Chapter 3: Nourished by Living Water

Chapter Three:  Nourished by Living Water

So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph.  Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.  When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?”  (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)  The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)  Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”  “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water?  Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”  Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.” (John 4:5-15, NIV)

What is that living water that Jesus says he will give that gushes up to eternal life?  How do we access this well?  The Samaritan woman says, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty…"  (John 4:15) I think we all want to be given this water.  We all want to find the fountain of youth. We all desire eternal life, but can we really access this water?  

It has often been pointed out that this is an unlikely encounter between the Samaritan woman and Jesus at the well.  Jews rarely if ever conversed with Samaritans.  Jews and Samaritans tended to despise each other for many reasons, too many to go into here.  Further, men rarely spoke to strange women, but Jesus does not hesitate to encounter this woman.  Jesus is physically thirsty and he perceives that the woman is spiritually thirsty.  Jesus the great rabbi seizes this teachable moment.  

The woman on the other hand probably feels sorry for this man.  She, too, knows it is not an encounter that is proper, but she sees he has no way to access the water deep in the well.  Little does she know that she is actually the one who needs a bucket to go deep, deep into her soul.  We too are often like the woman at the well.  We know we are both physically and spiritually thirsty, but we keep focusing on the external physical thirst. We disregard the deeper inner thirst where Jesus can show us a well that will gush up to eternal life.  God desperately wants us to lower the bucket into this well.  

My thirst for the deep inner well

In the summer of 1994, I was thirsty and my soul was dry.  I was trying to quench my soul by external means.  I sought answers in books.  I looked for guidance in community. I even went out West searching for truth. These are all good things and I am glad I did them.  However, I needed to learn how to go deep within to draw up living water.

As I sat at the gas station in Yellowstone National Park, I was thirsty.  I kept trying to think of how I might get out of this painful pattern of great negativity, anxiety, and doubt.  I wanted to stop thinking and out-thinking myself.  I wanted to stop feeling like I was on a small deserted island.  “Lord, help me out of this dark dryness,” I begged. 

Back to Camp

After a few Sundays in Yellowstone, I could not take it anymore.  I could not stand trying to preach about Jesus, while feeling barren inside.  I decided to abandon the westward journey and go home.  All told, I spent a month out west.  I drove back by myself on the fourth of July. “Lord help me to find some comfort,” was all I could think about.  I decided to go back to where I had most recently experienced God on a deep level.  I talked to my good friend and mentor who was in charge of the Diocesan summer camps, Reverend Debbie.  She was the most spiritual person I knew. “Maybe Debbie can help set me straight,” I thought. I told her I could help out for room and board.  She graciously and gladly welcomed me for the remainder of camp.  

While I was back at camp, I met a new young vibrant priest.  His name was Reverend Steve.  Steve was to take over the camping program the next year from Debbie.  More importantly for me Steve had a dad who was also a priest.  His dad was looking to hire a youth minister.  Steve set me up with an interview.  

Becoming Quasimodo

I was hired and at the beginning of August 1994 I started work as the youth minister at a Cathedral in Cincinnati.  "This will finally get me right," I thought.  “I will be living in a Cathedral. I have to get right with God.” I remembered what Buechner had written, "Generally speaking, if you want to know who you really are as distinct from who you like to think you are, keep an eye on where your feet take you."  This is a great quote and it is true, but I was still trying to solve an inner problem by changing the external.  

My first few weeks at the Cathedral were miserable internally.  I felt more anxious and darker than ever.  The cathedral church was in downtown Cincinnati.  My apartment was right under the bell tower. At any other time in my life I would have loved being there.  I loved Cincinnati.  I grew up in Dayton, Ohio. I was a huge Reds and Bengals fan, and downtown Cincinnati had so much to offer a young single guy.  

However, I was not myself and I knew it.  I remember sitting in my new apartment, staring at a cross on the wall for hours.  I went from having anxious doubts about my faith in God, to suddenly having horrific images stuck in my head.  All the images in my head were of pain, violence, and suffering.  I could not get away from it. I would think of a horrible image and it would get stuck in my brain.   “Get out, get out,” I would cry to God to take away the awful images. "Oh, Lord, is this the pain of the cross?" I wondered in agony.

I can’t take it anymore

I finally broke down and told someone I needed real help.  The person I turned to was the woman who gave me life, my mom.  My mom suggested that I go and see an analyst.  Her name was Nancy.  "Maybe Nancy could help," I thought.

The first time I met with Nancy I knew I was going to be put on the right path.  Not that God was not guiding my journey all along, but I definitely needed help finding some real living water.  Everyone needs someone like Virgil from The Divine Comedy to guide them through the tough times.  

I told Nancy, after babbling about my problems for an hour, "I deeply want to feel the love of God in my life again.  I want a living faith I can feel."  I will never forget what she said next. She said, "I do not just believe in God, I know there is a God."  I was stunned. What kind of confident faith was this?  I could tell it was genuine as well. She told me to buy a notebook and write to God exactly what I deeply wanted and of what I was afraid.  She also told me to write down my dreams, as much as I could remember.  I rushed home, and that night I wrote out my wants and fears. Below is much of what I wrote.

What do I want?

-  I want to feel love.
-  I want to feel you (God) there.
-  I want to be a leader in your church.
-  I want that skeptical voice gone.
-  I want to be able to pray and get in touch with myself.
-  I want to be around my friends and feel secure about my faith.
-  I want to be able to talk about you (God) and not feel hypocritical.
-  I want to be able to enjoy nature and not look at it and ask where did it come from.
-  I want you to reveal yourself to me so that I know I am not projecting, but that it is really you (God).
-  I want to be wounded.
-  I want to be able to start over again and stumble upon God.  I don't like to think I have been taught to believe something.
-  I want to be able to stop and learn, not look and wonder.
-  I want to be able to read the Bible and see you (God) in it, and not be frustrated by it.

What am I afraid of:

-  I am afraid to grow old, lonely and bitter.
-  I am afraid that I will never have any answers.
-  I am afraid of losing all my friends.
-  I am afraid of searching and finding nothing.
-  I am afraid I can't help anyone anymore.
-  I am afraid of hurting somebody.

As I look back on these wants and fears now, I can still feel the raw emotion behind them.  I think many people have had the same wants and fears.  Knowing the great negative voice and images stuck in my head back then, I can see that it was good to clarify what I wanted and of what I was afraid.  It was, in a great sense, lowering the bucket into a deep well, hoping to start the flow of water.

Paying attention to the unconscious

The first night I recorded my dreams was Tuesday August 23rd 1994.  I remembered three dreams.  I was always good at remembering my dreams.  There are two tricks I use to remember my dreams. First, I pray to God, "Lord, teach me through my dreams."  There is something to desiring to want to remember your dreams.  You have to want to pay attention. The second trick is to write down your dreams right away.  Have a notebook on your nightstand with a pen. If you wake up in the middle of the night, scribble a few important words that will help you recall the dreams.  Once you wake up in the morning, jot down keywords to help you remember your dreams.  Then write them out as best you can. If you do not remember everything, then write down what you do remember. The more you do this, the more you will remember. It is like anything else.  Most people can get good at this. The problem is that many people wake up and immediately start thinking of all they have to do that day.

The first night I journaled my dreams I remembered three dreams.  One had to do with being on the David Letterman show.  To this day I have not tried to unravel that first dream.  Another dream was about a wedding banquet. Now this is very curious to me as Jesus often used wedding banquets as images of what the kingdom of God is like.  However, the dream I gave to Nancy was the following:

"The Stump dream"  Tuesday 8/23/94

At halftime of a football game there was this tree stump with an insect in it.  He was green and he was fed another bug.  I remember he grabbed it and held the other bug for a long time.

Nancy - How did you feel in the dream?  

Me - I am not sure, but I kept thinking about it.

Nancy - Why do you think that is so?
Me - I just keep thinking about this green bug and what it was eating.
Nancy - What does halftime of a football game mean to you?  

Me - Well, to me football is a rough but fun game.  Sports are very important to me.  I think football reflects life in many ways. 

Nancy - How so?

Me - It is rough and tough and takes teamwork to get anywhere.  

Nancy - That is a good analogy.  So what is halftime?

Me - Halftime is a time to rejuvenate and replenish.  It is a time to make adjustments.  

Nancy - Maybe you are entering into a halftime?

Me - A time of rejuvenation?

Nancy - Yes.  Do you think you need to make any adjustments in life?

Me - I should say so.
Nancy - What does a stump mean to you?  

Me - I was thinking of Isaiah 11:1, where a shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse and a branch will bear fruit.  

Nancy - So once again an image of rejuvenation.

Me - Yeah.

Nancy - What else is a stump?

Me - What is that book where the boy becomes an old man and sits on the tree stump that gave him everything?

Nancy - That’s The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein.  The tree loved the boy so much it kept giving him what he needed throughout his life.  Do you think God is inviting you to rest and be replenished?

Me - Maybe Jesus is the Giving Tree?

Nancy - Absolutely.

Me - I hope so.

Nancy - I know so.  

Me - A stump is also simply a tree that has been cut down.  Have I been cut down to start anew?  

Nancy - Perhaps.  What about this green insect?  

Me - I think it was a plump caterpillar like insect.  

Nancy - What do caterpillars do?

Me - Caterpillars go into cocoons to become butterflies.  

Nancy - They need to eat to prepare for the transformation process, don’t they?

Me - Yes, I would guess.

This dream was the first sip of water from that deep well.  It was a powerful message to embrace.  Now someone could have simply told me that God is going to support, rejuvenate, and transform me.  However, there is something very powerful about knowing the message comes from God within you.  God was alive, awake, active and moving inside of me.  God was calling me to greater awareness or consciousness. Another dream I shared with Nancy early on was this:

"A storm is coming"  Sunday 8/28/94

I dreamed I was at a park with my mom and brother.  One of us was riding a red-type moped that was really nice.  I looked up in the sky and the sky started to swirl.  I looked again and the sky was dark.  So I warned my mom and brother and they said ok in a nonchalant kind of way, and I remember wanting to place the red motor scooter in a safe place and I did, behind a shady tree.  Then we took off down to a safe place.  I was there on a porch and it seemed like everyone else was fully safe inside and not too concerned about the storm. I then thought there was going to be no storm because I could see only part of the sky and no one seemed concerned.  Then I saw an Asian family coming to take shelter and she said it looks like there is going to be a storm.  So I stepped off the porch and saw she was right. A storm was coming. Then I woke up.

Nancy - How did you feel in the dream?  

Me - I felt confused, then relieved, and then I woke up very alarmed.
Nancy - What does a storm mean to you?  

Me - Well, storms come along and blow things everywhere.

Nancy - They kind of rearrange things, huh?

Me - Yeah.  Sometimes things get damaged.

Nancy - Sometimes.  Sometimes things need to get damaged.  What else do storms produce?

Me - Rain.

Nancy - And that does what?

Me - It helps things to grow.

Nancy - Right.  So you think there is a storm brewing in your life?

Me - Yeah. 

Nancy - I would say so.  Things are never easy are they?

Me - Nope.

Nancy - Sometimes things get harder before they get better.

Me - How hard?

Nancy - Not too hard, but harder.  Transformation thru inner work is definitely hard and rearranges our viewpoints in life, which can be scary.  Although, even though a storm may seem scary, it is from God, and we will be renewed.

Me - We lose our innocent faith?

Nancy - Oh, yes.  We all need to be cast out of the safe garden.  What does a red moped or motor scooter represent for you?

Me - A moped to me is a fun toy to play around on to get from here to there.  It is not a real motorcycle or car.  It’s kind of immature. You ride it when you are young. 

Nancy - Maybe it means your boyish ways of getting around in the world are over.  It’s interesting.  You are trying to protect it from the storm.

Me - But, I can't hide it though.  

Nancy - How do you still do immature things?

Me - I don’t know.

Nancy - Do you take care of all your finances,  food, etc.?

Me - I am starting to.

Nancy - Do you take it seriously?

Me - I guess.

Nancy - Maybe you should reflect on that.  What about your mom and brother and the people in the house?
Me - Well, once again my mom and brother tie the scene to me being childish.

Nancy - Did your mother and brother take care of you when you were little?

Me - Sort of.

Nancy - They don’t seem to be very helpful here.

Me - Nope.

Nancy - Maybe the storm is going to change how you rely on some things.  They aren’t useful to you anymore.

Reflection questions:

When have you felt dry in your life?

Who or what helped you through that time?

What helped you take that first step to the well of living water?

Footnotes:
1  Frederick Buechner,  Wishful Thinking: A Theological ABC  (San Francisco:  HarperCollins, 1973), 27.