My dear brothers and sisters in Christ
I wish we could be meeting together this morning
but we are in the midst of something entirely new for most of us:
restricting our own freedom of movement
for the sake of our neighbors nearby and far away.
Today it is a different world,
but one in which the words, “Fear not,” are very much needed.
How many times does that phrase, “Fear not,” show up in the Bible?
How many times does that spirit messenger from God need to say, “Fear not?”
How many times did Jesus say to his disciples, “Fear not?”
Rather than fear, I see what is happening now as a challenge,
especially to us as people of faith.
The challenge for us is like in any other sort of crisis that hits a community:
a wildfire, an earthquake, a flood, a hurricane or tornado.
And often in the midst of crises
we see examples of people caring for each other.
Now, in this particular situation we are going to need to be more creative,
because we will not be in physical proximity with each other as much.
I am feeling withdrawal symptoms
because although I am speaking to you through digital technology
I am standing in a near empty room.
How can this be Sunday morning?
And yet it is.
And literally we are not alone.
I am not alone standing here.
You at home, even if no other person is around you, are not alone really.
In our shared prayers we are spiritually present with each other.
And there are a whole lot of other churches meeting at about the same time
doing it on line today
joined in prayer, in a virtual fellowship of prayer, even if not physical,
joined with a common purpose:
to pray for those who are ill
to pray for the health care teams serving those who are ill
to pray for those in our communities whose health is vulnerable
to pray for those working on creating a vaccine.
We’re all in this together.
I think about the first lesson for today, the reading from Exodus.
Here is the whole congregation of the Israelites,
rescued from slavery in Egypt
passing through the Red Sea waters dry shod
but now were out in a desert wilderness.
I have hiked in that Sinai wilderness.
It is beautiful in its rugged terrain, steep in places, full of rocks and sand,
but with precious little vegetation
and next to no water at all.
And yet the Children of Israel would wander 40 years through that wilderness
surviving on manna and quail
and, as in this case, drinking water from a rock.
Our Bedouin guide showed us how to get water from a rock by striking it.
An interesting geological phenomenon.
But the point is, all those people out there in the wilderness
needed each other in order to survive.
One person alone was not going to last long.
But together and over the years
they were formed into a congregation that would shift
from a slave mentality yearning for the cucumbers and leeks
of Egyptian slave rations,
to a faith community trusting in God’s providence day to day.
The lesson from Paul’s Epistle to the Romans echoes this discipleship process
that strengthens us in faith.
Paul writes:
“Suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character,
and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us,
because God’s love has been poured into our hearts
through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.”
So who knows how long this quarantine situation will last?
A couple of weeks, a couple of months, God willing not too long?
This will be a spiritual challenge for us
as much as it will be a health challenge
and an economic challenge
and a challenge to our patience.
So some more good news from the lessons for this morning.
Jesus offers the gift of living water,
water that is life giving in the ultimate meaning of what is life giving.
And the very first person he offers such a stupendous gift to
is, as usual, someone other than those who might have expected it.
A woman, from the wrong side of the tracks, so to speak,
with a dubious marital record.
How utterly wonderful and incredibly important it is
that all these Gospel stories of Jesus have him engaging
with all sorts and conditions of humanity,
engaging with them in significantly non-judgmental ways,
seeing everyone as having worth,
prodigal in this extravagant giving of water of life
Later in John’s Gospel, chapter 7:37-38, we read:
“On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he cried out, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me,
and let the one who believes in me drink.
As the scripture has said,
‘Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water.’”
Where else in the Gospels do we hear about being thirsty?
The Beatitudes – Matthew 5
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they will be filled.”
When you are hungry,
you discover a greater appetite for your vittles
when you then get to come to the table.
When you are thirsty,
you find a greater appreciation for just a plain glass of water.
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they will be filled.”
When you are aware of your own poverty of spirit,
then the appetite is heightened;
we develop a hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for life giving relationship with, identity with
the One who satisfies the thirst.
This is having a greater awareness
of the reality of our relationship with our Lord,
and of his great abundance that overflows our poverty of spirit.
Jesus said to the Samaritan woman,
“Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again,
but …
The water that I will give
will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.”
And what we ourselves are filled with then overflows us,
overflows from us to others,
becomes rivers, as it says in chapter 7.
It is not just about getting ourselves satisfied –
We live as the community of creation.
If we get blessed, others get blessed.
So I am hoping that we can see ourselves as blest
even right now in the midst of a unique crisis.
And that we can see ourselves as a means of blessings for others.
As I said earlier, we will need to be more creative in this
because of the constraints of how we are to quarantine ourselves.
Bishop Gretchen wrote this in her Friday letter:
consider every handshake we don't make an opportunity for a phone call. Every embrace we must avoid a chance for verbal expressions of love. Every inch of physical distance a recognition of our need to be together. Let us find ways to care for each other in the midst of distance.
We are already taking some first steps in doing just that as a faith community.
We are doing this right now.
And we have several places to go to online to connect in with
the liturgies offered at cathedrals and churches of every size.
We have already been organizing a telephone tree for Nativity
that will be a way to get communication out to every member
whether or not they have a computer or cell phone.
This will be a way for us to keep in touch with each other,
to be there for each other when needs arise,
whether that be picking up something for them at the store,
or hearing their grief or loneliness and being with them in that.
And for me to be able to serve you as your priest at this time,
I will need to rely on you to communicate with me
when pastoral needs arise that I should know about.
Separated by some physical distance,
yet united in the common purpose of attending to one another
during this quite crisis.
Maybe this can also be considered God offering us
another Lenten discipline to undertake,
another way to walk the way of Love,
another spiritual tool to prepare us for Easter.
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