I don't write many sermons at this point - but I preached at my dh's church this morning and thought I would share - As background, W. is preaching about different symbols of the faith this summer. The church he serves is woefully ignorant of anything to do with liturgical seasons, symbols, anything like that - so W. is attempting to rectify that situation. The symbol for today was water....which becomes quite obvious on reading the sermon - so here goes. Scripture texts are 2 Kings 5:1-15, John 4:1-30.
When I was in middle school, my family took the first of 2 big vacation trips driving from our home in Indiana “out west.” I should point out that driving is a more apt description than vacation of our time away – we drove and drove and drove and saw many of the great national parks and other places of the western United States. The first trip, when I was in middle school, we left Indianapolis on the afternoon of July 1 and spent the day of July 4 in the Grand Canyon. I’ll let you figure out how many hours we spent in the car each day getting to the Grand Canyon – it was a lot. From the Grand Canyon we went to the California coast near San Diego and then wound our way up California, visiting family and national parks and zoos and such. One of the things I remember most about this vacation, however, is the drought the states we visited were experiencing that summer.
Growing up in Indiana where it is so humid in the summer that you can almost cut the air with a knife, I don’t remember there ever being a drought when I was young. I may have just been unaware, as I know there have been some dryer summers since then – but water conservation in practice all over the place was something new to me. I remember going to restaurants and having to request water at the table – and then getting a small glass which my father jokingly referred to as a shot glass of water and having to request more. I remember the signs and warnings about not starting fires in the backcountry at national parks because of the fire risk in dry conditions – something we know all too well this summer in Utah. And I remember that the whole point of our mad dash to get to the Grand Canyon on July 4 was to see fireworks over the canyon – which were cancelled because of lack of rain.
I also remember, from that same vacation, experiencing water in nature in amazing ways. Seeing the waterfalls at Yosemite National Park – even not at full capacity, they are beautiful. Seeing the Pacific Ocean – in all it’s fearsome grandeur – is another memory I have of water on that trip. And sitting in the blue seats at Sea World – the splash zone for those of you who haven’t been there – during the Shamu show – that’s another experience of water in abundance.
Water is all around us. Two-thirds of the earth’s surface is covered by water. Two-thirds of our bodies are water. Water, water, everywhere. It’s all over the Bible, too. In fact, Oremus Bible Browser comes up with 719 matches for water in the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible. A few of those are in the apocrypha – the books that the Roman Catholic Church includes in scripture that protestant Christians generally don’t – but even so, there’s a lot of water in the Bible.
Our Old Testament lesson today is the story of Naaman the Aramean’s healing from leprosy. I love the all-too-real human qualities that the characters in this story have. There is Naaman, commander of the Aramean army – a mighty warrior who generally used to things going his way and lots of respect. There is the king of Israel – who is known to think he has to do everything himself and therefore panics easily. And there is Elisha the prophet, who speaks from a distance and whose commands save the day.
What happens in the story? Naaman’s wife has a servant from Israel, who tells her mistress that there is a prophet in Israel who could cure Naaman’s leprosy. So Naaman gets the word, talks to his king, and sets off for Israel bearing gifts meant to insure his healing. The king of Israel panics – you can imagine a lot of four-letter words being whispered under his breath as he asks, “What am I to do?” Elisha hears, and says – send him to me. Naaman shows up at Elisha’s house with his entourage and Elisha sends word to go and wash 7 times in the Jordan River.
Now it is Naaman’s turn to mutter 4-letter words and get raving mad. Elisha didn’t even come out to talk to him in person, after all – and he is important – he deserves personal attention from this prophet. And to wash in the Jordan – that dirty, unclean river. Rivers back in Damascus have cleaner water – surely if any water was going to cure Naaman, the waters from those rivers at home would do it.
It is Naaman’s servants who manage to talk some sense into him, saying basically, “This isn’t so hard, and it might work – why not try it before we go home?” So Naaman does – he immerses himself 7 times in the Jordan River and is made clean.
Wash and be clean – it is what we do with water many times a day – washing hands, washing dishes, washing clothes – maybe even washing the car. Wash and be clean – it is what we do with water by faith as well. Like Naaman, who washed in the Jordan, we are washed by water – and we become clean. We are restored to a state of purity when we are washed by the waters of baptism. While the symbolism in our tradition of dipping a bit of water on someone’s forehead for baptism may not be as dramatic as immersing them bodily into a swimming pool sized font, the message is the same. We are washed, we are made clean.
In John’s gospel we find our second sacred story this morning – the story of the woman at the well. She is a Samaritan, unclean, outcast in society by both her ethnic identity and by her actions of having 5 husbands. Jesus asks her for a drink and she is shocked – who would dare to cross the lines and ask this of her? And what does she have to offer – just some water from a well. Jesus knows who she is – not just her ethnicity but also her behavior – and offers her something that cannot come from an ordinary well. Living Water. Jesus says, “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.” Living Water. Eternal Life. Never be thirsty again.
The Samaritan woman’s life is transformed by this encounter with Jesus and his gift of Living Water. She goes back to tell all whom she meets about this man, this Messiah come to bring Living Water, so that they might worship in spirit and in truth. Naaman’s life is transformed as well – he is cured of a disease that led to isolation in his time. Living Water. Transformation. New Life.
Much of our liturgy for today – the Call to Worship and the prayers we say in unison – comes from liturgies written for the celebration of baptism. Baptism is the central defining moment in our journeys as Christians – the moment when we say (or our parents say for us) that we will turn from the ways of evil and follow the way of Christ. Baptism is when we die to sin and are raised to new life. In the early church, baptismal fonts were often shaped like coffins to drive this point home – the candidate for baptism was immersed in a coffin of water and pulled up to a new way of life as a disciple of the Living Lord. And for us, in this day and age when powers and principalities that are not faithful to the gospel would claim our lives and corrupt our faith, our challenge is to live as those who have been baptized. To live as those who have drunk from that stream of Living Water – knowing that our salvation is assured by the grace of God. Knowing we are freed from worry – freed for loving action to bring that Living Water to the world. To turn from sin – to turn to new life – every day.
Our first semester of seminary we took a required course called “Baptism and Evangelical Identity” – I think Wade has mentioned this before. One of the books we read that semester told of a professor at a seminary who, every time it rained, would dash around campus without an umbrella and call out to everyone he met, “remember your baptism and be thankful!” Those words are included in the liturgy for baptism – addressed to the congregation – each time we see a new believer baptized we are to remember our own baptism and give thanks. Give thanks to the God who promises to transform our lives. Who gives us living water. Who frees us from whatever holds us back – stereotypes, mistakes, assumptions, guilt – frees us to live and love and serve. May we remember – and be thankful. Amen.
