This is the lost Gospel of
Marah, the woman at the well to whom Jesus spoke while travelling through Samaria,
as described in the Gospel of John, chapter four. It was recently discovered
wedged behind a stone of a well in Samaria. This is the Contemporary American
Version translation. Text allusion references provided in brackets.
Have
you ever met a stranger who seemed to know you inside and out, but without
judgment or romance? One who looked straight into your eyes and saw every wound
and hope and fear and love? One who valued you, your questions, your opinions,
your relationship with all things spiritual?
That
was how I first encountered Jesus, the Jewish prophet avoiding the judgmental
Pharisees of Judea en route to his home province of Galilee, who essentially
was “slumming” it by crossing Samaria. Prophets are rare in this place. Most Jews
do not hold Samaritans in high regard and will have nothing to do with us. They
view us as foreigners, mongrels, half-breeds, not fully Jewish, and they
believe we worship in the wrong way and in the wrong place.
Too,
I am a woman, and holy men such as rabbis do not speak to women lest they be
defiled by our perceived impurity, which would prevent them from going into the
Temple of Jerusalem, for the same reasons the priest and Levite, on their way
to the temple, passed by the man who had been mugged along the road, who was
then helped by the Good Samaritan who had no such qualms. Yes, that parable of
Jesus spread far and wide among us Samaritans. Here finally was a prophet who
recognized our worth, and I too had heard this story.
Jesus
also had a reputation of including women in his ministry, which scandalized
both Jewish and Samaritan men. In fact, Jesus’ disciples were quite flustered
when they found us talking. “What is he doing?” “What will people think?” “Does
he even know this woman?”
Jesus
knew without me telling him that I had had five husbands—two abandoned me for
younger women, three were very old and died, and the man who now supported me
refused to marry me. Tough times for women economically dependent on men, but
Jesus was primarily concerned with the poor anyway. Somehow he knew my
situation and I believe that’s why he had compassion on me, engaging me in a
very real conversation about the very nature of things, and eventually
revealing his calling from God.
The
well where we met was already a holy place for me. I used to go there with my
grandmother, who would tell me how our revered ancestor Jacob dug this well not
only for his family, but for his descendants—all of us. My grandmother taught
me that drawing from this well was drawing from our past, our heritage, our
ancient story. She taught me that the purest water was to be found in wells dug
over underground streams—she said such water was called “living water” because
it flowed freely beneath the ground.
It
was also at that well that my grandmother told me why she named me Marah, after
the bitter water the Hebrews complained about shortly after crossing the Red
Sea. Our ancestors were always kvetching with Moses in the wilderness, despite his
having led them out of slavery in Egypt. Marah, you see, means “bitter.” Legend
says that Moses tossed a piece of wood into the water, and miraculously, the
water turned sweet [Exodus
15:22-25]. My
grandmother named me Marah to remind herself, she said, that though her
daughter died in childbirth, common among women of the time, her bitter grief
was made sweet by my birth.
My
grandmother’s name, incidentally, was Rachel, named after the love of Jacob’s
life, and she told me many, many stories at our village well about those who go
before us, those who precede us in life’s caravan, including one other story about
the Israelites’ thirst being assuaged when God told Moses to go pound a rock,
and up rose a spring in the desert [Exodus 17:1-7].
To
me, her stories were my springs in our desert, pounded from the rock of our
experience as a people, and after her passing, I passed them on to my only
child to survive infancy and childhood, a girl named Mary, who was taken from
me when she was only thirteen, by whom or for what purpose I may never know. The
choice of my name, Marah, was perhaps prophetic.
This
is why I liked to go to the well alone, in the middle of the day, not in the
morning with the other women. I liked being alone at the well, thinking of my
grandmother and her stories about our ancestors, thinking of my lost daughter
and wondering if I would ever see her again. And that’s when Jesus spoke to me, asking me
for a drink of water.
I
was surprised, but happy to comply, and in return he told me about spiritual
things, how people would worship God in spirit and in truth, rather than in the
Temple of Jerusalem or upon our holy Mount Gerizim, where we Samaritans once
had a temple. I gave him a drink of
water, and he gave me living water, a Spirit that flowed out of him, into me,
and on to all those I gathered from my town, asking them to verify that he
might be our long awaited Messiah. They came to meet him at the well, and, our priest
handed him a scroll from Isaiah, and Jesus read [from Chapter 55]:
Ho, everyone who thirsts,
come
to the waters;
and you that have no money,
come,
buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without
money and without price.
Why do you spend your money
for
that which is not bread,
and your labor for that which does not satisfy?
Incline your ear, and come to me;
Listen
so that you may live.
Says the Lord:
For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
and
do not return there until they have watered the earth,
making
it bring forth and sprout,
giving
seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
so shall my Word be that goes out from my mouth;
it
shall not return to me empty,
but will accomplish that which I purpose.
And
Jesus rolled up the scroll, and gave it back to our priest, saying, “Today this
scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” All spoke well of him and were
amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth [Luke 4:20-22].
Then
he began to teach us, saying:
Blessed are those who thirst, for they shall be
satisfied. [Luke
6:21]
Blessed are those who thirst for righteousness,
for their thirst shall be quenched. [Matthew 5:6]
Blessed are those led beside still waters,
restoring their souls, for they shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever. [Psalm 23]
Blessed are those who cast their bread on the
waters, for it shall be returned a hundredfold. [Ecclesiastes 11:1 and Luke 18:30]
Blessed are those baptized with water and Spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. [John 3:5] Let no one forbid the waters of baptism to those
baptized with the Spirit. [Acts 10:47]
Blessed are those who give one of my little ones a
cup of water, they shall not be without their reward. [Matthew 10:42]
Blessed are those who will drink of the water that
I shall give them, for they shall never be thirsty. The water that I will give
will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life [John 4:14]. To the thirsty I will
give water as a gift from the spring of the water of life [Revelation 21:6]. Let everyone who hears
say, ‘Come.’ Let everyone who is thirsty come. Let anyone who wishes take the
water of life as a gift” [Revelation
22:17].
Then,
passing my jar of well water around for all to drink from it, Jesus said, “Do
this in remembrance of me.” [Luke 22:19] And after all had partaken, Jesus said, “Set me as a seal
upon your heart, for my love is strong as death, my passion fierce as the
grave—many waters cannot quench my love, neither can floods drown it.” [Song of Solomon 8:6-7]
After
two days in the presence of Jesus, my fellow Samaritans told me, “It is no
longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for
ourselves, and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.”
I
begged to follow Jesus anywhere, but he refused, saying, “Go home to your
friends, and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and what grace you
have witnessed.” [Mark
5:19] And so
I remained, and on the first day of each week, the day he came to us, we gather
around the well of our spiritual ancestors and remind ourselves and others of
all that he said and did among us, passing the jar of water around, drinking
all from it, remembering his promise of living water.
Then
we go out from the well, each with a jar of water, and look for those who are
thirsty, and give them to drink in his name. Among those who have received this
sacrament at our hands have been Philip, who used the water to baptize us when
he came here to preach, and Peter and John, when they came to lay hands on us
to receive the Holy Spirit. [Acts 8]
My
daughter Mary was never returned to me; but I take comfort that Jesus’ mother
was also named Mary, a name which is said to mean “child we wished for” and
“visionary.”
May
all who read this gospel be refreshed in Jesus’ name. Amen.
I gave this as a sermon
for Ormewood Park Presbyterian Church on the Third Sunday of Lent, March 23,
2014, using these texts: Exodus 15:22-25, 17:1-7 and John 4:1-30, 39-42. Copies
of this Gospel were distributed. Afterward I passed through the congregation
with cups of water that had been blessed.
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