Elements of the Passion - Number 1: Water

On Good Friday I will be leading a Good Friday Meditation at one of my churches called Elements of the Passion. During the meditation I will be taking seven elements that are present in the Passion story and exploring them in turn. (I'm not a scientist so I'm sure that some of my seven are not strictly elements so please humour me!)

I thought that I would share them with you here over the next seven days so here's the first which is on water.

Reading - Pilate Hands Jesus over to Be Crucified

So when Pilate saw that he could do nothing, but rather that a riot was beginning, he took some water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, ‘I am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves.’                                                                                      (Matthew 27:24)

  

Water flows through the Gospel stories.

Water had been a sign of people’s acceptance of God into their lives. John the Baptist had appeared in the wilderness proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And people from the whole Judean countryside and Jerusalem had gone out to him to repent of their sins and to accept God into their lives. John baptised people in the water of the River Jordan, water to wash the people’s sins away. But he had made clear to the people that water was just the start. He had said to them I have baptised you with water but he who is coming after me will baptise you with Holy Spirit.

And it was through water that Jesus Christ, the one who was coming after John, was revealed. John the Baptist had said;

“I come baptising with water for this reason, that he might be revealed to Israel”

And he was revealed. As Jesus was coming up out of the water of baptism the Spirit descended on him like a dove and a voice from heaven said “You are my Son”.

Water was a place of a place of encounter with God in the gospels. Matthew’s gospel tells us that it was as Jesus walked by the Sea of Galilee that he saw two brothers casting their net into the water. So Jesus cast his net into the water, he called on the two brothers Peter and Andrew to follow him and they did. Their lives were changed by an encounter with God by the water.

Someone else whose life was changed by an encounter with God by the water was the Samaritan women that Jesus met at the well. Jesus tells the women about the water that he can offer to all who come to him. He tells her that his water is living water and that everyone who drinks of his water will never be thirsty again and that it will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life. The woman’s life is changed by that encounter with God by the water.

And crowds of other people encountered God by the water. Sometimes so many people flocked to see Jesus at the waterside that he had to get into a boat to teach them. The water was a place of encounter and teaching and it was also a place of reassurance.  Chapter six of John’s gospel tells us about how the disciples were in a boat on the Sea of Galilee when a fierce storm blew up and they all became terrified. Then they saw Jesus walking towards them on the lake and he said to them “It is I, do not be afraid” And those words of Jesus echo down the centuries, whenever we are tossed about by the storms of life, Jesus reassures us saying “I am here, do not be afraid”.

And water had played a key part in events on the night before Jesus’ encounter with Pilate. At supper with his disciples Jesus had got up, tied a towel around his waist, poured water into a basin and washed his disciples’ feet. And when he had done that he said to them

“I have set you an example. If I your Lord and teacher have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s’ feet.”

Yes, water had been there throughout Jesus’ ministry. He had taught on it and through it, it had been a place of encounter and reassurance. And right back at the start of his ministry it had been a sign of people’s acceptance of God. But now water was a sign of the peoples’ rejection of God. Pontius Pilate washed his hands of Jesus. And by doing so he mirrored what the people had done, they had rejected Jesus and washed their hands of him. They turned their back on the person who could give them living water.

And what of us? What are we going to let water be used for? Are we, whose sins were washed clean in the waters of baptism, going to wash our hands of Jesus? Or are we going to come to him who is the source of living water? Are we going to remember all that he taught by the waterside, are we going to be streams of living water flowing out into the world? We can be like Pontius Pilate washing his hands of Jesus. Or we can be like the Samaritan women at the well desperate for the living water that only Jesus can give us. The choice is ours.