To get there now, you exit Interstate 75 at Dry Ridge, about 30 miles south of Cincinnati. Then drive through Dry Ridge and continue into the country for about 4 miles and on the south side of the road you will arrive at what used to be the Abernathy farm. That is where I visited my Grandmother Abernathy. She lived in a house that had been constructed shortly after the Civil War, long before the days of indoor plumbing and I have clear memories of visiting her before that plumbing was installed.

In the front yard, there was the piece of an old door that was held down by a large stone that was much too heavy for a child to lift and almost too heavy for two children, although as my cousins and I grew older, we found ways to move it. And beneath that rock and old piece of wood there was a well. As a child, I imagined that well to be a hundred feet deep and even as an adult, I do not really remember how deep it was, maybe twenty or thirty feet down. There was always an old galvanized bucket nearby with a long rope tied to the handle and the tin dipper was never far away.

There was nothing like it, on a hot summer day, to pull the old boards aside and drop that bucket into the water below and then pull it out, nearly full of cold well water. We took turns with the tin dipper, drinking the sweetest and tastiest water that God ever made. I can still almost taste it, feel the cold liquid in my mouth and stomach. It was the purest form of refreshment, better than Coke or Pepsi or Mountain Dew can ever hope to be.

Then, of course, whatever was left in the bucket had to be poured over our hands and splashed onto our faces and life was good, oh so very good!

Wouldn’t you like to have that kind of refreshment for your soul? That is what this Lenten Worship series is about – going back to the well to find refreshment for our souls.

Our text is taken from the Gospel of John. “Whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." (John 4:14 NRSV) I would love for you to remember this verse. Please say it after me. “Whoever drinks the water that I give … will never thirst.”

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Now that we have our memory verse, let’s remember the context, the story. Jesus is walking from Judea back to his home territory in Galilee and the region of Samaria was between the two.  To us it would appear to be the normal thing to do, to walk through Samaria in order to get from Judea to Galilee, but that was not so for the faithful Jews of the time.

You see, the Jews and the Samaritans were so much alike that they hated each other for their differences, so a faithful Jew would cross the Jordan River and walk north through Gentile territory and then cross back over into Galilee rather than walk straight north through Samaria.

So, in walking through Samaria Jesus is saying something about the nature of God’s Kingdom and the essence of His Gospel. Nobody is excluded.

He goes to a place called Jacob’s Well, named after the father of the twelve tribes of Israel. Do not miss the irony! Jacob’s Well is in Samaria!

It is about noon. The sun is high in the sky. The disciples have gone looking to buy food and Jesus is alone sitting by the well. He is tired and thirsty. There he meets a woman who has come to get some water and he asks her for a drink. I’m guessing that he had no bucket to drop into the well and no dipper for drinking. He asks her and she asks the obvious question, “How is it that a Jewish man would ask a Samaritan woman for a drink?”

Let me paraphrase that. “Mister, what are you doing in my world? You don’t like us and we don’t like you and you are not supposed to be here. I know your rules. If you drink from my bucket and if you use my dipper, you will make yourself unclean. You will religiously contaminate yourself. So why don’t you go back to where you came from?”

Through the woman’s question, we see the character of Jesus and the nature of God’s Kingdom. At the price of his own comfort and at the price of the scorn that he would receive from his own neighbors, Jesus went to the woman’s home territory.

Jesus answered, “If you knew me, you would ask me for living water.” And she answered, “How can you give me any water. You have no bucket and you have no dipper and what makes you think that you are better than our forefather Jacob?” And Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.” 

Drink the water that I give, Jesus said, and you will never be thirsty again. Drink the water that I give and it will become a spring that gushes up to eternal life!

Clearly, Jesus has just changed the subject. She is talking about H2O and he is talking about eternal life.

Eternal Life: What is he talking about?  My best guess is that most of us would immediately think of “life after death” and that is a part of it. But it is only a part of it.

In another part of John’s Gospel, Jesus gives his own definition of “eternal life.”

And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.  (John 17:3 (NRSV) 

Eternal life is to know God and to know Jesus Christ. How is that? Because God is the creator of eternal life and Jesus is the one who reveals it.

I remember talking to my Dad shortly before his death and The Old Preacher had to talk about it. He said something like this, “I once thought of eternal life as something that happened after we die. But now I know that I am already living in eternity. We live in eternity before we die – when we live with God. As we are bonded to God as disciples of Jesus Christ, we are participating in eternal life because God is eternal life!”

Now the question is, how do we move from knowing about the well to actually drinking the water?  How do we move from believing in God and knowing about God to “knowing God?” How do we move from theology to experience? 

Assume for a moment that I am a chemist and that I know all about water. I know its properties. I know how to contaminate it and how to clean it up. I know all about its necessity for human life. Suppose that I know everything. All of that knowledge does me not one smidgen of good until I drink the water!  How do I drink the water that gushes up to eternal life?

The obvious answer is, “Follow Jesus and he will take you to God – because he is God.” And if you cannot believe that, follow him and learn for yourself!

As you follow Jesus, you will learn that you know God as you make yourself aware of God’s presence. The spiritual writers often refer to this as “Practicing the presence of God.”

It is doing in our personal and private lives that which we do together every Sunday morning. As we gather in the sanctuary and become aware of our friends and sisters and brothers in Christ, we also remember that we have gathered for the purpose of consciously being in the presence of God. We come to worship, to pray and sing and listen to the scriptures interpreted, but behind all of that is a desire to remember that we are in the presence of God. We come together to “Practice the Presence of God.”

In my private life, I have tried to learn from a monk named Brother Lawrence and his little book entitled, Practicing the Presence of God.

Let me offer three quotes from Brother Lawrence:

"That he had always been governed by love without selfish views; and that having resolved to make the love of GOD the end of all his actions, he had found good reason to be well satisfied with his method. That he was pleased, when he could take up straw from the ground for the love of GOD seeking God only and nothing else, not even God's gifts."

"That the most excellent method which he had found of going to God, was that of doing our common business without any view of pleasing men, and (as far as we are capable) purely for the love of GOD."

"That we ought not to be weary of doing little things for the love of GOD, for God regards not the greatness of the work, but the love with which it is performed." Brother Lawrence

As a young man, Brother Lawrence was a soldier, a man of action – violent action. When he entered the monastery, he was assigned to the kitchen where his daily duties included a myriad of little ordinary duties. At first he resented it and then, over time, he learned to do his daily duties simply as though he was doing them for God. Each little thing, even picking up straw from the ground, became an act of love for God.

In learning that discipline, in saying to God as he cooked the meals and washed the dishes, “I am doing this because I love you, God,” he practiced the presence of God and he drank deeply from the water of eternal life.

I was thinking of this as I took my walks this week. There was a moment when a cardinal looked as if it was going to dive straight at me. It turned before it became a real threat, but the sight of that red bullet turning and showing its colors became a reminder of God’s presence.

I walked by a magnificent Willow Tree. The sun caught its drooping branches just right and they glowed with a golden radiance, beautiful and a little haunting and a reminder of God’s presence. Other branches of other trees are turning red, a sign of spring on the way and a reminder of God’s presence.

How do we drink from the well of eternal life? How do we practice the presence of God? How do we know God and his son Jesus Christ? One way is the way of Brother Lawrence.  It’s doing the little things we do for the love of God. It’s creating moments of awareness that we are in God’s presence, drinking from the well of God’s love.

Jesus said, “I will give you living water that will gush up in springs of eternal life.” Follow him. Learn from him. And he will lead you to the heart of God. He will give you the water that refreshes the soul. He will give you eternal life.