Meditation 241
John 4: 5- 42
The best known phrase that comes from this passage is “living water.” Jesus was at Jacob’s well outside of Sychar waiting for the disciples who went into the city to buy food. While he waited he asked a woman for a drink of water, which led to a discussion that has him offer living water to the woman at the well. When she began to grasp who Jesus was and what he was offering she went into Sychar to share this with the people of the city where she lived. Meanwhile the disciples had returned to the well and they talk with Jesus about food.
The conversation the disciples have with Jesus about food follows the same pattern as the conversation with the woman at the well. There is reference made to a usual activity and Jesus puts a metaphorical spin on it. The disciples urged Jesus to eat something and he said “I have food that you do not know about.” The disciples took this at face value and began to ask each other if someone else had brought Jesus food. Jesus then said that his food was to do the will of God. Sometimes as I read this gospel, I wonder how much the disciples paid attention to what Jesus was doing. It seemed usual for Jesus to make comparisons to teach about heavenly things. When Jesus spoke with Nicodemus in John 3, he spoke of being born from above, and had a talk with Nicodemus about being born from above not being a physical birth, but being born of the Spirit. Jesus told the woman at the well about living water, and as he talked it was clear that living water was another metaphor. Jesus used metaphors all the time, and yet his disciples, those 12 men who spoke with Jesus every day, needed to have the metaphor of “other food” explained to them. In this chapter of John, as in other places in the gospel, Jesus simply explained what he meant.
The application of the truth Jesus taught seemed to be hard for the disciples. This allows us to be able to take heart. If the disciples needed to be told things more than once, we are in good company when the same is true for us. Jesus taught the disciples well. He used examples from everyday life to teach the truths about who he really is. Jesus is the lamb of God, the one who gives eternal life, the one who gives living water and the one whose food it is to do the will of God. Throughout his ministry Jesus would tell parables and perform acts of power to show that he was/is the Messiah, the promised one, the one who would bring us into the kingdom of God. Just as the disciples needed to be told things more than once, so do we. Jesus reaches out to us through the words of scripture, through the time of prayer, through the love of other believers to remind us of the truth that we need to hear.
In our reading today Jesus said that his food was to do the will of God who sent him to complete God’s work, which was to gather fruit for eternal life. Jesus also likened the work of God to the gathering of a harvest, and said that “one sows another reaps.” We are invited to work with Jesus to do the work of God, and to do the part of the work that we are able to. As the reaper and the sower need each other to grow and harvest a crop, so we as believers need to work together to do the work that Jesus gives to us.