First Reading: Exodus 17: 3 – 7;
Second Reading: Romans 5: 1 – 2, 5 – 8;
Gospel: John 4: 5 – 42
The scriptures constantly remind us of the continual and personal love of God towards each one of us. On the third Sunday of Lent the church invites us to enter into this love of God and respond to him positively. God himself initiates the move in every person to bring them closer to him through the gift of the Holy Spirit. One of the recurring themes throughout the Lenten season is the compassion and mercy of our God that conveys his love. Repentance on the part of human person indicates the recognition of this love and his readiness to make reparations. This requires a spirit of sincerity and a sense of honesty to self and recognition of our nothingness before God. Once a person has accepted this change, God has a ready mission prepared for him to continue to spread his love.
In the Gospel of today, Jesus encounters the Samaritan woman at the well and gives her the living water. With this she and the people of the place are able to trust and accept the eternal life he gives them. They recognise him as the messiah, the saviour of the world.
Today’s First Reading from the Book of Exodus tells us that God presented the people of Israel with living water from the rock. It consisted of one of the three events found in the Old Testament that speak of people thirsting for water. This event took place at Kadesh where once more Moses was commanded by God to assemble the congregation and to command the rock before their eyes to yield its water. Here once again people exhibit spiritual weakness and grumble against God and Moses. God displays great patience both with Moses and his people. As biblical history tells us, Moses did not trust in the Lord. Because he struck the rock twice, he was punished and not allowed to enter the Promised Land.
Today’s Gospel Reading echoes the First Reading from the Book of Exodus concerning the living water and tells us how God communicates his divine life to believers. Jesus promised the unnamed Samaritan woman the living water that will become a spring of water gushing up to eternal life and the grace to recognise who he really is. Jesus uses the water as a metaphor to teach this woman the lesson of grace and forgiveness. He speaks about the living water, which gives eternal life, divine grace, which is God’s life within the soul. The woman craves for this type of water, because she wishes to have eternal life although she misunderstood this at first. Jesus now has a lengthy but candid dialogue with her. He makes her understand that she needs to confess her sins and change her life before she can obtain this life-giving water, grace. Jesus then reveals to her that he is the Messiah. Once she is given a share in the mystery, the Samaritan woman’s spirit is enlightened, accelerated, and illuminated by Jesus. She now realises what it means to take freely of the water of life, which is the spiritual refreshment that comes into her soul after her encounter and confession with Jesus. Not only was she impressed that Jesus knew all her sins, but she was also given the opportunity to have those sins forgiven. She believes he is truly the Messiah, the Anointed One. She repents of her past misdeeds and goes back to tell her family, friends, and tells them about Jesus. When we reflect on this episode we see how this story begins with Jesus showing himself as a person in need: tired, hungry and thirsty. We are surprised to see how genuinely human he was and asks help from a person he was supposed to avoid, namely a strange woman and also a Samaritan. She is also surprised at his approach but her surprise allows Jesus to turn the tables and offer her living water of grace. The richness of the story is found in the dialogue between Jesus and the woman. It is a story about revelation, communication and relationship. It is also a story about God, Jesus and boundaries. Jesus shows himself as the living water to be shared by all. We need to allow Jesus free entry into our personal lives. A sign that God is active in our lives is His entering in to our personal, “private” lives. Jesus wants to “get personal” with us, especially during this Lenten season. Jesus wants to get into our “private” lives because we have a “private” personal life which is contrary to the will of God. Christ wishes to come into that “private” life, not to embarrass us, not to judge or condemn us, not to be unkind or malicious to us, but to free us, to change us, and to offer us what we really need: living water. The living water is God the Holy Spirit Who enters the soul of the woman through Jesus and his love. We human beings are composed of four parts: mind, body, emotions and spirit. When we let God, the Holy Spirit come into us and take control of our thinking, our physical activity, our emotions and our spirit, He can bring harmony to all four parts of our humanity, and so to the way we live. We can find this living water in the Sacraments, in prayer and in the Holy Bible. We need to turn to Jesus who loves us with non-judgmental, unconditional love: We all face moments when guilt plagues us; when we are upset for falling for the same temptations again and again; when we make choices that turn out to be all wrong; when our relationships with others fall in a heap; when we feel lonely, sick, and tired of the way people are treating us; when we are depressed and upset and can’t see anything good in ourselves; when our Faith is at rock bottom and we feel as if the Church and religion aren’t doing anything for us; when we beat ourselves up for lack of enthusiasm to be true disciples of Jesus ready to do anything for him; when we survey the days that have gone by without a word of prayer; when all we feel is failure and defeat. During such moments it is great to read a story about Jesus and his love and acceptance of the woman at the well. Let us rest, assured that Jesus is there to accept us warmly and help us to see that he will give us the strength and the power we need to overcome whatever it is that is grieving us.