[Pearls Ep 162: Preparing for Sunday.]
Sunday’s Gospel reading brought us the Woman at the Well, and Christ’s promise for Living Water.
This analogy of water is extremely powerful for out spiritual life. As Exhibit A, we turn to the teachings of St. Teresa of Avila – a great Saint, Doctor of the Church and, as it turns out, talented chemist.
St. Teresa of Avila is particularly well known for her analogy of the interior life to mansions in a castle (thus her masterpiece, “The Interior Castle”). But she also likened prayer and our interior life to four different ways that a garden can be watered.
The “first water” – is drawn as from a well. This takes a great deal of effort on our part to draw the water and distribute it around the garden.
The “second water” is delivered by an aqueduct fed by a water wheel. It still requires a good deal of construction and effort, but the water comes more easily.
The “third water” is brought to the garden through a stream. All that is required is a bit of irrigation to feed the entire garden.
The “fourth water” is that which rains gently from the sky; it requires no effort on our part and waters the entire garden.
The great Saint is making a parallel between our spiritual life and our relationship with the Holy Spirit – the Living Water. The more we grow in our spiritual life, the more naturally the Holy Spirit comes to us and flows through us.
St. Teresa had another beautiful insight about water, perhaps unbeknownst to her. As she advanced in holiness, Teresa came a point where God called her to teach others. She was a great believer in analogies, such as water and mansions. But when she came to the topic of union with God, she found herself at a loss of how to explain what is beyond words and defies comparison.
So she did what came naturally, she prayed to God to show her how to best teach people about union with God. And the Holy Spirit gave her one word. A single word from the Holy Spirit to best capture what it means to live in union with God.
Dissolve.
We are meant to dissolve into God. When something dissolves into something else, the two substances are indistinguishable.
Do you know what is the single best solvent on earth? So powerful that it is called, by chemist, the “universal solvent?”
Water.
Here’s one other important aspect of dissolving a substance in a solvent – they retain their individual properties. If you dissolve salt in water, the salt is still salt and the water still water.
The closer we grow to God, the more our soul is indistinguishable from Him- that is a life of union with God. And yet – we remain ourself. We are not destroyed, but perfected.
You’ve probably had a taste of this at some point. Perhaps a moment of being brought to your knees, recognizing your need for God’s mercy in your life. Or in a moment of great joy or relief. In those moments, our ego, our sense of “I” disappears, and for an instant we are lost in God.
This is what we are made for – to dissolve into Living Water of God – in this life, and for eternity.
Lenten blessings –
Steve and Karen Smith
Interior Life
Postscript: Gospel according to John 4:5-15, 19b-26, 39a, 40-42
Jesus came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of land that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there. Jesus, tired from his journey, sat down there at the well. It was about noon.
A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” His disciples had gone into the town to buy food. The Samaritan woman said to him, “How can you, a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?”—For Jews use nothing in common with Samaritans.— Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God and who is saying 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 do not even have a bucket and the cistern is deep; where then can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us this cistern and drank from it himself with his children and his flocks?”
Jesus answered and said to her, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again; but whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst; the water I shall give will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may not be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.
“I can see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain; but you people say that the place to worship is in Jerusalem.” Jesus said to her, “Believe me, woman, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You people worship what you do not understand; we worship what we understand, because salvation is from the Jews.
But the hour is coming, and is now here, when true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and truth; and indeed the Father seeks such people to worship him. God is Spirit, and those who worship him must worship in Spirit and truth.” The woman said to him, “I know that the Messiah is coming, the one called the Christ; when he comes, he will tell us everything.” Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one who is speaking with you.”
Many of the Samaritans of that town began to believe in him. When the Samaritans came to him, they invited him to stay with them; and he stayed there two days. Many more began to believe in him because of his word, and they said to the woman, “We no longer believe because of your word; for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the savior of the world.”