neuroBIBLISTICS

In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit!

Reverend Fathers, dear brothers and Sisters, Christ is Risen!

Church dedicated the fourth Sunday after the Glorious Resurrection of the Lord to the Samaritan woman. Our Lord met her by the Jacobs well in Samaria and called her to seek the living water.

The reading from the Gospel according to St. Apostle and Evangelist John teaches us about this important encounter. This encounter erases social differences. Social norms are transformed into one norm – the image and likeness of God. Christ speaks with the woman from the group of people considered by Jews unclean. Samaritans were people living in the North, who were brought by the Assyrian kings to fill in the land. Because they did not know how to obey God, lions were coming and devouring them, as the witness of the Biblical book. Assyrians demanded some Jewish priests to teach them how to serve the Lord, but the community was never recognized. Differences prevailed and parted these nations.

However, Christ disregards these social differences. Christ builds the relationship with this woman by recognizing her dignity – the createdness in the image and likeness of God. He reveals himself as the true Messiah and she believes. Many Samaritans believed also in Christ the Savior. Everyone is called to partake of the Creator of the world and to be in the loving communion with God in Christ our Lord, through the works of the Holy Spirit.

Encounter with Christ, true living water is an encounter with the life eternal. Being with Christ is beyond time and space. This is the quality of the Kingdom of God. The presence of the Lord makes us living and eternal. Gifts of the Holy Spirit bring eternity into reality. Christ instructed the woman to seek the living water: “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:14).

Truly, Christ gave us the well of the living water, and it is present in the Divine Liturgy. This well is the Holy Cup, and the living water: Christ’s Holy Body and Christ’s precious and Holy blood. 

Soon, the disciples came back to Jesus and offered his food. Jesus instructed them to lift up their eyes so that their thoughts may be focused on what God wants to accomplish: “Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for harvest. Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together” (). St. Sava and St. Mardarije were focused on the will of God. They saw the fields ready for harvest and they worked hard to gather the harvest. Certainly, they were empowered by the living waters which unite people in the Church, the body that has Christ as its head. 

Let us treat people with dignity because each and every person is created in the image and likeness of God!

Let us partake of the Living Water: the Holy Communion, and live eternally!

Let us be focused on what God wants to be accomplished and give thanks to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen!

Hristos Voskrese! Christ is Risen! Hristos Voskrese!