Lent 3 2014

So let's recap.

Lent 1 Sin

Lent 2 Salvation

If this were a game of Jeopardy and the today's lessons the question

the answer would be What is Faith?

In this Lenten Period in Lectionary Series A we have some of the longest

Gospel Lessons in the canon as if sitting through them were part of the

Lenten Discipline.

Our Gospel concerns Jesus sitting beside Jacob's Well and asking a

Samaritan woman for water. This was an unorthodox request first because

Jews did not of choice associate with Samaritans and secondly because

she was a woman. While I'm at it I'll question whether Jesus actually

said 'for salvation is from the Jews.' in verse 22 or did the writer

place these words in his mouth. The Old Testament Lesson continues the

water motif with the Israelites dying of thirst in the wilderness and

challenging Moses and their God for bringing them here to die. Psalm 95

can only have seemed appropriate because it mentions the locations of

the story in Exodus. The Epistle Lesson is that passage in Romans that

lays out Justification by Grace through Faith.

Is it purely coincidence that the Iraelites journeyed from the

Wilderness of Sin to Mt Horeb? Lent is traditionally seen as a time of

fasting and privation and the Israelites forty years in the Wilderness

is likewise a period of want and testing. In this instance as all too

frequently during this period of wandering the people failed the test of

faith so that the Lord saw to it and none of the people who left Egypt

were alive when they arrived in the Promised Land save for Caleb and

Joshua who remained faithful. See Num_14:28-30

Psalm 95 is a hymn of rejoicing in the Lord who is "the rock of our

salvation!" That is until we reach the last 4 verses Psa_95:8-11. Here

we find why this particular Psalm was selected as it recalls the

Israelite's failure of Faith at Meribah and the price the people paid

for that unfaithfulness.

The Epistle in Romans 5 emphasizes what the Israelites in the Wilderness

lacked--faith strengthened by endurance or patience despite suffering

which breeds character or experience which results in hope. All these

are aspects of faith. The final verses explain that our hope and faith

rests in Jesus act of redemptive love on the cross.

To me the central message of today's Gospel is the fact that Jesus

brings his message to a Gentile, a reviled Samaritan at that and a woman

who lived off the avails of prostitution. But then Jesus was no stranger

to discrimination:

Joh 1:46 Nathanael said to him, "Can anything good come out of

Nazareth?" Philip said to him, "Come and see."

In the context of today's theme it is the woman's faith that causes her

togo back to her people and testify to what she had seen and heard and led

her to bring them back to hear Jesus resulting in his spending two days

with these people during which time many believed.

Once more it is to the lowest of the low that the message is brought and

through the testimony of one who would noramally be marginalized that

the message is spread. And it is to Gentiles the message is given.