Sermons

In the beginning of today’s Gospel Reading, the pieces are all there but they are scattered all over the place. By the end, in the overwhelming joy of Lazarus’ return from death, all the pieces are brought together around Jesus, who now must go on to Jerusalem and fulfill what He has made known in raising Lazarus from the dead, fulfilled in His own death and resurrection.

So we rejoice in how the pieces have come together for our 6 catechumens, at this point in their life as Christians. And we rejoice further to see, in Christ, how the good work which He has begun in them will be carried on to the fulfillment He intends for them.

That’s what St. John lays out with Luther-like clarity in this story, so that he can make one point with equal simplicity: Christ Jesus has come into the world for such as this Samaritan woman with her messy life; Christ has come into the world for such as us with our own messiness, whether recognized or not. And whoever drinks of His living water, will never thirst again.

From His Baptism Jesus is led into the desert, as we too are led by the Spirit into the wilderness places of life by our Baptism with Him. It is a potent reminder in our day, that the Church too fond of power, place, and claims in the world, the Church bedazzled and bedeviled with the glory of the world is the Church no longer walking with Jesus. Baptism-Desert…Cross-Resurrection; that’s how the Church of Jesus Christ is shaped.