Living Water
In the Greek tradition, the woman who met Jesus at the well becomes St. Fotini. She was so deeply moved by Jesus' willingness to engage with her--a woman, a Samaritan, an adulterer--that she went on to preach Jesus' message throughout Samaria and the Middle East after his death. As a result, she and her family--sisters and son--endured several tortures. Over and over again, she convinced her persecutors to convert, continually angering Nero so that he would try yet another torture, worse than the last. Finally, after all of her sisters and her son had been killed, she saw a vision of Christ and died in prison.
But most Christians don't know that part of the story. If they know the story at all, they likely memorized verse 13, out of context, in Sunday School: "“Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
Beautiful words, to be sure, but to me, Fotini's answer is more interesting than what Jesus said to her. She notes that walking all the way to the well is tiring, and that if he can tell her where to get this living water he speaks of, she would love to know. She's still focused on her own physical needs. If there's an eternal source of water that will save her this arduous walk, heaving a heavy cistern, she'll take it.
In the Protestant tradition, this reading is paired with readings about the Jews complaining because they didn't have enough water in the desert after escaping slavery--the story in which Moses makes water spring up from stone, but only after God gets totally exasperated by the complaining of the slaves he freed. It is a story of anguish and relief, of lack of gratitude turned gratitude, just one chapter in an ongoing story of a people returning again and again to the source of their freedom.
If we come to God at all, we come through our bodies. We hunger or thirst, and we find relief, and if we're spiritual people, we feel some sense of gratitude each time this happens. We suffer in our bodies--even if our illnesses are not physical, we often experience our suffering as physical pain. We feel elation and grace and hope in our bodies, also, even if we can't exactly describe the sensations.
And most of our lives are centered on meeting our physical needs, whether or not we realize it. Even if we spend more time in front of a computer than we do outdoors, we still think (to some extent) about how we're sitting, where we're sitting, where our hands are positioned in relation to our screen. We can't do anything, really, without relying to some extent on our five senses.
Today I went to housewarming party for a family recently reunited after a father's prison sentence. Many of us who had cared for the girls while their father was in prison gathered together at their new, small but functional apartment, graciously accepting the gift of frozen pizza and chips and iceberg lettuce salad the girls "made because we know you like vegetables, Argie." In return, they graciously accepted gifts from us--a waffle maker, towels, a colander, gift certificates to the local grocery. Last of all, the girls opened two jars of homemade strawberry jam.
"You helped me pick strawberries last July, remember?" a woman from our church reminded the girls. She had them in her home the longest. "I made the jam with the strawberries you picked."
One of the girls held the jam against her chest and proclaimed, "Oh, I do remember." She closed her eyes, as if she were remembering a warmer day. "I can't wait to eat that memory!"
But most Christians don't know that part of the story. If they know the story at all, they likely memorized verse 13, out of context, in Sunday School: "“Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
Beautiful words, to be sure, but to me, Fotini's answer is more interesting than what Jesus said to her. She notes that walking all the way to the well is tiring, and that if he can tell her where to get this living water he speaks of, she would love to know. She's still focused on her own physical needs. If there's an eternal source of water that will save her this arduous walk, heaving a heavy cistern, she'll take it.
In the Protestant tradition, this reading is paired with readings about the Jews complaining because they didn't have enough water in the desert after escaping slavery--the story in which Moses makes water spring up from stone, but only after God gets totally exasperated by the complaining of the slaves he freed. It is a story of anguish and relief, of lack of gratitude turned gratitude, just one chapter in an ongoing story of a people returning again and again to the source of their freedom.
If we come to God at all, we come through our bodies. We hunger or thirst, and we find relief, and if we're spiritual people, we feel some sense of gratitude each time this happens. We suffer in our bodies--even if our illnesses are not physical, we often experience our suffering as physical pain. We feel elation and grace and hope in our bodies, also, even if we can't exactly describe the sensations.
And most of our lives are centered on meeting our physical needs, whether or not we realize it. Even if we spend more time in front of a computer than we do outdoors, we still think (to some extent) about how we're sitting, where we're sitting, where our hands are positioned in relation to our screen. We can't do anything, really, without relying to some extent on our five senses.
Today I went to housewarming party for a family recently reunited after a father's prison sentence. Many of us who had cared for the girls while their father was in prison gathered together at their new, small but functional apartment, graciously accepting the gift of frozen pizza and chips and iceberg lettuce salad the girls "made because we know you like vegetables, Argie." In return, they graciously accepted gifts from us--a waffle maker, towels, a colander, gift certificates to the local grocery. Last of all, the girls opened two jars of homemade strawberry jam.
"You helped me pick strawberries last July, remember?" a woman from our church reminded the girls. She had them in her home the longest. "I made the jam with the strawberries you picked."
One of the girls held the jam against her chest and proclaimed, "Oh, I do remember." She closed her eyes, as if she were remembering a warmer day. "I can't wait to eat that memory!"
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