Advent Lutheran Church

"True Thirst, True Satisfaction (Lent 3)"

Grace and peace to you from God the Creator and the Lord Jesus.  Amen.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe occupies a unique niche in Western Civilization: He is recognized as the last person to master all of the academic disciplines.  Goethe was proficient as a poet, an artist, a musician, a playwright, a historian.  He devoted his entire existence to the pursuit of every avenue of human knowledge.

Goethe died in 1882, and this story is told about the scene at his deathbed.  As he lie there, at one point he sat bolt-upright and called out, “Light!  Light!  More light!”  His biographer wrote that it was a fitting end to someone who had spent his life searching for knowledge, pushing back the darkness of ignorance in favor of the light of learning.

Decades later, a Spanish philosopher was reading Goethe’s biography, and when he finished the passage about Goethe’s desperate plea for just a little more time to learn just a little information, he closed the book, turned to his wife and said, “You know, for all of his brilliance, Goethe had it wrong.  Instead of calling for ‘Light!  Light!  More light!’, he should have called for ‘Warmth!  Warmth!  More warmth.’  Because,” he said, “we human beings do not die of the darkness; we die of the cold.”

He’s right, of course.  We can have all of the world’s facts and figures at our fingertips, but if no one says to us, “Your life matters to me,” all of that knowledge can be sterile and cold indeed.  Newborn infants not only need to be fed; if they don’t experience the warmth of human contact and nurture, they simply don’t develop and thrive.  That’s why many hospitals offer programs in which volunteers do exactly that: they sit in the nursery and rock the babies.  Perhaps some of you have volunteered in programs like that, lending your own warmth and affection to infants you probably will never see again, but providing them with human contact that is indispensable to their growth.  Our need for that warmth doesn’t end at the cradle; it is one of the few constants throughout our lives.  We never outgrow our need for nurture.

It is against that backdrop of our persistent need for warmth, warmth and more warmth that we can begin to understand the significance of Jesus Christ for this Samaritan woman, for ourselves, and for the people who are not in this room this morning.

We sang about his birth just three months ago: “Hark!  The Herald Angels Sing!” and “Joy to the World!”  One of the hymns that we did not sing was by Martin Luther, and the reason we did not sing it is because while Luther wrote timeless lyrics he did not write timeless tunes.  Musically, the hymn “From Heav’n Above” is awful, but its lyrics are true.  Here are just two verses:

 

“This is the Christ, God’s Son most high, who hears your sad and bitter cry,

who will himself your Savior be, and from all sin will set you free.

“Ah, dearest Jesus, holy child, prepare a bed, soft, undefiled, a quiet chamber

 in my heart, that you and I may never part.”

 

God expressed himself into human form, and, according to the writer of John’s Gospel, that human expression of God was filled with grace and truth.  Jesus did come to tell us the truth about the human condition, that there is an enormous gulf that exists between ourselves and God, a gulf that was created by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, a gulf called original sin that is symbolized now by the various wrongful deeds that we do to one another in our daily lives.  It is a gulf that we cannot leap over.  This is true.

But Jesus also came filled with grace, and God’s grace is greater than human sinfulness.  One of the greatest signs I’ve ever seen is a billboard that I saw along the Gulf Coast right after Hurricane Katrina.  The sign said, “Katrina was big, but GOD is bigger.”  Human brokenness is big, but God’s grace is bigger.  The greatest illustration of that fact is Jesus himself.  Jesus gave his life for us in order to wipe away the impact of human sinfulness and to bring us into the presence of God.  The promise of that eternal union with God is bound to have an impact on how we live in the here and now.

Saint Augustine, a bishop of the early church, said that Jesus loved each person as if that person were the only person on earth.  He loved all as he loved each.  Each person who looked into the face of Jesus looked into the face of salvation itself and found there a love and a warmth that could be found nowhere else, an affection that said, “Your life makes a difference to me.”  He brought the warmth of God into a very cold world.

And so it was that one day Jesus came to the outskirts of a city of the Samaritans, a nationalist group that was related to, but also very distinct from, the Jews.  They shared a history, but it was not a history that united them.  It divided them, and had for centuries.  The animosity between the two peoples centered on the claim by each of them that they were the true chosen people of God.  The division had gotten so bitter and deep that Samaritans and Jews did not speak to one another.  A faithful Jew would have gone to great lengths to avoid any contact with a Samaritan, knowing that such contact would have rendered a Jew ritually unclean, and he or she would have had to undergo a process of cleansing before being allowed to rejoin Jewish society.

So normally a Jew would have simply skirted the Samaritan town.  But not on this day.  On this day, Jesus came to the well near the city, sat down, and there struck up a conversation with a Samaritan woman, a conversation that is the longest recorded conversation Jesus has with anyone in the Gospels.

It would be tempting and easy to see this Samaritan woman as an example of someone who just doesn’t get it.  There are a number of other stories in the Gospels about people who come into contact with Jesus, even experience healing from him, and simply go on their way, unaware of the significance of the person they have just encountered.  At first glance this looks to be one of those stories.

Jesus talks about “living water,” and she thinks he’s talking about the water that she will need for her daily responsibilities.  He says, “The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life,” and she says, “Oh, that would be good, could I have some of that?  I hate coming out here in the heat of the day to draw water, but it’s the only time I can come when no else is around to stare at me and talk behind my back.”  And we’re tempted to slap our foreheads and say, “She doesn’t get it.” 

But in fact, she does get it; or at least she begins to.  Notice how at the end of the story she goes into the city and tells people about her encounter with this Jesus?  Sure, she begins to understand.  No, this story of the Samaritan woman is an invitation for us to look at our own stories.

After all, when Jesus talks about “living water,” we know what he’s talking about.  We understand about Jesus in a way that this Samaritan woman does not, and yet, here we are, in church at 9:30 on a Sunday morning, thirsty.  We are, aren’t we?  We’re thirsting for something more in our work, work that we want to use all of who we really are so that we can make a significant difference in the world.  We’re thirsting for something more in authentic, genuine friendships, we’re thirsting for more healing in our families, we’re thirsting for something more in our relationship with God.

I’ve been talking with one of our members who finds himself in this season of Lent on an incredibly challenging journey with God.  It seems as if he takes two steps forward and one step back, accepting God’s invitation to come closer and not always, or even usually, knowing where it will take him.  He describes it as a mixture of joy and pain, a curious calculus, but it’s the way it is: he feels pain as he gives up more of himself, and he feels joy as he takes on more of God.  Clearly, it’s not always a comfortable journey, but he wouldn’t have it any other way.  He quenches his thirst for God even as he experiences an even greater and sweeter thirst.  He’s thirsty, wants more warmth.

Usually, one of the things we find remarkable in this story of the Samaritan woman is the fact that she’s been married five times.  The classic explanation of that is that she is simply not very good at marriage, or that she is immoral.  But scholars have recently pointed out that the Samaritans practiced something called Levirite marriage, a practice that was designed to safeguard the identity and survival of a particular ethnic group or clan.  According to Levirite tradition, which is still practiced in some parts of the world today, you could not marry outside of the clan.  Here is now it worked: If the husband died, his next of kin would be duty-bound to take in his widow and marry her; if he died, his brother would have to do the same. 

That’s what happened in this case.  The woman’s husband died, and his next of kin married her, and the same thing happened to the third husband, and the fourth and the fifth.  The sixth kinsman, who was probably clever enough to spot a trend here, for fear of his life refused to marry her, thereby creating a moral stain on her that she was powerless to remove.

No woman in ancient society, or contemporary society, wants to be married five times.  This Samaritan woman did not go to her life coach and say, “I’d like to go through five husbands, please.  Can we work out a program for that?”  No, every time she went to the altar, we can imagine how she felt.  “This will be the one, this is who I’m really supposed to be with, this one will put it all together for me and my life will make sense.”

Now, most of us have not gone through five marriages, but chances are that some of you have gone through five weight-loss programs, you’ve been through five self-help books, on your way to settling in here at Advent you’ve sampled five churches, you’ve had five jobs and many more job interviews, each time hoping that this is the right one, this is the one that’s going to work out.  Sure, we have our “if only” plans, too: If only this will work out, we’ll be fine.

I’ve been participating in and monitoring a fascinating Facebook conversation that was started by a friend of mine, joined by another friend, and then by a number of others.  The two people I know in this conversation are both men in their late 20s.  I don’t know anything about the others, but I suspect that they share the same world-view as my friends.  These are people who do not go to church except for weddings and funerals; they see “church” as irrelevant to their lives, so they simply stay away.  None of these people is a member of Advent, by the way; one of my friends lives just outside Pittsburgh, the other lives in Chicago.

The conversation started with a question by Andrew, who wrote: “Looking for a simpler way of life … what about you?”  Within an hour, 23 people had weighed in.  Here are just a few comments:

 

Talia: You should be more positive.

Andrew: I’m sick of being told to be more positive.  That’s what they say to keep you digging for gold. I don't wanna dig for gold anymore. Just want a simpler life.  I don't want the hustle anymore. I don't want to over pay an get underserved. I am done chasing the paper. And believe me I have chased more than most. I am done with doin stuff for money that I really don't like.

John: After you hit a certain salary you leave behind the stress about paying the bills then its just boring after that. you just buy bigger, shinier versions of things you already have but brings no new happiness. After that the more money you make new stress comes along with it because of responsibility.

Andrew: John THAT is exactly what I am talking about. I am tired of wanting to need to keep it all going...

Kristoffer: Whatever happens, life will remain miserable for everybody. Not money, nor success nor a trophy wife can change that fact. Only thing you can really do is to try to keep your misery at a minimum.

Jeff: I hear the Amish are always recruiting homies! ;)

Eric: The more money I make the more problems there are. There are a lot of people who hate you bcuz of the money you make. You can get hit by the people who make less and make more money than you do.  I agree with Andrew, I wish for a simple pure life. Where you work to uplift yourself along with your fellow man.

Dmitri: I threw away all my dishes except for two of everything. Turned my phone off, turned off internet and threw out the TV. Then I got a new girlfriend and she filled the kitchen with dishes, brought a huge tv, turned internet on.  I like the internet and the girl, but all the other stuff can go.

Andrew: What really matters in this world is very simple... Family, loved ones, friends, food, water, shelter, etc... all simple stuff... and all worth having... I think what you are thinking of is that no success worth having is simple or easy...

 

I have a hunch that what Andrew is looking for is not success but significance – the significance of a relationship with the only One who has brought the love and warmth of God into this world.  He will find it nowhere else.  Five hundred years ago, Martin Luther wrote this: “Jesus shows the great fire of the love of God for us, whereby the heart and conscience become happy, secure, and content.”  Let that sink in for just a moment.  That’s what the Samaritan woman is after.  It’s what Andrew is after.  Can you relate?

The Samaritan woman experienced some of that warmth, and she did something with it: she shared it!  She went back to the city – did you notice, she left her water jar and her old life behind – and went back to her people to tell them of her experience.  She is not a professional evangelist, not a church-growth expert; she has only her experience – limited, personal, simple.  Christ comes to her, her life is changed; she comes to her people, their lives begin to change; and the story continues.

Yes, the story continues in you – you, with all of your unresolved doubts and unanswered questions.  You are the vehicle for bringing the warmth of God into a very cold world.  You have, right now, all you need to do two things:

+ Christ meets you exactly where you are; so meet someone else exactly where they are, with no strings attached, no judgment.  Trust God to arrange that meeting, and remember: with God, there are no chance encounters.

+ Share the warmth that you have so freely been given.  The mission team that just returned from the Gulf Coast was able to do that in terms of physical labor on behalf of others.  That was their opportunity.  What your specific opportunity will be is between you and God.  Affirmation in the name of Christ, acceptance, encouragement, invitation in the name of Christ – these are all ways that Christ has of extending his warmth into the world.

This world is dying to discover what you have discovered: you don’t get this warmth; it gets you.  It’s a gift, and like all gifts it comes without earning, simply the abundant expression of love that flows directly from the heart of God, the Giver.  As you have been so freely and abundantly blessed, so freely and abundantly bless someone else, in the name of Christ.

Amen.