Coffee With Sister Vassa -- HAVE NO HUSBAND

How did St. John the Evangelist know, what exactly was said in the conversation of our Lord with the Samaritan Woman, when he wasn’t there, but he is the one who later recorded it in his Gospel? I think she told him. John explicitly says that the disciples did not ask the Lord about the conversation (Jn 4:27), so - she must have told the story. We do know that she immediately began to tell others in her own city about it. Thus, the rather long conversation of our Lord with the Samaritan Woman, - the longest recorded conversation He has with another person, - can be described as an example (to us and for us) of one woman’s account of “How I Met Jesus Christ.” It can help us recognize how it is that we, also, can “meet” Him, and come to know and believe in Him. 

The conversation has several revelatory moments, at which He gradually reveals important things about Himself, but she also gradually reveals major things about herself. Her “things” are her questions or issues, while His “things” are answers to those questions or issues. The thing about her that I am thinking aboutthis morning, is her admission, (after He pretends not to know this), that “I have no husband.” I think this was her main issue, or what she felt was her major issue, which Christ prompts her to reveal, along with her theological questions. It is reminiscent of the paralytic’s issue at the Pool of Bethesda, “I have no man,” he says, “to put me into the pool…” (Jn 5:7) The woman’s admission clears the way for our Lord to reveal Himself to her, as her Lord; as One who already knows everything about her, but in nowise despises her for any of it. Because here He is, talking to her, and opening to her a new Way that is her vocation.

This morning I’m thinking, I also have no husband. Many people “have no husband” (or wife), either by choice or otherwise. Let us not mistake the presence or absence of certain “others” in our lives for an obstacle to “meeting” Christ, entering into a conversation with Him, and drinking of His “living water.” He already knows everything about us, and does not despise us for it. “Lord, give me this water” this morning, “that I may not thirst!”

Fragments for Friday

Source: bostonmonks.com

 "Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice, you will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy." (Jn. 16:20)

"Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord." (Jn. 20:20)

At the midnight Paschal Liturgy, we heard the incomparable and magnificent Prologue from the Gospel According to St. John (1:1-18). In the Prologue, Christ is identified as the eternal Word of God who, though "with God" in the beginning - and who actually "was God" - "became flesh" (as Jesus of Nazareth), "and dwelt among us with full of grace and truth" (v.14). The evangelist John then reveals that: "No one has ever seen God; the only Son (or God, as in some manuscripts), who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known." (v.18) The Gospel is then the history of the Word made flesh as Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ. His ministry is marked by seven "signs" (what we call miracles) to indicate the truthfulness of that claim to those who are open to believe. In fact, those who do believe are called and become "the children of God." (v. 12)

Once the Son of Man (Jesus) is "lifted up from the earth" (12:32), He will glorify the name of God (12:28). This was, of course, the Crucifixion. Following his resurrection, the risen Lord appears to his frightened disciples (20:19-23), grants them his peace, and commissions them through "breathing" the Holy Spirit upon them to proclaim his resurrection to the world. Thomas, one of the twelve was absent on that first day of the week; but he is then present eight days later (20:24-31). During this dramatic encounter, Thomas is transformed from being an unbeliever into a believer. And in the process, utters the greatest affirmation of the identity of Christ in the Gospels: "My Lord and my God!" (20:28) Thus, we have come full circle from the Prologue. The God who has never been seen, is now "seen" in the flesh, but more importantly through the eyes of faith, in the risen Lord, Jesus Christ. This is also called inclusio, bringing together a particular theme proclaimed earlier in the Gospel with its fulfillment later. The Prologue finds its fulfillment in the profession of faith made by the disciple Thomas.

What is so meaningful and hopeful to us who are here after such a great interval of time is revealed in the response of Jesus to Thomas' extraordinary exclamation of faith: "Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe." (20:29) Perhaps one of our great resurrectional hymns, chanted or sung at every Liturgy, is a elaboration of that wonderful "beatitude" spoken by the Lord: "Having beheld the Resurrection of Christ, let us worship the holy Lord Jesus, the only sinless One ..." We have "beheld" the resurrection of Christ through the eyes of faith, and are thus enabled to worship the risen Lord as Thomas did - as our Lord and our God!