Water for the Thirsty
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If you were traveling in a hot arid country and you knew you
had no water … you'd know you were in trouble. That would be a bad situation to be in!
A person can go without food for a long time. There are a
good number of people who have gone 3 weeks without any food. Water, however,
is a different story! A Duke University professor stated in an interview for
Business Insider’s Science page that at room temperature, out of the sun, we
can live for 100 hours without water. And the Israelites were in a hot and
sunny land. Weeks without food. Days without water.
This was a life and death situation for Israel. They were
concerned. They began to grumble against Moses … and against God.
Shall we recall all that God had done for Israel up this
this point in their history? Start with rescuing them from slavery in Egypt
through the miraculous plagues. Then he parted the Red Sea and led them through
it on dry ground. He destroyed the Egyptian army pursing them. He had turned
bitter water sweet for them – made it more palatable. He gave them manna –
bread from heaven – to eat every day. He provided quail for them to eat in the
evening.
But now they are thirsty. So what do they do? Do they recall
God’s promise to protect and provide for them? Do they pray and ask for water?
Do they patiently wait having seen how much God has already provided, trusting
that he’ll provide yet again? No. They grumble. And yet God, in his mercy,
provided water … from a rock.
In 1 Cor. 10, it says the Israelites all drank from the same
spiritual rock … a rock that followed them … and it says that rock was Christ.
God provided miraculous salvation, miraculous food, and miraculous drink for
Israel.
Jesus brought forth water for the thirsty to sustain their
physical lives. And the way he gave them water was intended to sustain their
life of faith as well.
God wanted Israel to trust him, to have faith in him for
their every need: Physical and Spiritual. He would be their God, and they would
be his people and he would rescue them from their enemies and from their sins.
And here we gather, so many years later, in much the same
way as Israel – miraculously rescued from our slavery to sin by Jesus’ death on
the cross, brought to a new life through water … water connected to and
combined with God’s Word in Baptism, and given heavenly bread – Jesus body
broken for us and heavenly drink – Jesus blood shed for us – in with and under
the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper.
But what happens when life gets hard or we are unhappy with
our situation. Do we ever grumble? No one here complains about the weather, the
government, their parents or spouse … or any of the other blessings God has
given us. Do we? (Remember that if we say we have no sin, we only deceive
ourselves!)
I am struck by our reading from Romans – “We rejoice in our
sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces
character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame,
because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who
has been given to us.”
Rejoice in suffering? Yes, because we can pray and call upon
God … and find him faithful again and again, meeting our need, satisfying our
thirst – providing for us in ways that are sometimes strange, sometimes
unexpected, but always good.
We live in a time and place where thirst is almost
non-existent. If we want water we turn on the tap or buy a bottle at the gas
station. Indeed, we often prefer our water flavored, sweetened, and carbonated.
The account of Israel in the desert and the woman at the well are pretty
foreign to the way we live. The idea of rejoicing in suffering knowing God will
meet us there – even more foreign.
But there is more to thirst for than water. Jesus says,
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be
satisfied.”
When the woman in our gospel lesson went to the well – she
went to get water – normal water, like what Israel wanted. Instead she met
Jesus – the rock who gives living water – and she found a different thirst and
need for that living water which was greater than her physical thirst. She
received the good news that God forgives sins for Jesus’s sake. She went
because she was thirst for normal water, and by the end of her conversation
with Jesus she left her buckets to share the message – There is a guy at the
well. He says he is the Messiah.
What do you thirst for when you come here? Jesus meets us
here. The rock that followed Israel, comes to us here and offers us living
water – water that gives faith, water that removes sin. He is the stricken rock
that gives us water which makes us righteous in Baptism – where he removed our
sins and created the faith that receives his righteousness as a gift.
Jesus gives water for the thirsty. He satisfies our deepest
thirst – the thirst for his presence, his love, his forgiveness, his blessings.
And the water he gives wells up in us like a spring of water – his word
treasured in our hearts, his forgiveness new every moment – welling up to
eternal life.
He satisfies our thirst – and allows our faith to overflow
so others may taste the living water and receive Jesus’ righteousness by faith,
too. Amen.
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