Be a Font of Living Water
Children: Let’s pretend we are out camping and we want to build a fire. How do we do it?
Well, we start off small, right? A little dry tinder. A few twigs. Then a spark or a match becomes a small flame. We add to it, and we nurture it until it’s burning nicely, right? Then we tend and feed the fire, keeping it going in its place.
But what if there are others around you in the dark? What if they don’t have any matches or they don’t know how to start one?
Maybe they’ll see your light and come and ask or light a stick from yours. Or maybe you could walk over and offer a flame from the fire you already have. That is what we are doing here, helping everyone to get the flame, to be touched by God’s Holy Spirit and to share it.
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Jesus’ focus on his disciples after his Resurrection is much like nurturing a small initial fire for each of them. It requires close attention. He literally blows on it to get it going better. His presence with them reassures and empowers them. Get that little flame hot so you can get a good fire going, right? And that’s good. But that is just part of the call of the Gospel.
The disciples, about 120 of them, gathered for the Jewish festival of Pentecost. Fifty days after Passover, they celebrated when Moses brought the Law down from the mountain. That law defined them. It also celebrated the spring harvest. The Apostles are just getting started, trying to organize a bit. I’m sure they were doing their best. Jesus had breathed on them. They had a nice little fire going.
Then the Holy Spirit showed up and just kicked the heck out of the Apostles’ nice little campfire and scattered like tongues of flame across everyone gathered around so that they would catch the fire then carry it back to their own homes. There were people from Asia and Africa, Arabia, Greece, Rome – every part of their known world. And 3,000 of them got it. It didn’t matter where they were from, their language, their station in life or the color of their skin.
They then took the Gospel back to their own towns and cities and neighborhoods and families in their own languages. That is exactly what they did.
The Apostles then went out on their missions, but as we see in Acts and Paul’s letters, when he came to a new region there was often a nucleus of faithful Christians there to receive him and for him to build upon. Not always, but usually. And so we see that the Holy Spirit worked ahead of them to spread the fire around the world. Lights were lit and lives were changed. Lives are changed.
We know how true that is. We have a healthy Christian community right here, right now. The Holy Spirit is moving in and through us! We are a community of faith that prays, that rallies in time of need, that grieves losses and celebrates blessings as they unfold. We are like a family though most of us are unrelated. We live as neighbors despite the distances between our homes. During this COVID-19 crisis, extended family, former members and old friends have joined our worship, prayers and study from across the country and as far away as Germany.
Our witness has been spreading steadily as we live and work in this community. That’s good. We are tending our fire very well. But we’ve seen a lot of other fires this week, too. We’ve seen the video of George Floyd pleading for his life and dying in the street. And we’ve watched as protests turned into riots. It’s an all-too familiar scene. How are Christians, disciples of Jesus Christ, to respond?
In today’s Gospel Jesus was standing in front of the Temple on the last day of the Festival of the Tabernacle. That was a big festival, too. It celebrated Solomon building the first Temple. The Jews regarded the Temple as God’s house.
The prophet Ezekiel had a vision where God showed him water gushing out of the temple. In Israel they have these dry beds of rivers and streams and brooks. They call them Wadis. They don’t look like much until a hard rain comes, and then they become torrents of fast-moving water. And God showed Ezekiel a flood of living water gushing out of the temple that got deeper the farther out it went, an illustration of God’s grace pouring out for his people.
Remember that back in chapter four Jesus told the Samaritan woman at the well that he was the source of living water and the day would come when people would worship neither on their mountain nor in Jerusalem, but the true worshipper would worship in Spirit and in Truth.
Now, at the festival celebrating the Temple, and everyone knows that passage from Ezekiel and it has just been read, Jesus is announcing it to all the people what he said privately to the woman at the well, that he is the source of living water. If we are thirsty, come to him and drink. Then out of us shall flow rivers of living water.
We can’t fix Minneapolis or New York or Atlanta. But God has put use here to bless this community. I don’t have the answers and I don’t think I even know the questions. I do know what happened to George Floyd was horribly, horribly wrong. And what is happening in cities across this country is horribly, horribly wrong.
Jesus taught me to love God and to love my neighbor as myself. Jesus taught me, “Blessed are the peacemakers.” He taught me to care “for the least of these.” He taught me to proclaim hope to the hopeless and to heal the broken. Jesus taught me how to wash another person’s feet. But knowledge and even belief only carry us so far - and not far enough.
Jesus promised that, “Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water.” To be that font of living water we need the Holy Spirit. Pray and think on these things. Pray for our nation, pray for those in distress. Pray for the victims of crime and for healing of the hurts and wrongs people are suffering.
Moses said, “Would that all The Lord’s people were prophets.” Receive the Holy Spirit, pray for guidance and respond to His lead.
AMEN