Every now and then someone sends me some email humor that I can actually use in a sermon.  Like Joe Miles did with the story of the three old men who were thinking ahead to their own funerals.  They began speculating on what people would say about them when they passed by at the end of the funeral service.  When they look over into my casket, one of the men said, “I’d like for them to say about me, ‘He was a good man, a great friend.’”  Another of them said, “When they look at me one last time, I’d like for them to say, ‘He was a great father and a wonderful husband.’”  Those two then turned to the last man and asked him what he wanted people to say about him the day of his funeral.  “When they look over into my casket,” he said, “I’d like for someone to say, ‘Look!  He’s still moving!’” 

Haven’t you ever wanted someone to tell you those things, how good you are or even, at the end of a horribly long day or crisis, that you’re still alive?  Here’s the only problem, if we’ve never come to a place where we know that for ourselves, if we still have to have even one other person tell us that we’re worthy, that we’re good and that we have hope for a future beyond our past, then even a thousand will never be enough.  We’ll exploit friendships, we’ll drain marriages dry by getting married looking for love instead of looking to share love, we’ll end up all alone, by ourselves, drawing water from wells that never satisfy and watching one person after another walk in and out of our lives after they’ve been drained dry by our insatiable hunger for what no human being can give another.  We’ll know we’re alive when we come to the place where we can tell others how alive we are before we ask them to tell us.  That is exactly what changed in the life of this nameless woman at the well the day she met Jesus. 

We have to regress just a tad here.  Before that day she met Jesus this woman had been looking for something, someone to satisfy a bottomless pit thirst in her soul.  Jesus offered her what he called living water.  It was Jesus’ way of saying that unmet spiritual thirsts often mask themselves as other things, often insatiable physical or relational hungers. 

What’s Eating Gilbert Grape? is a terribly dark and disturbing movie from 1993.  Johnny Depp plays Gilbert Grape, a young man in his late teens or early 20’s whose father committed suicide in the basement of their home some years before.  He has a mentally retarded younger brother and two sisters.  When his father died, his mother quit living and started eating.  Sacrificing the freedom of his youth, Gilbert has become the surrogate father and caretaker for the entire family.  His mother has become so obese that she can no longer even walk up the stairs at night to go to bed.  At dinner time, the children prepare the table and then move it over to the sofa in front of her where she spends the entire day smoking and watching television.  It’s the heartbreaking story of a young man lost in the shame of what his family has become, despite his best efforts to save it.  Because children are keen observers but poor interpreters of family conflict, Gilbert keenly observed what was happening to his family but misinterpreted its meaning for him.  Lost in shame, it was eating him alive. 

Is any shame eating you alive?  As one friend puts it, “underneath our public image are the stains and shadows we collect along the way.  We all have things we don't want to remember.”  About those things, too often, “we embrace the holy trinity of denial: “Forget it, Fake it, or Formaldehyde it (Kenny Wood, Chance Meetings, September 11, 2003).”  This woman at the well was trying to drown her sorrows in just one more relationship.  But, please believe me, I’m not judging her, or anyone.

I’ve seen the pictures of my ancestors in those dark brown oval shaped frames hanging on the walls of my grandmother’s house.  Taken back before people knew it was OK to smile in pictures, they’re all of German Mennonite heritage.  They look like human bowling balls in dark suits.  My doctor tells me that some of that bowling ball DNA is part of my struggle.  In my adult years, however, I’ve come to know enough about my family history to know that my struggle isn’t just because of a genetic weakness for bratwurst.  I’ve also come to learn that if I need even one more person, just one, my wife, a good friend, a respected colleague, a pulpit committee, to tell me that I’m good or worthy or loved, then there will never be enough.  I’ll always need one more.  Spiritual freedom and joy, the kind that doesn’t need anything but an opportunity to slosh over onto anyone who gets too close, (Jesus had promised her “‘a spring of water gushing up to eternal life (John 4:14).’”) only comes from hearing Jesus peer over into the casket of your misery and say, “You’re still alive!” and believing it for yourself, for the first time.

That’s what Jesus did for this woman.  She couldn’t wait to get back to town.  “‘Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done!  He cannot be the Messiah, can he?’”  Think about this.  She did something most people don’t do.  She went back into the very community where she had lived out her worst failures for all to see to give testimony to those people of what Jesus had done for her.  Those people knew who she was.  Good chance that her five former husbands were in that crowd, with their new wives.  And, all she could say was, “You’ve got to meet this man!  He told me everything I ever did.  He offered me a drink of water like none I’ve ever tasted.  You’ve got to meet this man!” 

Jesus had looked over into the bottomless pit of her soul and announced to her that there was still something of worth there.  He saw clean through her, to something good and clean that could yet be.  Even though he knew everything there was to know about her past, every sin she’d ever committed, he still saw within her the possibility of being a living receptacle of the very life of God.  She couldn’t believe what she was believing.  She had to tell someone!  Most remarkable of all, said told it so convincingly that they believed her, her joy just sloshing all over anyone who got too close.  It was such a powerful moment that later, those people believed Jesus, too.

What Jesus had done was heal her shame.  By announcing, simultaneously, that everything she’d ever done didn’t undo everything God wanted to still do for her, he released her from the shame that had been eating her alive.  If there is a better feeling than getting released from shame, I don’t know what it is.  It’s the highest high, the deepest joy, the greatest thrill all rolled up in one.  Unhealed shame is the deepest root of depraved human behavior. 

Every time a Palestinian suicide bomber blows up an Israeli bus, aside from taking scores of innocent lives, he shames the nation of Israel.  Then, when the Israelis strafe a Palestinian camp to assuage their shame, aside from taking scores of lives, they shame the Palestinians.  Shame keeps shaming.  Where will it ever end?  It never will until something, someone, breaks the cycle of shaming.  Husbands and wives shame each other.  Brothers and sisters shame each other.  Christians shame one another.  It may look like a fight over something else.  It’s fundamentally about being shamed.  But, shame keeps shaming until someone breaks the cycle.  In Jesus, God has come to break the cycle of sin’s shame by taking our shame upon himself.  And, he’s invited us to share in the shame breaking business with him.

You see, meanwhile, back at the well, Jesus was having his own very private moment of joy until the disciples interrupted with, “What’s for dinner?”  They had gone back to town for food.  They hadn’t seen Jesus eat anything.  What’s for dinner?  There must have been a Schmucker among the twelve.  No matter how sacred the moment, food’s never a very distant thought. 

That’s when Jesus announced that he knew something about a certain kind of soul food that they had yet to discover.  He was talking about a life filled with purpose, specifically the purpose of helping others find their way to life.  Nothing satisfies like helping other people find life by getting disconnected from their shame.

I was standing in line with one of our deacons at supper the other evening.  We’re having one of those how’s-your-day-been conversations.  Instead of just a passive, “It was great,” he sounded deeply reflective.  He’d gotten to the end of the day asking himself what he’d done that day, if anything, to actually help even one person.  He went on to talk about how important it is to him to actually help people, not just do business.  He said that his clients tell him that they appreciate his kindness and honesty, that that’s a rare thing these days.  Aren’t you glad he’s one of our deacons?  Here’s a man who is in business to do more than just make money.  He’s in business to help people find their way through this life. 

He reminded me of the spirit of this church, actually.  We’ve spent a lot of time lately talking about what we can do to reach people, to grow.  That’s always a good conversation to have.  However, a friend of mine reminded me this week that we Texans have been culturally conditioned to define significance of nearly everything by its size.  How far out your fence reaches and how many you have inside it are too often the operative questions in strategizing for church growth.  It can be a very dangerous thing to supplant identity and purpose with size alone as the measurement of the significance of what God is up to in this church.  Shame is a funny thing.  Sometimes, if there’s no one else around to shame us, we’ll shame ourselves for not being what we think others want us to be, even if they’ve never said so.

When I put the story of this woman at the well and our deacon at the dinner table together, this is the lesson I learn.  If we need even one more person to join our church so that we will feel better about ourselves, believe that we are worthy, that we are indeed the family of God in this place, if we need even one more to join for those reasons, then even a thousand, ten-thousand, would never be enough.  We’d always be a church just one bad attendance Sunday away from being ashamed of what God said is very good. 

If, however, we are so thrilled that we’ve met someone who peered over into the casket of our personal shame, saw everything we ever did, and then announced to us that we are still alive and worthy and, by God’s grace, very good, and we really believed him, we’d never need one person to join this church, even though many probably would.  Jesus said, “‘look around you, and see how the fields are ripe for harvesting.  The reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together.’”  Rejoice, he said.  Celebrate life!  The life that only God can give but that he wants us to share in helping others find.  Nothing feels better, is better, than being released from our shame or helping others find their way out either.  People all over this city are desperate to be a part of a community where faith, not shame, is the operative word.

Fred Craddock tells about stopping to eat dinner at the Black Bear Inn in Gatlinburg, Tennessee.  An old man approached them and asked if they were on vacation.  Fred didn’t want to be interrupted but he didn’t want to be rude.  Sure enough, the old man kept asking questions until he found out that Fred was a minister in the Christian church.  The old man pulled up a chair and began to tell his story about a Christian minister he once knew.

He started by telling of how his mother gave birth to him out of wedlock and how he’d carried this private shame all of his life.  In his teens, he started attending a little rural church.  He would always slip out early, afraid that someone would ask what a boy like him was doing in church.  One day, as the service ended, he started to slip out when he felt a hand on his shoulder.  He looked up to see the old preacher staring down at him.  He was so afraid the preacher was going to ask, “What’s a boy like you doing in church?”  Instead, the preacher said, “Well, boy, you’re a child of . . ..” and then paused for a moment.  Then, he said, “Boy, you’re a child of God.  I see a striking resemblance.  Now, you go and claim your inheritance.”

Craddock was deeply moved by the story and finally asked the old man, “What’s your name?”  “Ben Hooper,” the old man said.  “Ben Hooper?  There was a governor of this state once named Ben Hooper.” Craddock said.  “That’s right,” said the old man.  “That’s me.  And, I just told you about the day I was born.”

The day we are born is the day we finally believe for ourselves what Jesus is personally announcing to each of us.  When we finally believe for ourselves that, despite our deep rooted sense of shame, he still sees in us a receptacle of the very life of God.  Despite the fact that he knows everything we’ve ever done, there is still a place for us in his family.  When Jesus releases us from our shame, we’ll spend the rest of days not needing even one person to tell us how good or how alive we are.