The God Box Read Online Free Page A

the fresh air would help calm me down.I had always loved our school club Bible studies. I cherished the fellowship of the Spirit and valued hearing the perspectives of my friends.As everybody got settled, Angie, as the day's leader, asked Elizabeth to start us in prayer."Heavenly Father," Elizabeth began, "we ask your Holy Spirit to cleanse our hearts and open our minds to receive your Holy Word. We ask you this in Jesus' name. Amen.""Amen," everyone echoed.For our discussion, Angie had selected John 4, the story of the woman at the well. It had always been one of my favorites. I loved the image of Jesus as "living water," able to quench any thirst for all eternity.Each of us had brought his or her own Bible. I'd brought the one my ma had given me for First Communion. Over the years its leather cover had grown worn, the pages had gotten dog-eared, and countless verses had been underlined, marking my spiritual growth.Angie began reading the chapter aloud, telling how Jesus traveled to Galilee and '"had to pass through Samar'ia.'""As I researched that passage," Angie interjected, "I read a commentary that said this wasn't literally true."Cliff glanced up from his Bible, shooting a look at Angie. As a fundamentalist minister's son, he believed passionately in the inerrancy of the Bible. Anytime anyone questioned the literalness of a passage, Cliff debated it vehemently."In fact," Angie continued, "most Jewish people in Jesus' time traveled from Judea to Galilee through the Jordan Rift Valley in order to avoid passing through Samaria. They believed Samaritan people were ritually unclean and that contact with them would24render a Jewish person unclean too. So Jews went out of their way. The phrase 'He had to pass' was probably a traditional way of saying the events that transpired were no accident but happened as part of God's will."Cliff leaned back in his seat, apparently satisfied that Angie's explanation hadn't discredited Holy Scripture.Angie continued reading to us from the chapter. Jesus met a woman at Jacob's well: "Jesus said to her,
    "Give me a drink." For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. The Samaritan woman said to him, "How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samar'ia?" For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.'""Okay." Angie paused again and her voice became animated. "I thought this was really interesting. When Jesus asked the Samaritan woman for a drink, he violated a number of ancient customs. First, that Jesus even started a conversation with a Samaritan demonstrated a rejection of Jewish mores of that time. Second, that Jesus would talk with a woman as an equal went against a culture of male superiority. Restrictions against speaking with women were so strict that a rabbi (or teacher, such as Jesus) wasn't even allowed to speak with his own wife, daughter, or sister in public. And third, that Jesus started a conversation with a woman he knew (as we'll read later) to have a bad moral reputation was even more shocking and significant. So, for Jesus to travel through Samaria and speak with and share a drinking vessel with a Samaritan woman he knew to have a bad rep put his own reputation at risk."As Angie spoke, I recalled Cliffs caution before our meeting about risking my rep through association with Manuel."What this passage says to me," Angie continued, "is how no one was--
    or is--beyond the love of Jesus, regardless of their tribe, gender, or sexuality."At the word
    "sexuality" our entire group looked up at Angie.25In the three-plus years I'd gone to Bible Club, no one had ever talked about anything remotely related to sex. Why was she bringing it up now?The silence in the room weighed so heavy I could practically hear my own heart beat.Elizabeth finally asked, "What exactly do you mean by sexuality?""Well," Angie replied, "In verse eighteen, Jesus reveals to the woman his supernatural knowledge that 'you have had five husbands, and he whom you now have is not your