popular watering hole in those parts, resting. His disciples were off somewhere in Sychar, presumably, looking for carry-out. The dust of the road sticks to his arms and legs. He's thirsty. The Samaritan woman shows up around noon. She has a rope and a bucket, but it's an odd time of day for a woman to be drawing water. Some say she really came out to meet men. Well, she met one, didn't she? "Give me a drink." (That's the way men used to speak to women in "the good old days." Look for it only in story books, for it is a world "gone with the wind.") But we need not pity this woman; she was a tough chick. "Isn't that rich," she says? You high-and-mighty Jews who think yourselves so superior to us Samaritans that you won't usually even drink from the same cup - if you're thirsty enough - will beg one of us for a drink.!" (I imagine her spitting on the ground, at this point.) "Here's the thing," Jesus said: "If you knew the gift of God, and who I am, you would have asked me, and I would have given you living water." "What brass," she says! "You don't even have a bucket. Now you're telling me you already have water, and it's better than the water we've drunk from this well for centuries?" "See," Jesus said, "everyone who drinks this water gets thirsty again. But if someone drinks my water he will never thirst." And she, wanting to save herself her daily trudge to the well, says, "Gimmie some."

In a church in New Jersey, where I served as a seminary intern, there was a sign over the water fountain. It said, "He that drinketh of this water shall thirst again, but he that drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst." Seemed real hokey at the time, but I never forgot it.

Jesus is not finished with this woman. "Go get your husband." "I don't have a husband." "Right. Actually, you've had five, and now your living with a man you're not married to." She's staggered. "I see you are a prophet," she says. And then, because she feels the Word of God closing in on her, she tries to direct the conversation another way - into an old theological dispute, between Jews and Samaritans, about where to worship God, hoping Jesus will take the bait and argue the case for Jerusalem. But he says something so much better: "What's important in worship is not how, or when, or where. What's important is sincerity and honesty." "The hour is coming and now is (Jerusalem and the Temple have already been destroyed by the Romans when John writes his Gospel) - the hour is coming and now is when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for such the father seeks to worship him." Then she gets very quiet and very pious. "I know the Messiah's coming," she says. "I guess he'll tell us everything we need to know." 'It's me," Jesus says.

The disciples return. The woman, totally flustered, forgets her water jar, and rushes back to town where she exclaims to everyone who will listen, "Come see a man who told me everything I ever did."

Today's beatitude is, "Blessed are they that hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled." Righteousness ("rightwiseness") means being right with God. We can understand the beatitude (about hungering and thirsting for righteousness)two ways. It might mean, "Blessed are those devout people who have an insatiable desire to know God better, and to learn more about him every day" Or it might mean, "Blessed are those outside the circle of faith who deeply desire to be made right with God, and have no idea how to go about it.." Like the Samaritans. Who don't know the gift of God. Who are thirsty but don't have access to "living water." Both interpretations are fine. One emphasizes growth in faith and the other spreading the faith.

John begins his story of the woman at the well by saying that Jesus "had to go through Samaria." But scholars have long pointed out that he did not have to go there, at least not geographically. There were other roads." "Had to" means God made him go to Samaria - he had a choice of roads, but no choice of mission. This is a mission to Samaria, to people despised and hated by the Jews, to people who think wrong, and worship wrong. Watch what happens.

First Jesus humbles himself (asks for water). Then he promises something outlandish: "living water." Then he reminds her of some embarrassing things about herself - arousing in her the need for confession and repentance. Then he tells her how to worship: some local customs are o.k. All Christians don't have to worship the same way. Just make sure you worship "in spirit and in truth." Then he tells her who he is. And she goes and tells her neighbors. And that's the way the Christian Church grew. And is still growing.

When Anglican officials locked John Wesley out of the church he was pastoring, Wesley walked out into the graveyard, stood up on his own father's tombstone, and said, "The whole world is my parish." And indeed, that is what that became. And the whole world still is our perish. Reaching out is our business. Kirkegaard said, "The church lives by mission as a fire lives by burning." Beginning with our own families, and our own neighborhoods, and our own country - and extending around the globe - we are called to be missionaries to those who hunger and thirst for a right relationship with God. For these people, Jesus said, are blessed because God wants to reach them..and they will be filled.. They may resist at first, and act bellicose, as this woman did, but not far beneath the surface they yearn for the Spirit of God. Sometimes we have to show them, with humility and gentleness, how bankrupt their lives are: hunting and gathering, getting and spending, a squirrel cage of meaningless hopes and dreams. We have to humble ourselves and go to them where they are: the teenager, the person who has rejected religion, the one who has been hurt, the one who's afraid to take risks, the one who lives and talks rough, the ones who aren't so clean, the ones of different ethic backgrounds. They all have something to teach us. We can ask them for a cup of water. Then we have to tell them about the living water (the end of all insecurity, the end of all desperate longing, and wishing, and dissatisfaction, and desire). We have to draw out of them the truth about themselves, their sins and self-centeredness, and failures and get them to see their hopeless state. We have to reveal Jesus to them. And, then, they will believe and go and tell others.

Jesus was always in the wrong place associating with the wrong people. (It drove his enemies crazy.) Here he was in Samaria (of all places!), talking to a woman (of all things!) and a disreputable woman at that. That's how you serve as a missionary. That's why we're not so good at it. We're not willing to go to the wrong places and talk to the wrong people. We're not willing to be flexible about our faith - we came to Christ one way, so every one else must experience him that way, too. But, let me tell you dearly beloved, Christianity looks different (and should look different) in Africa and Asia, and it looks different in urban America, and that's o.k. It's not the form of religion, but the spirit and truth of the thing that counts. We have to be willing to operate in the other person's world.

Albert Camus, in his novel, The Fall, has a character who sits in a bar in Amsterdam all day and pontificates about the world outside. Of course, because he never goes out, what he says tells us more about him than about the world. For example, he advises people never to walk across a bridge at night - because they may come upon someone about to jump. And, if that should happen, they would have two choices: either to try to rescue him (which has its dangers) or to ignore him (which makes one feel guilty). So the answer is don't walk across any bridge at night. In other words, make it impossible for you to become involved. Just sit on the sidelines and comment on the game. Avoid any real part in life.

When we venture outside our usual worlds and bring the mission of Jesus to others, we take a chance. Suppose we come upon someone about to jump? We'll have to decide. We'll have to be real. We won't be able to simply express our opinion...from a barstool someplace. Many of us simply don't cross bridges at night. It doesn't work. We have to go through Samaria. There are people there who thirst for righteousness, and we have the living water.