Wednesday • 8/14/2024 •

Wednesday of Proper 14

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 101; Psalm 109; Judges 13:15-24; Acts 6:1-15; John 4:1-26

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 11 (“The Third Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 60:1-3,11a,14c,18-19, BCP, p. 87); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 16 (“The Song of Zechariah,” Luke 1:68-79, BCP, p. 92)

One good reason for staying in the biblical story is its power to inject wonder into life’s downward spiraling. God shows up when things seem most out of control, and says, “I’ve got this. I’ve got you!” Right now, for us, perhaps it’s global pandemic, destructive rage in the streets, self-serving public servants, a generation that may or may not get a decent education. But we are a people of God’s Book, and therefore a people of hope, because this Book recounts situations like ours in which God inserts himself in a saving way.

Wonder for Samson’s parents. For forty years, Israelites have “been given into the hand of the Philistines” (Judges 13:1). Out of nowhere Manoah and his barren wife receive word from on high that they will have a son whom they are to dedicate to the Lord, and who “shall begin to deliver Israel from the hand of the Philistines” (Judges 13:5). Their wonder is palpable. The appearance of the angel of Yahweh is “most awe-inspiring” (Judges 13:6), his name is “too wonderful” (Judges 13:18). The instruction for the child’s prenatal care and “rule of life” are extraordinary: their son is to be a lifelong Nazirite. His name is Samson. Under his parents’ care, we are told, Samson grows, is blessed of the Lord, and the Spirit begins to stir in him (Judges 13:24-25). In the midst of Israel’s desperate state, God has come to bring relief.

If we’ve heard or read Samson’s story before, we know that tragedy and heartbreak lie ahead. Samson will prove to be, arguably, the least worthy of all the judges—but deliverance will indeed come through him. Meanwhile, we take heart knowing that in the worst of times, God does not forget. And even if he must use the crudest and oddest of means, the Lord redeems.

RobyBS89, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Wonder at Jacob’s well. A woman’s life is in tatters. She is surrounded by profound reminders of God’s faithfulness: Jacob’s well is the source of her drinking water; her town, Sychar, is built on the site of ancient Shechem, standing in the shadow of Mt. Gerizim, where the first Israelites in the land had recited God’s covenantal blessings. But Israel’s united faith had long ago disintegrated, thus the divide between Samaritans and Jews: (“…Jews do not associate with Samaritans,” v.9). The woman’s five previous “marriages” have also fallen apart. As deep as the religious divide between Samaritans and Jews, so is the moral divide between this woman and her neighbors. That is why she comes to the well with her water jar alone, in the heat of the middle of the day, instead of communally with the other women of Sychar in the cool of the morning.

It turns out that a “divine appointment” awaits the celebrated “Woman at the Well,” because Jesus “had to go through Samaria” (John 4:4) to return to Galilee. And what has brought the two of them together on this day at Jacob’s well is this wonder-bringing conversation. He starts the conversation as though it’s simply about obtaining drinking-water for himself. Quickly, though, he turns the topic to “living water” for her instead. When the conversation gets too personal (“You have no husband…”), she attempts to dodge that discussion by bringing up the topic of religion. While she’s done that to keep the conversation safely at arm’s length, Jesus zeroes in on her true need and directs her to the seeking Father and the worship-renewing Spirit. He discloses to her that he, this weary traveler, the one she is talking with, is at one and the same time, the Messiah she awaits (John 4:6). He is the great “I AM” (John 4:26). She drops her water jar, and runs off to share the good news with everybody in Sychar.

With the coming of the Holy Spirit and studying the Scriptures, we have access to the mind of God and to his heart. We are told over and over in the Bible that he desires to bring those he loves into relationship with him. No one is too “bad” for him to love. That is as true today as it was the day the Samaritan woman encountered Jesus. As my friend Steve Brown says, “being bad isn’t bad enough” to prevent God from loving us. Praise be!

Be blessed this day,

Reggie Kidd+