Memorable Encounters. Roberto Badenas

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СКАЧАТЬ choices. In some dangerous births the only solution is surgical intervention. So we, too, can see the light only through the intervention of the Surgeon “from above.” It’s a radical solution, but in just such a solution is our salvation.

      “Whoever lives by the truth comes into the light” (John 3:21, NIV). With these words of hope echoing in his ears, Nicodemus leaves. This restless intellectual has found more than a teacher. However, though he exits marked forever by this disconcerting message, it will take time before he will act on what he has learned. His will be not a rapid “birth,” but a prolonged “gestation.”

      He could have become a new man right that night, entering into the service of the gospel. Instead he continued to work as a lawyer at the service of the law.

      Nicodemus waited three years before making his decision. Only when the Sanhedrin decided to arrest and finish once and for all with this revolutionary Preacher did Nicodemus finally risk himself in the Teacher’s defense. He waited, not for lack of conviction, but lack of courage. Too afraid of what others would think and of

      how a decision for Jesus would affect his career, he admired Him from a distance. Nicodemus ran the risk of never leaving the lukewarm group which God will eventually spit from His mouth. He waited to declare himself until he saw Jesus hanging on the cross that terrible Friday.

      Finally, remembering Jesus’ allusion to the serpent lifted up in the wilderness, he dared to stand and align himself with the crucified Jesus. When Pilate gave permission for Joseph of Arimathea to take the body of Jesus from the cross and give it an honored burial, Nicodemus contributed about 75 pounds of myrrh and aloes. Then, following Jewish custom, he and Joseph bound the body of Jesus with linen and spices. It was a final tribute to the One that Nicodemus had followed from afar, covering with perfume the wounds that his own cowardice had helped to inflict.

      After his first meeting with Jesus, Nicodemus returned to his own world. But beyond the shadows, in the distant horizon of his life, an inescapable sunrise had begun to dawn.

      By the Well

      Unquenchable thirst

      The fierce sun blazes in the midday sky, stifling and suffocating in the still air. Heat rises from the stones surrounding a well, and a dusty traveler tries in vain to protect Himself from the sweltering rays. He sits alone by the wellhead, for at this hour everyone has retreated to the relatively cool darkness of their home.

      Why has He chosen such a solitary time to wait by the well? Either morning or evening was the logical time. A chill envelops the plaza at dawn, bravely challenging the rising sun. And in the evening, almost imperceptibly at first, the coolness steals back as shadows lengthen and the heat slowly subsides.

      These are the hours when all along the path brown pitchers are seen bobbing above dark heads and white veils. Women’s laughter fills the air. Boys, wishing to be men, cluster bashfully upon the stepping-stones of the plaza, awaiting the maidens who come to draw water. Men sit in the shadows discussing politics and business. The well is the center of town life at these times. But not now. Not at midday. So why has Jesus stopped here?

      He has trekked through Samaria to Sychar to confront the pain and prejudice of human hearts. Jesus knows that Jews and Samaritans share only the rivalry of separate religious ruins. They share only the common ground of hatred, pride, arrogance, and grudges. Scarred by years of mistrust and insult, the people of these neighboring countries will not even speak to one another. Today, Jesus chooses to reach beyond the hatred and the hurt to the hated and the hurting.

      He has come at noon because He knows the Samaritan woman will be there. And so He sits waiting.

      She trudges up the hot, dusty path accompanied only by her shadow. Her lonely arrogance is as visible as her bracelets glinting in the sun. No one knows what she hides behind her aggressive look, but her midday trips to the well have long been a topic of conversation among the townspeople.

      She ignores the Stranger, but He is there to meet her, and addresses her in a way she is sure to understand. He looks up. “Give me a drink,” He says.

      The woman pauses. Why has this Jew spoken to her? What can He want from a Samaritan woman? Jews considered Samaritans less than dogs. His request is nothing more than an overworked line. Asking for water beside a well! She knows the Old Testament. Almost all the love stories in Sychar begin this way. When Abraham decided to find a bride for his son, he sent his servant to a well. Way back then his strategy was the same.

      “May it be that when I say to a girl,” Abraham’s servant prayed,

      “ ‘Please let down your jar that I may have a drink,’ and she says, ‘Drink, and I’ll water your camels too’—let her be the one you have chosen for your servant Isaac” (see Gen. 24).

      That was how Isaac and Rebekah came to be married. And today this strange Jew sits at the well that had been dug by Jacob, the son of that famous couple, and asks her for a drink.

      The Samaritan woman knows the line by heart. She has participated in the scenario alongside the well with five or six men, each time hoping that her dreams would finally come true. But that had been when she could still dream. Is this Man any different? Can He offer her hope for the future? Will she encounter her destiny here today? Can she dream just once more?

      She eyes Jesus cautiously, still unconvinced. Unwilling to trust again yet just as unwilling to end the conversation, she teasingly plays with her words. She speaks of water as one would speak of the rain when it is torrential or the sun when there is good weather. She speaks merely to fill the silence until she can decide what this Stranger has to offer.

      An abyss, seemingly impassable, spreads between Jesus and this woman. It separates their worlds, yet Jesus reaches out to her. Samaritan and Jew; sinner and sinless. Her world is one of unstable relationships in the night. This Man presents her with an encounter at high noon.

      He chooses His words carefully, each one calculated to spark hope where there is none. Apart from His genuine thirst, He knows that to ask for water is to say, “I’ve come to talk about your future.” How else could He interest a woman like her?

      “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked Him and He would have given you living water, which would never run dry. He would give you water that overflows all boundaries and that cannot be channeled by any system of irrigation. He would give you a fountain of life, a spring of hope. My water brings life to the spirit and to the body. It cleanses inside and out.”

      It is not strange that when Jesus offers the Samaritan better water, she thinks in concrete terms. Can this Man offer her a house with a water storage tank? Can He offer her a tap, a sink, or perhaps even a bathroom of marble? No. He does not seem able to offer her any of these. And so the woman sidesteps involvement and continues to draw water.

      Time is precious for Jesus. In the distance He already sees His returning disciples. And so He dispenses with the small talk of new acquaintances and offers her, from the depths of His compassion, water much more valuable and refreshing. He speaks of living water. Jesus believes the Samaritan is capable of following the spiritual lesson.

      By talking with her of spiritual things, Jesus shows her the respect not often shown to women of that time, and thus places her above social barriers, religious taboos, sexist exclusion, and racial borders. He frees theology from its last straitjacket and puts it to work on behalf of this woman. Will He be understood?

      In order to clear up any misunderstanding, Jesus turns toward her once more. “Go, call your husband,” He suggests, СКАЧАТЬ