The Kingdom of Heaven is within US ! for we are to worship in Spirit & in Truth .

Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.”  The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep.  Where then do you get that living water?  Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?”   Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst.  But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.”  The woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw.”   In the ordinary sense, “living water” means fresh and flowing water, from a stream or spring rather than a pond or cistern; it’s water that is the best to drink.  But Jesus uses the term to refer to the grace of the Holy Spirit that leads to eternal life.  My study bible says, “This gift not only remains in a person, but is so abundant it overflows to others.”  Once again, in a typical usage in John’s Gospel, the woman misunderstands Him, taking His spiritual metaphor for its literal daily meaning — and opens up an opportunity for explanation, and uplifting.  She asks Him, “Are You greater than our father Jacob?” referring to the well and the water.  My study bible names Jacob “a type” of Christ, for he received the vision of the divine ladder rising to heaven (Genesis 28:12), which is fulfilled in Christ.  It tells us that “just as Jacob gave this well for earthly life, now Christ gives the well of the Holy Spirit for eternal life.”

Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am He.”  The significance of His reply can’t be overstated.  Jesus says literally, “I AM who speak to you.”  In Greek, the words I AM (ego eimi) is a divine name of God as revealed to Moses.  This is called epiphany or theophany, a revelation of God Himself (see Exodus 3:14).  My study bible points out that the use of this Name by a “mere man” was considered blasphemy and was punishable by death (John 8:58, Mark 14:62).  It says that as Jesus is divine, His use of the name reveals His unity with the Father and the Holy Spirit, revealing that He is God Incarnate.

Jesus reveals Himself to a woman of Samaria.  Why?  We can ask this question over and over again to get a clue to this ministry, this revelation in the world.  If salvation is of the Jews, then why her?  Why this stranger, a woman — of all things!  And a Samaritan!  It’s incomprehensible, unless we start to think that revelations of God aren’t about our expectations, but rather about truth teaching us something and stretching us beyond our own understanding.  It’s a revelation in a revelation.  God’s life and work can’t be limited by us, by our understanding, by our expectation.

 It can’t be contained.  He tells her that the hour is coming when God will be worshiped in spirit and in truth.  But the fact that He’s even speaking to her is another message about just that:  she’s a woman, she’s a Samaritan, He shouldn’t even be speaking to her — her first question reflects that startling reality that a Jewish man should even address her at all.  But all of that reveals something about God and the ways of the God who is Spirit:  it’s not about the place, the name, the region, the tribe, the nation.  It’s not about any of the barriers and boundaries we erect and understand as “earthly.”  This is about God, what God is, and how therefore God is worshiped, even “where” God is worshiped as spirit — in the heart.  What boundaries are there on the heart?  This paradox is yet another great thing to contemplate. 

If the Kingdom of heaven, as Jesus will teach, is within us (and among us), then where is that Kingdom?  Doesn’t it mean that the heart, the true center of a person, is a place of the greatest expansion, the most unlimited possible territory?  At least, this is the way that God is worshiped in spirit and in truth, in the place that is capable of the greatest expansion — and yet also, the place where we block our understanding of God — the heart.  We don’t understand God truly unless we understand how God is worshiped and what God’s nature is, as my study bible points out about today’s reading.  And this is the emphasis of Jesus. 

The heart is the one and only place where it can be understood how the Messiah could reveal Himself to a woman and a Samaritan at that.  That God is spirit, and can’t be confined in a worldly sense, is the only way we can understand any of this.  So many centuries later, can we “wrap our heads” around this?  Can we understand its full significance?  It’s awesome to contemplate.  Most of all, what we find is that our God will go anywhere and everywhere to find us, to find a heart willing to open and to understand.  Revelation 3:20 expresses the words of God well, through Christ:  “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.”  The door is the door to the heart.    And please note that this invitation is to “anyone” who hears His voice and opens the door.  He will “come in to him and dine with him” — and in this specific, magnificent, singular case, her — and us with Him.  How can there be anything greater or more truly “awesome” than that?  This is what it is to worship God in spirit and truth.

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Visual Verse of the Day

“The wilderness and the dry lands shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom.” Isaiah 35:1