The Woman at the Well (Part 1)

This past Sunday was a pretty intense Gospel reading. Or at least it was for me. I can't stop thinking about it. 

Maybe its partially because it was a little longer than our typical Gospel readings, but that passage struck me as particularly RICH. 

I'm not going to claim any grand Scriptural knowledge or educational credentials, but I can say that this Gospel called me out. The woman at the well. We never even learn her name, but we come to understand her past more intimately than a lot of the people whom Jesus encounters in the Gospels. There was a lot that stood out to me from that passage, but primarily two different thoughts have been swirling in my brain since Sunday morning. For now I'll just focus on the first.

HOPE. I think its worth noting how surprised the disciples are to see Jesus talking to this Samaritan. WOMAN. Their shock indicates that this was far outside of the social norm. And Jesus didn't just accidentally end up in conversation with this woman. He sought her out.

Jesus didn't ask. He wasn't particularly polite. He said, "Give me a drink of water." And her response wasn't really all that cordial either. “How can you, a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?” But this is how Jesus draws her into conversation.

Jesus saw her thirst. Not her physical thirst for water, but the thirst of her soul for something more.  He didn't wait for her to ask...he went to her.

This woman was obviously a sinner. But Jesus sought her out. 

Here's the thing. I don't get the impression that Jesus sought this woman out because he had to. It wasn't begrudgingly that He drew her into conversation. When his disciples return and try to convince their Master to eat something, He replies, “I have food to eat of which you do not know...My food is to do the will of the one who sent me and to finish his work.”

In reaching out to satisfy the thirst of that woman's soul, Jesus was satisfying the Father's thirst for His children to return to Him. With tenderness and compassion, the Good Shepherd was calling back His lost sheep HOPE.

So often I am focused on bringing my needs before the Lord. Even though He knows them better than I do, I'm convicted of asking for those needs to be filled...of not taking God's goodness for granted. But there is something in the way that Christ reaches out to that woman at the well. Before she can call, He is there. Before she can ask, He answers her questions. Before she confesses, He knows her heart. She is undeserving, and yet she is the that the Messiah approaches.

The second reading from this past Sunday speaks to this unworthiness:

"Brothers and sisters:
Since we have been justified by faith, 
we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 
through whom we have gained access by faith 
to this grace in which we stand, 
and we boast in hope of the glory of God.
And hope does not disappoint, 
because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts 
through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
For Christ, while we were still helpless, 
died at the appointed time for the ungodly.
Indeed, only with difficulty does one die for a just person, 
though perhaps for a good person one might even find courage to die.
But God proves his love for usin that while we were still sinners Christ died for us."

(Romans 5:1-2., 5-8)

There is hope. There is hope for the one who has made mistakes...for the one who is still making mistakes. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 

I needed to be reminded of this very important fact...that our God is a Father who WANTS to give good gifts to His children.

"Before I could call, You were running to save me.

You have captured my heart, oh God."

Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam,

Catherine

Dear Cincinnati...

Dear Cincinnati,

Hi there. I've never met you, but I hear we are going to be great friends. I just thought I'd write to introduce myself. After all, I'll be moving my whole life to your city in just three short months.

I think it still shocks my mother how much I love the city. After all, I grew up in a town where the closest Wal-Mart was an hour away. But I'm a city girl at heart.

I fell in love with Saint Paul, Minnesota more than six years ago, and I always hoped I'd live here. It was my dream, and I could barely believe it when that dream came true. God in all His goodness led me to the very place I had longed to be. But now (to quote the movie "Tangled")...now I have a new dream.

Cincinnati...YOU are my new dream.

It started slowly. You see, this past year I was busy falling in love with my soon-to-be-husband. And as I slowly started to build hopes and dreams of what our future would look like...you crept in. It was a maybe. It was a hypothetical. But...what if? 

I never used to like adventure. This adventurous side of me is fairly new. I'm not a big fan of change, and yet I'm currently planning a wedding and preparing to move to a city I've never been to before. So something obviously happened, huh? Yeah, I fell in love. I fell in love with Christ. And I told Him He could do whatever He wanted with me. I didn't quite realize what a can of worms I opened with that statement. What a crazy and hard and BEAUTIFUL can of worms.

Now its just two short weeks until I visit you for the first time. I'm SO excited! Because I know that God has an incredibly beautiful plan for for Ryan and I...and you are part of it, Cincinnati. I still love Saint Paul and I always will, but for now I know that we are being called somewhere new. And I know that it is going to be GOOD.

You are my new dream, Cincinnati. See you in two weeks. 

Love, 

Catherine