Thirst

John 4:5-42

Jesus came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there, and Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon.

A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink." (His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, "How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?" (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.) 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." The woman said to him, "Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?" Jesus said to her, "Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life." The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water."
Jesus said to her, "Go, call your husband, and come back." The woman answered him, "I have no husband." Jesus said to her, "You are right in saying, `I have no husband'; for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!" The woman said to him, "Sir, I see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem." Jesus said to her, "Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." The woman said to him, "I know that Messiah is coming" (who is called Christ). "When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us." Jesus said to her, "I am he, the one who is speaking to you."

Just then his disciples came. They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman, but no one said, "What do you want?" or, "Why are you speaking with her?" Then the woman left her water jar and went back to the city. She said to the people, "Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?" They left the city and were on their way to him.

Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, "Rabbi, eat something." But he said to them, "I have food to eat that you do not know about." So the disciples said to one another, "Surely no one has brought him something to eat?" Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work. Do you not say, `Four months more, then comes the harvest'? But I tell you, look around you, and see how the fields are ripe for harvesting. The reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, `One sows and another reaps.' I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor."
Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman's testimony, "He told me everything I have ever done." So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them; and he stayed there two days. And many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, "It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world."

Homily

Everyone thirsts! The human body is made up of approximately 60% water. This water is used in the process of living a human life and so it needs to be replenished. The human person needs to take in water – either H20 directly from the tap or nowadays in a bottle – or – in lesser amounts in other foods we eat that contain also water.

It is not uncommon then, from time to time for a person to say outloud: "I thirst! I am thirsty! I need something to drink!" It seems that 4-8 glasses of water a day is the recommended amount to keep the body well lubricated and fully functional!

Everyone thirsts! But there is another thirst that everyone has as well! It is a thirst to KNOW, and to LOVE and to SERVE God – who created the water in the first place, who created us in the second place and who knows exactly what we all need both in the material and spiritual dimensions of our lives!

Thank goodness He knows! Thank goodness He shares that knowledge! Thank goodness all it takes to become functional is our cooperation!

The type of cooperation that God desires is our free, voluntary and loving cooperation; our trusting and obedient cooperation; our responsive, faithful and grateful cooperation! Which is not the kind that was demonstrated by the Israelites in the first reading today: newly formed as God's people they mistrust him almost from the start! Moses has his hands full! And God reluctantly gives them water when they ask in a grumbling, argumentative, even hostile sort of way! If Moses was not God's friend, it might have turned out another way!

We can trust God to provide the water – both physical and spiritual – his own way – in his own time! It should never cross our minds: "Is the Lord in our midst or not?" God is always with us – to supply for all our needs – if we trust him – if we let him!

In the gospel passage Jesus has an encounter with the Samaritan woman to whom he reveals not only to her, but to the whole world that he himself is the source of the spiritual life giving water from God: the life giving water that would be effective by his self-sacrificial death on the Cross and subsequent Resurrection from the dead. He is the Life of the world. He tells her that if she drinks the water he can give her she will never be thirsty again - her spirit would be filled with grace and there would be nothing more to add! She misunderstands and thinks he is talking about water from Jacob's well. Jesus convinces her that his words are no ordinary words – that he is truly the Messiah – and that her spiritual parchment and yearning can be satisfied both now and forever: for the asking – from him!

She asks, he gives; she believes, he is content that at least this one woman is now on the right track! (Jesus has seemingly so few "victories" in his job as Savior).

Today, here and now, we rejoice that 5 of our own neighbors and friends have made the statement of the woman at the well!: "I thirst! I thirst for what the world cannot give me! I thirst for what only God can give me! I thirst for the spiritual waters that flow from the pierced side of Christ Crucified! I thirst to be a member of the Catholic Church!"

We are so happy to have them here. We are so happy to continue their process of Initiation into full communion with us by the ceremony of the First Scrutiny (special composition of prayers) that will open them most fully to what God will bestow on them on Easter Sunday! We are so happy that life-giving water still wells up from the Cross of Christ Crucified!

(Fr Bill Dinga's Blog.)