Jesus' Living Water

By The Very Rev. Sherry Crompton
February 24, 2008
John 4:5-42

Wow! John’s gospel story is rich, it’s loaded with meaning….deep, spiritual meaning. I can’t begin to touch everything that’s happening in this story today, but I’ll share what seems important for us now, here, today.

First of all, it is a surprising story….a remarkable story….because the conversation between Jesus and the Samaritan woman shouldn’t have happened. The barriers to the conversation are great. Jesus is a Jew and the woman is a Samaritan. Between Samaritan and Jew there is a wall of separation no less than what in our time separates the Israeli from the Palestinian.

The Jews and Samaritans are related peoples. Both are Hebrews. The Samaritans are from the old northern kingdom of Israel, while the Jews are from the old southern kingdom of Judah. To make a long story short, the Samaritans inter-married with non-Jewish peoples, and lost much of their ethnic identity, while the Jews maintained theirs. Each group ended up with their own temple, the Samaritans on Mount Gerizim, the Jews on Mount Zion, starting a continuing controversy over the proper place to worship. And so it is a strange choice Jesus makes to travel through Samaritan territory. And that he strikes up a conversation with a Samaritan is even stranger.

There’s something additional that makes this conversation beside the well a surprise. In that place and time men and women are not to talk to one another in public. It is not considered proper. This is especially so when the man is, like Jesus, a rabbi, a teacher, someone looked up to as an example of propriety. And so the disciples, when they return, are astonished that Jesus is speaking with this woman.

Still more must be said about this surprising encounter. The nameless one is a Samaritan, and a woman. She is also someone rejected by her own people. She comes to the well to draw water at noon, and she comes alone. Noon is the hottest time of the day. Morning and evening are times to do the hard work of drawing water from the well, and hauling it home. This is work that women do in company with one another. It is a chance for a chat, for some social contact. But this woman goes to the well at a time when she will be alone. She sees herself as a misfit. She probably avoids others in order not to be hurt yet again by their words, their attitudes, their hard looks.

So, imagine her surprise when she comes in the heat of the day with her water bucket balanced on her head and sees a strange man sitting beside the well. He could be anyone, but when he lifts his head and asks her for a drink, she sees the olive skin, the dark eyes, the strong nose. He is no half-breed. The man is a Jew, but what in the world is he doing there? Has he lost his way? Has he lost his faith, to be talking to her like that? The Jews have endless rules about what they may and may not eat and drink. She knows that much at least, and she knows this man will be breaking the law if she lets him sip from her bucket.

And so Jesus meets a woman who couldn't be more of an outsider, and he receives her as an insider, an intimate who has no cause for shame. He brings up her past, and her present, not to shame her, but to take away their power in showing how little they affect how Jesus and the God he proclaims receive her.

When the woman at the well perceives Jesus to be a prophet, she asks what every Samaritan wants to know – where is God’s Holy Presence? Where are we to worship God? Is Mount Zion the Holy Mountain or is Mount Gerizim? Should we look to Jerusalem or to Samaria for guidance and direction?

In response, Jesus simply says, “It isn’t a matter of place.” Both places are sacred. Both places are holy.

In the mind of Jesus, there is no wall between Jew and Samaritan; both groups of people are loved by God. Both Jew and Samaritan are in need of food and water, both Jew and Samaritan are in need of forgiveness and compassion, both Jew and Samaritan are in need of love and grace.

Those who worship God transcend all boundaries, all borders, all barriers. “God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

Jesus received the Samaritan woman with such love and such grace that she was profoundly transformed. She had once accepted the village's verdict that she was so unfit for their company that she could draw water only at noon. After meeting Jesus, she's bold enough to demand living water from him. By the end of the conversation, she's left her water jar behind and is rushing into the very center of the village, demanding to be heard by those who were once her tormentors. And she IS heard; many believe in Jesus because of the woman's bold testimony.

Jesus sets aside all score-keeping, and by treating all as if all were forgiven, he makes forgiveness possible -- even for self-righteous sinners like us.

What Jesus did for that woman, he is able to do for each of us as well. Just as he broke down all the barriers that existed in order to reach out to her, so he seeks to break through the barriers that we put up in order to reach us. The living water that Jesus offered her is still available to all who are seeking to quench their thirst for righteousness and wholeness. To all those whose lives may be parched, whose relationships may seem dry, whose spiritual quest seems to have taken them into the desert, to all of these and all others who thirst for healing and hope, Jesus still says, "Come. Come and sip the living water which I offer, and you will no longer be thirsty. Come. Come and drink." Amen.

Honest Self-Examination

By The Very Rev. Sherry Crompton
February 10, 2008
Read: Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7 and Matthew 4:1-11

This morning we hear two very familiar stories…Adam and Eve with the serpent, eating the forbidden fruit. And Jesus in the wilderness being tempted by Satan. Temptation is a prominent theme.

But what about temptation? What about Satan? What about the serpent? It seems that the temptations we face are really the same temptation, to take charge..to take control and not let God be God. Or as the serpent put it, “don’t you know you’ll be like God”. Even the temptations of Jesus follow this pattern, and the only answer to them was to trust God's word and promise and not one's self.

Satan came to Jesus after he spent 40 days and nights in the wilderness. Jesus was led there by the Spirit. We begin Lent each year in the same way, with Jesus in the wilderness or in the desert. Led there by the Spirit. Being in the wilderness means that we are alone, with no distractions. A place where we might be able to look deep inside of ourselves to discover who we truly are. A place where we might acknowledge that there is a hollow, empty feeling inside us that we just can’t seem to fill. A place where we search for the healing and wholeness that comes from God, through Jesus Christ.

That is what Lent is about…a 40 day period where we commit to self-examination. Honest self-examination in the eyes of God. Because it is through knowing ourselves, deeply knowing who we are and what motivates us, that we are able to make better choices in our lives. Choices that lead us farther along in our mutual journey toward healing and wholeness with God.

There is currently a trend in our society about finding fulfillment and happiness. Books like The Secret, The Power of Attraction, and one woman’s search and journey for everything. “Eat, Pray, Love” is Elizabeth Gilbert’s story of a part of her journey in life, when after a divorce and depression, she gave up all outward marks of success. Her job, a home and set out on a journey to three different cultures. Italy, India and Indonesia. It was during her several month stay in India, in an Ashram, where she spent hours and hours in disciplined meditation. Elizabeth writes of her struggles to achieve a higher state of meditation because in the quiet stillness, with no distractions around, in her wilderness, she only had her own self to contemplate and she did not want to go there. It took hours and hours and wise advice before she finally allowed herself to face those parts of herself that she didn’t like. The bad choices she had made in her life and why. And when she was able to acknowledge those parts of her own self, she discovered God in a new and different way. She discovered an all powerful forgiveness and acceptance from God. It was the bringing up and naming of her demons that allowed a sense of release. Her experience has changed how she makes choices in her life now. When faced with temptations, it is the choice that becomes important, the action involved.

Many of us know, or have friends, or maybe even are, what we call “recovering addicts”. These friends get together in groups on a regular basis….what we know of us “anonymous” groups. Simply put the addiction in front of the word anonymous. And these friends – most of whom are Christian – are not freaks or monsters. They are simply human beings who have become painfully honest with their lives. They will tell you that they have made a series of bad choices and that those choices have impacted them and their families. In the wilderness of their lives, they have made the discovery that all is not well with their soul. And they come together from all walks of life because they are convinced that life was meant to be lived on a higher plane that what they’ve experienced.

These friends have finally broken the sad silence about their lives. Honest to God. And to self. And to family. These are friends who have finally rubbed some of the veneer off their soul and freely admit that they have tried to fill in the blank with the wrong things.

Pascal once said that inside of us there is a God-shaped vacuum. And recall Augustine’s famous prayer, “You have made us for yourself, O God, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you.” Both of these sayings speak to the hollowness that we feel when God’s special place is filled with lesser gods.

If addiction is, at its core, anything we use to fill the empty place inside of us which belongs to God alone, then I wonder if maybe all of us or at least 99% of us are addicted to something. Food, fashion, accumulation, blaming, shopping, fitness, diet, the pursuit of happiness, even care-giving could fit the bill. Anything really. And so whenever that emptiness becomes unbearable, it’s quite easy to fill that emptiness with something other than God to numb the pain. Yet, as Augustine discovered, there is nothing on earth that can fill emptiness of the soul but God.

Jesus Christ is here to help us in the battle against sin and temptation, no matter what form it comes in. And when (notice I didn’t say “if”, but when) and when we succumb to sin and temptation…either in obvious ways or ways that are deep inside our hearts, God is here to shower his forgiveness on us. His forgiveness and his grace for the meeting of a new day, the grace to get up and move on making better choices in our lives and avoiding the bad choices.

Today we ask God to fill our ‘God shaped vacuum” with His love. So enter the wilderness. Expect great things from God, do great things for God, for with God all things are possible. And especially during the season of Lent……So we enter the wilderness, Amen.

We Are God's Property

By The Very Rev. Sherry Crompton
February 6, 2008 (Ash Wednesday)
Read: Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21

Tonight we are reminded that we are all sinners…that we are all in need of forgiveness. We are also reminded that we are God’s property. God is the ultimate forgiver. God is the healer who begins to change us from the inside when the sick soul cries out for help. God is the one who creates a clean heart.

The Gospel doesn’t guarantee our physical well-being, or slow down the aging process, but it does something much more. Our confessions and God’s forgiveness begin the healing process in our soul. To name our sins and ask for God’s forgiveness enables us to ease our load and walk a little lighter. Ashes in the form of the cross remind us that we are God’s property. Ashes in the form of the cross…there is a pastor who says he always preaches Good Friday and preaching Good Friday, the Cross, is important on Ash Wednesday.

Lee had been in the Korean War, and he was a CIA agent. He and a group of CIA agents had been flown up into North Korea, and had been dropped there for a landing. They went secretly into North Korea, had blown up some ammunition dumps, made a raid on a secret installation and after that, they were coming back to their point of pick up. They were going to rendezvous and be flown back to their ship. On the way back, Lee made a mistake and he got separated from the other CIA agents. He made a mistake; he was clear about it. It was his dumb fault. Lee got caught in this sniper fire. He jumped behind a rock and there were a group of enemy soldiers up above him, shooting at him below as he was hiding behind a large rock. The bullets were pecking against this rock and making the rock smaller. Every time that a flick of the rock would hit him in the back, Lee thought that he was dead. He would roll over in panic, thinking that he had been shot in the back. It was a petrifying experience for him. His mouth was dry, white mouthed, dehydrated. Suddenly, his fellow agents came back to rescue him. It was like the cavalry had come in the old west movies. The cavalry had come back to save him, to cover up his mistake. But…six of his fellow agents, his good friends, were then killed…because of the mistake that he had made. As he told this story, he said, “Yes. I have carried this guilt with me for a long time now, and Good Friday will always been the most important day for me because Good Friday was that day that God came down to die for us, to pay for the enormous mistakes that we have made. I will always preach a Good Friday sermon because every sermon for me is about the cross. That God came to die for us in our mess. I believe that.

Tonight we are reminded that we are all sinners…that we are all in need of forgiveness. We are also reminded that we are God’s property. God is the ultimate forgiver. God is the healer who begins to change us from the inside when the sick soul cries out for help. God is the one who creates a clean heart. And the ashes in a form of a cross remind us that we are God’s property. Amen.

Mr. Hopewell, the Bunny Rabbit

By The Very Rev. Sherry Crompton
February 3, 2008 Transfiguration (Last Epiphany)
Read: Matthew 17:1-9

The Transfiguration. Jesus on the mountaintop transformed, an awe-inspiring vision of the presence of God for Peter, James and John. Unmistakable.

And I wonder, what can I say about such an experience. The Bible is filled with these encounters, these epiphanies. There is Moses and the burning bush, Jacob and the ladder full of angels, Job and the voice out of the whirlwind. “They are all cracked doors between this world and some other, brighter place where God is no absentee landlord but a very palpable presence”. (B. Taylor) The Irish call these “thin places” –places where the veil between this world and the next is so sheer that it is easy to step through.

There is no shortage of epiphanies in this world. A friend tells a story about a bunny rabbit by the name of Mr. Hopewell. Mr. Hopewell had the unfortunate experience of being born in Minnesota. That is, it was very cold, cold, cold and very white, white, white during wintertime. Mr. Hopewell, this bunny rabbit, had never seen anything but the white of snow.

When this bunny rabbit talked to other bunny rabbits, the other rabbits always talked about spring. How magnificent and beautiful spring was. So Mr. Hopewell, was really looking forward to meeting Mr. Spring. You see, Mr. Hopewell erroneously thought that spring was a person, and so he said to the other rabbits that he was really looking forward to meeting Mr. Spring. All the other rabbits laughed and laughed Mr. Hopewell and his foolishness to think of such a thing. Mr. Hopewell did not dare to ask the rabbits any more about this Mr. Spring character because he did not want to make a fool of himself.

Time passed and soon it got warmer and warmer and warmer in Minnesota. As it got warmer and warmer and warmer, all the snow melted. So Mr. Hopewell went out and said that it was time to go looking for Mr. Spring. He wanted to personally meet that person called Mr. Spring.

So the bunny rabbit, Mr. Hopewell, came up to a daffodil and he said to the beautiful daffodil, “Are you spring?” The daffodil laughed and laughed and said, “Of course I am not spring. But I would not have come out if spring wasn’t here.” Hmmm.
Mr. Hopewell went hopping along, being rather embarrassed that he did not know what spring was, and he came upon a mushroom. It was a large, beautiful mushroom and he asked, “Mushroom, are you Mr. Spring?” The mushroom laughed and laughed and said, “Of course I am not spring. But I would not have come out if spring was not here.” Hmmm. What a puzzle.

So Mr. Rabbit hopped on and came to a big fuzzy ball there in northern Minnesota. Mr. Rabbit said to the fuzzy big ball, “Are you Mr. Spring?” And the bear growled in a roaring voice, “Of course I am not spring, but I would not have woken up if spring was not here.” Hmmmm.

This rabbit could not find Mr. Spring anyplace. Mr. Hopewell started to cry and cry, his tears running down his rabbit face. About that time a robin came by and the robin said, “What is wrong with you?” Mr. Hopewell replied, “Well, I have been looking for spring. Are you Mr. Spring?” The robin, being a kinder soul, said, “O no, spring is aaaaalllll around you. You are living in the middle of spring.” Hmmmmm.

Time passed. He was no longer a little bitty bunny rabbit but he was a human being whose name was Mr. Hopewell. Mr. Hopewell was looking for the Presence and glory of God. Mr. Hopewell did not know who God really was or where to find God. He went walking through the woods one day, and he came to this large forest of old growth fir trees. These trees had giant limbs like arms and they pointed right up at the heavens. Mr. Hopewell said to the trees, “Are you God? Are you the Presence of God?” And the giant trees in nature’s majestic cathedral smiled and said, “O no, we are not God. But we wouldn’t be alive if God was not here.” Hmmm.

Mr. Hopewell was confused and he went and sat down on the banks of Puget Sound. It was beautiful that day and the sun was just setting. There was no movement of wind and it was perfectly still. The water was like glass and the reflections of the clouds were perfectly silhouetted in the water. The sun went down and made a sunbeam as golden as the clouds that gleamed in the sky. It was incredibly gorgeous and Mr. Hopewell said to the sun as it went down to set behind the mountains, “Sun, are you God?” The sun smiled as it faded underneath the mountains in the west and said, “O no, I am not God. But God is here and all around you, in the beauty of my golden rays.” Hmmm.

Mr. Hopewell was perplexed. He thought to himself, “Where can I go to find God, to find the Presence of God, the glory of God?” For some reason or another, Mr. Hopewell went to a hospital and up to the maternity ward and saw a friend’s new born baby. The baby was crying and cooing and the mother and father were glowing with happiness and joy at the birth of their child. They had never been so happy in their whole lives. Mr. Hopewell said, “Are you God? Are you the Presence of God?” The baby just continued to coo and gurgle. Hmmm.

Mr. Hopewell finally came to a church one day. It was a majestic church with high vaulting ceilings, and there was a majestic stained glass window in the front of this church, looking like the visions of heaven from the book of Isaiah. Music filled the rafters of this church with the sounds of the magnificent choir and organ. The music cast a majestic spell over his soul. Then it all stopped. The organ stopped. The choir stopped. The movement of the bodies stopped. It was perfectly silent, and the silence was even more powerful than the music. Mr. Hopewell broke the silence when he whispered, “Are you God? Are you the Presence, the Glory, the Majesty of God?” And his questions echoed throughout the sanctuary, “Are you God? Are you the Presence? The majesty? The glory?” The words reverberated, echoing in the perfectly harmonious sanctuary.

Mr. Hopewell went to the front of the sanctuary, and there was a Bible there on a table in the front of the sanctuary. Mr. Hopewell, becoming somewhat desperate, asked the Bible, “Are you the Presence of God?” And before there was an answer, a pastor started to preach and told the congregation of the wonderful, glorious Presence of God in Jesus Christ, that God was all around them on every side. And Mr. Hopewell came up to the pastor and foolishly asked him, “Are you God?” The pastor laughed and said, “I have been called lots of things, but I have never been called God before.” Mr. Hopewell finally left, heavily discouraged, trying to find the glory of God, trying to find the Presence of God. Mr. Hopewell went out to a bus stop in the front of the church, and there was an old man standing at that bus stop. Mr. Hopewell, exhausted by his journey, finally approached the old man and asked, “Sir, I have been looking for God. I have been looking for the glory of God, for the glorious Presence of God. Do you know where I could find God?” The old man said, “Why you are living in the middle of God. God is aaaaallllll around you … if you have the eyes to see.” Hmmmmm. (Edward F. Markquart Lutheran pastor)

Here’s my point. We try so hard to understand. We try to throw our nets over God and haul Him in to our understanding. We try to contain God within our human ability to use language. But we’re only human. We can’t take in all of the holy light God’s given us. It’s too bright. It overwhelms us. We need God present in human form, smiling at our sorry attempts to describe the indescribable. God understands. “You’re trying too hard,” he whispers. “You don’t have to wrestle and fight and use your muscle to deserve this. God’s given it to you already. Try softer.”

Robert Fulghum, the author of Everything I Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, tells about a woman who was so stressed she went to see a psychiatrist. Near the end of the session, he wrote out a prescription and handed it to her. Rather than providing for medication, he gave her some instructions. “Spend one hour on Sunday watching the sunrise while walking in a cemetery.”

She didn’t want to do it. But she did, for she was desperate to find help for what was ailing her. The next Sunday morning, as the sun came up, she stood in the cemetery listening to the birds and watching the world come alive all around her. And she found herself getting in touch with her life again. There’s nothing like a cemetery to give a person perspective. And it doesn’t take a long time either.

The best and most meaningful experiences of life do not last very long. Think about it...

Can you recall that moment when Jesus came into your heart? Whether it was a private moment or very public, you knew instantly and instinctively that life would never again be the same. But it was just a flash, wasn’t it? Just a blink of the eye, and God made His presence known to you in a way you’d never know it before. And you knew what had happened. You just knew. You couldn’t quite explain it, perhaps, but you knew. That moment became a preview of the journey of faith that has brought you to this moment in life.

And the Robin told Mr. Hopewell…Spring is aaaall around you, you are living in the middle of Spring. Amen.