Exodus 17:1-7; John 4:5-42
If you’re looking for a word from Scripture
to describe what it’s like to live in the midst of the coronavirus outbreak, we
heard it in the first reading this morning:
Making their way through the wilderness, “the Israelites journeyed by
stages, as the Lord commanded” (Exodus 17:1); and they wondered, “Is the Lord
among us, or not?” (Exodus 17:7). Maybe
we can forgive them for a little complaining, as well as for faltering trust. They’ve been freed from slavery in Egypt, and
they’ve celebrated the new life God’s given them … only to find themselves wandering
in the desert with food and water scarce.
Just before today’s reading, they’re starving; and God provides manna,
bread from heaven, to carry them through.
Then today, they can’t find enough water, and God empowers Moses to
strike a rock at Mt. Sinai to bring living water that flows from barren stone.
Wandering in the wilderness might be an
overused metaphor for the confusing times of our lives, but it certainly seems
to apply right now. Answers are not
coming easily these days. I’ve sent you
two letters in two weeks to explain how we’re working to manage the risk of infection
here at church. That’s not because I think
you like getting mail but because the situation is so fluid.
As of now, these are the most important
ways we’re protecting you when you come to church: We’re greeting each other
without touching, and it would be smart to keep a six-foot distance as much as
possible. We’ve stopped serving the
common cup. We’ve stopped passing the
collection plates and the sign-in folders.
We’re not handling prayer books or hymnals. We’re sanitizing surfaces more
intensely. We’ve removed the holy water
from the font. We’re serving individually
wrapped snacks at coffee hour and serving meals without shared utensils.
So, I’d like to end this list by saying, “There’s
our response plan, and I think we’re good.” But I have a strong feeling that we aren’t done
yet, though I don’t know what this week will bring. In the past week, just in the small world of The
Episcopal Church, we’ve learned of six rectors of large congregations who’ve
been diagnosed with coronavirus infection, effectively closing their churches
for a time. And, even more drastic, at
least three dioceses – Virginia; Washington, DC; and Lexington in Kentucky –
have shut the doors to all their congregations for at least two weeks, closing more
than 300 churches. Plus, as you know, many
Kansas City churches, including Church of the Resurrection and Village Presbyterian,
are worshiping only online today, and our bishop may move us that way for next
Sunday. Worship online is great, and
thank God for it, in this moment. Yet,
it is deeply sad that churches are having to ask people not to come at a time
when we’d most want churches open, a time when people are uncertain and afraid.
So, as we’re thinking about what happens
next, the guiding principle is this: We are
the church, the Body of Jesus Christ in this place and time; and we will keep
being the church, no matter what. As individuals
and as a congregation, we’ll continue to live faithfully even in uncertain
times; and we’ll live trusting that God is with us and will bring us through this. In your day-to-day lives, wherever you are, you’ll
continue to love God and love the person in front of you – even when that means
staying away from the person in front of you.
As you make your way through this coronavirus wilderness, you can keep
going on your Lenten journey, reading your Bible and saying your prayers.
And, it’s our intention that you’ll be able
to “come” to worship, too, even if we can’t all come together to worship
in this room. I know worshiping at home
is not ideal. Just as you miss receiving
the Body of Christ when you can’t be here, you miss physically gathering as
the Body of Christ, getting to talk with people you love and being energized for
this life God gives us Monday through Saturday.
I get that. But we’re blessed that
we can still be the church as we gather virtually.
In fact, we’re starting that on a daily basis,
as of tomorrow morning. Several of you saw
our Facebook posts offering the service of Compline over the past couple of
nights. Beginning tomorrow, we’ll offer
live prayer on Facebook three times a day.
It’s easy to remember: 8-1-8. We’ll be on Facebook Live at 8 a.m., 1 p.m.,
and 8 p.m. each day, gathering with you for beautiful prayers from our Anglican
tradition. We’ll use the framework of
the Daily Devotions for Individuals and Families in the Book of Common Prayer,
though you won’t need a prayer book to take part. All you’ll need is your phone or computer and
a few minutes out of your day to stop, and breathe, and remember that God
is God, no matter what. And you’ll be
able to be part of the experience in real time, too, typing in your prayers in the
moments of silence. Through that brief
witness, three times a day, we can pray for ourselves, our friends, our family,
and our world, commending our common life in this difficult moment to Jesus’
healing touch.
And then, we have the question of Sunday
mornings. Although our bishop hasn’t stopped
in-person worship yet, I wouldn’t be surprised if that happens in the next few
days. And if it does, we will still have
worship, and you can still be part of it through the livestream on our website.
It wouldn’t really make sense for us to
celebrate Holy Communion if no one’s in the pews. But, as some of you will remember from an
earlier day, we have the beauty of Morning Prayer available to us. We’ll bring together Dr. Tom and our singers
and some blowhard to stand up here and preach.
And worship will happen, because we are the church. We are God’s people, and we will praise
him.
You’ve probably also wondered about
classes, meetings, and other gatherings. That, too, is a fluid situation. For today, the Satterlee family cancelled
Lois’ funeral, which was set for this afternoon. Tonight, we’re cancelling our Third Sunday offering
of Irish Pub Night, sadly. But our Discovery
class and our Sunday-night class, the Way of Love in Lent, will go on because
we can offer them on Facebook Live, too.
So, tonight, people can come, and keep their distance; or they can “come”
and be with us online. Visit the St. Andrew’s
Facebook page, or watch your feed, at 6 p.m. tonight.
We’re also having to think about major
events to come. It’s way to early to
know how the coronavirus situation will look by Easter, but … Easter is four
weeks away. And a week after that, we’re
planning to debut our new service at HJ’s, Trailside. We may need to approach those events
differently, so stay tuned as the weeks go on.
Obviously, there’s a lot that’s uncertain
right now. But there’s far more that is
certain, now and always. The living
water of God’s love is there for us, even if we have trouble seeing it and
touching it ourselves. Think about the
Gospel reading today, this meandering, disjointed conversation Jesus has with
the woman at the well.
You know, for most of their conversation, Jesus
and the woman just aren’t connecting. Actually,
they’re not even supposed to be talking to each other. Men and women who were strangers didn’t engage
each other in public. And in this case,
they really shouldn’t have, because Jesus was a Jew and the woman was a Samaritan,
and Jews and Samaritans were supposed to hate each other. Plus, this woman had no social standing for a
conversation with a strange man because she wasn’t married.
Now, we hear Jesus say this woman has had
five husbands and isn’t married to the man she’s with now, and we may think
that implies loose morals. Instead, most
likely Jesus was recognizing her as somebody completely on the margin,
completely powerless. In that time and
place, only a man could initiate divorce, and the divorced woman was left with virtually
nothing financially or socially. This woman
had been through that multiple times and had no standing … but
here she is, talking with Jesus, trying to understand why he’s so different,
what he means about living water “gushing up to eternal life” (John 4:14).
So, she keeps at it. She hangs in there and doesn’t let her
confusion, or the violation of social norms, stop her. She knows he has power she’s never seen or
heard or felt before; and she’s going to keep asking, keep pushing, keep
digging until she finds it. And
eventually, she pushes through the confusion and the uncertainty and the fear
about “we’ve never done it this way before,” and she taps into that living water. “I know [the] Messiah is coming,” she says,
holding out hope that maybe she’s got it right (John 4:25). There you go: “I am he,” Jesus says (John
4:26). The wandering, the digging, the
interrogating, the breaking of the rules – it’s all paid off. And at the end, despite everything, even the
Samaritans around her can say, “We know that this is truly the Savior of the world”
(John 4:42).
Sometimes, faithfulness looks very different
than we’d expect. In challenging times –
when we’re wandering in the wilderness, when we find ourselves in enemy territory,
when we’re afflicted by threatening forces – in challenging times, faithfulness
means keeping on when you can’t see where the path leads.
You know, maybe the coronavirus threat
will pass quickly; and in a few weeks, maybe we’ll all look at each other and
smile and wonder what all the fuss was about.
Or, maybe not. But whatever happens
this week, and in the weeks ahead, we will be OK, because we are the church. We are the Body of Christ. We are God’s people in this place, however life
looks in the moment. And we will keep on
the journey even though it’s complicated, even though it’s rough, because we
know what awaits us at the end: Bread
from heaven. Water from the rock. The Savior of the world, walking among us. And living water “gushing up to eternal life”
(John 4:14).
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