Barriers to Compassion

Gospel John 4: 3 - 30

This passage from John’s gospel is one of my favourite Bible stories. The woman is an outsider, - as a woman, a Samaritan, and someone who has had  rough time in life. Last week we heard of Nicodemus coming to Jesus, Nicodemus, male, Jewish, religious elite - he had it all, he still had trouble getting his head around what Jesus was saying to him. He went to Jesus at night, hiding under the cover of darkness.

This week we hear of the woman, who is ‘other’ in so many ways. She doesn’t come to meet Jesus, they both happen to be at the well at the same time, noon. Hot, dry and thirsty.

Some background: Samaritans traced their lineage back to ancient Israel, BUT, they had intermarried with the Assyrians when under occupation in 580’s BCE. They were therefore considered unclean by the Jews, and their land was polluted or defiled, because they were.

And in the time of Jesus, women needed to be in the protection of a man: father, husband , brother, or some other male relative. A woman was of similar status to a slave. 

This woman, we aren’t told her name, is often portrayed as being immoral, a loose woman, but there is nothing in the reading to suggest that. Jesus doesn’t call her to repentance, he doesn’t mention her living situation as a sin.  As a woman, if your husband died, divorced you, or abandoned you, the outcome was that you needed the security of a household headed by a male, otherwise begging and prostitution were the only ways you could survive. 

Think back, it is not that long ago that women were unable to get a home loan without their husband’s approval; and think back to Henry the Eight, a wife was only as good as the male heirs she produced.

So it is quite feasible that this woman had a sad history, rather than an immoral history.

…..

Back to the encounter between Jesus and the woman. Jesus had stopped to rest at the well, while his disciples went to town to get food. The woman came to get water, it is an unusual time of day, but with a long sad history, maybe she isn’t welcome with the other women, maybe she is thought of as bad luck, or maybe she ran out of water, and just needed to get some more.

Jesus breaks the cultural and religious codes by asking her for a drink – a Jew would not speak to a Samaritan, especially not to ask for help; a man and woman who were not related should not speak to each other. Here Jesus is asking her for a drink, and he doesn’t have anything to drink from – this is wrong on so many levels. But it is Jesus who is breaking the rules, not the woman.

When Jesus offers life giving water, her first thought is physical, concrete, no more carrying large pots of water. But she stays in the conversation.

Jesus speaks to this woman, knows who she is, asks her for help, and she believes. When she says “I see you are a prophet”, that is a statement of belief. She sees that Jesus is a prophet, because he has seen her, as a person, as someone with dignity, she has worth and value, and she is not used to being treated that way. Jesus has seen her, and she has recognised something special in him.

Then, again, against all the rules, Jesus and the woman have a dialogue about faith and worship. It was considered foolish to waste your time trying to teach a woman, or even having a discussion with a woman.

So astonished was the woman, that she ran back to the city, leaving her water jar behind, and told everyone; now that means the men who were discussing politics and religion in the town square.

….

Jesus speaks to us with compassion, understanding and the offer of living water, water gushing from inside us like a spring – an image of abundance and constancy.

But from speaking with people I know some of us don’t feel like there is a never ending, abundant, continuous source of living water within us, there are certainly days when I don’t.

What stops us from accepting the offer of life-giving water? The woman could have insisted that it was inappropriate to speak with a Jew, or a male, and especially a Jewish male, and never found out what Jesus had to offer her. She could have stuck to the idea that water came from the well and was carried in jars. She could have not continued the conversation, and never come to the realisation that the man she is speaking to is a prophet from God.

How often does our social conditioning, our aversion to people different to us, our unwillingness to share our resources, our attempts to be self-dependent, our  reluctance to discuss questions of faith, prevent us from being open to new experiences, to new learning, to new opportunities and to relationship with God.

This is a story for anyone who has ever been put down, because of their age, their gender, their educational level, their job or lack thereof, their choices in life; this is a story for those with few options. This is a story for people who are marginalised, for those who carry shame. This is a story for those who don’t even know they are searching for something better, because life is about putting one foot in front of the other, of doing whatever is necessary to survive. This is a story about compassion, about hope, about that which binds all people, the need for water, the need for life, the need for identity.

This woman not only receives life giving water, compassion and the answer to the hottest issue of her day - where to worship - she also has a new found sense of herself. 

This is a story of the transforming power of compassion and love. While we all need that transformation in our lives, we can also be agents of healing and hope by offering that compassion and love to those who need is most. Because when we have that life giving water, we, like the woman, will want to tell others; it will show in our lives.

What prevents you from receiving the compassion and love that Jesus offers you? What prevents you from showing that compassion and love to others?

* some ideas from UCC SAMUEL  and http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-lose/misogyny-moralism-and-the_b_836753.html

Knowledge and Faith

Knowledge is power! The more a person knows about a tropic, the more they are seen as an expert, the more people will look to them for advice, and the more importantly they are treated. Such is our modern world.

Knowledge is power in another way as well. The more someone  knows about you as an individual, the more you rely on them not to make fun of you, or use the information against you.

Knowledge was power in Jesus’ time as well. Nicodemus was a religious expert, he knew the Scriptures and would have been held in high esteem because of this. Knowledge was also power, in a society where honour and shame  are paramount, being seen to do the right thing was often more important than what you did or why you did it.

Nicodemus goes to Jesus at night, because he doesn't want to be seen talking to Jesus. If his religious colleagues found out he would have some serious questions to answer.

Nicodemus doesn't initially ask Jesus anything, but tells Jesus what he knows about him: that he is a teacher, and that he must be sent by God because of the things he has been doing. Even though Nicodemus recognises that Jesus is someone special, he still goes in  with his current mindset of knowledge and what he knows about Jesus.

For many of us knowledge is not only power but also security, it gives us a sense of control in our lives, and control over the world around us. Doubt, mystery and questions signify weakness, weakness in ourselves that we don't want to acknowledge. And weakness in ourselves we don’t want others to know about.

When we look at what has been happening in our world this year: floods, bushfires, earthquakes, tsunamis, cyclones and civil disobedience.

It can be difficult to know what to do in the circumstances, we seek to know and understand so many things so that we feel in control. Even if we know how earthquakes happen, we can’t stop them from happening. Knowledge gives the illusion of control, but we are never completely in control.

Nicodemus came to Jesus at night and told Jesus what he knew about him. Jesus then proceeds to talk to Nicodemus about things he just doesn't understand, so much of life is mystery, so much of life is questions and doubts and fear and not knowing. That doesn't mean we shouldn't ask questions and we shouldn't try and learn, but it does mean that at times things happen that we just don't understand.

After Nicodemus tells Jesus that he must be a teacher from God because of the signs that he was doing Jesus answers him by saying :I tell you no one could see the kingdom of God without being born from above. The Greek phrase can be translated as being born again or born from above. Nicodemus chooses the wrong option. He sees only what is in front of him. While he can recognise that Jesus is a teacher and that he must come from God because of the signs and miracles Jesus has been doing, Nicodemus doesn't think any further than what he already knows. Jesus goes on and tries to talk to him about spiritual things, but Nicodemus is focused on the physical.

When we see people as purely physical beings we treat them as half people, we ignore the other side of our own life and the life of people around us.

The way the phrase born-again is used by some Christians, it suggests that we are the ones who are in control. That we choose to be born. If we read this chapter of John's gospel we read of God and the one who is in control. The well-known verse, of John 3:16 talks of God's love, of God's desire to save not to condemn. This is not to say that we should not respond to God with our whole lives, but we need to remember that it is a response and God is the main actor in this story and in the story of our lives.

Going back to the situation in Japan at the moment, and the other natural disasters that have occurred this year, each time someone for a group have tried to make sense of the situation in terms of God's judgment.

The same happened with hurricane Katrina, the bushfires in Victoria a couple of years ago, as well as floods and cyclones and earthquakes this year. These have all been explained in terms of God’s judgement, against homosexuality, abortion, egocentricity. One group is currently suggesting that the earthquake in Japan is God’s way of allowing Christian groups to move forward with evangelisation.

We know how floods happen, it's got to do with lots of rain and not enough space for the water to run away; we know cyclones are a weather phenomenon that occurs from time to time; we know of earthquakes happen when tectonic plates move and shove against each other; trying to explain why God let these things happen to some people and not to others is futile, and I would say irresponsible hurtful and an Godlike. But some people need the certainty of an explanation, when there is no explanation, and God becomes judge and executioner.

There are things in life that we have no control over, and at times all we can do is ask questions, knowing that there may not be an answer. That doesn't make the questions any less important but when we stake our faith and our life on having an answer to every question, we lose out. Faith is not about knowledge, faith is living in the mystery, faith is trusting in God when we don't know what's happening as well as when we feel like we are in some kind of control. Faith is Abram and Sarah walking away from the only place they knew.

Lament is one way that the people of Israel handled the questions for which there were no answers. We are shortly going to sing a song that is a lament, that expresses some of the unease, some of the questioning, some of the unknown.

As people of faith, we ask questions, we wrestle with doubt, but we know there are not always answers, or answers that make sense to us. As people of faith, part of the freedom that we have been given in Christ Jesus is not having to know everything, because we trust that God's love is stronger than anything else, and that God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world but that the world might be saved through him.

Just be!

Some people when they go on holidays or to something special like a wedding or a party, spend all their time taking photos, so that they can remember what happened. I am sure most of us know people who are so intent on getting souvenirs and taking photos, that they don't actually participate and experience what is going on around them. There are times when you really need to just be present.

In the chapter before the one we heard this morning from Matthew, Peter has declared that Jesus is Lord, and Jesus tells his disciples that he will die and that if they want to be his disciples they have to be prepared to leave everything and follow him. Then we get to this reading about the three disciples and Jesus going up to the top of the mountain, and something amazing happens.

Only three disciples went up the mountain with Jesus. Matthew tells us that Moses and Elijah who there with Jesus.  Moses was a great leader, it was Moses who led the Hebrew people out of Egypt and out of slavery. In the same way that Moses freed the people from slavery, so Jesus saves us from slavery of sin and guilt and shame. Elijah is one of the major prophets of the old testament and it is recorded that he was carried off to heaven in a chariot. Moses and Elijah, two of the great characters of the Old testament, are here seen talking with Jesus. There is lots of symbolism we could go into, but that can wait for another time.

I wonder what it's like for us when we experience something that leaves us speechless and not knowing what to do, what to say, how to describe what we've experienced or what we've seen?

And I wonder what it's like for those of us who haven't had those experiences?

I wonder what it was like for the disciples who were left at the bottom of the mountain?

I wonder what it was like for the three who were on the mountain,, seeing Moses and Elijah talking to Jesus, being told to listen to Jesus and then being told to keep quiet.?

There is a time to plan and think about where we go on holidays. But there are also times when we need to just be, to stop and breathe and taking the wonder of a sunset, the magnificence of a waterfall, the hug of a child. In the same way there is a time for planning and thinking and understanding and working through our faith, and there are times for us to think about our faith, there are times to count the cost of following Jesus, there are times to think about what that means and who Jesus is for us, but when we are here as we take the bread and the juice this morning is a time to be open to God a time to be present in the moment to what is happening.

A story [from 'It was on fire when I lay down on it' by Robert Fulghum, p 27ff]:

when Molly started school she helped pack the morning lunches for herself, her brothers and her father. Each bag got a share of sandwiches, fruit, milk money and sometimes a note or treat. One morning Molly gave her father two lunch bags to take to work. He asked Molly what the extra bag was? She said the other one is something else. Her father asked what was in it? Molly said: it's just some stuff, take it with you. And off it went to work he went. At midday the father quickly ate his lunch then tore open the other bag and shook out the contents: to hair ribbons, three small stones, a plastic dinosaur, the stump of the pencil, a tiny seashell, two animal crackers, one marble, a used lipstick, a small doll, two chocolate kisses and 13 pennies.

The father smiled and thought how charming, then getting ready a busy afternoon, he swept the desk clean, into the wastepaper basket, lunch scraps, Molly's bag and all. There wasn't anything in there he needed.

That evening Molly asked here father: where's my bag? Her father asked : what bag? She said: the one I gave you morning. Her father said he'd left it at the office, why? Molly said : I forgot to put this note in it, anyway I want it back those are my things in there, the things I really like, I thought you might like to play with them, but I want them back. You didn’t lose the bag, did you daddy?

OH!!!

Her father said: no, I just forgot to bring it bring it home. Molly hugged her father. Then he looked at the note: I love you daddy. OH!!!

 He rushed back to the office, picked up the wastepaper bin and pour the contents on his desk before the cleaner came. The next day he bought the back home. He asked Molly to tell him what was special about those things.

Sometimes we have missed the affection we were being given, like, “standing knee deep in the river and dying of thirst”.

Sometimes we think we don't need what we are being given, and sometimes all we can think to do is build a monument or take a photo.

Baptism reminds all of us that we are loved.

Baptism reminds all of us that we are part of the people of God.

Baptism reminds us that Jesus lived and died and rose, and in baptism we get to be part of the life and death and resurrection of Jesus.

There are times in life when we need to be present, we need to let the love of God, and the love of those around us, to wash over and through us. There are times when we need to just be. As we share in communion shortly, we rehear the story of God's interaction with people throughout history, we rehear the story of the night when Jesus was betrayed and how he died for us. There is more to this ritual than just rehearing the story. In being part, in participating, we become part of the story. We can see it as something that we don't need, just a little bit of bread and a mouthful of juice. Or it can be a time when we allow God to be part of us, it can be a time to be, and see what happens.

Some people will have been on the mountain top and experienced God in really powerful and amazing ways, but whether we have been to the mountaintop or not we have all experienced the love of God. God loves each one of us and is offering each one of us life and nurture, is offering each one of us love, forgiveness, grace; is offering each one of us hope and peace.

Experiencing God is life changing, transforming.

we take some time to think about the ways God has and is transforming our lives.