Sermon on John 4:5-42

Pastor Jennifer Garcia

Many of the people in our readings from Exodus and John were concerned with their immediate needs when God was inviting them into something greater.

The Israelites in Exodus were worried about where they would get water to the point that Moses was afraid that they would turn to violence against him.

Then the Samaritan woman thought Jesus was offering literal water that wouldn’t run out so that she wouldn’t have to keep drawing water from the well.

And Jesus’ disciples completely misinterpreted Jesus’ response to them reminding him to eat. Again, they were thinking about literal food when Jesus was metaphorically talking about expanding the Beloved Community.

But it’s hard to think about spiritual things when we’re worried about our physical needs. Maslow’s hierarchy is all about this: that our most basic needs like food and water have to be met before we can address our needs in higher tiers like belonging and self-esteem.

That’s why the Israelites were like, “we can’t worry about God right now, because we will literally die without drinking water,” and why the woman at the well was like, “I’d have so much more bandwidth to think about spiritual things if I didn’t have to keep lugging water around,” and the disciples were like, “Jesus, we’re showing you that we care about you by making sure you eat literal food.”

So, God gave the Israelites water in the wilderness.

And Jesus taught the woman at the well and his disciples, none of which were in a state of dehydration or starvation, that he would provide what they truly needed—something beyond the basic needs of food and water.

The Israelites were still trying to figure out whether God was worthy of their trust or if God would just be another Pharoah, using them for their labor and not truly caring about their well-being.

But God proves over and over again to be trustworthy, forgiving God’s people every time we let our worries and jealousies and egos get in the way of our memories of God’s character and love for us.

God knows what we need and will provide for us. And one of the ways God provides is by creating Beloved Community where people take care of each other.

It’s a community where resources are shared, not wasted, and where people are treasured, not taken advantage of.

It requires mutuality, where everyone’s contribution is honored, and there’s no sense of “we” are giving to “them,” those poor souls.

And there has to be trust. Trust in God and trust in each other that there’s enough for everyone. It’s an abundance mindset that’s not the default for many of us.

We live in a society where there’s a scarcity mindset, where if you’re thriving, it might be at my expense. And where it’s encouraged that we keep striving for more, because we’re worried there might not be enough to go around. And where our stuff tells a story about how important we are and that we deserve more than someone else who must not have worked as hard as we have.

And if that comes at the expense of a species’ habitat, that’s too bad, but it’s not my fault.

Or if someone’s water supply becomes undrinkable because of the mine that supplies the materials for the smart phone in my pocket, that’s too bad, but it’s not my problem.

Or if the exhaust from my car adds to the pollution that will exacerbate the asthma of my friends’ kids and grandkids, that’s too bad, but it’s not like getting one car off the road will make that big of a difference.

I’m just one person—I can’t make a difference by myself.

But that’s just it. If millions and billions of people have that attitude, nothing will change, and we’ll throw the massive amount of power that we have collectively out the window instead of using it to love our neighbors, human and nonhuman.

Author Madeleine L’Engle wrote this about separating ourselves from the whole of humanity and the kinship of creation: “Perhaps I may not personally cheat the government, consider the poor expendable, murder, steal, mug, or rape. Perhaps I may not use a knife with the intent to injure or kill. Perhaps I try to eat a diet suitable for a small planet. But can I separate my own health from the rest of the world? My own good nutrition from the poor nutrition of billions? My longing for peace from the warring in the Middle East or South America or Ireland or anywhere else at all? In a universe where the lifting of the wings of a butterfly is felt across galaxies, I cannot isolate myself, because my separation may add to the starvation and the anger and the violence. I am not burdening myself with a lot of guilts which are impossible for me to resolve. But to separate myself from the suffering of the world is dis-aster. If I call myself “good” is that not separation?”

Just as Jesus called the woman at the well and his disciples to something more, God is calling us to kinship with humanity and the world that doesn’t stop with our individual concerns.

Beloved Community reminds us that we’re not alone. We’re not alone in our needs, and we’re not alone in our desire for a better world.

The Holy Spirit binds us together and moves us to compassion and collective acts of justice and mercy.

God calls us not just as individuals, but as the Body of Christ, to draw living water for others, to partake in the food that is doing God’s will, feeding the world body and soul.

Part of that means preserving the abundance of creation for future generations.

We talked during our 2024 yearlong Sabbath theme about seven-generation thinking. It’s the idea present in some Indigenous cultures that whenever a tribe makes a decision, they consider how it will impact people seven generations into the future.

Many of us consider what the world will be like that we’re leaving to our kids and grandkids, but how many of us think beyond that?

Could seventh generation thinking help us keep our descendants from becoming climate refugees?

Could it help prevent future wars fought over water and other basic resources?

Could it preserve the waterfalls and lush forests and pristine beaches we enjoy on weekend hikes and family vacations for generations to come, so that they don’t just survive, but thrive in God’s beautiful creation?

It’s natural for us to worry about our own basic needs and those of our loved ones. And God invites us to expand our imaginations from basic survival to life abundant for everything that has breath.

Let’s recognize our kinship in the Beloved Community where God is madly in love with every being from the beginning of time to the end of the age.

As we learn to live into that kinship, enjoy creation, help preserve it for the next seven time seven generations, and remember that God created you and calls you good.

Sermon on John 3:1-17

Pastor Jennifer Garcia

We see in both our readings from Genesis and John that God cares about the world.

In Genesis, we have our introduction to Abram, later Abraham, one of the most well-known ancestors in faith. God was calling him to a long journey away from what he knew.

But with this big ask also came a blessing: that Abram’s descendants would be many and that God would use them to bless “all the families of the world.”

And then, in our reading from John, Jesus says what’s probably the most famous verse in the Bible, John 3:16: “For God so loved the world…”

And that’s immediately followed by: “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world but in order that the world might be saved through him.”

God loves the world! God created the world and called it very good. A bit later, God declared that God’s people would be a blessing to all the families of the world. Then, God became human in Jesus to save the world because God loves it so much.

Sometimes we hear John 3:16 and only think of God loving the people of the world, especially when it’s used in an evangelistic way, trying to convince people to become Christians.

But if God loves the whole world, the cosmos (which is what it says in Greek), and God sent Jesus to save the world, then it’s not just people that God loves and wants to save. Maybe God really meant that Jesus came to save the whole world—the people, yes, and also the animals and birds and plants and rock formations and oceans and bacteria and the sun and other stars and everything!

As ELCA Pastor Leah Schade wrote in her commentary on our Gospel reading, “Because God loves the entire cosmos, Jesus’s life, ministry, death, and resurrection is meant for all of Creation, including – but not limited to – human beings.”[1]

But we humans tend to put ourselves first and act like the world is just a thing to be used and used up as we please. We don’t tend to be a blessing to all the human families of the world, let alone its non-human families.

Because we ourselves are humans, we tend to take a human-centric view of the world. We think ourselves smarter than animals who can’t write books. We think we know better how to manage forests than the natural processes they experience. We think our profits in the human-made systems of currency and the economy take precedence over delicately balanced ecosystems.

Yet, if time were telescoped into one 24-hour period, and the Earth was created at midnight, humanity would have only appeared in the final couple minutes of the day.

We act as if we’re the wisest beings in the universe, when we’re the youngest siblings of the family of life, which maybe tracks if any of you have annoying younger siblings.

Maybe we need to stop acting like we’re God’s gift to the world. We haven’t on the whole acted very much like blessings to the families of the world—the schools of fish, the groves of trees, the flocks of birds.

Many of us see coyotes roaming the streets in our own neighborhoods, looking for food in the suburbs that have overtaken their habitats. I’m sure you’ve seen pictures of marine animals and birds caught in plastic packaging.

During the COVID lockdowns, we saw news articles about cougars in the capitol of Chile and sea lions taking over ports in Argentina. Scientists estimate that with less human risk, animals traveled 73% farther in a 10-day period during the lockdown than they did in 2019.[2] It’s too simplistic to say that with less human activity, nature was improving across the board, but it did illustrate the large effect humans have on the world around us.

What would it look like to be a blessing to the whole world?

What would we learn if we stopped acting like humans know best?

What would it take to live in right relationship with our planet?

I don’t know exactly what that would look like. I don’t think anyone does. I do believe it’ll take a lot more than recycling, the occasional beach clean-up, and installing a low-flow showerhead, though of course those are good things.

We as a species are going to have to reimagine a whole lot of things to get off the trajectory of warming oceans and greenhouse gases.

You and I as individuals can’t do it by ourselves, but I hope that enough people become passionate about climate change in time to avoid the worst effects.

I don’t believe this is something we can do from a purely intellectual perspective. There’s an essential spiritual aspect to this work, and that’s where you and I as people of faith can make a difference.

Being a blessing to the families of the earth starts with our hearts—not in a sentimental way, but in the deep work of learning to love the world the way God does.

Close your eyes, if you feel comfortable, and think for a moment of someone you love deeply.

Feel your love for that person fill your heart.

Now remember that God loves you abundantly more than that.

And God loves the whole world like that.

Imagine God’s love for you and the whole world filling your heart and spilling over until it brightens everything that exists.

Reflect God’s love for the world with your heart and your life.

As you open your eyes, I’d like to share a blessing from Buddhist dharma teacher Mary Stancavage. It’s a beautiful way to practice our love for the world. Again, if you feel comfortable, you may close your eyes. You can put a hand over your heart if it feels good to you.

In gladness and in safety,

May all beings be at ease.

Whether they are weak or strong

Great or mighty, medium, short or small,

Seen and the unseen,

Living near and far away,

Born and to-be-born —

May all beings be at ease!

Let none through anger or ill will wish harm upon one another

So with a boundless heart

Should one cherish all living beings.

With that, let us say Amen! Let God’s love for the world overflow in your life, now and always.

[1]https://www.patheos.com/blogs/ecopreacher/2026/02/for-god-so-loved-the-world-creation-and-john-3-16/

[2]https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/what-wild-animals-were-really-doing-during-covid-19-lockdowns-180982351/

Sermon on Matthew 4:1-11

Pastor Jennifer Garcia

Our readings today speak to the human temptation toward domination.

Our archetypal ancestors in faith, Adam and Eve, weren’t content to walk with God through the lushness of Eden, at peace with God and creation.

They feared God was keeping something from them. Their egos didn’t want to be told they weren’t as smart as they could be.They wanted what they didn’t have. They wanted knowledge and power and control. There’s a reason why this story has continued to be told through the ages, and it’s not just because it’s in the first few pages of our Bibles.

We keep telling it, because we see ourselves in it:

We recognize the scarcity mindset that wasn’t satisfied with the abundance of Eden.

We recognize the insecurity that rose up when the serpent said that God wasn’t telling them the truth.

We recognize the desire to gather knowledge and power and resources beyond our basic needs.

Then, we get another version of that story in our Gospel reading.

Newly baptized Jesus wandered in the wilderness for forty days and forty nights without food and without the comforts and safety of home.

The accuser came to tempt him, and the temptations seem awfully familiar: the temptation to gratify our own desires, the temptation to test God’s relationship with us, and the temptation of power over others.

Jesus succeeded where our archetypal ancestors did not, but the temptations are common to the human experience.

We human beings still fall prey to these temptations.

We succumb to these temptations:

1.    when we choose the convenience of single-use plastics without considering where they will end up.

2.    when our companies choose short-term profits over the long-term cost to our planet.

3.    When we ignore research that warns of the devastating effects of climate change.

4.    When we allow species to go extinct because we only consider our human needs instead of considering those of our sibling species.

5.    When we choose not to make lifestyle and business changes now that would improve the lives of the generations that will come after us.

6.    When we cling to a scarcity mindset instead of letting our God-given imaginations find new ways of creating abundance for all.

We’re surrounded by these temptations. Marketers and lobbyists and advertisers spend their careers trying to get us to succumb to the temptations to consume and extract and acquire and dominate without considering the polluting and death-dealing effects of our choices.

We’re spending this season of Lent considering our broken relationships with creation. There’s a lot to grieve and lament.

And the dominant Western culture doesn’t give us a lot of tools for how to do that.

We’re encouraged to move on from grief and any unpleasant emotions as quickly as possible (preferably by buying something to make us “happy”).

We’re encouraged to numb ourselves (preferably with something we can buy or through media that has advertisements that will get us to buy).

We’re encouraged to hustle and grind and work harder until we’re so exhausted we don’t have time to think about what needs lamenting.

We’re encouraged to think positively, with “good vibes only.” It’s called “toxic positivity” because it keeps our other emotions bottled up instead of processing them in a healthy and mature way.

We don’t have many models or tools for lament.

Fortunately, the Bible gives us some.

There is, of course, a whole book called Lamentations.

And then there’s the book of Psalms, which is full of songs—poetry that shows us an incredible range of human emotion: from the pinnacles of delight to the depths of despair. They show us that God isn’t afraid of our emotions—no matter how big, unpleasant, or shameful they might seem to us.

There’s a whole category of psalms called “lament psalms.”Some are individual, lamenting circumstances in an individual’s life, and some are communal, lamenting events in the world and ways God’s people have strayed. These psalms can help us learn to lament and give us some frameworks for what lament can look like.

My therapist gave me a lament exercise a number of years ago, and I’d like to share it with you today. We’re going to write our own lament psalms using Psalm 71 as a guide.

On the first page, there’s more information about lament psalms.

The second page breaks down the parts of Psalm 71 and gives us space to write down equivalent parts of our own laments.

The third and fourth pages contain Psalm 71 so you can see the different sections.

We’re going to take some time to work on this exercise. We probably won’t have enough time to finish, and that’s okay. You don’t have to share this with anyone—it’s between you and God. Read over the exercise and start writing whatever you can. You don’t have to stick to the parts of the psalm as described—it’s just a framework to get us started.You can also draw your psalm or sit in quiet prayer.

You can lament about our broken relationship with creation, but you don’t have to. You could lament about a situation in your life or something broader. However the Holy Spirit moves you is exactly right.

The Spirit led Jesus to the wilderness, where he overcame human temptation to domination.

Let the Spirit lead you in lament, which can help us move toward right relationship with God, each other, and creation.

The Lord be with you.

Gracious God, Creator of wilderness and garden, accept our laments this day and continue to teach us to lament the ways we succumb to the temptations to domination. Heal our relationships with You, each other, and creation. Draw us to your heart and renew a right spirit within us, this Lent and always. Amen.