Sunday, March 3, 2002
3rd Sunday of Lent
1st Reading: Ex 17:3-7
In those days the people thirsted for water there and grumbled against
Moses, "Why did you make us leave Egypt to have us die of thirst
with our children and our cattle?"
So Moses cried to Yahweh, "What shall I do with the people? They
are almost ready to stone me!" Yahweh said to Moses, "Go ahead
of the people and take with you the elders of Israel. Take with you the
staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. I will stand there before
you on the rock at Horeb. You will strike the rock and water will flow
from it and the people will drink." Moses did this in the presence
of the elders of Israel.
The place was called Massah and Meribah because of the complaints of the
Israelites, who tested Yahweh saying, "Is Yahweh with us or not?"
2nd Reading: Rom 5:1-2, 5-8
Brothers and sisters, by faith we have received true righteousness, and
we are at peace with God, through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Through him
we obtain this favor in which we remain and we even boast to expect the
Glory of God. And hope does not disappoint us because the Holy Spirit
has been given to us, pouring into our hearts the love of God.
Consider, moreover, the time that Christ died for us: when we were still
sinners and unable to do anything. Few would accept to die for an upright
person; although, for a very good person, perhaps someone would dare to
die. But see how God manifested his love for us: while we were still sinners,
Christ died for us.
Gospel: Jn 4:5-42 (or Jn 4:5-15, 19-26, 39-42)
Jesus
came to a Samaritan town called Sychar, near the land that Jacob had given
to his son Joseph. Jacob's well is there. Tired from his journey, Jesus
sat down by the well; it was about noon. Now a Samaritan woman came to
draw water and Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink." His disciples
had just gone into town to buy some food.
The Samaritan woman said to him, "How is it that
you, a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan and a woman, for a drink?" (For Jews,
in fact, have no dealings with Samaritans.) Jesus replied, "If you
only knew the Gift of God! If you knew who it is that asks you for a drink,
you yourself would have asked me and I would have given you living water."
The woman answered, "Sir, you have no bucket and this well is deep;
where is your living water? Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who
gave us this well after he drank from it himself, together with his sons
and his cattle?"
Jesus said to her, "Those who drink of this water will be thirsty
again; but those who drink of the water that I shall give will never be
thirsty; for the water that I shall give will become in them a spring
of water welling up to eternal life."
The woman said to him, "Give me this water, that I may never be thirsty
and never have to come here to draw water." Jesus said, "Go,
call your husband and come back here." The woman answered, "I
have no husband." And Jesus replied, "You are right to say:
'I have no husband'; for you have had five husbands and the one you have
now is not your husband. What you said is true."
The woman then said to him, "I see you are a prophet; tell me this:
Our fathers used to come to this mountain to worship God; but you Jews,
do you not claim that Jerusalem is the only place to worship God?"
Jesus said to her, "Believe me, woman, the hour is coming when you
shall worship the Father, but that will not be on this mountain or in
Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship without knowledge, while we Jews worship
with knowledge, for salvation comes from the Jews. But the hour is coming
and is even now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father
in spirit and truth; for that is the kind of worshippers the Father wants.
God is spirit and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth."
The woman said to him, "I know that the Messiah, that is the Christ,
is coming; when he comes, he will tell us everything." And Jesus
said, "I who am talking to you, I am he."
At this point the disciples returned and were surprised that Jesus was
speaking with a woman; however, no one said, "What do you want?"
or: "Why are you talking with her?" So the woman left her water
jar and ran to the town. There she said to the people, "Come and
see a man who told me everything I did! Could he not be the Christ?"
So they left the town and went to meet him.
In the meantime the disciples urged Jesus, "Master, eat." But
he said to them, "I have food to eat that you don't know about."
And the disciples wondered, "Has anyone brought him food?" Jesus
said to them, "My food is to do the will of the One who sent me and
to carry out his work.
You say that in four more months it will be the harvest; now, I say to
you, look up and see the fields white and ready for harvesting. People
who reap the harvest are paid for their work, and the fruit is gathered
for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together.
Indeed the saying holds true: 'One sows and another reaps.' I sent you
to reap where you didn't work or suffer; others have worked and you are
now sharing in their labors."
In that town many Samaritans believed in him when they heard the woman
who declared, "He told me everything I did." So, when they came
to him, they asked him to stay with them and Jesus stayed there two days.
After that many more believed because of his own words and they said to
the woman, "We no longer believe because of what you told us; for
we have heard for ourselves and we know that this is the Savior of the
world."
Commentary
Third Sunday already! In no time another Lent will have come and gone. Don't suppose anything much will change!…. It will though. God loves us too much for nothing to change. In time, we always encounter some kind of painful crisis in our lives, and that's the moment of growth. What's growth? Greater love. And what's the crisis? That question in the first reading: "Is God with us or not." The pilgrims discovered that God was with them, giving water. In the similar crisis of Calvary, water will flow again, from the heart of Christ, a sign of the Spirit, the Love released into the world by Jesus. How simply he asks for what he needs: "Give me a drink." A lot depends on the humility to ask. It's Sunday - can you spend some time in the desert today to listen for the prayer that's welling up in your heart?