Day 28, Tuesday, 16 March Along the river will grow every kind of fruit

 

RETREAT IN LENT 2021

Day 28, Tuesday, 16 March

Along the river will grow every kind of fruit

Settled organised communities, in contrast to nomadic loosely structured ones, grew up on the banks of great rivers; the Euphrates, the Nile, the Niger. Water was the life blood of the earliest developed communities and is central to any human settlement – even the driest. Botswana’s currency is simple called pula, water.

It was natural, when choosing a symbol for the life of grace, the divine life, for the scriptures to choose water. The Israelites passed through the waters of the Red Sea and the Church, following the teaching of Jesus, settled on Baptism as the initiation rite for belonging to the Christian community.

In today’s reading from Ezekiel (47:1-12) we have a rich illustration of the power of water – not just in the flooding and cyclones of nature which we hear about and often see with our eyes – but in the pouring out of God’s spirit over the earth. Even the leaves of the fruit trees are medicinal and when the book of Revelations takes up this reading from Ezekiel it adds ‘for the healing of the nations’ (22:2) a striking reminder that grace is at work in politics.  

This fourth week of Lent hints at victory. There are constant references to the new life that will unfold through the mystery of Jesus among us. We read a passage in John (5:1-16) about the man at the pool waiting for someone to dip him in ‘when the water is disturbed.’ Jesus, the great disturber of our complacent world, comes and asks him, ‘Do you want to be become well?’

That is the second time he has asked that question. The first was in John 1:38. ‘Do you want?’ The water of life, the divine dwelling within, the gift of God. The question keeps coming to us and gently calling us give ourselves to this new life that is offered.