After what I wrote about water in the service, this week, today’s gospel reading happened to be Jesus debating the feisty Samaritan woman at the well. I love this gospel because I wrote one of my earliest HD papers on it and because it was the second gospel I ever preached at. Shallow of me. I ought to love it for the message and the contents and instead I love it for the road it has travelled with me. As I listened to it today I had words in my head from one of my friends who had told me Jesus was just ordinary “like you” and I thought about and ordinary Jesus offering “living water” and being told he has nothing to draw it with and the well is deep. And isn’t that just how ordinary old us feel most days? That people need things from us but we have nothing to draw it with and the well is deep. And I burst into tears (everyone was either too deep in thought to notice or tactful and looked away). But this poem is my musing on the “ordinary” burdened Jesus meeting this woman who refreshed him with her honesty and her reluctance to let him get away with things. May we all meet such women!
Encountered at the well
You are right,
I have nothing to draw with and the well is deep,
nothing to draw with and the well…
yes well I hadn’t planned on being
any sort of a Messiah, had I?
I could have done without the early mornings,
the lonely roads
the misunderstandings
frankly
and it is not like I am trying
to force something down your throat
rightly cynical fellow-traveller
but I am thirsty and you should be also
for the transformation that makes meaningless
your previous life.
Yes, call them all
come…come…come to the freakshow.
Are you another one that will call me
“King” and “Lord” and “Master” even while
missing the point?
I like you when you argue,
as if we were simply determining
whether you will address me as “Comrade” or “Adversary”.
To tell you the truth
I struggle with the same question.
