Stranger in a Strange Land (a Lectionary reflection by Steve Orr)

In Robert Heinlein's STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND, the main character, Michael, is a human who was raised on Mars by Martians, and then, as an adult, comes to Earth. He grows up on a planet with very little water and then comes to a planet that is mostly water. Actual, physical, wet water is a central theme, but it also takes on a spiritual meaning quite apart from its physical form. When people on Earth give MIchael a drink of water, he considers them to be "water brothers" because they have shared water with him. He feels spiritually bound to them because, having grown up with very little of it, water has a spiritual meaning for him. The humans he meets only think of water as a physical liquid, and therein lies a lot of miscommunication.

On Earth, even though he is also human, he is truly a "stranger in a strange land."

Water. When you need it (or feel that you won't be able to get it when you need it) ... well, it's hard to think of anything else. The Lectionary scriptures, this week, are all about water: the physical kind and the spiritual kind. In Exodus, the people fear they will die for lack of water. Following God's instruction, Moses (the original stranger in a strange land) strikes a rock in front of tribal leaders and water gushes forth. But, in this week's Psalm, the event is mostly remembered as a time of complaining and testing of God; not so much for the gushing miracle.

In the gospel of John, Jesus is tired and thirsty; He breaks some taboos by asking a Samaritan woman for a drink of water. What follows is one of those conversations we often find in John where Jesus means one thing and his listener thinks he means something else. It's all about the water: but she thinks he means the wet kind, and he actually means the spiritual kind. Finally, in Romans, we're told that the reason "hope does not disappoint" is "because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us."

That's the spiritual water of which Jesus spoke.

We can't let wet water, or the lack of it, remain our focus in this life. Sure, we need it; we can't live without it. But there comes a point when, like the folks in the Samaritan village, we move from the physical to the spiritual. We must think of the spiritual water that is as essential to our souls as the physical water is to our bodies. We can't live without that spiritual water, either.

We can both drink and share that living water because it never runs out; a continuously gushing miracle that daily strengthens us for our journey.

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READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Third Sunday in Lent (March 19, 2017)
http://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/

Exodus 17:1-7
Psalm 95
Romans 5:1-11
John 4:5-42

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Lectionary Breakfast still meets Friday mornings at the Waco "Egg and I" restaurant. Starting at 8:00, we take the time to allow the living water to flow through us as we laugh, pray, read, discuss, and, of course, eat breakfast.

And each person gets a full glass of water.

Blessings,
Steve

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PHOTO CREDIT:
J. Alan Glennon. (2008) About Geysers, http://www.uweb.ucsb.edu/~glennon/geysers/index.htm, University of California, Santa Barbara, originally posted January 1995, updated August 9, 2008.