First Reading:
1I therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to lead a
life worthy of the calling to which you have been
called, 2with all humility and gentleness, with patience,
bearing with one another in love, 3making every effort to
maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of
peace. 4There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were
called to the one hope of your calling, 5one Lord, one
faith, one baptism, 6one God and Father of all, who is
above all and through all and in all.
7But each of us was given grace according to the measure of
Christ's gift. 8Therefore it is said, When he ascended
on high he made captivity itself a captive; he gave gifts to his
people.
9(When it says, He ascended
, what does
it mean but that he had also descended into the lower parts of the
earth? 10He who descended is the same one who ascended far
above all the heavens, so that he might fill all
things.) 11The gifts he gave were that some would be
apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and
teachers, 12to equip the saints for the work of ministry,
for building up the body of Christ, 13until all of us come
to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to
maturity, to the measure of the full stature of
Christ. 14We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro
and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people's trickery, by
their craftiness in deceitful scheming. 15But speaking the
truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head,
into Christ, 16from whom the whole body, joined and knitted
together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is
working properly, promotes the body's growth in building itself up in
love.
This week's second reading starts where last week's left off: after the miraculous meal where he fed thousands of people with only a few loaves of bread and a couple of fish, Jesus had gotten up in the middle of the night and walked across the lake. In the morning when the crowd began to look for him, he was nowhere to be found. They knew he didn't get on the boat with the disciples, and there were no other boats around the night before. They also knew that he would have been noticed and followed if he tried to walk away from the crowd… so like at least a few other times in the gospel accounts, the crowd set out looking for him. And they were quite surprised when they found him… Listen for the word of God from the gospel of John chapter 6 verses 24-35.
24So when the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his
disciples were there, they themselves got into the boats and went to
Capernaum looking for Jesus.
25When they found him on the other side of the lake, they
said to him, Rabbi, when did you come here?
26Jesus
answered them, Very truly, I tell you, you are looking
for me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of
the loaves. 27Do not work for the food that perishes, but
for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will
give you. For it is on him that God the Father has set his
seal.
28Then they said to him, What must we do to
perform the works of God?
29Jesus answered
them, This is the work of God, that you believe in him
whom he has sent.
30So they said to him, What sign
are you going to give us then, so that we may see it and believe you?
What work are you performing? 31Our ancestors ate the manna
in the wilderness; as it is written, 'He gave them bread from heaven
to eat.'
32Then Jesus said to them, Very
truly, I tell you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from
heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from
heaven. 33For the bread of God is that which comes down
from heaven and gives life to the world.
34They said to him, Sir, give us this bread always.
35Jesus said to them, I am the bread of
life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes
in me will never be thirsty.
It always seems there are some lessons that you never forget…
Rabbi, when did you come here?
That's how the dialogue
begins… You had no boat, you couldn't have walked this far in
that amount of time, let alone getting past the crowd… When did
you come here? How did you come here? This is a teaching
moment… the first of three times that the crowd asks a question
of Jesus in this passage. Each time they ask, Jesus gives an answer
that they don't expect, an answer that shifts their understanding and
teaches them something From this first question, there's a bit of a
play on words. The crowd talks about food and signs. And Jesus talks
about faith. But Jesus also talks about food and signs and how they
relate to faith. And for all of this, we have to remember that only
the day before, Jesus had given a meal, a miraculous meal, from a few
loaves and fish to feed thousands to the point of being filled.
So when the crowd finds Jesus on the wrong side of the lake, the
lesson begins. They ask how he got there. And for the first of his
unexpected answers, he raised the question of their motivation…
Why do you care? What is it that you're looking for? In John's
gospel the miraculous meal is one of the signs of the power of God in
Jesus Christ, and Jesus said to the crowd, you aren't looking for me
because of the sign… you aren't looking for me out of faith or
out of a desire for growth, you're looking for me because you're
hungry and I fed you yesterday. Some people say the crowd was on a
stomach level
search… seeking an answer to the question
What can you do for me?
As one writer put it: If (God) will
give us loaves and fishes, better houses, shorter hours, [higher]
wages, gadgets to lessen work and add to our leisure, ...we will
follow [God] for (these things). But who wants spiritual gifts? What
would we do with them? What difference would they make?
And so
Jesus teaches them. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for
the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give
to you. The phrase echoes earlier points in the gospel. John 3:16
talks about perishing vs. eternal life… God so loved the
world that he gave his only son so that whoever believes will not
perish but have eternal life
… and there are other places that
talk about food, My food is to do the will of the one who sent me
and to complete his work.
Jesus just fed the thousands… He knows that food is important,
but he also knows that it takes more than literal food to sustain
life. Bread and fish aren't the only things to think about in this
world and in this life. And the people seemed to accept what he said
(I mean who wouldn't want sustenance that lasts longer than dinner?)
and so they asked Jesus, How do we perform the works of God?
This is the second place in our passage where Jesus says something to
redirect their understanding of what's going on. They ask about the
works of God. Jesus answers there's only one! This is it: Believe in
the one who was sent by God. Easy, right? I tell you what, it's a
lot easier when we turn belief into some sort of intellectual
agreement. But that's not what belief is, at least not in this sense.
Believing is about trust and trust is about commitment to action.
I had a physics lab professor in college who started off the semester
with a lesson on what he said was one of the most important things we
needed to learn if we were ever going to do anything useful in the
arena of physics. On the first lab day, he asked us if we believed
the theories in the textbook. None of us knew at this point where he
was going but most of the class raised their hands to signify that we
did trust the book. He said good, and instructed us to open to the
chapter on pendulums in the text and then he asked for a
volunteer… he had a smirk on his face that made me not want to
volunteer, and apparently most of the others in the class felt the
same… you know the feeling when someone asks for a
volunteer… everyone looks around at each other, or looks down
at the book; pretends to be studying equations, going over
notes… anything to avoid eye contact... but he waited, and
eventually someone did volunteer. The professor had this girl stand
up on a chair and then he pulled a bowling ball, from a hook on the
wall. The ball was attached to a line which was attached on the other
end to a beam on the ceiling. He asked the girl if she would be
willing to hold the ball against her forehead and let go of it…
and then to not move while the ball swung out through the aisle of the
room and came back at her. She looked at him like he was a little bit
crazy and said, Well sure, I'll do it, but if it's coming toward my
head I'm going to move.
He said, Oh, I brought a blindfold so
you wouldn't have to worry about that.
And she
said, uh…I' m not real comfortable wearing a blindfold for
this
He said back, But according to the equations in the book
you don't have anything to worry about.
And she replied, Well,
I guess if the point you' re trying to make is that we don't really
trust the book, you're right
Thank you, you can sit down.
The professor continued, The point of this exercise was not to
challenge your trust in the book… The point is to illustrate
what you already know intuitively that theory and practice are
different. I want you to know the theory. I want you to understand
the thought processes going on behind what we do… but I also
want you to realize that theory isn't everything. Life doesn't happen
in a vacuum, it's full of variables. This is a lab class and it's
about doing things and observing what happens in the real world.
Now I'll be the first to admit, life is not a physics lab but there is something about faith to be learned in that story… when we turn belief into theory, we miss out on the growth and the blessing of faithful action. It's much easier to talk belief than it is to act on trust but this is the work of God: that you believe in the one who was sent by God. And you know what belief looks like? Belief looks like following Jesus. In the context of our passage, belief means feeding the hungry with food for their stomachs as well as with food for their spirit. In the context of other passages in this gospel, belief means forgiving people who have wronged you, welcoming the outcast and the stranger, sharing God's love in word and in action — doing ministry, continuing the ministry Jesus started. Each of us, all of us. What must we do to perform the work of God? Believe — and that looks an awful lot like following the way of Jesus Christ in the real world.
The crowd was interested but they weren't ready to follow yet. If we' re supposed to believe, if we're supposed to follow, give us a sign. Now, of course, we remember that just yesterday in the story, Jesus fed thousands of people, wasn't that enough of a sign? But the crowd was quick to point out that Jesus' miracle was only one day of food, one meal and they had higher hopes… they remember Moses provided manna for the Israelites every day for 40 years as they wandered through the desert. That's sustaining power…do that and we'll follow you. It always seems like there's something else…Just do this one more thing Jesus and then I'll follow, make this go well in my life, give me some sort of sign, then I'm yours. But again Jesus answers to redirect their understanding. The bread you remember from the wilderness, the manna that sustained the Israelites, it wasn't given by Moses. It was given by God. And the power to sustain didn't stop way back in the desert. Jesus told the crowd God was still giving them what they needed: both for their stomachs and for abundant life. And friends, I'll tell you that to this day, the sustaining power of God is still at work. Even as the economy is in the toilet and money is tight everywhere, political debates rage and positions are polarized, families and friends are separated by emotional and physical distance, there's still hope because God is still at work. Martin Luther said:
God's wonderful works which happen every day are lightly esteemed, not
because they are unimportant but because they happen so constantly
without fail and without interruption.
We have grown used to the miracle that God upholds all of creation,
and because things continue on their daily course, it seems
insignificant, and no one thinks it worthwhile to regard it as God's
wonderful work, and yet that is a greater wonder than Christ feeding
five thousand men with five loaves and a couple fish.
Yesterday he fed their stomachs… today he feeds not only the crowd's spirit, but our spirit as well. He says I am the bread of life, whoever comes to me will never be hungry and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. In a few minutes we're going to come to the table to celebrate the sacrament of communion, In our tradition this is the primary symbol we have of the sustaining nature of God's love. Over and over again, we come to the table to be reminded, to be fed, to be nourished and to be sustained. It is the table the Lord Jesus Christ and all who believe are welcome. As you prepare yourself to come and receive the sacrament, I would invite you to open your heart open your eyes and open your mind to see how you, specifically, might be called to believe and to follow, to learn who Jesus was, and to learn who Jesus is, to do what he did and to partner in what he's doing. Because this is real life and we are sustained by God's grace every day. We live in the real world and it is not simply a course in theory.
God give us the grace to seek you with everything we have, the ability to see you for who you are and the courage to follow wherever you lead. Amen
The foregoing sermon was given by Rev. Dan Holland at the United Parish of Bowie on August 2, 2009.
© 2009 Daniel Holland
