Automatic Water Faucets and Humility

The guy at the sink did every move imaginable - the standard-palm-slow-push, the blackjack-dealer-hand-flip, the peanut-butter-finger-spread, the three-stooges-hand-up-and-down, and the catch-a-fly-clap - all to no success.

And he was getting visibly frustrated that he slid down to the sink net to me, hopeful that faucet would produce the water needed to wash off his soapy hands. After he apologized for violating the unspoken rule in men’s restrooms (known in the south as the “Porcelain gap”), he then said something I will never forget. “I hate having to beg for water.”

No wonder Christianity is a tough sell to the world.

Christianity teaches about the need to let go of control, the value of humility, and how we are not self-reliant. I am aware that automatic faucets are not the greatest things in the world, but I am saying that there is something for each of us to experience being a beggar. For we are each just that, beggars for mercy and grace. The Good News is that God is the source and giver of mercy and grace.

The tough part is that when we receive mercy and grace it feels like we did not do anything to earn it or that we deserve it. It is almost as though we were beggars who received that which was given by another.

Those water faucets (and paper towel dispensers while we are at it) are opportunities for those of us who have to practice what it is like to be in need. What it feels like to beg for something and have to rely on someone/something else for help.

And if we are going to get frustrated when that water does not come out right when we ask for it, perhaps we can consider our fellow sister or brother in need who is asking and we are just as difficult as the faucet in that bathroom that refused to share the water.

Jesus as the Means

In the first month, the entire Israelite community entered the Zin desert and the people stayed at Kadesh. Miriam died and was buried there. Now there was no water for the community, and they assembled against Moses and Aaron. Then the people confronted Moses and said to him, “If only we too had died when our brothers perished in the Lord’s presence! Why have you brought the Lord’s assembly into this desert to kill us and our animals here? Why have you led us up from Egypt to bring us to this evil place without grain, figs, vines, or pomegranates? And there’s no water to drink!”

Moses and Aaron went away from the assembly to the entrance of the meeting tent and they fell on their faces. Then the Lord’s glory appeared to them. The Lord spoke to Moses: “You and Aaron your brother, take the staff and assemble the community. In their presence, tell the rock to provide water. You will produce water from the rock for them and allow the community and their animals to drink.”

Moses took the staff from the Lord’s presence, as the Lord had commanded him. Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly before the rock. He said to them, “Listen, you rebels! Should we produce water from the rock for you?” Then Moses raised his hand and struck the rock with his staff twice. Out flooded water so that the community and their animals could drink.

The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you didn’t trust me to show my holiness before the Israelites, you will not bring this assembly into the land that I am giving them.” These were the waters of Meribah, where the Israelites confronted the Lord with controversy and he showed his holiness to them. - Numbers 20:1-13

You read that correctly. Moses cannot enter the Promised Land because he hit a rock two times rather than just speaking to the rock. Which of course seems crazy. Moses did a lot of things that seemed a bit more “out of line” than hitting a rock in order to provide water. The time he murdered a man (Exodus 2:12). There was that time he smashed the ten commandments (Exodus 32:19). The time he ordered the killing of 3,000 fellow Israelites (Exodus 32:27-29). We do not call these actions “the sin of Moses”, that title is reserved for when he hit a rock to provide water for the people. 

It is easy (and lazy if you ask me) to chalk this story up to some moral or ethical imperative for leaders. Something like, “leaders are held to a higher standard” or “Moses should have had faith” are found all over the internet. And maybe those are true, but these suggest that previous actions of Moses were less important than this one act. 

It is interesting to me that those who told this story of Moses were willing to justify the violence of Moses as though he had a sort of divine permission. Those who told this story suggest that the most important thing is “following orders” - even if they are violent to another sister or brother. We live in a time where we are prone to think that the ends justify the means, but perhaps it is worth considering that God cares about the means just as much (or even more so) than the ends they produce. Maybe Moses could not enter the Promised Land not because the rock was struck, but because Moses fell prey to the idea that the ends justify the means - even violent means. Maybe God forbids Moses from entering the Promised Land because God desires that we pay attention to the means (the way) we use to bring about healing in the world? 

This may be why Jesus says that he is “the Way” and not “the end”. The Way (the means) matters.

How to Avoid Drowning in the Living Waters

As religion develops the role of the priest was born as the person who was the mediator between the people and the divine. We see this from the High Priest in ancient Jewish tradition to the priest in the Catholic Church. Protestantism argued that the control the Church had over people was not what God intended and that one way the Church exerted control was to elevate the role of the priest and the saints as mediators between the people and God. Since Protestantism protested the economic monopoly of the Church of the time, the protest toward mediated access to God became a rallying cry. Protestants are proud to say that "we no longer need a mediator and we all have direct access to God." Which is true, but direct access makes me recall the story of Moses and the people on the mountain.

Moses asks to see God and God says that it would not be a good thing to do, since to do so would be death. God then gives permission to Moses to view the God's cloak and backside. While Moses is viewing the backside of God, the people at the base of the mountain are told to not even touch the mountain or they too will die. 

If Moses cannot handle direct access to God, can we?

The role of mediator is not to be the one who limits access to God. Rather the role of the mediator is the one who makes it so that we can take in a portion of God that will not kill us.

Imagine that God is like a mighty waterfall. This water is powerful and yet the source of all life. It is life giving and yet if you try to drink directly from the waterfall you will be hurt or even killed by drowning. However, if we were able to lay a series of pipes so that the water can flow through them in a less powerful way we can drink from the waterfall. These pipes are the mediators and Saints of the Church. They are the ones who channel the water of life to us so that we can drink. 

For all the boasting of my Protestant tradition about not needing a mediator we forget that we have a mediator in Jesus Christ. Jesus as the mediator to all creation which is why Jesus is able to offer living water in the Gospel of John. If it is Jesus or St. Mary or St. Patrick or St. Teresa then, Catholic or not, I celebrate the mediators that help us all drink from the waterfall of God because they help us from drowning.

Digging wells in a bottled water world?

Like buildings, even the artifacts around us shape us. We hear and read about how are brains are being changed by the internet and the technological devices all around us. The internet and smart phones are easy targets to express how we are affected by these cultural artifacts, but there is one little cultural artifact that has changed us perhaps more than we aware. 

The water bottle. 

The water bottle gives us the impression that water is easy to come by. Walk into any gas station and there are cases of bottled water. I can buy a gross of bottles at a membership store and I can even buy water bottles in vending machines. With all this water everywhere, it is amazing that upwards of 75% of Americans are chronically dehydrated (cue the irony music).

The impact of the water bottle mentality has leaked into other aspects of our culture. We live in a time where there is little patience for the things that take time. Heck, we even have shorter attention spans than a goldfish. 

Over time we become accustom to get things quickly and those things that take time are dismissed for quicker solutions. There are water bottles all around us and we are always on the look out for the next water bottle device to come along. 

The Church is in the well digging business. The Church is charged to teach the ways of contemplation and meditation and prayer and patience and discipline and reflection and silence and solitude. These disciplines take time to develop and even take time to practice, which may be whey many of us are not interested in them. My concern is not so much that we may not be interested in them, but that we do not see the value of taking time to dig wells when there are so many water bottles around. 

For all the Church is, it is a well digging movement and institution. We dig for the Living Water of Life. The Water that quenches thirst and we never grow thirsty again. We know this is difficult labor and hard work, and we are not sure if the well we dig will reach the Water. We only trust that we are getting closer by digging deeper. 

Too often I feel like I am six feet under digging for water while my people stand on the surface drinking from bottled water wondering what the heck I am doing digging a well. I want to be a Church that picks up a shovel and digs.