Lent  3, year a, 2026

Once upon a time, a long time ago….

What a comforting phrase.  When I hear these words I smile and settle in for what I know will be a good story.   Each culture has an opening line that starts every good story.  In Japan when I was learning the language I quickly found out that all folk tales began…’Mukashi, Mukashi, aru dokoro ni Oji san and Oba san ga imashta…’  a long, long time ago lived an old man and an old woman. 

You hear this and you know what comes next, it’s part of the culture.  And all these tales have a familiar pattern… when you meet a family with three sons, you already know the first two will fail at a test and the third will succeed.  If you meet a bedraggled beggar woman in the woods, always help! No doubt she is a fairy or sorceress testing your kindness.  And in Jewish tales…if a man meets a woman at a well, a marriage is soon to follow.  As we see in several bible stories.  Issac and Rebbeca, Jacob and Rachel, even Moses and Ziporah. 

Today we find it is Jesus resting at the well by himself and low and behold, a woman soon arrives.  Everything is ready for the traditional set up of a ‘woman and the well’ marriage tale, but this tale takes a turn.

So once upon a time, Jesus was walking to Samaria and because the road was long and dusty, Jesus sat down by the well to rest.  Being without provisions, Jesus disciples went into the city to find some food.  As Jesus sat at the well a Samaritan woman came to draw water…and here we encounter our first problem. 

This is not a woman Jesus should be associating with, the Samaritans and Jews had an ancient feud and we’ll just say they were not on friendly terms.  regardless, Jesus speaks to her, “Give me a drink”, and the story begins.  Jesus and this unnamed woman begin to converse speaking of shared history and religion, of faith and philosophy.  Jesus patiently and symbolically leading this faithful woman to a new understanding of faith.  This seems as far from the expected marriage tale we were lead to believe would take place.

And yet, marriage does enter into it.  We do find out that this woman has had five husbands and lives with another man now.  so is this a marriage tale after all?

When a woman was given in marriage in biblical times, she was indeed given and would leave her family to join her new husband.  A new life, a new beginning. She would have to change loyalties, status and be under the protection (or not) of this new man. This woman had endured five marriages (and considering how little control women had in marriage and the very few ways one could lose a husband, I assume that hers must have been a very difficult life), and now was forced to rely on a man who would not marry her. 

This woman  had drunk from that marriage well many times and it had not brought her life.

“Jesus said to her, everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give will never be thirsty.  The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.”   The Woman said “Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”

As the conversation continues it become clear that this discussion is less about marriage and water than it is about truth and life.  We are reading from the Gospel of John and John’s gospel is full of symbolism and mysticism.  So when Jesus tells the woman she will have a spring of Eternal Life, it means something different than what we assume.  Just like the story of the woman at the well, John’s telling of eternal life has a twist.

John 17:3 tells us what he means  3 Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.”

Of course, this is just one verse, but it does represents what Jesus in John’s gospel is speaking about when he talks of eternal life.  For John eternal life is not in a galaxy far, far away, but here and now.  It is knowing that Jesus is the way, the truth and the light.  Eternal life is living the life of Christ now.

In this meeting at the well John is switching up the story, it isn’t your everyday Woman at the Well story.  In this foretelling of marriage Jesus is the bridegroom and by meeting him at the well this woman’s life has been changed forever.  However, instead of her being forced to drink from the stagnant waters of moral hope over which she had no control, Jesus is offering this woman the opportunity for true life.

Giving this Samaritan woman and, symbolically through her, everyone a chance to choose a life which is refreshing, fulfilling, full of meaning and purpose.  Jesus is giving her the chance to choose and the chance to be empowered.

The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water."…and, "I know that Messiah is coming" (who is called Christ). "When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us." Jesus said to her, "I am he, the one who is speaking to you." Then the woman left her water jar at the well and went back to the city. Saying to the people, Come and see! And thanks to her story we read that “Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman's testimony…And many more believed because of his word.”

 

 

The meeting of the Samaritan woman by the well is a marriage story.  It is a story of meeting the Bridegroom and gaining a new life.  We so often think we know how the story goes.  That the players in the scene have to walk the path that tradition and ‘always has been’ lays out for them.  That eldest son is doomed to fail, so that the youngest will succeed.  The stepmother must be evil.  That what happens a long, long time ago and far far away, must tell us what will happen here too. 

However, Jesus gives us options, choices to step away from expectations and into a new life.  To leave behind the futile attempts to assuage our thirst and transform our lives by drawing time and again from the same old well; and to drink deep of the living waters.  The river of life which flows from God to nourish the whole of creation.

The Samaritan woman looked at man before her at the well and compared him to the greatest man she could think of, Jacob the forebearer of their mutual faiths.  In whose name that well was dug and had nourished people for generations.  She looked back and so she could not see what possibilities were ahead, if we do the same we can expect the same results, futile attempts to gain new life from old wells, long dry. 

We too are a part of a wedding story, the church and the bridegroom are continually renewing their vows and recreating life eternal. Jesus told his disciples “I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor."

 

 

We are not the only people at the well, nor the only people at the wedding feast.  Pick what metaphor you wish.  When we take the hand of the Bridgroom and drink that living water we become part of a larger family.

We have entered into God’s family and given our pledge to follow his lead, his purposes and do his work.  God’s mission field is the world and his harvest is eternal life for all.  God sends forth the river of life, to renew and refresh creation and provides us with the opportunity to do the work that nourishes and fulfils us.  Bringing us eternal life, here and now…the knowledge and love of God, the mutual devotion of a bride and a bridegroom.

We are a part of this tale, this story of women and well, we are the bride entering a new life.  A life full of promise, full of renewal, full of life…eternal life.

May our life wedded to Christ always be fruitful, fulfilling and full of love.