Exodus 17:1-7 and John 4:5-42

"Gracious God - bless now the words of my lips and the meditations of our hearts. Breath your Spirit into us and grant that we may hear and in hearing be led in the way you want us to go. Amen.

Some time ago I heard something which I would like to share with you:

When it comes to times of stress, the most reassuring companion isn't your sweetheart - it's your dog.

A study has found that people who were under stress showed the least amount of tension when accompanied by their dog. The stress levels were highest when the people were with their husbands or wives.

"I think that dogs are non-evaluative, and they love us", said Karen Allen, a research scientist at State University of New York at Buffalo's medical school.

This caught my attention, not because of what it says about stress and our spouses - I don't happen to find its assertion in this regard to be true in my experience of the in which I have been married to Carmel. NO, it caught my attention because of what asserts about how dogs love us - and of the benefits that kind of love has.

There is something very biblical in the assertion made by Ms. Allen that non-evaluative love, non-judgmental love, reduces tension.

In fact the scriptures testify that this kind of love does far more than reduce tension - it in fact gives life - it gives hope - it gives assurance - to all who receive it.

Non-judgmental - accepting - all embracing love is the essence of the Gospel message: it lies behind such statements as: "Do not judge others lest you be judged - for the judgement you give will be the judgement you receive" and it is at the root of what has happened whenever we find Jesus being criticized by the scribes and pharisees for the company that he keeps.

Jesus accepts and embraces those whom others find wanting. He loves those who seem unlovable - to others - and to themselves.

I'm not much of gardener, but one thing I do know is that every plant needs water to grow.

And I know this as well - the plants that are in the driest soil - the ones that are struggling the hardest and beginning to wither - the ones whose leaves are beginning to curl and which look worse than the rest need more water than those who are in damp ground are whose leaves are rich and full of moisture.

And I know too that dry plants respond better to water than they do to added heat - that they thrust down their roots to where they can find it or turn their leaves over so that they better receive it - and receiving it - they change - they begin to look better - they begin to grow - and at length - they produce the fruit that they have been designed to produce.

We are the plants in God's garden - placed here for a reason and a purpose - and some of us are awfully dry - and some of us are not.

But each one of us, whether we be dry or moist at this very moment, needs the living water that Jesus says he has come to give:

- that water which wells up to eternal life,
- that water which overflows and brings life to other plants near to it.

I give thanks to God today for his love - for that love shown by Christ - that love which was poured out me when I was withering and perishing as a young man - alone in a large city and which even now is poured out upon me -even though I am far from perfect.

I give thanks for his love which has given me hope that I never had, a peace that at one time I could only long for, and an assurance that I thought I would never see at work in my life.

In giving thanks before you today I do what thousands, indeed millions of people have done before me, I do what the woman at the well did after first encountering Jesus: I point to the one who is the Saviour promised from long ago, I point to the one who has accepted me - the one who calls me brother and does not hold my human failings against me - the one who encourages me and challenges me and never - even when I argue with him - rejects or condemns me.

That is what Jesus did with the woman at the well. He accepted her.

He accepted her though she was a Samaritan and an enemy to his people.

He spoke to her of God though she was a woman and not thought worthy of such conversation.

He offered her his blessing - even though she debated with him and questioned his statements.

He regards her as a dear sister - and gives her the same title of endearment he gave Mary when he calls her woman in verse 21 and asks her to believe his words concerning how the time is coming when true worshippers will worship Father in Spirit and in Truth.

And that is why she sang his praises in her village. Because of his acceptance - because of his love.

It was not just because knew her past.
It was not just because he could tell her things that no stranger should know that she spoke of him to her friends and neighbours.

It was because in knowing her, in knowing her nationality, her gender, her religious attitudes, and the mixed history of her marriages, he none-the-less treats her as if she was an equal, as if she was a person worthy of respect, worthy of affection - worthy of love.

And that is where it is at.

When we treat others as we ourselves would like to be treated - when we can talk to kings and to beggars and not show any preferences to the one and not the other - when we can debate with sinners and with saints - and have both feel that you respect them - when we can open our homes to both friends and strangers - and have both feel welcomed - when we can encounter people and not judge them - not put them down - not patronize them - then we know something of God's love, then we show something of God's love.

Blessed be God, day by day. Amen.