Third Sunday of Lent 08 03 2026
FIRST READING: Exodus 17.1-7
Second Reading: Romans 5.1-11
GOSPEL John 4.5-42
As we are saddened by the ongoing war in the middle east, feeling a sense of grief that thousands of people have lost their loved ones, their homes and are homeless and stranded, the readings for today give us some guidance.
The Hebrew people were in their journey to the promised land and they had to pass through places where there was no water to drink. We cannot live without water. For the pilgrim people who were journeying in very hot weather conditions, not having water is quite disastrous. These are a people who have seen mighty acts of wonder which God performed in setting them free from the slavery in Egypt and has been guiding them all through the way. Here in this time of need they don’t depend on God or ask God for help but they became very angry with Moses their leader. They asked him painful questions, is this why you brought us out of Egypt, to see us die of thirst in the wilderness. Some of them even became violent and they took up stones to hurt Moses. The people begin to ask, ‘Is the Lord among us or not?’ It was then that Moses looks up to God and pleads with God for water.
God asks Moses to strike a rock with a staff and water gushed out of the rock to quench the thirst of the people. It is strange that the people lost their faith in God when they had to face suffering. They did not ask for God’s help in that situation but started complaining and questioning God.
Paul the great apostle in his letter to the Romans tell us something very profound. We are not strangers to God, God has invited us to share in God’s glory. Therefore, if there is any kind of suffering we have to face, we can even boast about our suffering. He gives the reason stating that, ‘suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us’.
Times of need and suffering are to or advantage because we depending on God have the power to endure, the more we endure, it produces character and character produces hope and hope does not disappoint us. The hall mark of faith in God is to have hope.
While we heard in the Old Testament, the way God provided water to a thirsty people, the gospel reading bring before us another profound situation involving Jesus. This event is happening in Samaria. The Jewish people in those times hated the people of Samaria, they were looked down upon. Jewish people will not have anything to do with Samaritans. If people have to travel from Judea to Galilee they will not pass through Samaria. They will avoid Samaria and take a round about path even though it makes the journey longer. Jesus on the other hand has walked through Samaria and was seated by a well. He meets a Samaritan woman who has come to fetch water from the well. Jesus asks her for water. The Samaritan woman herself is so surprised because Jewish people considered Samaritans as people who are defiled and defiling and therefor will not accept water or food from the Samaritans.
Jesus tells her, if you had known me, you would have asked me for water. And he said, ‘but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.’ While the woman was talking about physical water for the body, Jesus was talking about the water for the soul. He is the living water who quenches all our thirst. Water for the soul is what Jesus offers and we receive it as we face the truth about ourselves. Jesus surprises this woman by telling her story to her, the number of husbands she has had. This revelation that Jesus makes opens the eyes of the Samaritan woman. Jesus affirms that he is the Messiah, the anointed one. Jesus talks about worship, worship is the time our deepest thirst are quenched. Jesus tells her a time has come where people can worship anywhere. No need to go to Jerusalem. You can worship the living God anywhere and anytime because go is everywhere. Jesus adds to say when you worship God, worship God in spirit and in truth, in spirit as we are led by the Spirit who opens our heart to God and in truth, bearing mind the truth about ourselves.