Affordable Living Water
Children's sermon
Illustration
Preaching
Sermon
Worship
Health care reform is a hot topic in Washington these days, with the Republican Congress and the Trump administration intent on repealing the Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”) and replacing it with their own version. But their effort to overhaul the system has been stalled so far by intra-party divisions over what should be in the replacement bill, and most independent analyses have determined that the House legislation backed by Speaker Paul Ryan would result in millions losing health care insurance. In this installment of The Immediate Word, team member Mary Austin sees a parallel between health care in our society and the water drawn from the well where Jesus encounters a Samaritan woman. When Jesus asks her for a drink, she is startled -- because she lives on the margins of her community, she assumes the she and her plight will be invisible to him. Yet he demonstrates the depth of his concern by offering her living water, which satisfies our (spiritual) thirst far beyond the ability of the well water to take care of our (physical) thirst. Mary explores the implications of this encounter, suggesting that Jesus’ outreach -- and the woman’s enthusiastic response -- offers us a possible model for healing some of the divisions in our world.
Team member Dean Feldmeyer shares some additional thoughts on the Exodus and Psalm texts, and how we ought to react in the wilderness. When we find ourselves in wildernesses of various sorts -- figurative and literal -- our typical reaction is like that of the Israelites: we moan and complain about our plight, and even question why God has put us in such dire circumstances. But Dean notes that this is precisely the wrong reaction -- instead the psalmist points us to the proper reaction when we are in the wilderness: to worship God even more deeply and fervently.
Affordable Living Water
by Mary Austin
John 4:5-42
The woman at the well has Jesus to fill up her places of need -- physical, mental, and spiritual. In our time, she might seek her healing through her health insurance -- and find that the well there has run dry.
Interpreters differ on this, but I have always imagined that the woman is lonely, living at a distance from the other women in the village because of her history. She seems to be poor. If she had money, she wouldn’t need the husbands -- and her current partner -- for economic support. If she lived in our time, without a job, she would most likely need to buy her own health insurance, and her current options might leave her worse off than before.
The divide between the Jews and the Samaritans mirrors the divisions in our country, and their lack of understanding is much like ours. This woman’s needs remind us of the similar people around us, and what they require to live healthy lives.
In the News
The proposed health care overhaul , known as the American Health Care Act (ACHA), would leave 14 million additional people without insurance in 2018, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO). The CBO projects that number would grow to 24 million uninsured people in a decade, based on capped spending for Medicaid. The number of people who receive insurance at work is also projected to drop: “[The report estimates] seven million fewer people would be insured through their employers [by 2026] because some people would choose not to get coverage and some employers would decline to offer it.” Options for coverage would narrow, and the bill eliminates funding for Planned Parenthood clinics, where many women receive wellness care and screenings. “The CBO’s report... found that some of the reduction in coverage would be from people choosing not to buy coverage because of these repeal of the individual mandate under ObamaCare.... But the report also finds that people would go without coverage because of cuts to Medicaid and a drop in financial assistance under the bill.”
Women would also have fewer choices about where to seek health care, as the bill does not allow Medicaid funds to be used for screenings or care at Planned Parenthood. Medicaid funds for reimbursement would be cut. “Fully 43 percent of Planned Parenthood’s revenue in fiscal year 2015 -- more than $550 million -- came from government grants and reimbursements. Right now, under Obamacare, federal funds can be spent at Planned Parenthood, but they can’t be used for abortion -- again, a result of the Hyde Amendment and again, with the three Hyde Amendment exceptions. But this bill goes further, saying that people couldn’t use Medicaid at Planned Parenthood.”
Poorer women are affected more deeply by the proposed law, which allows states to say which medical services are essential for Medicaid starting in 2020. “The Republican plan would ‘freeze’ the Medicaid expansion in 2020. According to statistics compiled by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, the majority of Medicaid recipients are female, and the program ‘covered nearly half of poor women aged 15-44 in 2015,’ per a report from the Guttmacher Institute. In fact, the uninsured rate of women of reproductive age dropped by 36% between 2013 and 2015 because of the [Affordable Care Act]’s expanded coverage and subsidies, according to the report. Rolling back the ACA’s Medicaid expansion and decreasing its subsidies would ensure fewer women have access to affordable, comprehensive care.” The new law would also hold a particular danger for women who have suffered spousal abuse. “Under Obamacare, couples have to file taxes jointly to receive a tax credit -- unless they are victims of domestic abuse, domestic violence, or spousal abandonment. The [proposed law] doesn’t account for this and requires all couples to file jointly to receive a tax credit, without exception.” Women would need to give their abusers their new address as they file a joint return, placing themselves back in danger.
If the woman at the well were seeking her well-being through her health insurance, she would have few choices under the proposed American Health Care Act.
The health care debate takes place against a backdrop of division between the poor and the working class. President Trump’s proposed budget suggests cuts to discretionary spending in favor of increased military spending, including cuts to programs which benefit poor Americans. Dividing working-class and poor Americans may have a political benefit for the president, as he makes cuts in “in areas as diverse as food stamps and housing assistance, education for the disadvantaged and Head Start.... In White Working Class: Overcoming Class Cluelessness in America, due out in May from Harvard Business Review Press, Joan C. Williams argues that white workers’ resentment of the safety net should not be surprising: They get next to no benefit from it... they see themselves as hard-working citizens who struggle to make ends meet, only to be left out of many of the government programs their taxes pay for.” The income divide is narrow, but the gap in services is large. “Over all, 61 percent of poor Americans draw from one means-tested benefit program or another, according to an analysis by the Census Bureau. But among families with incomes above the poverty line -- many of which are barely better off, making just over $24,000 for a family of four -- only 13 percent do.” Each group finds plenty to mistrust about the other, when really their economic stresses are very similar.
In the Scriptures
The woman at the well (curious that we never learn her name, even with her long and lively conversation with Jesus) and her neighbors are as divided, in their own way, as working-class and poorer Americans. From the outside their lives don’t look that different, but they understand themselves in dramatically dissimilar ways. To the outsider looking in, the woman at the well and her neighbors are all despised Samaritans, but the people of the town find other things to deplore about this woman, leaving her alone at the well.
She comes to the well alone, and is surprised to find someone there. Her surprise deepens when the other person turns out to be a strange man... and a Jew... who will converse with her, starting with the request for a drink of water. Perhaps she starts out looking down on him, a traveler who is foolish enough not to have a bucket with him. When he starts to talk, he seems even nuttier, talking about gifts from God. The woman answers politely enough, but I imagine her taking a step back from Jesus and preparing to run, just in case he turns out to be dangerous instead of merely foolish.
Something about his promise of living water is compelling enough that they stop talking about buckets and start talking about her life. She reveals her pain to him, and all of a sudden no one is looking down on anyone else. They’re sharing a moment of truth by the well. She leaves her water jar to share the good news, becoming -- for the moment -- just as foolish as Jesus.
In the Sermon
The sermon might look at the levels of healing that happen for this woman. She’s healed out of her isolation, out of a level of emotional stress, into a place where she’s fully welcomed and valued. A lot happens here, but this is also a healing story, and the sermon might talk about spiritual, mental, and emotional healing.
When she hears good news from Jesus, and knows that she’s included in it, the woman’s first impulse is to share it. She reaches out to her neighbors, setting aside past hurts. She lets go of past divisions to pass on what she’s learned -- and her neighbors are willing to listen to her. Our contact with people is increasingly sorted out by our beliefs, limiting us to people who think like we do. Listening is hard, and learning something new is harder still. The woman and her neighbors offer us a generous possibility in the way they reconnect with each other in Jesus’ presence. The sermon might look at the hard work of approaching people with other views, and hoping to find a place of common ground.
Or the sermon might look at our reaction to receiving good news. Do we mistrust signs of grace, waiting for something dreadful to happen next? Do we feel undeserving? If we met Jesus at the well, would we believe that his offer of living water was for us too?
The woman at the well comes looking for water and ends up with a new mission. She comes to run an errand and leaves with a gift of healing. In her meeting with Jesus, she ends up with much more than she expects -- and more than her neighbors may think she deserves. The divisions that seem so fixed at the beginning of the story are ended in the shared experience of surpassing grace. We can learn from her example as an evangelist, and also from the way she and her neighbors knit themselves back together in a web of caring after years of mistrust. The presence of Jesus is powerful!
SECOND THOUGHTS
Into the Wilderness
by Dean Feldmeyer
Exodus 17:1-7; Psalm 95
Stephen Schwartz and John Caird’s musical Children of Eden is based on the book of Genesis and tells the stories of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, and Noah and his family.
In the first act, when Adam and Eve are expelled from the Garden of Eden into what lies beyond, the narrator describes the land outside Eden in a song called “Wasteland.” The wilderness that it describes is as far as you can get from the bucolic bliss of the Garden. It is a place of...
Red rock and outcrop stone
And the sun glares off a bleaching bone
There’s no comfort or softness here
There’s only the wasteland
The land of the hunter, the stalker, and the skinner
Where you’re either the diner or the dinner
And the line between man and beast keeps getting thinner
In the wasteland.
Stephen Schwartz’s wilderness is a wasteland, nothing like what we 21st-century Americans usually think of when we hear the word “wilderness.” I don’t know about you, but I usually think of those National Geographic calendar photographs of our national parks or the marvelous black and white photos by Ansel Adams.
My wilderness template is lush and verdant, overflowing with beauty. It is pine and fir trees, crystal-clear lakes, and snow-capped mountains. My wilderness is the Quetico Provincial Forest in Ontario, where I spent a week fishing and canoeing with eight high school boys and another adult and never saw another human soul besides our group.
Adjoining the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness of the Superior National Forest in Minnesota, it totals about 450,000 acres of rugged beauty, towering rock cliffs, majestic waterfalls, virgin forests, picturesque rivers, and more than 2,000 lakes.
Canoeing quietly, or as quietly as eight teenage boys can, we observed beavers building a dam, and moose and elk running along the shore and in one case swimming across the lake. And we watched a bald eagle pluck a fish from a lake and sit to eat it on a tree branch where he could also keep an eye on us.
It was vast and beautiful and wonderful, much as it was 600 years ago when the first native Ojibwa ventured there in birch bark canoes -- and it was nothing, nothing like the wilderness through which Moses brought the Children of Israel to the Promised Land.
That wilderness, the same into which Jesus fled for the 40 days we commemorate with Lent, is hot and dry. It is brown and sandy, and nothing lives there that doesn’t have to. It is a forbidding place where only the strongest can survive, a place of scorpions and snakes and vultures and jackals, a place where wild beasts are always hungry and always vicious.
And all the wild beasts which lived therein were not the four-legged kind. There were two-legged ones as well. Thieves, criminals, nomads, and Bedouin outlaws lived in the wilderness and thrived there, often on the things they stole from unwary travelers.
It is not the kind of place into which you flee on weekends with your family, your pop-up camper, and your Coleman camping gear.
It is, however, a potent metaphor for the difficulties and problems in the midst of which we sometimes find ourselves as we endeavor to live as the People of God.
What a Wilderness Is
The wilderness is scary.
When we find ourselves out of our element, where we don’t speak the language, where we don’t know the lay of the land, and where a mistake can have tragic consequences, we are in the wilderness.
In the wilderness, the old rules don’t necessarily apply.
When we find ourselves in a place where the first rule is to survive and the old rules may no longer be helpful or even work at all, that is the wilderness. New rules have to be discovered and sometimes made up on the spot.
In the wilderness, the boundaries and the parameters are always changing. The sand dunes shift, the roads get covered and disappear, rivers even change their courses overnight. And if we are not fully attentive, we will find ourselves wandering in circles... lost and alone.
In the wilderness you sleep with one eye open because predators roam there.
A wilderness, depending on what you are used to, can be an inner-city parking lot or it can be a suburban PTA meeting. It can be in Manhattan or the Boundary Waters. It can be on Wall Street or Main Street or at the corner of Haight and Ashbury. The wilderness is the literal or the figurative “wasteland, the land of the hunter, the stalker, and the skinner, where you’re either the diner or the dinner, and the line between man and beast keeps getting thinner.”
The question raised by this week’s texts is: What is the proper response of the People of God when we find ourselves in a wilderness wasteland?
What Not to Do in a Wilderness
In the Genesis text the Children of Israel take the low road.
Their answer is to give in to their fears, to find someone (Moses) to blame, and then to whine and complain: “Why did you bring us out of Egypt just to die of thirst, along with our families and livestock, out here in the desert. At least back in Egypt we had water to drink.”
Moses goes to God about the situation, but more out of fear for his own life than out of any real doubt. “Uh, God, in case you haven’t noticed, these people are about to stone me to death because they are really, really thirsty. A little help here would be nice.”
You can almost hear God sigh in his response: “Go on ahead of the people. Take some elders with you and go up to Mt. Horeb. Strike the Horeb Stone with your staff, and I’ll make water come out of it and they can drink.”
So that’s what Moses does. He goes up to Horeb and strikes the stone, and water comes out and everyone drinks -- and he names the place Massah and Meribah, which means “quarreled” and “tested,” because the people quarreled with Moses and tested the Lord, saying “Is God with us or not?”
God gave them water to drink -- but because they were so hateful and mean about it, he decided to lead them in circles in the wilderness for 40 years until that entire generation died off... and it was their children who finally get to enter the Promised Land.
What to Do in a Wilderness
So blaming, whining, and complaining are not good choices for how to behave in a wilderness.
This week’s reading from Psalm 95 offers an alternative behavior.
“O come, let us sing to the Lord. Let us make a joyful noise to our salvation.” The thing to do in the wilderness, says the psalmist, is to worship God.
Desert wilderness? Worship God.
Financial wilderness? Worship God.
Volunteer wilderness? Worship God.
Idea wilderness? Worship God.
This, says the psalmist, is what you do if you want to survive the wilderness. You worship the Lord.
Worship is the definitive behavior of the true People of God. Worship reminds us that God is creator and we are creations. Worship reminds us of the wonders of the universe that God created by the flick of his wrist or the word of his mouth. Worship places us in an appropriate posture -- standing next to God, in God’s shadow, dependent upon God’s power and grace.
By nature, 21st-century Americans tend to be problem solvers. We are the progeny of what Tom Brokaw dubbed the Greatest Generation, those who defeated the Nazis, lifted the nation out of the Great Depression, and sent the first astronaut into space. We have inherited their need to accomplish, to achieve, to fix, to repair, and to improve.
And that is all well and good.
There is much in this world in need of repair, and to which we would do well to commit ourselves.
But this week’s psalm reminds us that there is a task which we must first undertake, for it is that task which creates the context in which the work of repair and improvement will be done -- and that task is worship.
May God bless us as we sing songs of love and praise.
ILLUSTRATIONS
From team member Ron Love:
God
Arnold Schwarzenegger recently announced that this is the last season that he will be appearing on the television show The Celebrity Apprentice. The reason is because of the previous host, Donald Trump, who is now the 45th president of the U.S. but remains as an executive producer for the program. Schwarzenegger indicated that he cannot be a part of anything associated with Donald Trump and his politics -- and noted that a common reaction he heard from those who watched the show was “I turned it off, because as soon as I read Trump’s name I’m outta there!”
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is that people have the opportunity to worship several gods. It is important to understand which god we worship and why.
*****
Discipleship
Because it losing television viewers and fans attending at the ballparks, many believe that the game of baseball needs to be speeded up, once again returning to regular playing times of two-and-a-half hours. To achieve this end, a number of rule modifications have been made for the upcoming season. One is that an intentional walk can now be signaled from the dugout and there will no longer be four outside pitches. Another rule limits the time umpires have to review replays. These are just a few of the minor changes. And that is the problem -- the real culprits that slow down the game, such as television advertising between innings, will remain.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the obedience and discipline required to be a disciple. Also, as a disciple, we are to always be aware of the feelings of those whom we are serving.
*****
Discipleship
Snapchat went from being a private company to a public company by offering shares of stocks. Snapchat is a popular app that allows you to decorate your smartphone messages. What is amazing about Snapchat is that 158 million people use it daily, and those users use it roughly 18 times a day.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the obedience and discipline required to be a disciple. It would be world transforming if we could get a 158 million people a day to do 18 conscious things for Jesus.
*****
Discipleship
Social psychologist Adam Alter recently published a book titled Irresistible: The Rise of Addictive Technology and the Business of Keeping Us Hooked. In a recent interview, Alter said: “In the past we thought of addiction as mostly related to chemical substances: heroin, cocaine, nicotine. Today we have this new phenomenon of behavioral addicts.” Alter went on to say, “The definition of addiction I go with is that is has to be something you enjoy doing in the short term, that undermines your well-being in the long run -- but that you do compulsively anyway.” Alter advocates that for certain hours of the day we assume the social and cultural lifestyle of the 1950s.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the obedience and discipline required to be a disciple. We need to be sure what behaviors are interfering with serving our Lord.
*****
Discipleship
After a period of seven straight days in which White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer held no televised press briefings, Spicer was heavily criticized for banning television cameras from his meetings with the press. Understandably, there is a very real concern about the administration’s recognition of the importance of a free press.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the obedience and discipline required to be a disciple. A part of that discipline is to be responsive to the people we serve.
*****
Sin
Uber is once again making headline news for the scandalous way in which its company is being run, after it was discovered that for a number of years Uber has been using the computer tool Greyball. Greyball collects data from consumers’ apps. The information is then posted on screens with false vehicles. This is not done to confuse potential customers -- the vehicles are shown on screens to deceive regulatory enforcers and to confuse competing cab companies.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is that unethical individuals must be confronted, but also approached with an attitude of grace.
*****
Sin
A secret, invitation-only group for Marines and Marine veterans on Facebook was recently discovered which posted pictures of nude women. The photos were meant not only to be enjoyed by viewers but also to intimidate and punish the women. As a retaliatory practice, the group’s phrase is “make her famous.”
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is sin. We cannot tolerate the sins of others, especially when it hurts other individuals.
*****
Faith
Norman Vincent Peale, best known as the author of The Power of Positive Thinking, enjoyed visiting his grandmother in Ohio when he was a child. He recalled that whenever she served him a meal, she would seat him at the dining room table opposite a painting that hung on the wall. Peale contends that his grandmother acted deliberately so that he could study and one day internalize the artist’s message. The painting depicted a terrible stormy sea, with a dark, overcast, foreboding sky. The scene was one of desolation, except for a rock rising in the middle of the tossing sea. Planted on the rock was a large cross, anchored from the ravages of the storm. Sitting at the bottom of the cross was a lady with her arms wrapped around the cross, clinging to it for security. Beneath the picture were the words “SIMPLY TO THY CROSS I CLING.” Looking at the picture, his grandma would often say to young Norman, “Everything else may be swept away, but as long as you hold on to the cross, you will have security in life.”
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the trust individuals placed in God.
*****
Compassion
Arkansas is racing against the calendar to have the most executions in a close period of time -- in a ten-day stretch, four white men and four black men will be executed two per day. The reason for this frantic scheduling is that one of the drugs for legal injection will expire at the end of April, and the drug cannot be replaced. Governor Asa Hutchinson said the executions are necessary to bring closure and healing to the families of the murdered victims.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is that Jesus understood the sins of human beings, was able to show compassion and understanding, and most importantly offered a means for redemption.
*****
Compassion
There’s a poignant scene in the movie Driving Miss Daisy that ought to stir everyone’s conscience. Miss Daisy (Jessica Tandy) and her black chauffeur Hoke Colburn (Morgan Freeman) are driving to Mobile to celebrate the 90th birthday of Miss Daisy’s uncle. Along the way, they innocently park their car on a beautiful lawn next to a serene lake. There they sit in quiet conversation, sharing a box lunch. Two Alabama state troopers arrive and interrupt this peaceful scene, questioning Colburn’s right to drive an automobile. Only when Miss Daisy is able to establish the fact that she is a woman of prominence and wealth do the patrolmen cease their harassment. Harried, Miss Daisy and Colburn leave their lunch half-eaten and depart. Watching the car travel down the highway, one trooper says to his partner: “An old nigger and an old Jew woman takin’ off down the road together. Now ain’t that a sorry sight.” The really sorry sight is the inability of the two troopers to see Miss Daisy and Hoke Colburn as human beings who have the same rights and privileges as all other persons. It is pathetic that our whole society is still blinded by the “isms” -- racism, sexism, ageism, attitudes that demean and belittle other individuals, because one thinks of herself/himself as superior to another person because of some arbitrary standard of skin color or religious affiliation.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the need to understand and accept others without condemnation.
***************
From team member Chris Keating:
Exodus 17:1-7
Complaint Department
A writer for the ReformedJudaism.org blog shared this story along with exegetical reflections on Israel’s complaining to God in the wilderness:
An Israeli farmer asks a recent Russian immigrant about his experience. “So really, how was life back in Russia?” the farmer asks.
“I couldn’t complain,” the immigrant answers.
“And how were your living quarters there?”
Again, the same answer: “I couldn’t complain.”
“And your standard of living?”
And again, “I couldn’t complain.”
“Well,” responds the Israeli, “if everything was so good back in Russia, why did you bother coming here?”
“Oh,” replies immigrant, “here I can complain!”
*****
Exodus 17:1-7
Give Us Water to Drink
Residents of Flint, Michigan, will soon be required to pay the full cost for water, even though the water system has yet to be declared safe to drink without filtration.
In February, the state of Michigan ended a subsidy program designed to help Flint residents pay for their water. The program began following a series of decisions in 2014 that left the city’s water system contaminated with lead. Flint residents, who according to the Washington Post pay one of the highest water rates in the country, will still be provided with water filters and cartridges.
For many, the decision adds frustration to an unending crisis.
“They want to make it look like they’ve resolved this thing, that it’s fixed,” said Tim Monahan, a carpenter who survived a harrowing bout of Legionnaires’ disease after the water problems began. “It’s been three years, and we still can’t drink the water.”
*****
John 4:5-42
Living Water
Coming soon to a water system near you: a possible water crisis impacting millions of Americans.
Despite the Flint crisis, polling data suggests that large numbers of Americans are not concerned with the possibility that a major crisis could strike across the country. Yet Environmental Protection Agency data shows that over 18 million Americans live in areas that do not meet the safety standards for lead. Studies show that over 70% of water systems have elevated samples of lead present. America’s aging infrastructure of pipes contributes to pollution, which tends to disproportionately impact impoverished minority groups.
*****
John 4:5-42
Listening to Her Story
Jesus’ encounter with the woman was so transforming that she left her jar at the well so she could go and tell others whom she had met. It’s clear that in offering her living water, Jesus also connected to the woman’s life story.
One of the ways we connect to each other is by listening to each other’s stories. In effect, we set down our water jars and dare to cross the boundary lines that exist between us. No doubt the woman had experienced some level of grief in her life. As writer Carol Caffin explores in an honest and candid essay, “grief never ends.” But the good news for those filled with grief is like the good news for those who long for living water. “Though grief doesn’t end,” Caffin writes, “it does change shape over time.” She continues:
At some point, you will smile again, and it will be because you are genuinely happy. You may not be happy in the same way, but one day, you will laugh, and it will be for real. You will “go on,” because that’s what life is -- going on.
WORSHIP RESOURCES
by George Reed
Call to Worship
Leader: O come, let us sing to God!
People: Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation!
Leader: Let us come into God’s presence with thanksgiving.
People: Let us make a joyful noise with songs of praise!
Leader: O come, let us worship and bow down.
People: Let us kneel before God, our Maker!
OR
Leader: God call us together so that we might receive life.
People: We come, even though we know we are unworthy.
Leader: God knows we are sinners, but God loves us anyway.
People: We find it difficult to believe we are lovable sometimes.
Leader: God loves all of us, even those we think are unlovable.
People: With God’s help, we will love ourselves and others.
Hymns and Sacred Songs
“All People That on Earth Do Dwell”
found in:
UMH: 75
H82: 377, 378
PH: 220, 221
NNBH: 36
NCH: 7
CH: 18
LBW: 45
ELA: 883
W&P: 661
AMEC: 73
STLT: 370
“We Gather Together”
found in:
UMH: 131
H82: 433
PH: 559
NNBH: 326
NCH: 421
CH: 276
ELA: 449
W&P: 81
AMEC: 576
STLT: 349
“Help Us Accept Each Other”
found in:
UMH: 560
PH: 358
NCH: 388
CH: 487
W&P: 596
AMEC: 558
“Hope of the World”
found in:
UMH: 178
H82: 472
PH: 360
NCH: 46
CH: 538
LBW: 493
W&P: 404
“Spirit Song”
found in:
UMH: 347
AAHH: 321
CH: 352
W&P: 352
CCB: 51
Renew: 248
“It’s Me, It’s Me, O Lord”
found in:
UMH: 352
NNBH: 496
CH: 579
“Take Time to Be Holy”
found in:
UMH: 395
NNBH: 306
CH: 572
W&P: 483
AMEC: 286
“Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing”
found in:
UMH: 400
H82: 686
PH: 356
AAHH: 175
NNBH: 166
NCH: 459
CH: 16
LBW: 499
ELA: 807
W&P: 68
AMEC: 77
STLT: 126
“Fill My Cup, Lord”
found in:
CCB: 47
“Behold, What Manner of Love”
found in:
CCB: 44
Music Resources Key:
UMH: United Methodist Hymnal
H82: The Hymnal 1982 (The Episcopal Church)
PH: Presbyterian Hymnal
AAHH: African-American Heritage Hymnal
NNBH: The New National Baptist Hymnal
NCH: The New Century Hymnal
CH: Chalice Hymnal
LBW: Lutheran Book of Worship
ELA: Evangelical Lutheran Worship
W&P: Worship & Praise
AMEC: African Methodist Episcopal Church Hymnal
STLT: Singing the Living Tradition
CCB: Cokesbury Chorus Book
Renew: Renew! Songs & Hymns for Blended Worship
Prayer for the Day / Collect
O God who treats all people as your cherished children: Grant us the grace to accept ourselves as your beloved and to extend that grace to others; through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
OR
We praise you, O God, for your gracious love. You don’t look upon us as worthless sinners but as beloved children. Help us to understand our worth as you see us. Give us the grace to extend to others the dignity that you give to them. Amen.
Prayer of Confession
Leader: Let us confess to God and before one another our sins, and especially our failure to understand ourselves and others as God’s beloved children.
People: We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You call us your beloved children and offer us the water that slakes the real thirst of our souls, and yet we don’t really believe that we are worthy. Instead we try to pump ourselves up in ways that don’t really make us better people, or we tear others down to make ourselves look greater than they are. We spend too much time complaining about the way things are instead of spending our time worshiping and praising you. Forgive us and redeem us. Amen.
Leader: God freely gives us drink from the waters of life. Receive God’s gift and share it with others.
Prayers of the People (and the Lord’s Prayer)
We worship you, O God, our loving parent. You seek us out and offer us the very things we need to have a life that is full and abundant.
(The following paragraph may be used if a separate prayer of confession has not been used.)
We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You call us your beloved children and offer us the water that slakes the real thirst of our souls, and yet we don’t really believe that we are worthy. Instead we try to pump ourselves up in ways that don’t really make us better people, or we tear others down to make ourselves look greater than they are. We spend too much time complaining about the way things are instead of spending our time worshiping and praising you. Forgive us and redeem us.
We give you thanks for all the ways in which you show your love for us. Though we are often forgetful of you and allow ourselves to be drawn in to sinful behavior, you love us and care for us. When we choose the things that bring death, you come and offer us life.
(Other thanksgivings may be offered.)
We pray for those who struggle with believing that they are lovable, especially by a holy God. We pray for those who have been abused and neglected so much that they have come to believe they deserve such treatment. Help us to share your love with others so that they may reclaim the dignity with which you created them.
(Other intercessions may be offered.)
All these things we ask in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ, who taught us to pray together, saying:
Our Father . . . Amen.
(or if the Lord’s Prayer is not used at this point in the service)
All this we ask in the Name of the Blessed and Holy Trinity. Amen.
Children’s Sermon Starter
Take a silver dollar (or a quarter) and cover it in mud. Tell the children that you think it is a really neat thing and that you would like for them to have one. Make a big deal about how nice it looks and that you know they would really like it. Get their response to this. Then break the mud off and show them what is inside. Talk about how we often judge people by what we see, but God always sees the good inside. (It’s up to you whether you actually give them to the children!)
CHILDREN’S SERMON
by Beth Herrinton-Hodge
John 4:5-42
(Welcome the children as they come forward.) Today’s gospel reading tells about two people who are very different from one another. They are so different that it’s not very likely that they would ever meet.It’s about Jesus (a Jewish man born in Bethlehem) and a Samaritan woman.
People from Jesus’ home and the woman’s home didn’t like each other very much. They didn’t trust each other.They would never speak to one another if they could help it.They would never share food or drink.They wouldn’t ask the other for help.
All of these things are what make this Gospel story so wonderful! Jesus changes everything!
Tell the story of the Woman at the Well:
Jesus is on a long journey, walking through Samaria, a country not too far from his home. It is hot. It is dusty. He is tired and thirsty. He stops by a well near one of the towns, hoping to get a drink of water. But he has no bucket to get water out of the well. A woman from the town comes to the well to get water for herself. She has a bucket. So Jesus asks her for a drink of water. The woman is shocked! No man... no Jewish man... would speak to a Samaritan woman! And he certainly wouldn’t ask her to give him a drink! But Jesus needs her help. He has no way to get water unless she helps him.
As it turns out, the woman needs Jesus’ help too.
As the story goes on, we find out that the woman has had a difficult life. She’s come to the well alone... usually women would meet at the well to talk and help one another. She comes by herself. She tells Jesus that she has no husband. It was rare in Jesus’ day for a woman to live alone. Yet Jesus knows that she’s had several husbands. We don’t know why... but her home life probably changed a lot with each new husband.
She needs Jesus’ help.
As you might expect... Jesus helps her. He gives her “living water.”
Jesus says to the woman, “The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.”
The woman says to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”
Jesus and the woman help one another. They each share what they have to give. Jesus gets water because he is thirsty. The woman gets Jesus’ living water, which comes with acceptance, purpose, and eternal life.
The woman’s life is changed! She feels it! She runs through the village, telling everyone about the living water that Jesus gives. People listen to her. They pay attention to her. They hear the good news about Jesus. Meeting and helping Jesus changed everything for her.
Summary:
I really like this story! It shows what good can come when two people help one another and share what the other needs.
No one thought that a Jewish man would ever talk to a Samaritan woman. They were too different from one another. No one thought that either of them could help one another. What could this poor, lonely, hurting woman have to share with Jesus?
But Jesus shows us (as he showed the Samaritan woman, as well as his disciples!) that the outside appearances of a person aren’t enough to keep us apart, or keep us from helping or sharing with one another.
Men and women.
Boys and girls.
Samaritans and Jews.
Blacks and Whites and Hispanics.
Rich and Poor.
Old and Young.
Well-dressed or not.
One parent or two.
These differences don’t have to keep us apart.
Jesus shows us that we each have something to share with one another. We each have ways that we can help one another.
What can you do to help one another -- even the people that seem the most different from you?
(Affirm answers the children offer.)
Prayer: Jesus, you show us how to reach out to people who seem very different from us -- this is a way to love one another. Help us to look at people around us as people we can help -- and who can also help us. Love us as we learn to love one another. Amen.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Immediate Word, March 19, 2017, issue.
Copyright 2017 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
Team member Dean Feldmeyer shares some additional thoughts on the Exodus and Psalm texts, and how we ought to react in the wilderness. When we find ourselves in wildernesses of various sorts -- figurative and literal -- our typical reaction is like that of the Israelites: we moan and complain about our plight, and even question why God has put us in such dire circumstances. But Dean notes that this is precisely the wrong reaction -- instead the psalmist points us to the proper reaction when we are in the wilderness: to worship God even more deeply and fervently.
Affordable Living Water
by Mary Austin
John 4:5-42
The woman at the well has Jesus to fill up her places of need -- physical, mental, and spiritual. In our time, she might seek her healing through her health insurance -- and find that the well there has run dry.
Interpreters differ on this, but I have always imagined that the woman is lonely, living at a distance from the other women in the village because of her history. She seems to be poor. If she had money, she wouldn’t need the husbands -- and her current partner -- for economic support. If she lived in our time, without a job, she would most likely need to buy her own health insurance, and her current options might leave her worse off than before.
The divide between the Jews and the Samaritans mirrors the divisions in our country, and their lack of understanding is much like ours. This woman’s needs remind us of the similar people around us, and what they require to live healthy lives.
In the News
The proposed health care overhaul , known as the American Health Care Act (ACHA), would leave 14 million additional people without insurance in 2018, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO). The CBO projects that number would grow to 24 million uninsured people in a decade, based on capped spending for Medicaid. The number of people who receive insurance at work is also projected to drop: “[The report estimates] seven million fewer people would be insured through their employers [by 2026] because some people would choose not to get coverage and some employers would decline to offer it.” Options for coverage would narrow, and the bill eliminates funding for Planned Parenthood clinics, where many women receive wellness care and screenings. “The CBO’s report... found that some of the reduction in coverage would be from people choosing not to buy coverage because of these repeal of the individual mandate under ObamaCare.... But the report also finds that people would go without coverage because of cuts to Medicaid and a drop in financial assistance under the bill.”
Women would also have fewer choices about where to seek health care, as the bill does not allow Medicaid funds to be used for screenings or care at Planned Parenthood. Medicaid funds for reimbursement would be cut. “Fully 43 percent of Planned Parenthood’s revenue in fiscal year 2015 -- more than $550 million -- came from government grants and reimbursements. Right now, under Obamacare, federal funds can be spent at Planned Parenthood, but they can’t be used for abortion -- again, a result of the Hyde Amendment and again, with the three Hyde Amendment exceptions. But this bill goes further, saying that people couldn’t use Medicaid at Planned Parenthood.”
Poorer women are affected more deeply by the proposed law, which allows states to say which medical services are essential for Medicaid starting in 2020. “The Republican plan would ‘freeze’ the Medicaid expansion in 2020. According to statistics compiled by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, the majority of Medicaid recipients are female, and the program ‘covered nearly half of poor women aged 15-44 in 2015,’ per a report from the Guttmacher Institute. In fact, the uninsured rate of women of reproductive age dropped by 36% between 2013 and 2015 because of the [Affordable Care Act]’s expanded coverage and subsidies, according to the report. Rolling back the ACA’s Medicaid expansion and decreasing its subsidies would ensure fewer women have access to affordable, comprehensive care.” The new law would also hold a particular danger for women who have suffered spousal abuse. “Under Obamacare, couples have to file taxes jointly to receive a tax credit -- unless they are victims of domestic abuse, domestic violence, or spousal abandonment. The [proposed law] doesn’t account for this and requires all couples to file jointly to receive a tax credit, without exception.” Women would need to give their abusers their new address as they file a joint return, placing themselves back in danger.
If the woman at the well were seeking her well-being through her health insurance, she would have few choices under the proposed American Health Care Act.
The health care debate takes place against a backdrop of division between the poor and the working class. President Trump’s proposed budget suggests cuts to discretionary spending in favor of increased military spending, including cuts to programs which benefit poor Americans. Dividing working-class and poor Americans may have a political benefit for the president, as he makes cuts in “in areas as diverse as food stamps and housing assistance, education for the disadvantaged and Head Start.... In White Working Class: Overcoming Class Cluelessness in America, due out in May from Harvard Business Review Press, Joan C. Williams argues that white workers’ resentment of the safety net should not be surprising: They get next to no benefit from it... they see themselves as hard-working citizens who struggle to make ends meet, only to be left out of many of the government programs their taxes pay for.” The income divide is narrow, but the gap in services is large. “Over all, 61 percent of poor Americans draw from one means-tested benefit program or another, according to an analysis by the Census Bureau. But among families with incomes above the poverty line -- many of which are barely better off, making just over $24,000 for a family of four -- only 13 percent do.” Each group finds plenty to mistrust about the other, when really their economic stresses are very similar.
In the Scriptures
The woman at the well (curious that we never learn her name, even with her long and lively conversation with Jesus) and her neighbors are as divided, in their own way, as working-class and poorer Americans. From the outside their lives don’t look that different, but they understand themselves in dramatically dissimilar ways. To the outsider looking in, the woman at the well and her neighbors are all despised Samaritans, but the people of the town find other things to deplore about this woman, leaving her alone at the well.
She comes to the well alone, and is surprised to find someone there. Her surprise deepens when the other person turns out to be a strange man... and a Jew... who will converse with her, starting with the request for a drink of water. Perhaps she starts out looking down on him, a traveler who is foolish enough not to have a bucket with him. When he starts to talk, he seems even nuttier, talking about gifts from God. The woman answers politely enough, but I imagine her taking a step back from Jesus and preparing to run, just in case he turns out to be dangerous instead of merely foolish.
Something about his promise of living water is compelling enough that they stop talking about buckets and start talking about her life. She reveals her pain to him, and all of a sudden no one is looking down on anyone else. They’re sharing a moment of truth by the well. She leaves her water jar to share the good news, becoming -- for the moment -- just as foolish as Jesus.
In the Sermon
The sermon might look at the levels of healing that happen for this woman. She’s healed out of her isolation, out of a level of emotional stress, into a place where she’s fully welcomed and valued. A lot happens here, but this is also a healing story, and the sermon might talk about spiritual, mental, and emotional healing.
When she hears good news from Jesus, and knows that she’s included in it, the woman’s first impulse is to share it. She reaches out to her neighbors, setting aside past hurts. She lets go of past divisions to pass on what she’s learned -- and her neighbors are willing to listen to her. Our contact with people is increasingly sorted out by our beliefs, limiting us to people who think like we do. Listening is hard, and learning something new is harder still. The woman and her neighbors offer us a generous possibility in the way they reconnect with each other in Jesus’ presence. The sermon might look at the hard work of approaching people with other views, and hoping to find a place of common ground.
Or the sermon might look at our reaction to receiving good news. Do we mistrust signs of grace, waiting for something dreadful to happen next? Do we feel undeserving? If we met Jesus at the well, would we believe that his offer of living water was for us too?
The woman at the well comes looking for water and ends up with a new mission. She comes to run an errand and leaves with a gift of healing. In her meeting with Jesus, she ends up with much more than she expects -- and more than her neighbors may think she deserves. The divisions that seem so fixed at the beginning of the story are ended in the shared experience of surpassing grace. We can learn from her example as an evangelist, and also from the way she and her neighbors knit themselves back together in a web of caring after years of mistrust. The presence of Jesus is powerful!
SECOND THOUGHTS
Into the Wilderness
by Dean Feldmeyer
Exodus 17:1-7; Psalm 95
Stephen Schwartz and John Caird’s musical Children of Eden is based on the book of Genesis and tells the stories of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, and Noah and his family.
In the first act, when Adam and Eve are expelled from the Garden of Eden into what lies beyond, the narrator describes the land outside Eden in a song called “Wasteland.” The wilderness that it describes is as far as you can get from the bucolic bliss of the Garden. It is a place of...
Red rock and outcrop stone
And the sun glares off a bleaching bone
There’s no comfort or softness here
There’s only the wasteland
The land of the hunter, the stalker, and the skinner
Where you’re either the diner or the dinner
And the line between man and beast keeps getting thinner
In the wasteland.
Stephen Schwartz’s wilderness is a wasteland, nothing like what we 21st-century Americans usually think of when we hear the word “wilderness.” I don’t know about you, but I usually think of those National Geographic calendar photographs of our national parks or the marvelous black and white photos by Ansel Adams.
My wilderness template is lush and verdant, overflowing with beauty. It is pine and fir trees, crystal-clear lakes, and snow-capped mountains. My wilderness is the Quetico Provincial Forest in Ontario, where I spent a week fishing and canoeing with eight high school boys and another adult and never saw another human soul besides our group.
Adjoining the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness of the Superior National Forest in Minnesota, it totals about 450,000 acres of rugged beauty, towering rock cliffs, majestic waterfalls, virgin forests, picturesque rivers, and more than 2,000 lakes.
Canoeing quietly, or as quietly as eight teenage boys can, we observed beavers building a dam, and moose and elk running along the shore and in one case swimming across the lake. And we watched a bald eagle pluck a fish from a lake and sit to eat it on a tree branch where he could also keep an eye on us.
It was vast and beautiful and wonderful, much as it was 600 years ago when the first native Ojibwa ventured there in birch bark canoes -- and it was nothing, nothing like the wilderness through which Moses brought the Children of Israel to the Promised Land.
That wilderness, the same into which Jesus fled for the 40 days we commemorate with Lent, is hot and dry. It is brown and sandy, and nothing lives there that doesn’t have to. It is a forbidding place where only the strongest can survive, a place of scorpions and snakes and vultures and jackals, a place where wild beasts are always hungry and always vicious.
And all the wild beasts which lived therein were not the four-legged kind. There were two-legged ones as well. Thieves, criminals, nomads, and Bedouin outlaws lived in the wilderness and thrived there, often on the things they stole from unwary travelers.
It is not the kind of place into which you flee on weekends with your family, your pop-up camper, and your Coleman camping gear.
It is, however, a potent metaphor for the difficulties and problems in the midst of which we sometimes find ourselves as we endeavor to live as the People of God.
What a Wilderness Is
The wilderness is scary.
When we find ourselves out of our element, where we don’t speak the language, where we don’t know the lay of the land, and where a mistake can have tragic consequences, we are in the wilderness.
In the wilderness, the old rules don’t necessarily apply.
When we find ourselves in a place where the first rule is to survive and the old rules may no longer be helpful or even work at all, that is the wilderness. New rules have to be discovered and sometimes made up on the spot.
In the wilderness, the boundaries and the parameters are always changing. The sand dunes shift, the roads get covered and disappear, rivers even change their courses overnight. And if we are not fully attentive, we will find ourselves wandering in circles... lost and alone.
In the wilderness you sleep with one eye open because predators roam there.
A wilderness, depending on what you are used to, can be an inner-city parking lot or it can be a suburban PTA meeting. It can be in Manhattan or the Boundary Waters. It can be on Wall Street or Main Street or at the corner of Haight and Ashbury. The wilderness is the literal or the figurative “wasteland, the land of the hunter, the stalker, and the skinner, where you’re either the diner or the dinner, and the line between man and beast keeps getting thinner.”
The question raised by this week’s texts is: What is the proper response of the People of God when we find ourselves in a wilderness wasteland?
What Not to Do in a Wilderness
In the Genesis text the Children of Israel take the low road.
Their answer is to give in to their fears, to find someone (Moses) to blame, and then to whine and complain: “Why did you bring us out of Egypt just to die of thirst, along with our families and livestock, out here in the desert. At least back in Egypt we had water to drink.”
Moses goes to God about the situation, but more out of fear for his own life than out of any real doubt. “Uh, God, in case you haven’t noticed, these people are about to stone me to death because they are really, really thirsty. A little help here would be nice.”
You can almost hear God sigh in his response: “Go on ahead of the people. Take some elders with you and go up to Mt. Horeb. Strike the Horeb Stone with your staff, and I’ll make water come out of it and they can drink.”
So that’s what Moses does. He goes up to Horeb and strikes the stone, and water comes out and everyone drinks -- and he names the place Massah and Meribah, which means “quarreled” and “tested,” because the people quarreled with Moses and tested the Lord, saying “Is God with us or not?”
God gave them water to drink -- but because they were so hateful and mean about it, he decided to lead them in circles in the wilderness for 40 years until that entire generation died off... and it was their children who finally get to enter the Promised Land.
What to Do in a Wilderness
So blaming, whining, and complaining are not good choices for how to behave in a wilderness.
This week’s reading from Psalm 95 offers an alternative behavior.
“O come, let us sing to the Lord. Let us make a joyful noise to our salvation.” The thing to do in the wilderness, says the psalmist, is to worship God.
Desert wilderness? Worship God.
Financial wilderness? Worship God.
Volunteer wilderness? Worship God.
Idea wilderness? Worship God.
This, says the psalmist, is what you do if you want to survive the wilderness. You worship the Lord.
Worship is the definitive behavior of the true People of God. Worship reminds us that God is creator and we are creations. Worship reminds us of the wonders of the universe that God created by the flick of his wrist or the word of his mouth. Worship places us in an appropriate posture -- standing next to God, in God’s shadow, dependent upon God’s power and grace.
By nature, 21st-century Americans tend to be problem solvers. We are the progeny of what Tom Brokaw dubbed the Greatest Generation, those who defeated the Nazis, lifted the nation out of the Great Depression, and sent the first astronaut into space. We have inherited their need to accomplish, to achieve, to fix, to repair, and to improve.
And that is all well and good.
There is much in this world in need of repair, and to which we would do well to commit ourselves.
But this week’s psalm reminds us that there is a task which we must first undertake, for it is that task which creates the context in which the work of repair and improvement will be done -- and that task is worship.
May God bless us as we sing songs of love and praise.
ILLUSTRATIONS
From team member Ron Love:
God
Arnold Schwarzenegger recently announced that this is the last season that he will be appearing on the television show The Celebrity Apprentice. The reason is because of the previous host, Donald Trump, who is now the 45th president of the U.S. but remains as an executive producer for the program. Schwarzenegger indicated that he cannot be a part of anything associated with Donald Trump and his politics -- and noted that a common reaction he heard from those who watched the show was “I turned it off, because as soon as I read Trump’s name I’m outta there!”
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is that people have the opportunity to worship several gods. It is important to understand which god we worship and why.
*****
Discipleship
Because it losing television viewers and fans attending at the ballparks, many believe that the game of baseball needs to be speeded up, once again returning to regular playing times of two-and-a-half hours. To achieve this end, a number of rule modifications have been made for the upcoming season. One is that an intentional walk can now be signaled from the dugout and there will no longer be four outside pitches. Another rule limits the time umpires have to review replays. These are just a few of the minor changes. And that is the problem -- the real culprits that slow down the game, such as television advertising between innings, will remain.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the obedience and discipline required to be a disciple. Also, as a disciple, we are to always be aware of the feelings of those whom we are serving.
*****
Discipleship
Snapchat went from being a private company to a public company by offering shares of stocks. Snapchat is a popular app that allows you to decorate your smartphone messages. What is amazing about Snapchat is that 158 million people use it daily, and those users use it roughly 18 times a day.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the obedience and discipline required to be a disciple. It would be world transforming if we could get a 158 million people a day to do 18 conscious things for Jesus.
*****
Discipleship
Social psychologist Adam Alter recently published a book titled Irresistible: The Rise of Addictive Technology and the Business of Keeping Us Hooked. In a recent interview, Alter said: “In the past we thought of addiction as mostly related to chemical substances: heroin, cocaine, nicotine. Today we have this new phenomenon of behavioral addicts.” Alter went on to say, “The definition of addiction I go with is that is has to be something you enjoy doing in the short term, that undermines your well-being in the long run -- but that you do compulsively anyway.” Alter advocates that for certain hours of the day we assume the social and cultural lifestyle of the 1950s.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the obedience and discipline required to be a disciple. We need to be sure what behaviors are interfering with serving our Lord.
*****
Discipleship
After a period of seven straight days in which White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer held no televised press briefings, Spicer was heavily criticized for banning television cameras from his meetings with the press. Understandably, there is a very real concern about the administration’s recognition of the importance of a free press.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the obedience and discipline required to be a disciple. A part of that discipline is to be responsive to the people we serve.
*****
Sin
Uber is once again making headline news for the scandalous way in which its company is being run, after it was discovered that for a number of years Uber has been using the computer tool Greyball. Greyball collects data from consumers’ apps. The information is then posted on screens with false vehicles. This is not done to confuse potential customers -- the vehicles are shown on screens to deceive regulatory enforcers and to confuse competing cab companies.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is that unethical individuals must be confronted, but also approached with an attitude of grace.
*****
Sin
A secret, invitation-only group for Marines and Marine veterans on Facebook was recently discovered which posted pictures of nude women. The photos were meant not only to be enjoyed by viewers but also to intimidate and punish the women. As a retaliatory practice, the group’s phrase is “make her famous.”
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is sin. We cannot tolerate the sins of others, especially when it hurts other individuals.
*****
Faith
Norman Vincent Peale, best known as the author of The Power of Positive Thinking, enjoyed visiting his grandmother in Ohio when he was a child. He recalled that whenever she served him a meal, she would seat him at the dining room table opposite a painting that hung on the wall. Peale contends that his grandmother acted deliberately so that he could study and one day internalize the artist’s message. The painting depicted a terrible stormy sea, with a dark, overcast, foreboding sky. The scene was one of desolation, except for a rock rising in the middle of the tossing sea. Planted on the rock was a large cross, anchored from the ravages of the storm. Sitting at the bottom of the cross was a lady with her arms wrapped around the cross, clinging to it for security. Beneath the picture were the words “SIMPLY TO THY CROSS I CLING.” Looking at the picture, his grandma would often say to young Norman, “Everything else may be swept away, but as long as you hold on to the cross, you will have security in life.”
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the trust individuals placed in God.
*****
Compassion
Arkansas is racing against the calendar to have the most executions in a close period of time -- in a ten-day stretch, four white men and four black men will be executed two per day. The reason for this frantic scheduling is that one of the drugs for legal injection will expire at the end of April, and the drug cannot be replaced. Governor Asa Hutchinson said the executions are necessary to bring closure and healing to the families of the murdered victims.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is that Jesus understood the sins of human beings, was able to show compassion and understanding, and most importantly offered a means for redemption.
*****
Compassion
There’s a poignant scene in the movie Driving Miss Daisy that ought to stir everyone’s conscience. Miss Daisy (Jessica Tandy) and her black chauffeur Hoke Colburn (Morgan Freeman) are driving to Mobile to celebrate the 90th birthday of Miss Daisy’s uncle. Along the way, they innocently park their car on a beautiful lawn next to a serene lake. There they sit in quiet conversation, sharing a box lunch. Two Alabama state troopers arrive and interrupt this peaceful scene, questioning Colburn’s right to drive an automobile. Only when Miss Daisy is able to establish the fact that she is a woman of prominence and wealth do the patrolmen cease their harassment. Harried, Miss Daisy and Colburn leave their lunch half-eaten and depart. Watching the car travel down the highway, one trooper says to his partner: “An old nigger and an old Jew woman takin’ off down the road together. Now ain’t that a sorry sight.” The really sorry sight is the inability of the two troopers to see Miss Daisy and Hoke Colburn as human beings who have the same rights and privileges as all other persons. It is pathetic that our whole society is still blinded by the “isms” -- racism, sexism, ageism, attitudes that demean and belittle other individuals, because one thinks of herself/himself as superior to another person because of some arbitrary standard of skin color or religious affiliation.
Application: A common theme in our lectionary readings is the need to understand and accept others without condemnation.
***************
From team member Chris Keating:
Exodus 17:1-7
Complaint Department
A writer for the ReformedJudaism.org blog shared this story along with exegetical reflections on Israel’s complaining to God in the wilderness:
An Israeli farmer asks a recent Russian immigrant about his experience. “So really, how was life back in Russia?” the farmer asks.
“I couldn’t complain,” the immigrant answers.
“And how were your living quarters there?”
Again, the same answer: “I couldn’t complain.”
“And your standard of living?”
And again, “I couldn’t complain.”
“Well,” responds the Israeli, “if everything was so good back in Russia, why did you bother coming here?”
“Oh,” replies immigrant, “here I can complain!”
*****
Exodus 17:1-7
Give Us Water to Drink
Residents of Flint, Michigan, will soon be required to pay the full cost for water, even though the water system has yet to be declared safe to drink without filtration.
In February, the state of Michigan ended a subsidy program designed to help Flint residents pay for their water. The program began following a series of decisions in 2014 that left the city’s water system contaminated with lead. Flint residents, who according to the Washington Post pay one of the highest water rates in the country, will still be provided with water filters and cartridges.
For many, the decision adds frustration to an unending crisis.
“They want to make it look like they’ve resolved this thing, that it’s fixed,” said Tim Monahan, a carpenter who survived a harrowing bout of Legionnaires’ disease after the water problems began. “It’s been three years, and we still can’t drink the water.”
*****
John 4:5-42
Living Water
Coming soon to a water system near you: a possible water crisis impacting millions of Americans.
Despite the Flint crisis, polling data suggests that large numbers of Americans are not concerned with the possibility that a major crisis could strike across the country. Yet Environmental Protection Agency data shows that over 18 million Americans live in areas that do not meet the safety standards for lead. Studies show that over 70% of water systems have elevated samples of lead present. America’s aging infrastructure of pipes contributes to pollution, which tends to disproportionately impact impoverished minority groups.
*****
John 4:5-42
Listening to Her Story
Jesus’ encounter with the woman was so transforming that she left her jar at the well so she could go and tell others whom she had met. It’s clear that in offering her living water, Jesus also connected to the woman’s life story.
One of the ways we connect to each other is by listening to each other’s stories. In effect, we set down our water jars and dare to cross the boundary lines that exist between us. No doubt the woman had experienced some level of grief in her life. As writer Carol Caffin explores in an honest and candid essay, “grief never ends.” But the good news for those filled with grief is like the good news for those who long for living water. “Though grief doesn’t end,” Caffin writes, “it does change shape over time.” She continues:
At some point, you will smile again, and it will be because you are genuinely happy. You may not be happy in the same way, but one day, you will laugh, and it will be for real. You will “go on,” because that’s what life is -- going on.
WORSHIP RESOURCES
by George Reed
Call to Worship
Leader: O come, let us sing to God!
People: Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation!
Leader: Let us come into God’s presence with thanksgiving.
People: Let us make a joyful noise with songs of praise!
Leader: O come, let us worship and bow down.
People: Let us kneel before God, our Maker!
OR
Leader: God call us together so that we might receive life.
People: We come, even though we know we are unworthy.
Leader: God knows we are sinners, but God loves us anyway.
People: We find it difficult to believe we are lovable sometimes.
Leader: God loves all of us, even those we think are unlovable.
People: With God’s help, we will love ourselves and others.
Hymns and Sacred Songs
“All People That on Earth Do Dwell”
found in:
UMH: 75
H82: 377, 378
PH: 220, 221
NNBH: 36
NCH: 7
CH: 18
LBW: 45
ELA: 883
W&P: 661
AMEC: 73
STLT: 370
“We Gather Together”
found in:
UMH: 131
H82: 433
PH: 559
NNBH: 326
NCH: 421
CH: 276
ELA: 449
W&P: 81
AMEC: 576
STLT: 349
“Help Us Accept Each Other”
found in:
UMH: 560
PH: 358
NCH: 388
CH: 487
W&P: 596
AMEC: 558
“Hope of the World”
found in:
UMH: 178
H82: 472
PH: 360
NCH: 46
CH: 538
LBW: 493
W&P: 404
“Spirit Song”
found in:
UMH: 347
AAHH: 321
CH: 352
W&P: 352
CCB: 51
Renew: 248
“It’s Me, It’s Me, O Lord”
found in:
UMH: 352
NNBH: 496
CH: 579
“Take Time to Be Holy”
found in:
UMH: 395
NNBH: 306
CH: 572
W&P: 483
AMEC: 286
“Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing”
found in:
UMH: 400
H82: 686
PH: 356
AAHH: 175
NNBH: 166
NCH: 459
CH: 16
LBW: 499
ELA: 807
W&P: 68
AMEC: 77
STLT: 126
“Fill My Cup, Lord”
found in:
CCB: 47
“Behold, What Manner of Love”
found in:
CCB: 44
Music Resources Key:
UMH: United Methodist Hymnal
H82: The Hymnal 1982 (The Episcopal Church)
PH: Presbyterian Hymnal
AAHH: African-American Heritage Hymnal
NNBH: The New National Baptist Hymnal
NCH: The New Century Hymnal
CH: Chalice Hymnal
LBW: Lutheran Book of Worship
ELA: Evangelical Lutheran Worship
W&P: Worship & Praise
AMEC: African Methodist Episcopal Church Hymnal
STLT: Singing the Living Tradition
CCB: Cokesbury Chorus Book
Renew: Renew! Songs & Hymns for Blended Worship
Prayer for the Day / Collect
O God who treats all people as your cherished children: Grant us the grace to accept ourselves as your beloved and to extend that grace to others; through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
OR
We praise you, O God, for your gracious love. You don’t look upon us as worthless sinners but as beloved children. Help us to understand our worth as you see us. Give us the grace to extend to others the dignity that you give to them. Amen.
Prayer of Confession
Leader: Let us confess to God and before one another our sins, and especially our failure to understand ourselves and others as God’s beloved children.
People: We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You call us your beloved children and offer us the water that slakes the real thirst of our souls, and yet we don’t really believe that we are worthy. Instead we try to pump ourselves up in ways that don’t really make us better people, or we tear others down to make ourselves look greater than they are. We spend too much time complaining about the way things are instead of spending our time worshiping and praising you. Forgive us and redeem us. Amen.
Leader: God freely gives us drink from the waters of life. Receive God’s gift and share it with others.
Prayers of the People (and the Lord’s Prayer)
We worship you, O God, our loving parent. You seek us out and offer us the very things we need to have a life that is full and abundant.
(The following paragraph may be used if a separate prayer of confession has not been used.)
We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You call us your beloved children and offer us the water that slakes the real thirst of our souls, and yet we don’t really believe that we are worthy. Instead we try to pump ourselves up in ways that don’t really make us better people, or we tear others down to make ourselves look greater than they are. We spend too much time complaining about the way things are instead of spending our time worshiping and praising you. Forgive us and redeem us.
We give you thanks for all the ways in which you show your love for us. Though we are often forgetful of you and allow ourselves to be drawn in to sinful behavior, you love us and care for us. When we choose the things that bring death, you come and offer us life.
(Other thanksgivings may be offered.)
We pray for those who struggle with believing that they are lovable, especially by a holy God. We pray for those who have been abused and neglected so much that they have come to believe they deserve such treatment. Help us to share your love with others so that they may reclaim the dignity with which you created them.
(Other intercessions may be offered.)
All these things we ask in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ, who taught us to pray together, saying:
Our Father . . . Amen.
(or if the Lord’s Prayer is not used at this point in the service)
All this we ask in the Name of the Blessed and Holy Trinity. Amen.
Children’s Sermon Starter
Take a silver dollar (or a quarter) and cover it in mud. Tell the children that you think it is a really neat thing and that you would like for them to have one. Make a big deal about how nice it looks and that you know they would really like it. Get their response to this. Then break the mud off and show them what is inside. Talk about how we often judge people by what we see, but God always sees the good inside. (It’s up to you whether you actually give them to the children!)
CHILDREN’S SERMON
by Beth Herrinton-Hodge
John 4:5-42
(Welcome the children as they come forward.) Today’s gospel reading tells about two people who are very different from one another. They are so different that it’s not very likely that they would ever meet.It’s about Jesus (a Jewish man born in Bethlehem) and a Samaritan woman.
People from Jesus’ home and the woman’s home didn’t like each other very much. They didn’t trust each other.They would never speak to one another if they could help it.They would never share food or drink.They wouldn’t ask the other for help.
All of these things are what make this Gospel story so wonderful! Jesus changes everything!
Tell the story of the Woman at the Well:
Jesus is on a long journey, walking through Samaria, a country not too far from his home. It is hot. It is dusty. He is tired and thirsty. He stops by a well near one of the towns, hoping to get a drink of water. But he has no bucket to get water out of the well. A woman from the town comes to the well to get water for herself. She has a bucket. So Jesus asks her for a drink of water. The woman is shocked! No man... no Jewish man... would speak to a Samaritan woman! And he certainly wouldn’t ask her to give him a drink! But Jesus needs her help. He has no way to get water unless she helps him.
As it turns out, the woman needs Jesus’ help too.
As the story goes on, we find out that the woman has had a difficult life. She’s come to the well alone... usually women would meet at the well to talk and help one another. She comes by herself. She tells Jesus that she has no husband. It was rare in Jesus’ day for a woman to live alone. Yet Jesus knows that she’s had several husbands. We don’t know why... but her home life probably changed a lot with each new husband.
She needs Jesus’ help.
As you might expect... Jesus helps her. He gives her “living water.”
Jesus says to the woman, “The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.”
The woman says to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”
Jesus and the woman help one another. They each share what they have to give. Jesus gets water because he is thirsty. The woman gets Jesus’ living water, which comes with acceptance, purpose, and eternal life.
The woman’s life is changed! She feels it! She runs through the village, telling everyone about the living water that Jesus gives. People listen to her. They pay attention to her. They hear the good news about Jesus. Meeting and helping Jesus changed everything for her.
Summary:
I really like this story! It shows what good can come when two people help one another and share what the other needs.
No one thought that a Jewish man would ever talk to a Samaritan woman. They were too different from one another. No one thought that either of them could help one another. What could this poor, lonely, hurting woman have to share with Jesus?
But Jesus shows us (as he showed the Samaritan woman, as well as his disciples!) that the outside appearances of a person aren’t enough to keep us apart, or keep us from helping or sharing with one another.
Men and women.
Boys and girls.
Samaritans and Jews.
Blacks and Whites and Hispanics.
Rich and Poor.
Old and Young.
Well-dressed or not.
One parent or two.
These differences don’t have to keep us apart.
Jesus shows us that we each have something to share with one another. We each have ways that we can help one another.
What can you do to help one another -- even the people that seem the most different from you?
(Affirm answers the children offer.)
Prayer: Jesus, you show us how to reach out to people who seem very different from us -- this is a way to love one another. Help us to look at people around us as people we can help -- and who can also help us. Love us as we learn to love one another. Amen.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Immediate Word, March 19, 2017, issue.
Copyright 2017 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
