March 12, 2023: Third Sunday of Lent, Year A Exodus 17:3-7 Psalm 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9 Romans 5:1-2, 5-8 John 4:5-42 I Can Love You Because I Trust GodA reflection by Thomas DeVoyd We are called to trust that God will provide for what we need. That is very easy to say, but hard to do. I was listening to Mother Angelica’s old shows. A woman called in and said that she was in great pain. She had suffered all her life with different illnesses. Her question: “Why did she have to go through all this pain? There are evil people in the world who have no ailments at all.” Mother Angelica had a great answer. She said that God has a special care for people who suffer during this life. Jesus was put on the cross and suffered for all of us. When we suffer during this life, it can help us grow in love. People who do evil – whether they suffer now or not – will suffer for eternity. It can be difficult to trust God. In the first reading, Moses is being pursued by the people he led out of Egypt. They complain they have no water. They feel like they are going to die of thirst. Earlier in Exodus, the Israelites complained that they did not want to eat the manna God provided. They wanted more meat. They were struggling to trust that God would provide for their needs – and even when God did provide, they struggled with how God did so. Moses (seemingly on the edge of panic) asks God what they are going to do. This lack of trust is becoming more common. We struggle to trust that God will care for us, but trust is exactly what we are called to do! Jesus died for the sins of all. This includes the ungodly. Jesus came for those who needed to hear God’s word (everyone!). This is why the Pharisees and Scribes were looking to kill Jesus. Jesus was taking time with those that they felt were not worthy of the Word. Throughout the New Testament, Jesus preached the word without prejudice. It makes me wonder why we all cannot strive for this. Even in the LGBTQ+ community, we tend to decide who is worthy of care. We encounter people in need, yet we turn our backs. One example of this comes from the stories of people who began their transition to a new gender identity and then chose to return to their original identity. They were embraced by the community during their transition but when their journey changed some in the LGBTQ+ community turned their backs. It is heartbreaking. We are called to love everyone, no matter where they are in their spiritual and sexual journey. I am not pretending this is easy. I try daily and fall short. It’s one of the things I pray for every day. Jesus speaks to the Samaritan woman in today’s Gospel. It turns out, she is not a favorite of the Pharisees. They could not understand why Jesus would bother with her. She had five husbands and the man she was with was not her husband (all this Jesus knew without asking). This made the Pharisees brand her a sinner. Jesus offered her the water that would keep her for feeling thirst. Obviously, he meant the “living water” of faith. When the woman went back to her village and told all that she had met the Messiah. Jesus was offering salvation to a group of people that many people at the time. When the disciples saw Jesus talking to this woman, they asked why Jesus spoke to her, but they did not let him answer. I thought that they should have. They wanted him to eat. He said, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.” He is referring to his own relationship with God. The parables of Jesus are clearer to me since I have been reading through the Bible every year. I have read the Bible 5 or 6 times now. It is empowering to hear a reading and to remember it. What do these reading say to me? Part of trusting God is the call to love everyone – to look beyond what they do and see who they are. We spend way too much time finding ways to hate and dismiss others. We should exert as much energy learning how to appreciate people and accept others without judgement. Trusting that the journey they are on with God is as sacred and incomplete as our own |
