The Light Has Come: Water

Intro:

Context (before the reading):

7:1-10 - Jesus’ brothers invite him to come to the feast and he says, “no” but then comes to Jerusalem “not openly, but in secret”

7:14-36 - Jesus is no longer in secret, but goes up to the Temple and begins to teach (and controversy ensues)

In today’s reading we are going to hear Jesus talk about something we’ve already heard Him talk about earlier in John. And then we are also going to encounter a figure who we met earlier in the gospel.

A few weeks ago, we read sections from John 3 and 4 - and in them, was approached at night by a Jewish leader, a Pharisee named Nicodemus and then Jesus was in Samaria with a woman at a well. Jesus told Nicodemus that he would need to be born of water and the Spirit. And Jesus told the woman He had LIVING WATER that would quench her thirst in ways the water she was there to draw never could.

So, listen in our reading today for both mentions of Water and the Spirit and then watch for Nicodemus to enter the scene once again.

Libby, would you come and read for us?

Reading: John 7:37-52

John 7:37–52 (CEB)

37 On the last and most important day of the festival, Jesus stood up and shouted,

“All who are thirsty should come to me!

38 All who believe in me should drink!

As the scriptures said concerning me,

Rivers of living water will flow out from within them.”

39 Jesus said this concerning the Spirit. Those who believed in him would soon receive the Spirit, but they hadn’t experienced the Spirit yet since Jesus hadn’t yet been glorified.

40 When some in the crowd heard these words, they said, “This man is truly the prophet.” 41 Others said, “He’s the Christ.” But others said, “The Christ can’t come from Galilee, can he? 42 Didn’t the scripture say that the Christ comes from David’s family and from Bethlehem, David’s village?” 43 So the crowd was divided over Jesus. 44 Some wanted to arrest him, but no one grabbed him.

45 The guards returned to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked, “Why didn’t you bring him?”

46 The guards answered, “No one has ever spoken the way he does.”

47 The Pharisees replied, “Have you too been deceived? 48 Have any of the leaders believed in him? Has any Pharisee? 49 No, only this crowd, which doesn’t know the Law. And they are under God’s curse!”

50 Nicodemus, who was one of them and had come to Jesus earlier, said, 51 “Our Law doesn’t judge someone without first hearing him and learning what he is doing, does it?”

52 They answered him, “You are not from Galilee too, are you? Look it up and you will see that the prophet doesn’t come from Galilee.”

Story of correct but not right…

7:37 On the last and most important day of the festival…

Feast of Tabernacles AKA Festival of Booths AKA Sukkot

“The festivals (all of them) are by definition acts to maintain relationship with God and remembrances of God’s relational commitment and covenant.”

But what about this particular festival? Is there anything special about the Feast of Tabernacles, the Festival of Booths, Sukkot?

This Festival was one of three pilgrimage festivals that brought Jews from all regions of Palestine to Jerusalem and the temple. It was the culminating festival of the year, a fall festival that celebrated the end of harvest, particularly the grape and olive harvest.

The festival brought together an agricultural moment and the historic link to a time when they couldn’t have celebrated a harvest because they didn’t stay anywhere long enough to grow something. On both levels, there is a celebration of the presence and provision of God. There in the wilderness. Here in the harvest.

And, of course, the common need in the wilderness and in the growing season is … WATER.

During the festival, there was a daily procession from the Temple to the Pool of Siloam to fill a golden pitcher and then process back to the Temple where the water is poured out on the altar. On the final (seventh) day, this procession happens seven times. It is on this day that Jesus stands up and shouts…

Two things I want to explore: meaning(s) and discussion

What does it mean that living water flows: 2 meanings to explore

The text itself is somewhat unclear. Living water will flow. That is clear.

But from whom will the living water flow? From Jesus, from believers in Jesus, or from both?

The text actually is somewhat ambiguous. Pronouns will do that - Jesus says, this is about me. Okay. Clear enough. But then there’s an object

Bible scholar Dale Bruner describes the dual meaning as a somewhat geographically-based tradition. The Western Church has emphasized that the living waters flow FROM CHRIST and from Christ alone. The Eastern Church has drawn on the Woman at the Well in John 4, in which the believer becomes a spring of water. The woman at the well becomes a well, if you will.

And then Bruner also describes what he calls the Double Interpretation in which the waters flow from both Christ and the the lives of the believers.

Belief in Jesus, which you’ll remember in John is like a stand-in for the idea of relationship with Jesus.... belief in, relationship with Jesus results in the living water that flows from Jesus now flowing from us as well.

Christ is the one from whom living water flows AND the believer becomes a source of that living water for those around them.

And, in case, we would otherwise miss it, John tells us DIRECTLY, “Jesus is talking about the Holy Spirit.”

The Spirit who, at this moment in the story, had not yet been poured into the lives of believers, enabling them to be the BODY OF CHRIST, the CHURCH. But who, as John’s readers are first reading this has already been poured out. And John is wanting those readers to see that the Spirit is in them, overflowing the life of the believer, bringing living water.

Water flows not for the sake of the one from whom it flows, but for those around them!

So two meanings - and in this case, YES to both. Yes, Jesus is the living water. Yes, the very body of Jesus was a source of living water - as He walked the earth. But also YES, the body of Christ, believers in Jesus also become a source of living water.

How does this happen? By the Spirit!

How do we see this? How can we recognize it?

Communities made up of individuals who are indwelt by the Spirit of God, and out of whom the Living Water overflows… bringing LIFE to those around them.

And so, on this day when the water is the focal point of the religious festival, the main symbol through with God’s people are maintaining their relationship with God and remembering God’s commitment to them. On the day when SEVEN TIMES the water is scooped up into that golden pitcher and then taken back to the Temple all in glorious procession… on this day, Jesus stands up and shouts something revolutionary. And it’s the same thing that he spoke a few chapters back to the Samaritan woman at the well. As Darrell Johnson puts it… the woman who became a well. Now, here Jesus is again, saying I am the Living Water - and you too can become a source of God’s presence and provision for those around you.

No wonder arguments are what follows. In fact, some would say that this chapter is where, in the gospel of John, things start to ramp up, as we head towards “the hour” - which is still not “now” but we get a sense more and more that the time is coming near.

So, following this second “temple incident” John lets us in on 2 discussions

The “common people” (the crowd)

The crowd articulates the confusion about who Jesus really is.

A prophet. The Christ (Messiah). He’s dangerous. But he’s from Galilee…

And John tells us that the crowd was divided.

The religious elites (the Pharisees), aren’t so divided, it seems. Or are they? Their agents don’t arrest Jesus, and say that it’s because of how Jesus speaks. Like no one they’ve ever heard. But the leaders are trying to maintain control, and so they do what is so easy for leaders to do… they announce the only acceptable opinion and shame anyone who might be thinking otherwise. Saying that only the “uneducated fools in the crowd” would fall for something so ridiculous.

And then enters Nicodemus. Or, should I say “re-enters” Nicodemus. The Jewish leader, a Pharisee who came to Jesus by night in chapter 3. Who was curious and who brought his questions to Jesus.

And as Henri Nouwen has written… “Nicodemus deserves all [our] attention.”

In a moment that will cost him, he challenges the tradition of his own by knowing the tradition well enough to see how the leaders are not being faithful to their own rules and to their own tradition.

Nicodemus will be ridiculed for what he says. He will be attacked both personally and professionally. And John won’t offer a rebuttal - we don’t see Nicodemus stand up for himself. We don’t see Jesus appreciate Nicodemus coming to his defense. We don’t see any of the Pharisees taking a second look. But maybe, what John is letting us in on is that Nicodemus is no longer under the cover of night with his curiosity about this man from Galilee. Something is happening. And I think John wants us to stand in the place of Nicodemus. Is something happening with us as well?

The question we are left with is

will Nicodemus become one of those people from whom living water flows?

The question John leaves us with is,

will WE become one of those people from whom living water flows?

Will our lives be so flooded with the Holy Spirit, with the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead, that we might become sources of living water to those around us? Providing access to the only water that will ultimately quench the thirst of the human soul? Will be drink and be made into aqueducts, carrying living water into our homes and neighbourhoods, into our workplaces and community relationship, into our schools and stores and onto the hiking trail and the business calls?

Holy God, we try so hard to be your faithful people.

We want to get it right, to follow your way and to live according to your word.

We confess that sometimes we have held so fast to the simple and obvious commands, we can no longer see the bigger picture.

We find the small things easier, so we insist on them, even while your Spirit moves right in front of our faces.

Forgive us for being so literal about some things while ignoring others.

Forgive us for being oblivious to your new thing because it doesn’t fit our preconceived notions of how you are meant to work.

Forgive us for missing your grace emerging from people and places we have so easily dismissed.

Open our hearts to receive, and to become, life in all its fullness, even now.

We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.

As Ben & Christina come, just a word about our song of response. It is a prayer inviting the Holy Spirit to be present - and again, there are (at least) a couple of ways we might think of this…

We invite the Holy Spirit to be present in our lives - as individuals, as a community (as Southwest Community) and then in the world… revealing the Living Water, the Bread of Life, the Word made flesh, the One who is Light and in whom we find abundant life.