The Necessaries of LifeAdmit it.
Doomsday Preppers are having their day in the sun. While the hoi polloi were stacking their trolleys high in supermarket raids, Preppers Sam and Mable Smith were sitting on a basement full of…well, everything! No one wants to undergo any form of deprivation. It’s natural to want to be surrounded by the necessaries of life, and even more so to make sure you are not going to run out. Jesus disciples went into town to buy supplies while passing through Samaria. Unbeknownst to them, Jesus engaged a Samaritan woman in a theological discussion. It started with him asking her for water and ended with her running off without the water that she had come for.
Jesus’ introductory chat about ‘Living water’ seemed to end inconclusively. But when he went on to shock her with intimate knowledge of her matrimonial history (concluding with the fact that her latest man is just a live in), it didn’t escape her that she was standing in front of a prophet. I can only guess at the reason for her segue into a discussion on places of worship. I am sure that you, too, have been in religious conversations that have stuck that sudden death knell of: “My church is better than you church!” But Jesus didn’t miss a beat. He just told her that the Samaritan worshipers were wrong, and that the Jewish worshipers were right; and that soon it’s not going to matter anymore, anyway. All that’s going to matter is what is at the heart of your worship – spirit and truth.
At the heart of both Samaritan and Jewish worship was the expectation of Messiah. So, lest she be outdone, our Samaritan woman offers this Jewish prophet the ultimate authority on all religious truth: “I know that Messiah is coming (He who is called Christ); when that One comes, He will declare all things to us.” Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am He.” This would be lunacy coming from you or me; but backed up by the miracle of knowledge he had shared about her personal life, it now made perfect sense to her. It did what it was designed to do: Confirmed the Word of God in her heart. Now face to face with Messiah, what must she do? She believed and ran home with the news. Jesus disciples had returned with dinner from the supermarket. The necessaries of this life had arrived. But Jesus didn’t want to know. His appetite was spiritual. Thus, he was not going to allow this teaching opportunity to be ruined; no matter what the necessaries of this life are. He had just planted and watered. Now he was about to go into the Samaritan village for a two-day harvest. He told them plainly, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to accomplish His work.” johnstaiger1@gmail.com