Rev. Roland J. Wells, Jr. - Pastor

The Third Sunday In Lent - March 3, 2002

Lessons: Exodus 17:1-7; Romans 5:1-11; John 4:5-42

"Impossible Water"Introduction:

Back in 1995 we took a group from St. Paul's to the Holy Land. For two days we traveled in an air-conditioned bus in the land called Sinai.

I) The Need for Water

I've never seen anything quite so dry, desolate and unwelcoming. The mountains are sharp and toothy- that's probably where the term 'Sinai' comes from - the word for 'tooth.' I can see why Moses had trouble bringing the people of Israel through that place. And worst problem of all was water. We know that a person can fast without food for a few days without danger. But not without water. Even in Minnesota, to go without water for more than a day or two creates a health crisis. Three days without water may mean death.

In 1995, as we went through the Sinai wilderness, we were reminded again and again to make sure to drink enough water. Bottled water is a major industry in the Mideast. A couple times I drank more than a gallon before noon. Perhaps someone who is used to living that area could get by one gallon for the whole day. Let's use that as our figure.

To live in the dessert, the people of Israel, about one million of them, would have needed about one million gallons of water each day! If I've got my numbers right, that's about the amount of water in four high-school sized swimming pools! That, is a lot of water in the middle of the desert!

Let's think some more about our OT lesson. They had just been miraculously delivered from slavery; they had just lived through the plagues and been spared. They had just seen the waters part, crossing on dry ground. They had been following God as a pillar of fire by night and cloud by day. All these miraculous things day after day; you might think they'd learn. Instead they whined because they didn't have anything to eat. So God provided them with all the bread they could eat.

They still didn't trust God. Then they whined about having no meat to go with the manna. So God sent them quail every night. They still didn't trust God. Still they grumbled.

Then comes today's story. The people now are thirsty. What they had done the day before isn't clear, but it seems they probably had water, because this time it's notable that they don't have a campsite with a water hole.

Now don't you think that by now they might have seen a pattern? Don't you think that just once they might have said, "Let's trust God and thank him for watching over us so far." But they just don't think that way. Let's hear this part again: (Read Exo 17:1-4)

Now that was a real danger, because the Sinai has a whole lot of stones! Now aren't you glad that neither you nor I am God? At this point, if you were God, wouldn't you be tempted to just 'smite' them? Or send them back to Egypt? Or at least spank them or give them boils? Again, aren't you glad that neither you nor I am God?

II) A God of Love and Faithfulness

But God doesn't do it that way. He's got plans for this people of his. In his fatherly love and patience, God has a different plan: (Read Exo 17:5-7)

But look at God's patience! Some think of the Old Testament God being a God of vengeance and judgement, whereas the New Testament God is a God of Love. As if God changed his mind and somehow cleaned up his act!

No, the just God is the loving God and vice-verse. The justice of God comes from his desire to make things right. Love and cleansing are the same thing. But when we're in need of cleansing and reproof, we may not want to experience it.

As a parent, since the time that our boys were tiny guys, I worked hard to be both a loving dad, but also a dad who worked to help them know the limits of their behavior. I'm sure when they were spanked weren't very thankful that they were being punished and being taught right from wrong. But spankings were always followed by hugs. And the same dad who taught right and wrong was the same dad who prayed over them and kissed them every night.

Now to an infinite degree more loving than that is our God. To an infinite degree more just than that is our God. When we see our Gospel story about the questionable woman at the well, and see Jesus' love for her--that's the same God. Yet Jesus is also clear to point out the things that needed cleansing in her life.

III) How Can we Apply it

But there's one more thing to tie into this complex story this morning. In this miraculous story of the water pouring out of the rock in the desert, the people were refreshed in an impossible way. At a time they were in a difficult, impossible place. They were facing impossible odds. Trusting God day by day was hard for them. But God refreshed them.

The people who chose this text to go along with the story about Jesus and the woman at the well made a good choice. Because that story is about being refreshed, too. Jesus says, "...but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life."

Many times we've sung the song, "I've got a river of life flowing out of me." We see in this Old Testament story a picture of what Christ's death on the cross, his being wounded for us results in. His wounding brings us a stream of refreshing. His wounding and death make possible the river-sized flow of refreshing God promises us--a river of life! To be filled and re-filled continually with God's Holy Spirit.

When the worries and pressures of the day take away our joy and sense of connectedness to God, we start feeling empty inside. Paul tells us in Ephes. 5:17-18: "So do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. [18] Do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery; but be filled with the Spirit," Even as Moses and the people of Israel were refreshed in a supernatural manner, so can we have our joy and strength restored. Only God can strengthen us to go the long march. Only God can give us the strength to carry on.

The presence of God's Spirit makes such a difference. Since 'way back in my seminary days, when were assigned a rotation of hospital visitation, I 've noticed that there seemed to be two distinctly different kinds of nurses. There were the worn-out, burnt-out crabby ones. And there were the committed Christian ones. Only the Christians had the power inside to be renewed and refreshed, even after all that hard work with cranky patients.

That's why Paul reminds us, "Be filled with the Holy Spirit." Because the Spirit is given to empower us for ministry. To refresh us on the long march in the difficult territory.

Conclusion:

So that's the story of Moses and the people of Israel, as they wandered about the toothy dessert and the toothy mountains. They got thirsty! They whined and mistrusted God; but he still loved them. They were impatient and constantly getting in trouble. But the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob became the God of the People of Israel during those wanderings. He kept his covenant, even though his children wouldn't listen.

This morning, are you tired? Are you thirsty? Then come and be renewed. Come to the rock, cleft for you, to bring you refreshment. Ask God to pour out his river of life, the power and presence of God's Holy Spirit, to fill you up and restore you.

Or maybe this morning you are really afraid of God. Maybe you've done something in your past that just won't leave your heart and mind alone. Maybe shame and guilt are clinging to you, ready to strangle you with their power. Your God is not the author of shame or guilt. Your God is one who specifically convicts you of specific sins. Once they have been confessed, they are gone.

But the devil loves to bind people up in shame. He loves to bind Christians up in chain after chain of shame. This morning, hear God's promises and hear of a God who loves you. You can trust him. He meets you in the midst of your pain; that's what the cross is all about. Christ has entered into our human pain, to the deepest part. He has reached down that far and taken all human sin and brokenness into himself. You can trust him and share your pain with him. He's the God who does the impossible, to give rivers of water in the driest of deserts. He's the God who says, "...whoever drinks the water I give will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give will become a spring of water welling up inside to eternal life."

Our God is a God who is able. He's a God who is willing to give you strength, healing and power. He is a God who is strong enough to carry you through hard times.

As you come to the Lord's Table this morning, let's ponder the meaning of the love of this God, who despite of human hard- headedness and rebellion wills to break into your situation to let rivers of refreshing flood you.

Invitation

Amen

Third Sunday in Lent - March 3, 2002

Exodus 17:1-7

The whole Israelite community set out from the Desert of Sin, traveling from place to place as the LORD commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. [2] So they quarreled with Moses and said, "Give us water to drink."

Moses replied, "Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you put the LORD to the test?"

[3] But the people were thirsty for water there, and they grumbled against Moses. They said, "Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?"

[4] Then Moses cried out to the LORD, "What am I to do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me."

[5] The LORD answered Moses, "Walk on ahead of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. [6] I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink." So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel. [7] And he called the place Massah and Meribah because the Israelites quarreled and because they tested the LORD saying, "Is the LORD among us or not?"

Romans 5:1-11

Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, [2] through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. [3] Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; [4] perseverance, character; and character, hope. [5] And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.

[6] You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. [7] Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. [8] But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

[9] Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through him! [10] For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! [11] Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

John 4:5-42

So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. [6] Jacob's well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about the sixth hour.

[7] When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, "Will you give me a drink?" [8] (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)

[9] The Samaritan woman said to him, "You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?" (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)

[10] Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water."

[11] "Sir," the woman said, "you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? [12] Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his flocks and herds?"

[13] Jesus answered, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, [14] but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life."

[15] The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water so that I won't get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water."

[16] He told her, "Go, call your husband and come back."

[17] "I have no husband," she replied.

Jesus said to her, "You are right when you say you have no husband. [18] The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true."

[19] "Sir," the woman said, "I can see that you are a prophet. [20] Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem."

[21] Jesus declared, "Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. [22] You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. [23] Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. [24] God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth."

[25] The woman said, "I know that Messiah" (called Christ) "is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us."

[26] Then Jesus declared, "I who speak to you am he."

[27] Just then his disciples returned and were surprised to find him talking with a woman. But no one asked, "What do you want?" or "Why are you talking with her?"

[28] Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, [29] "Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Christ?" [30] They came out of the town and made their way toward him.

[31] Meanwhile his disciples urged him, "Rabbi, eat something."

[32] But he said to them, "I have food to eat that you know nothing about."

[33] Then his disciples said to each other, "Could someone have brought him food?"

[34] "My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. [35] Do you not say, 'Four months more and then the harvest'? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. [36] Even now the reaper draws his wages, even now he harvests the crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper may be glad together. [37] Thus the saying 'One sows and another reaps' is true. [38] I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor."

[39] Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony, "He told me everything I ever did." [40] So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. [41] And because of his words many more became believers.

[42] They said to the woman, "We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world."