REFLECTION/HOMILY FOR 3RD SUNDAY OF LENT (YEAR A)
HOMILY THEME: GOD THE LIVING WATER CAN AND WILL DO IT STILL
BY: Rev. Fr. Jacob Aondover ATSU
READINGS: EXODUS 17:3-7, PSALM 95, ROMANS 5:1-2.5-8, JOHN 4:5-42
✓•Pray
✓•Wait
✓•Trust
✓•Don’t grumble
Fair-weather Christians abound in our world today. These sing God’s praises when he blesses them but should any misfortune threaten, they ask like the Israelites of Moses’ time “Is the Lord among us or not” (Exo. 17:7). Grumbling and complaining about how unfair and unjust life has been to us is an act of ingratitude and worst still, despairing in times of trouble is our way of hitting God right in the face. It is an act of complete distrust. It is a wrong path to tread. When our businesses thrive, our farms are productive, our health is sound, and the ships of our lives are sailing peacefully on smooth seas; then we love and honour God. However, when farms yield no harvest, businesses become sterile; when our health fails and the seas become stormy, we quickly grumble and anger God with our distrust.
Having lived in Egypt for about 430 years, suffering and slaving for the Egyptians, and having been liberated miraculously by God at the appointed time; it was only right that the Israelites trusted and thanked God unswervingly. Considering the mighty deeds he had done pursuant to their liberation, it was preposterous for them to think he’d let them die of thirst in the wilderness. They like all of us today were quick to forget the wonders of God in their lives and grumbled against him. God who cannot be outdone in mercy and patience overlooked their blasphemies and granted their request by quenching their thirst. Jesus promises to give us spiritual water in John 4:5-42 to preserve us for eternity.
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Jesus teaches today to work for essentials, the substance of our existence – eternal life and he alone can give us that. Instead of spending too much time and effort on bodily cares: food, drink, power, wealth etc. all of which will perish upon death; may we focus more on leading chaste lives so as to attract Jesus’ gift of the living water.
A secondary but all important lesson, practical and urgent one, especially in our day is Jesus’ condemnation of racialism. In his offer of salvation to the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well, he a Jew (supposed enemy of Samaritans) wiped off the raging enmity that hitherto existed between them. St. Paul in his letters to the Galatians 3:28 and Colossians 3:11, also stressed that the salvation brought by Christ is for all: neither Jew nor Gentile, neither black nor white; Tiv nor Igbo etc. All the separating walls, the dividing ideologies, the barricades of language, the barriers occasioned by different belief systems between us are not reasons enough to build mantles of hate and enmity. The challenge for us is to break down every wall separating us from our brethren and build bridges linking us to ourselves.
We pray against fair-weather Christianity; and as we strive to do everything without murmuring and complaining (Phil. 2:14) against God and his chosen leaders, may we never distrust God but thank him always. May we strive for what really matters, eternity even as we live in brotherly love bridging all the unnecessary gulfs that divide us. Amen.
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