Sometimes temples just aren’t that helpful.

In the ancient accounts passed down to us about Jesus, there is this beautiful story of a Samaritan woman who recognizes him as “a prophet”.  But…she doesn’t totally trust this prophet because “you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”

So let’s back up a bit.  In first century Palestine, the land was divided between Samaria to the north and Judea to the south.  Jerusalem, and the Jewish temple, were located in Judea.  And because Jews historically saw the Samaritans as sell-outs and bitter enemies, they forbade them from worshipping in the Jerusalem Temple.  So the Samaritans built their own temple to the same God on Mt. Gerizim in Samaria.

Hang with me.  We’re going somewhere…

The two groups—Samaritans and Jews—hated each other.  And so they excluded each other, in part by saying that their temple was where God really lived and that the “other” group was not invited.  We’re in, you’re out.  Go home.  Walls were erected.  And so this Samaritan woman is interested in the prophetic aspect of this Jewish rabbi named Jesus, but was still wary because he was part of a tribe that excluded her.

Notice, then, what Jesus says to her next, “A time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem…a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth.”

Whoa.  Did you see what Jesus just did there?  He, and this woman, grew up in a culture that said God—and His Spirit—were in this building or in that building.  They grew up in a culture that was trying to co-opt the Giver and His Spirit by closing them behind walls.  (Can you even imagine?) Jesus says that the time has come when we can no longer do this.

The Spirit can’t be contained in a particular building or among a particular people.  The word for “spirit” in the ancient Greek tongue is the word pneuma, which can also mean “wind”.  The Spirit is like wind: uncontainable, uncontrollable, and the very air we breathe.

What happens when you let the wind into a building and then close the doors?  It disappears.

Jesus put it this way, “The wind (pneuma) blows wherever it pleases.  You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going.  So it is with everyone born of the Spirit (pneumatos).” Jesus is teaching us something about the nature of the Spirit that births new life in our spirits: She cannot be contained, controlled, or closed in.  

She can only be joined.

Joined in the very places where the Spirit is at work, which is everywhere.

We are invited to pay attention to this Spirit at work, and then to listen for how this Spirit is inviting us to join the One in repairing that which is broken, healing that which is sickened, reconciling that which is divided.

It is that nagging sense that you need to call him.  It is that won’t-go-away inkling that you need to show up there.  It is that awareness that your precious schedule or timeline or to-do list has removed your flexibility to be where you really need to be, to do what you really need to do.

Because calendars can distance us from the Spirit just as much as temples can.

This is what we are being invited into: a way of life that not only recognizes the Giver, but also participates in the giving.  It is in these moments that we experience something new giving birth deep within us that we can only describe by saying, “I have never felt more alive.”