{"id":2075,"date":"2017-03-19T12:32:07","date_gmt":"2017-03-19T16:32:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=2075"},"modified":"2017-03-19T12:32:07","modified_gmt":"2017-03-19T16:32:07","slug":"3rd-sunday-of-lent-year-a-homily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/3rd-sunday-of-lent-year-a-homily\/","title":{"rendered":"3rd Sunday of Lent, Year A – Homily"},"content":{"rendered":"

3rd<\/sup> Sunday of Lent, Year A<\/a>
\nExodus 17:3-7
\nPsalm 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9
\nRomans 5:1-2, 5-8
\nJohn 4:5-42
\nMarch 19, 2017<\/p>\n

The Israelites have just left slavery in Egypt.\u00a0 You might think they would be very thankful for being set free yet they are grumbling.<\/p>\n

Now, they do have a real concern.\u00a0 They don\u2019t have water to drink.\u00a0 Water is necessary for life so stating their need would be appropriate but \u201cgrumbling\u201d indicates a lack of trust.\u00a0 They had previously said they needed food to eat and God provided the manna and the quail.\u00a0 God had set them from the Egyptians.\u00a0 Why did they not trust in God?<\/p>\n

Moses cries out to God and God provided water in a way that only God can.\u00a0 He told Moses, \u201cStrike the rock, and the water will flow from it<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 There is no way for Moses to have done this on his own.\u00a0 God<\/em><\/strong> provided for his people.<\/p>\n

Now, jump a head a number of centuries and we find Jesus at Jacob\u2019s well in Samaria.\u00a0 He sees a Samaritan woman there and said to her \u201cGive me a drink<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

She is surprised that He speaks to her.\u00a0 She recognizes him as a Jew and she is a Samaritan and the two peoples didn\u2019t get alone.\u00a0 This was a centuries old conflict going back to the split between the northern and southern kingdoms of Israel.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, she continues the conversation with him.<\/p>\n

Jesus then speaks to hear of \u201cliving water<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 She is taking his comments about water literally.\u00a0 She says that Jesus doesn\u2019t even have a bucket, there is no way He can give her water.\u00a0 He says that whoever drinks the water that He will \u201cgive will never thirst<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

She still thinks He is speaking of literal water but she wants some.\u00a0 How great it would be to never need to drink again.<\/p>\n

Jesus then speaks to her about her \u201cfive husbands<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 This is what begins to get her to open her eyes to something more, something deeper in Jesus.<\/p>\n

She says she knows \u201cthat the Messiah is coming<\/em>\u201d to which Jesus identifies himself as the Messiah she awaits.<\/p>\n

She is not sure whether to believe him or not.\u00a0 As disciples return, she goes into the town and tells people about Jesus.\u00a0 She isn\u2019t sure what is going on but Jesus has stirred something in heart that leads her to share with others what she has learned about Jesus.<\/p>\n

This leads them to go and see Jesus for themselves and to invite him to stay with them.\u00a0 Their belief in Jesus started because of what the Samaritan woman told them but, having listened to Jesus, they \u201cbegan to believe in him because of his word\u201d <\/em>and they came to know \u201cthat this is truly the savior of the world.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

Two questions.\u00a0 First, how much do we know about Jesus? Secondly, do we share what we know?<\/p>\n

Sometimes people think that once they are confirmed, they know everything, well maybe not everything, but they know what they need to know about Jesus.<\/p>\n

However, when they are called to share our faith with others they will say they don\u2019t know enough our faith to do that.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a contradiction there, isn\u2019t there?\u00a0 If we know what we need to, then we must know enough to share.<\/p>\n

If we don\u2019t know enough to be comfortable in sharing our faith, then we need to put some effort into learning more.\u00a0 I would say all of us, myself included need to put effort into learning more about our Catholic faith\u00a0but that doesn\u2019t mean we can\u2019t share what we do know.<\/p>\n

You see, at its core, sharing faith starts with about speaking of our experiences more so than sharing \u201cknowledge.\u201d\u00a0 We need<\/em><\/strong> the knowledge but our sharing should begin with what our faith means to us.\u00a0 Tell people what about our faith gets you to come to church.\u00a0 What do you like about being here?<\/p>\n

Evangelization means both sharing our faith with others and growing in our own faith. \u00a0The Samaritan woman does this as sh shared her personal experience of Jesus and that got the people to come.\u00a0 May we have the courage to do the same.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

3rd Sunday of Lent, Year A Exodus 17:3-7 Psalm 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9 Romans 5:1-2, 5-8 John 4:5-42 March 19, 2017 The Israelites have just left slavery in Egypt.\u00a0 You might think they would be very thankful for being set free yet they are grumbling. Now, they do have a real concern.\u00a0 They don\u2019t have water …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘3rd Sunday of Lent, Year A – Homily’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[9,82,260],"tags":[124,267,268],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-xt","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2075"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2075"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2075\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2076,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2075\/revisions\/2076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}