Obey Your Thirst (3rd Sunday Lent A)

(grabbed from http://ccdumaguete.com)

The dry season is in the air. The green grasses around our homes are turning brown. The soil is starting to become parched. The rain is scarce. The heat is on. We perspire a lot and our thirst intensifies. Under these circumstances, we cannot but “obey our thirst” as the ads remind us over and over again. Actually, we do not need even a modicum of reminder when it comes to obeying our thirst as we cannot do otherwise. We obey it by necessity. What needs a great amount of reminding in us is our choice of the things with which we try to quench our thirst. The ads entice us to patronize a certain brand of beverage which promises optimum satisfaction. Still, we all know that nothing beats fresh water. Yet whether we drink the advertised refreshing beverages or simply the ice-cold fresh water, what we experience is only provisional satisfaction. We keep coming back as we grow thirsty again and again.

Our thirst seems to be infinite. As such, it cannot be completely slaked by finite things this world can offer.  Hence, if we keep on going back to the temporary answers to our thirst expecting to be fully satisfied, we sure will end up in restless frustrations.

Two Kinds of Thirst. I find very helpful our awareness of the distinction between two levels of thirst that we all experience in life.  The first level of thirst is the horizontal yearning.  We yearn for the good things that this world offers:  refreshing drink, delicious food, a cozy house, a decent income, pleasures and entertainment, friendship and companionship. It is but natural to desire these things and when sought within reasonable limits, these are actually not bad. But much deeper than this yearning for earthly goods is our experience of the vertical yearning.  This is our thirst for meaning.  All human beings are in search for this meaning.  Experience tells us that no amount of goods in this world can totally satisfy this thirst. Only the vertical friendship with God provides the answer to this infinite longing.  Only the infinite love of God satisfies this deepest thirst.

Obeying our thirst wisely, then, means distinguishing between these two kinds of thirst which are naturally operating in us.  It is foolish to seek satisfaction of our deepest longing for meaning in the temporary horizontal goods like food, wealth, fame, pleasure, human relationships.   They all provide temporary answers.  People who have tried this foolish way ended up frustrated, lonely, unhappy, and empty.  St. Augustine had tried this for many years before he realized that, as he wrote in his Confession, "You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you." 

Source of Living Water.  In today’s gospel reading (Jn 4: 5-42), Jesus is in conversation with a Samaritan woman who is drawing water from Jacob’s well.  Jesus takes the opportunity to enlighten this woman regarding the source of living water that can truly quench her thirst. Commentaries explain that this woman had lived in disappointment, loneliness, and insecurities.  She had lived with five husbands and now she was with another man whom she hadn't even married. On account of this status, she was drawing water from Jacob’s well at the hottest time of the day in order to avoid the other women in the town as they would just ridicule her.

We can discern that this woman had been trying to quench her deepest thirst for meaning and for infinite love with worldly goods like human love, comfort, and earthly pleasures.  In the process, she ended up miserable and lonely. But her meeting with the Lord at Jacob’s well changed everything. She came to the cistern to draw water that had kept her coming back for more but she encountered the source of living water, the “spring of water welling up to eternal life,” Jesus Christ.  With her encounter with Christ and her acceptance of him in faith, not only did her life turned around completely, she even became an enthusiastic missionary to the people in her village announcing the good news.  The whole town came to believe in Jesus.

A Season for Obeying our Thirst. Lent is a time for obeying our thirst—not so much the thirst for horizontal stuff which leave us craving for more but our deepest thirst for meaning, our thirst for the infinite love of God.  In this season of grace, let us allow Jesus to quench our thirst as we unmask the emptiness of the promise of satisfaction offered to us by the things of this world:

To what well do I keep coming back in life in order to seek satisfaction of my thirst? Just like the Samaritan woman, we can go through life, searching for the little things in life that satisfy our thirst – perhaps pleasure, material things, a challenging job or a friendship. All these things satisfy, but their satisfaction is provisional and we must return to them again and again. Again, to what do you turn to satisfy your thirst? Don’t you think you have enough of these?

Have I discovered the source of the living water that truly satisfies? Just as Jesus offered the living water, the life of grace, to the Samaritan woman, He offers the same to all. He shares this life of grace with us in abundance.  When we accept his offer of life-giving grace, our lives can turn around from endless frustrations to a meaningful and joyful life.  This season of Lent is our opportunity to make this change happen.  Am I ready to open my heart to Jesus the source of the living water?

Obey your thirst. Like the Samaritan woman, beg the Lord to give you the living water that you may not be thirsty or have to keep coming back to the well that never satisfies.