We are now half-way through Lent.  Only three Sundays remain in this Season of Preparation for the celebration of Easter prior to Palm Sunday and the beginning of Holy Week.

We notice two things about these three remaining Sundays (in what we call Year A of the Three Year Lectionary Cycle that most Christians share): the Gospel Readings are from the Gospel of John (not Matthew which is the Gospel we read primarily in Year A); and, they are three of the longest Gospel readings in the Lectionary.

This morning, we have the story of Jesus and the woman from Sychar meeting at Jacob’s Well.  Next Sunday, we will have the story of Jesus healing the man who was born blind.  And the Sunday before Palm Sunday we will have the story of the raising of Lazarus.

If you remember last week, where we encountered the story of Jesus and Nicodemus, I said that reading that story and listening to that story was like seeing a one-act play.  Today’s story and the two that follow are also one-act plays, dramatic presentations where we are not just an audience observing the production, we become participants in the drama itself.

Last Sunday’s story took place in the dark of night, this Sunday’s story takes place at High Noon.  Last week it was Nicodemus and Jesus, this week it is Jesus an a woman without a name who is from the village of Sychar in the region of Samaria.

There are all kinds of things going on in this one-act play … the scene itself is desolate, in the heat of the day two people meet at a well.  But it is in the heat of the day and it is an encounter that is not quite kosher, in fact it is full of suggestion and innuendo.   The woman is a woman of question.  We find out that she has had several husbands, and now is living with someone – as it used to be said – “Without the benefit of clergy.”  We can see her coming to the well after hours, as it were, because customarily women of the village came to the well in the cool of the morning to draw water for the day, and there in the coolness and around the well the conversation, the sharing, the gossip took place.

We can let our imaginations wander a bit and listen in on their chatter: “Where is that Six Spouse Hussy?” someone taunts.  Another mocks, “Oh … you mean Sychar Sabrina, well … you know … she never shows her face before noon … I wonder why …..?”

But now that the plaza is deserted and folks are inside their homes, or taking the noon day siesta, the woman of Sychar comes to the well, avoiding the stares and giggles and hissing of her neighbors.

That’s one thing that is going on.  But there is more:  she comes to the well and finds a man there, and not just any man, but a Jewish man.  And at this level, there are two things happening:  the custom is that a man and woman alone in such place, unless married or related, do not speak to each other; and certainly a man does not address an unknown woman, unless he is seeking intimate favours.

The other thing is that this woman is Samaritan, and this man is Jewish.  And the enmity between Samaritans and Jews went back centuries.  In 586 BCE King Nebuchadnezzar dealt the Israelites a humiliating military victory, destroying the Temple built by Solomon and bringing the leadership of Judea to Babylon in chains.

Looking for someone to blame long after the Exile ended, Ezra and Nehemiah blamed those men of Israel who had married foreign women, and they demanded that all such men immediately divorce their wives.  Many, especially in Samaria, refused. 

Besides this, there were two claims to where God showed up … for Samaritans on the nearby mountain, for Jews in Jerusalem in the Temple. 

And so the story unfolds where this woman from Sychar seeking solitude at the well in the middle of the day finds instead a man who not only talks to her, talks with her and their dialogue (for that is what it is) brings understanding to her heart and peace to her life.  The water she has gone to draw she leaves at the side of the well, and instead goes back into the homes of the village surrounding and bangs on the doors of the houses with a single message, “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done!  He cannot be the Christos … can he?”

And many from that place came to see for themselves, not because this Jew went around knocking on Samaritan doors himself, not because this Jesus personally invited them to a town meeting, but because a woman of question told her story of acceptance and grace and then they could see for themselves and understand for themselves the presence of holiness. She was the bearer of the Good News, and in her is the lesson for us today.

I’ve always wondered what Jesus did in that village for the next two days.  He rises above the grumblings and restraints of his followers, who try to prevent him from becoming any more ritually unclean than he is (talked with a woman alone, messing with the Samaritans, things like that) … he rises above these shaking heads and does what …?  We don’t know, we are not told.  But we can imagine. 

What does Jesus do here, in our midst, around this Table, in these pews, in our meeting of each other with a simple “Peace be with you”?  What does Jesus make of us who bow down and confess our many faults before the one who tells us everything we have ever done?  What does Jesus call on us to do with our lives as we taste the bread and wine? 

Perhaps the same thing, “Here is God.  Here is who God is.  Here is how God loves.  Here are your neighbors.  Here is how to accept and love them.  Here is the world in need of healing.  Here is how to love the world and bring peace to what God has so lovingly made.”

Perhaps indeed the same thing for us … for us who are often strangers and come to meet God when we think no one is looking at us, no one can see the stain on our lives, the things done and left undone, the fallings short, the embarrassment and guilt and shame of our souls.  Can I be forgiven?  Is there some way to make this brokenness whole?  Can my wounded heart be healed?  Can my anger go away?  Can my tears stop flowing?  Can I possibly be accepted, loved, embraced … ever again? 

And the answer from the well is, “Yes.”

The Lord be with you.
Let us pray.
Holy One, by the encounter of Jesus and the Woman of Sychar, you taught your disciples and people of a foreign village to love and to make whole what was broken.  So meet us today at your Table and teach us how to pray, how to forgive, how to mend, how to love.  And let us say … Amen.