One of the great questions that I will never really understand is why we human beings are so hard to convince. Time and again God has gone to extraordinary lengths to convince us of his love and yet we doubt.
Today we reach the moment in the Moses story where he strikes the rock and water gushes forth. But let's not forget that it is called the waters of meriba (contention, quarreling).
Every day the church has us start the Liturgy of the Hours with Psalm 95 which includes
Today, listen to the voice of the Lord: *
Do not grow stubborn, as your fathers did
in the wilderness, *
when at Meriba and Massah
they challenged me and provoked me, *
Although they had seen all of my works.
Even after he sacrificed his own Son and raised him from the dead. Day after day, we as Christians are marked by Meriba and Massah (quarreling and testing). Our modern American equivalent is a phrase involving "…and moaning" How many people have given up on church because when the go to their local church this is the behavior they see among supposed Christians.
To the woman at the well, Jesus promises living water, and indeed we have received that water. Today let us find a moment to mediate on that font of living water that was placed in us at the moment of baptism. Let us drink of the Spirit.
