SUNDAY EXCERPT OF THE SCRIPTURES JOHN 4.25The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”26 Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.” 27 Just then his disciples returned (to Sychar) and were surprised to find him talking with a woman. But no one asked, “What do you want?” or “Why are you talking with her?”28 Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, 29 “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?” 30 They came out of the town and made their way toward him.
HOMILY GOD’S DREAM FOR YOU.
God has a dream for you. It’s God’s dream for the abundant life to happen in you. Jesus said: “I have come that you might have abundant life.” (Do you know its Scripture reference? It’s in John 10:10. )
The dream of God for you is not just of Heaven, although that will be a spectacular and eternal gift of God to you. Yet indeed, God has His present dream of His life flowing in you and refreshing your spirit. As you are. In the now. Leading you to the everlasting.
I thought of a 7 fold dream that God would have for you (and I) to know and live. I’ve been pondering on it the past three days. Here’s the list: God dreams for you (some) 1unconditional love in your life, 2inner peace, 3enduring joy, 4self-control, 5real honesty, 6a forgiving spirit, and 7a selfless spirit of service to others. God dreams for us to have such a blessed life. Will we let the dream be realized? Do you need any work in those listed seven areas? Or even finishing touches? That’s a list I put forth to our convert class people this week, of what God dreams for them—that they might know and live it out in this Catholic life. Again, the seven are: (that they’d live with) unconditional love, inner peace, enduring joy, self-control, real honesty, a forgiving spirit, and a selfless spirit of service to others.
I’ll talk on unconditional love today—the first. What has brought on this theme? First, this Gospel. The Woman at the Well went from Dismal Druthers to Dreams upon her Jesus Encounter. Dismal Druthers to Dreams. The moment she put her water jug down so to go see the town to tell her Good News—she moved into the Dreams stage. She had a quenched thirst from the Living Water of Jesus. She no longer would be a slave to lust or a loner at noon at the well.
She now had the unconditional love of Jesus in her heart, and she was going out to the village to introduce her reborn life, as no longer one to fear or to pity or to avoid. She would love the people there of Sychar, even enough to have them to come meet Jesus. She gets the whole village to show up, to meet this Holy Person that changed a woman in a day. A day of her dreams.
Second reason: We have a Three Night Mission on March 22-23-24—Sunday, Monday and Tuesday night at 7 p.m. By Malta Diocese Priest Fr. Dominic Sultana. He will be speaking on God’s Dreams and Destinies for us. So I have applied it to this homily. He has much to share with us to lift our hearts to God. I plead for you to come to our Parish Mission.
I present this Samaritan Woman story of our Lenten week to indicate how some people need some work in their lives, while others need a whole lot of immediate attention from God, and if they would but need to turn to Him, God is ready to work—like Jesus was at Jacob’s Well. In this John 4 story. The woman in the story has no name given, so then let’s just call her Hannah. She will have a dream day.
In this gospel we can see stages of conversion for Hannah at the well, which I think can inspire expectations of any person at any stage of their faith development that God can take us further along into “the abundant life” that He dreams for us.
He can even put unconditional love into our being, because Christ has a plan to be in our hearts and forever. He can help us towards becoming fully alive.
The Woman at the Well met Jesus and had a great experience of transformation. Jesus’ unconditional love won her over in the end. Hannah went through stages of knowing Him—from meeting a thirsty stranger to knowing Him as Lord and Messiah. She went from a shady woman living in some shame onto becoming a trusting believer in Jesus. Hannah first was a bit judgmental and forward with Jesus in the story. She bluntly puts Him into a category, saying ‘you’re a Jewish man and (thus) think poorly of a woman like me, particularly my being a Samaritan woman.’ But Jesus isn’t put off by that. He says: ‘I have a gift of living water to give you. If you would know Me better, then you’d have a better understanding—
‘Yet she butts in, adding: ‘Oh, and so you think you can come in here to Samaria and say you are greater than our ancestor Jacob, who built this place?’ Yet, again, Jesus is non-conditional of her ‘defense’ of Jacob and her people. That loving heart of Jesus, and patience and prudence of Him, helped her open up more to His ‘Living Water.’ Perhaps Jesus handled the in-between conversation like this: ‘God did something good for Jacob here, and in that inspiration, God wants to do something very good for you, a local who respects the history of this spot. Are you interested in that?’ (I see Jesus approaching Hannah that way.) What unconditional love He had towards her!
Next, Jesus mentions to her that she might want to have a husband here with her, so as not to be seen alone with a man, even at noon at the well. This is where the dialogue turns for the better. Hannah gets honest. She’s at the well at noon because she is the village’s hussy. She admits that she has no husband. Jesus then tells what He honestly knows: I know you have no husband, but have had five, and moved on from them! I know you live with a man now, and you have shame in it, but I want to keep talking to you, to introduce you to the Gift of God.” This is Jesus’ Love at work! Hannah gets more respectful, saying: “I see you are a prophet.” She is showing interest in more dialogue in this most unconditionally-loving holy man.
Jesus knows that the Samaritans have been divided from the Judah Jews, with the Samaritans with their own holy city and places, and the Jews with theirs, mainly in Jerusalem. The strict Jews or legalistic ones have acted in separation from the so-thought unclean Samaritans. Here comes Jesus’ unconditional love again in this encounter with Hannah. He shows that He does not look down on her or her people. Even when she insensitively says to this Jewish holy man “you Jews claim Jerusalem, but we this Mountain,” Jesus is not put off with the “you Jews” comment or the us versus you statement. Jesus will be tender in his address back to her. It’s why He uses “woman” in His reply. “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe Me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.” Here Jesus is saying to her “believing woman”, and in a polite way, not in a curt modern way, as in “hey woman, get me a beer from the fridge.”
In Catholic tradition, Jesus calling the Samaritan woman (and Mary) “woman” (in Greek: gynai) is akin to a formal address today of “ma’am” and a bow or tip of the cap. Theologically, Jesus’ talking this way to her signifies her role as a representative of humanity needing salvation, and maybe even linking her to the “New Eve” theme, emphasizing her role as a recipient of the Word. Jesus will use this respectful approach with His own mother, too. (See John 2 and John 19). Jesus adds: ‘A time is come now when it’s not of Samaritans here or Jews there—but a time anew arrived when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.”
Hannah is startled. She concludes, ‘that could only come about if Messiah were come here.’ Jesus lovingly looks deeply to Hannah, and says: I Am He.
In this encounter of Unconditional Love, Jesus brings a woman into faith. Hannah would show her transformation to her whole village of Sychar. It brought many of the village to faith in Jesus. How else could this Hannah be changed, but by a true blessing of love from God? Hannah made it up many rungs of Jacob’s Ladder that day in this Gospel story—at the holy place in the forgotten Samaria land of God’s favor in the past.
JESUS HAD A DREAM AND DESTINY FOR HANNAH. We can believe He has one for us, too. To move us up the rungs of Jacob’s Ladder, so to speak… ##
BONUS
I envisioned seven areas or “dreams” of a transformed life of someone willing to be led by God to a better place to be. For #1. In GOD’S DREAM FOR YOU—it would be for a deeper experience of Love for Others: Even Unconditional Love for Others. What’s this? It’s a deeper capacity than using just mere humanity to love, but to borrow heavily from our spiritual relationship to Jesus Christ, in order to further show compassion, and prioritize human relationships over things, looking to help the needs of others, especially to fellow believers. This is unconditional type loving. How is it done? St. Irenaeus in the early Church taught that it is by living in the combination of your human person and your new Spirit-alive person. You have a human and divine side of life, a blended you! Let the soul-life bless your physical being. Note how the Gospel story has the woman at the well moving from the natural to the supernatural or religious view. From where’s your ladle—you can’t draw water….(the mere physical) to her saying that “when the coming Messiah arrives, He shall explain all to us (as Hannah gets to the spiritual side).” Jesus says: “I Am He.”
Unconditional love happens when we Catholics blend our physical/spiritual sides. (It’s done by) Relying on God by faith, and living out our humanity as best we can to its design. St. Augustine said: “Pray as though everything depended on God. Work as though everything depended on you.” That’s how the blend works. St. Stanislaus said: “I live earthly, but I want eternity. I was born for greater things.”
If you want to succeed to unconditional love, then encounter Jesus and have Him take you to its lofty goals. St. Irenaeus succinctly explained it: “The Glory of God is humanity fully alive.” Thus, God’s Dream is to get Unconditional love into us. It is found by our going to the Sacred Love and Heart of Jesus and letting His heart be in our hearts, flowing forth new life in Him. Like the gift the woman at the well found. We can know Living Water, Living Love. Saint and Pope John Paul II said: “In the Sacred Heart is every treasure for wisdom and knowledge on how to live our life. In that divine heart, inspiring ours, is beating God’s infinite love for everyone and for each of us as individuals.” In this gospel, Hannah is close to Jesus, the Messiah, the king of hearts, the Gift of Love in her presence. She will show that Jesus’ heart gets to hers, by being so blessed by His encounter with her, that she goes into the village to speak with her formerly quite distant neighbors.
I hear of people consumer with hateful opinions and divisive, self-important views and it shows me they are in most need of a conversion of heart. Let their passion be of God’s Dreams, not humanity’s follies. Unconditional love will not let a person living by it remain under the dictates of outer circumstances, being tossed about by worry, fear, negativity or selfish control. Take Hannah at the Well’s example, and let the Living Water quench your true thirst and not be ever so secular again. You are newly born for the Kingdom of God.