Homily Three for the Sunday of the Samaritan Woman
By St. John of Kronstadt
By St. John of Kronstadt
“A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her: Give Me a drink” (John 4:7).
The words of the Savior to the Samaritan woman who came to the well for water should not be understood literally, but as a parable. This is evident, first, because the Lord usually spoke to the people in parables, in fulfillment of the ancient prophecy: “I will open My mouth in parables” (Matt. 13:35); and second, because He almost always turned ordinary events and experiences of daily life into opportunities to teach heavenly truths. For example, He turned the sowing of seeds in a field into a lesson about the sowing of the Word of God in human hearts, and so on. These words mean: “Woman, I thirst for your repentance and salvation, because I came to call sinners to repentance (cf. Mark 2:17; Luke 5:32) and to save them. I thirst for your eternal blessedness, for which I created you.” Or more briefly: “I deeply desire to save you; repent and follow Me.”
“Jesus said to her: Give Me a drink.” A simple event — the arrival of a woman to draw water — the Lord used as an occasion to teach about the grace of the Holy Spirit. I too will follow my Lord. Since in this church today there are probably many who often go to draw intoxicating drink from the places that in our city continue to multiply because of human greed for money, I intend today, for the glory of God, to use this circumstance — that is, the drunkenness of the residents and visitors of this city — as an opportunity to teach about avoiding greed for wine and awakening within ourselves a thirst for the grace of God and for our salvation.
“Jesus said to her: Give Me a drink.” Christian soul! If only you knew and always remembered how greatly the Lord God thirsts for your repentance, correction, and salvation, you would long ago have abandoned your craving for sensual and coarse pleasures and begun with fear and trembling to work out your salvation (Phil. 2:12). But do you really not know how much God desires your salvation? Do you not know that He Himself swears by His own eternal life, which has neither beginning nor end, that He does not desire the death of the sinner, but desires that he should turn and live forever? “As I live, says the Lord, I do not desire the death of the sinner, but that he should turn and live” (Ezek. 33:11; Prayer before Holy Communion, first prayer of Basil the Great). Do you not know that He gave His Only-Begotten Son so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life? (John 3:15).
Christian soul! Hear these great words well: the Heavenly Father, for the sake of your salvation, did not spare His Only-Begotten Son, but delivered Him over to humiliation, unceasing labor, insults, slander, mockery, spitting, beatings, the Cross, and death — and what are you doing? You despise and trample upon this saving providence of God for you. You despise the love of God the Father, His Only-Begotten Son Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life. You lose your eternal life and eternal salvation because of your animal-like attachment to intoxicating drink. You trample upon the Blood of the Son of God, by which you were sanctified and which alone is true drink, while valuing drunken drink as a treasure. The Son of God redeemed you from eternal torments by the price of His sufferings, His Blood, and His death, yet you willingly sell yourself again to the devil. Tell me, man, what punishments and torments do you deserve for this? Yet however sinful you may be, however deeply you may have sunk into your sins, while you are still alive there remains the possibility for you to stop sinning, repent, and correct your life — through the all-powerful grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. You only need to sincerely desire amendment with all your heart and call upon the divine grace of the Savior for help. He Himself ardently desires your salvation and only waits for you to sincerely call upon Him from your whole heart, because He seeks our free consent and forces no one into blessedness. “Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me” (Rev. 3:20). Blessed is the one who listens to the voice of Christ speaking inwardly to him. But woe to the person who, though repeatedly warned by the inner voice of God or by the voice of a preacher in church, refuses to listen to these saving voices and remains unrepentant. Eternal fire will consume him, and then no repentance will help him forever. “Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire” (Luke 3:9), and “the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire” (Luke 3:17). “How much worse punishment do you think he deserves who has trampled underfoot the Son of God?... It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Heb. 10:29–31).
Therefore, brothers and sisters, abandon greed for wine; abandon drunkenness.
Where does greed for wine come from? It comes from the fact that Christians do not have in their hearts a saving thirst for the grace of God; from the fact that they do not thirst for eternal salvation and, deceived by the enemy and through their own carelessness, treat it as something unimportant. A thirst for divine grace, a thirst for salvation, would drive away every craving for wine and sensual pleasures, just as the vision of eternal heavenly joys removed from the saints every desire for earthly pleasures. If the drunkard firmly believed that for drunkenness he would be cast like a dry tree into eternal fire — and constantly remembered this — he would quickly abandon his passion. The thought of the horrors of eternal fire would make him hate every form of intemperance, and he would spend his whole life weeping for his sins and his animal-like way of living.
Brothers and sisters inclined to drunkenness, weep for your sins, repent, and correct your lives! Our repentance and firm intention to reform are so pleasing to God and the Angels that “there is joy in heaven over one sinner who repents” (Luke 15:7, 10). What if all those inclined to drunkenness abandoned it? Then truly heaven itself would rejoice.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
