Third Sunday of Lent

Lectionary: 28

And hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. For Christ, while we were still helpless, died at the appointed time for the ungodly.


Amid the billions of people on Earth, I am a right one to hear the Word of God and hear the Message of Hope, for I am a pessimist by nature. I look at the political, economic, medical, social, ecological and religious situation at the moment and throw my hands in the air. I am reasonably certain the world will end before I finish this sentence. Or maybe the next one....
So it didn't end and we're still here and we still have to deal with the situation.
That's where grace arrives for me, "Hope does not disappoint." So long as there is life, and God's word, we hope.
The human being, with its acute sense of a past which reaches from this moment through the years of one's life and human history to prehistory and the creatio ex nihilo; and our intense awareness of this present moment and its possibilities; and the future which stretches infinitely before us, needs hope as an engine needs gasoline. We cannot bear today without some assurance that tomorrow will be good, and perhaps better.
In today's gospel the Samaritan woman picked up her memory of six husbands and her water bottle and set out to meet the Stranger resting at Jacob's well. She had not despaired of men-in-general; she might meet one good one yet.
And hope did not disappoint. She suddenly knew the ancient Song of Songs,

I found him whom my soul loves.
I held him and would not let him go...

Christians are given the grace of practicing hope in its purest form, for we don't know what to expect. Prosperity? Security? Happiness? Satisfaction? Contentment? Will there be a chicken in every pot and a car in every garage? Will the streets be paved with gold? Will the poor enjoy prosperity; and the sick, healing? Will there be dancing and singing and food for everyone? Will the miserable be comforted?
As T.S.Eliot wrote, "hope would be hope for the wrong thing."

For answer we have only a clear memory of Jesus: his life, teachings, death, and resurrection.  Traumatized by what we saw on that Friday we could hardly breathe on that Passover Saturday. But when, on Sunday, the women said the tomb was empty, we ran to see it. Could an empty tomb mean hope?
And then he appeared to us. Or did he? It was more like he disappeared to us for the moment was so short. And yet we touched his hands and side, and he ate with us!
And then he gave us his Spirit. Mysteriously, wonderfully, it has never left us. Despite everything we expect his return.
There is no hope without a promise. Hope is our response to God's promise. What has he promised? I like to call it freedom. But it will be a freedom without its constant companion, anxiety.
For the Lord God of Heaven and Earth is nothing if not courageous. In the face of nothing, before the emptiness of the void, God speaks the Word of Love and, filled with hope, we spring to life again, ready to deal with the situation: the political, economic, medical, social, ecological and religious situation of the moment.