March 15, 2020- Bible Readings for Lent III Year A

Bible Readings with Introductions

Sunday March 15, 2020 Third Sunday in Lent Year A

Introduction

This morning we are using three out of the four Bible Readings assigned for this Sunday by the New Revised Lectionary. The use of the Lectionary is a good reminder to us that we are part of a worldwide community of those who seek to follow Jesus in the way of compassion.

Exodus 17.1-7

This morning our reading from the Hebrew Scriptures is from the Book of Exodus.

The events described in this second Book of Moses, from the Torah, happened in ancient times. The stories were told and retold around the fire in the evening over many generations. It was not until the time of the Babylonian Exile in the sixth century before the Common Era, that the Rabbi’s recognized the need to have a written record – a written history – to help the people to understand who they were. They no longer had Solomon’s Temple and Jerusalem as the centre of their faith and place of pilgrimage. Their faith became centred on the Synagogue with its study of the holy books – the record of their relationship with the Holy One.

Although the books of the Torah are described as the Books of Moses, they were composed centuries after his death.

This morning we read the story of the people’s journey in the wilderness, and how they received water in a dry and thirsty land. In this and all our readings this morning, listen for the word of God:

17.1 The whole Israelite community left the desert of Sinai, moving from one place to another at the command of the LORD. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water there for them to drink.

2 They complained to Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” Moses answered, “Why are you complaining? Why are you putting the LORD to the test?”

3 But the people were very thirsty and continued to complain to Moses. They said, “Why did you bring us out of Egypt? To kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?”

4 Moses prayed earnestly to the LORD and said, “What can I do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me!”

5 The LORD said to Moses, “Take some of the leaders of the people with you, and go ahead of the people. Take along the stick with which you struck the Nile.

6 I will stand before you on a rock at Mount Sinai. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink.” Moses did so in the presence of the leaders of the people.

7 The place was named Massah and Meribah, because the Israelites complained and put the LORD to the test when they asked, “Is the LORD with us or not?”

The Gospel of John 4.5-42

The Gospel of John is the fourth book in our New Testament. There is general agreement among Biblical scholars, that the book came into being either late in the first century or early in the second century of the Common Era. This gospel came out of the community that had grown up around the Apostle John – the Galilean fisherman, son of Zebedee and brother of James. The gospel was written by a Greek speaking author and is similar in style to the three Letters of John. This morning we read the story of Jesus encounter with a Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well.

4.5 In Samaria Jesus came to a town named Sychar, which was not far from the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph.

6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired out by the trip, sat down by the well. It was about noon.

7 A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink of water.”

8 His disciples had gone into town to buy food.

9 The woman answered, “You are a Jew, and I am a Samaritan – so how can you ask me for a drink?” (Observant Jews would not use the same cups and bowls that Samaritans use.)

10 Jesus answered, “If you only knew what God gives, and who it is that is asking you for a drink, you would ask him, and he would give you life-giving water.”

11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you don’t have a bucket and the well is deep. Where would you get this life-giving water?

12 It was our ancestor Jacob who gave us this well; he and his sons and his flocks all drank from it. You don’t claim to be greater than Jacob, do you?”

13 Jesus replied, “Whoever drinks this water will get thirsty again,

14 but whoever drinks the water that I will give them will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give them will become in them a spring which will provide them with life-giving water and give them eternal life.

15 “Sir,” the woman said, “give me that water! Then I will never be thirsty again, nor will I have to come here to draw water.”

16 “Go and call your husband,” Jesus told her, “and come back.”

17 “I don’t have a husband,” she answered. Jesus responded, “You are right when you say you don’t have a husband.

18 You have been married to five men, and the man you live with now is not your husband. You have told me the truth.”

19 “I see you are a prophet, sir,” the woman said.

20 “My Samaritan ancestors worshipped God on this mountain, but you Jews say that Jerusalem is the place where we should worship God.”

21 Jesus said to her, “Believe me, woman, the time will come when people will not worship the Father on this mountain or in Jerusalem.

22 You Samaritans do not really know whom you worship: but we Jews know whom we worship, because it is from the Jews that salvation comes.

23 But the time is coming and is already here, when by the power of God’s Spirit, people will worship the Father as he really is, offering him the true worship that he wants.

24 God is Spirit, and only by the power of the Spirit can people worship in truth.

25 The woman said to Jesus, “I know that the Messiah will come, and when they come, they will tell us everything.”

26 Jesus answered, “I am the Messiah, I who am talking with you.”

27 At that moment Jesus disciples returned, and they were greatly surprised to find him talking with a woman. But none of them said to her, “What do you want?” or asked Jesus, “Why are you talking with her?”

28 Then the woman left her water jar, went back to town, and said to the people there,

29 “Come and see the man who told me everything that I have ever done, could he be the Messiah.”

30 So they left the town and went to Jesus.

31 In the meantime the disciples were begging Jesus, “Teacher, have something to eat.”

32 But he answered, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.”

33 So the disciples started asking among themselves, “Could somebody have brought him food while we were in town?”

34 “My food,” Jesus said, “is to obey the will of the One who sent me, and to finish the work he gave me to do.”

35 You are saying, ‘Four more months and then the harvest.’ But I tell you, take a good look at the fields, the crops are now ripe and ready to be harvested!

36 The one who reaps the harvest is being paid and gathers the crops for eternal life; for the one who plants and the one who reaps will be glad together.

37 For the saying is true, ‘One plants and another reaps.’

38 I have sent you to reap a harvest in a field where you did not work; others worked there and you profit from their work.”

39 Many of the Samaritans in that town believed in Jesus because the woman had said, “He told me everything I have ever done.”

40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they begged him to stay with them, and Jesus stayed there for two days.

41 Many more believed because of his message,

42 and they told the woman, “We believe now, not because of what you said, but because we ourselves have heard him, and we know that he really is the Saviour of the world.”

Psalm 95, VU#814, Part One

Our Responsive Reading this morning is from Psalm 95. It can be found at Voices United #814. We will be reading Part One. Before we begin, we will practice the Refrain: Come let us bow down and worship; let us kneel before God our maker.

O come, let us sing to God,

Let us shout with joy to the rock of our salvation.

Let us come into God’s presence with thanksgiving;

Let us joyously shout to God with songs of praise.

Refrain: Come let us bow down and worship; let us kneel before God our maker.

For you are a great God,

High sovereign above all gods.

In your hands are the depths of the earth;

To you belong the height of the mountains.

The sea is yours, for you made it;

Your hands also formed the dry land.

You are indeed our God;