Sunday Homily, March 19, 2017, 3rd Lent, A cycle
Readings:
Exodus 17, 3-7, Moses: “What shall I do with this people?”
Psalm 95, If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Romans 5, 1-2, 5- 8, The love of God has been poured out into our hearts.
John 4, 5-42, The Samaritan Woman at the well.
Say Brandon and Mary, his mom, "Welcome in, Everybody."
Exodus observations :
What: After two weeks in the first book of the Bible, today we move to the second. The book basically tells the heroic struggle of Moses to get the Hebrew people out of Egypt, where they had gone because of the drought in their land some decades or centuries before.
Author: The book is about Moses, but he is not the author, as was thought for centuries. Instead, it is a compilation.
My Dearest Genevieve, are you playing for us this morning?
When: Take a guess. Yes, during and after the Babylonian Captivity, 555 before Christ. Why now? To help the Jewish tribe stay together. Biblical commentators will say this is the most important book in the Bible. Why? Cultural history gives identity, especially one that goes from tragedy to triumph. Plus, the writers, the priests-Levites, emphasized that God considered this tribe to be The Tribe.
Today’ selection: an amusing story about how the Jewish people are bummed out with Moses for taking them out of the so called cushy slave life of Egypt into a desert with no water and no food.
Recommendation for Lent: Read Genesis and Exodus. Interesting stories.
The best Music, Shonda & Ray. Anybody know why Bethany is not with us this morning? Yep, she finally had her baby!
Life Giving Water
This morning I would like to mention 3 comments about John’s gospel that contemporary Bible scholars make. Then, proceeding from the general observations, I would like to look at today’s gospel and especially the play on water. Is it symbolic maybe? Of what?
Hi, Kevin, thanks for all your help.
Observation 1: 3 writers can be identified as contributing to the gospel of John. The 3 authors worked over a period of 25 to 30 years, up to around 90.
Secondly, the figures in the stories are literary creations, perhaps built around certain people.
Thirdly, the words that Jesus uses are not just recordings, but words composed by the writers to convey a message or a symbol, like water.
Hi, Georgie, thanks, also, to you for all your help.
Which leads to our selection from John this morning, the Samaritan woman at the well.
She is talking about ordinary well water. Jesus is talking about symbolic water, living water that gives life to the spirit.
I would propose this life giving water takes all sorts of forms. For example.
And thanks to you, Buddy. It is so nice to have you with us.
Remember the first time we had our penitential rite? When Mike proposed the idea at a team luncheon I confess I was a bit skeptical. I was thinking, ‘Nobody is going to want to do this. More focus on sin.’ This is why I don’t like Lent, the endless focus on sin. What does the ordinary Mass always begin with? Focus on me a sinner.
Was I pleasantly surprised! In fact, that penitential rite was pure water to my spirit. I was humbled and touched.
Let us begin.
So, events can be life giving water, people can be life giving water. Put them together and my spirit is moved.
Last week in Hilton Head we had Rosemary’s two sisters and husbands. We celebrated a little Sunday Mass in the living room. I was moved to tears. I could hardly talk.
Brandon, our Candle Lighter of The Week.
Another event: our own Mass right here at Sigler. You people are living water for me.
What event brings living water to you?
Who brings living water to you?
And You?
Sources: Raymond Brown and John Shelby Spong
Our Candle Lighter at work, three whites and one purple.