Sermon: Eleventh Sunday After Pentecost

Joe Pearson, Deacon

Invocation of God’s Spirit

God of all ages past, our present today, and for years to come, be with us as we seek your presence in our lives and anticipate what you have to teach us today. Amen.

The Introduction

Last week, Bishop Alexander had us hanging on a pendulum arc that swung from our baptism and our history on one end and our individual and collective future on the other. He talked about our tendency to look back and to work hard to hold on to what was. He encouraged us to stand in the present, respecting and honoring our traditions, and to embrace the unknown tomorrow with anticipation. With reference to the “transfiguration,” he recalled how the disciples wanted to build dwellings to “house” the spirits of Elijah, Moses and Jesus. Instead “a cloud came and overshadowed them; and they were terrified as they entered the cloud. Then from the cloud came a voice that said, ‘this is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!’" Without diminishing what was, God wanted them to focus on the present—what is and what is to come.

So here we are again, one week later, sitting smack in the present. As we sit, each of us brings our own unique remembered past. Everything and everyone who has brought us here is also here—along with Elijah, Moses and Jesus. But none of us knows what will transpire in the next second or minute. Will someone faint? Will someone be struck by God’s grace? Will others be struck with boredom--thinking perhaps of golf dates, or lunch plans, or work challenges…?

The pendulum of life swings and we are caught here and now at the center of that which was and is and will be. We are part of the long arc of history and active participants in the shorter arc of our lives in this day and time.

Just a little over ten years ago, I was caught in one of those moments “between the no longer and the not yet” and wanted, like Solomon, some direction, some discernment about my future:

• Should I retire now or work a few more years—maybe make it to 70
• When I retired what did I want to do
• Where did I want to live
• Did I want to seek ordination

Bottom line: I was at one of those milestone crossroads……and the temptation was to “stand pat,” to hold on to what was and slide quietly into the future. But something was nudging me to move forward, to move beyond the present into uncharted waters.

My spiritual director at the time, John Westerhoff, encouraged me to engage in a specific period of discernment. With his support, I decided to go on a spiritual retreat. I spent eight days in solitude and silence at a Jesuit retreat center in Colorado. For this retreat, each attendee was assigned a spiritual director. We spent the entire time in silence—except for one hour each day when we met with our director. On the first day, I shared my list of concerns and said that I was hoping for some discernment.

At the end of my time there, I came to a strong realization. You could say, and I do, that I experienced a major breakthrough—something like a conversion.

Exegesis and Mid-Rash

With this memory in mind (I want to hold for now sharing details about my breakthrough experience) I find our texts for today extremely interesting and quite frankly, somewhat confusing.

For the past several Sundays, the gospel texts (with the exception of last Sunday when the Transfiguration text from Luke took precedence), have come from the 6th Chapter of John.

The long arc of this chapter begins with loaves and fishes and the feeding of an estimated 5,000 (including rumblings from the flock present of a Kingship for Jesus) and ends with grumblings, defection of some followers and Jesus’ forecast of betrayal. Consider the following:

• Feeding thousands with real food from undisclosed sources
• The food sated crowd (now convinced that Jesus is their Messiah, their once and future King) seek him out
• Jesus, not wanting to be so confronted, departs and crosses the Sea of Galilee. En route he takes a walk on the water. At first this seems out of context. Why would John inserts this here—almost as an afterthought? I suggest, for extra reading, that you check this out at home and see what you think. But I digress….
• The people, not finding Jesus, go looking for him. It seems they want to make him their long ago promised candidate for King, and along the way to provide more food, to perform more miracles. For them, it seems that Jesus validity depends on his being willing to perform signs and wonders.
• When they find him they ask—and I greatly paraphrase: What must we do to keep these miracles coming? What signs will you give us? Moses provided manna. You provided loaves and fishes.
• Jesus counters and my vivid imagination suggests he counters with a flash of anger: It was not Moses who provided manna. It was God, my Father, and your God. Don’t you get it? It is not about the food; it is about me. I am the bread of life.
• The disciples, the crowd, (whoever was still around) are astonished. How can that be? We know you. Are you not the son of Joseph the carpenter? What are you talking about?
• Again and again, it seems, Jesus responds: I am the bread of life. Moses gave you, by the grace of God, physical food. Yesterday I provided loaves and fishes for you to eat. But this is not what I am about. I am the bread of life. This bread brings eternal life.
And this is where our gospel text for today enters the narrative. Jesus says, “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”
• But again, the people cry out in disbelief: How can this man give us his flesh to eat?

The gospel reading for next Sunday concludes this narrative arc. In this reading the disciples say: “This teaching is too difficult. Who can accept it? Chapter six ends with some followers leaving and the commentary from John that Jesus knew from the first who would betray him—and even identifies Judas as the betrayer.

From Miracle to Betrayal. John has provided us with a lot to ponder.

What in the world is going on? It is obvious that Jesus and his disciples are not on the same page. The disciples are caught up in 1) tradition and their expectations based on it, 2) the practical world of survival where food is scarce, 3) the thrilling rush of adrenalin as they hear Jesus preach, experience miraculous events, and bask in his charismatic presence. Imagine how they must feel as their excitement mounts that this man, this carpenter’s son from Nazareth, may well be the long expected Messiah.

From this hoped for King, they want food (read miraculous signs and wonders), substance, mission, political leadership. What they get is mystery-- ambiguity. They are asked to replace their desire for things with Jesus desire for people to come directly to God through him.

It seems, though, that at every turn they misunderstand what he means, what he teaches, what he desires for them. He has been sent to show them the deep love that God has for them. He has been sent to alter their focus on things, and principalities and powers and to refocus on one thing only—the mystery and power and glory of the living God.

Jesus affirms: “Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me and I in them. Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate….”

Implications for Us.

It is no wonder that they were confused. Those disciples wanted substance. What they got was metaphor.
Are we, two thousand plus years later, still somewhat confused ourselves?
Don’t we want, downright expect, answers?
Don’t we demand substance?
Don’t we seek guidance and direction?
Don’t we allow our expectations, our desires, our needs to frame what we want—even expect—from God?

Instead of just giving us what we want and say we need …
Jesus offers Jesus.
Jesus offers God.
For Jesus, that should be enough!

It is clear that Jesus is not talking about disciples actually eating his literal flesh. He is speaking symbolically. Keep in mind that in the gospel narratives Eucharist has not yet been instituted. That comes later. These disciples did not have centuries of theological dialogue and struggle about whether wafers and wine were the real presence of Jesus or just some mystical symbol. In fact, there is no institution of the Eucharist in the gospel of John. The symbolic activity that takes place at John’s last supper is the washing of feet. I have often wondered why John did not include this Eucharistic and symbolic feast in his gospel.

It now occurs to me that in Chapter 6 John is essentially presenting a Eucharistic metaphor. It is symbolic and deeply incarnational. God is in Jesus, and when we take in Jesus we literally take God within us. This is, first and foremost, about human life—your life and mine—with God. The word Immanuel—used quite often to refer to Jesus--simply means, “God is with us.”

To accept this, to believe this, to respond to this is an act of faith. It requires a bold leap from the realities of human expectation to the promises of divine blessing.

This in no way implies that guidance, or mission, or purpose, or answers will not come through a life of Faith—a life of God’s incarnation with us. It is nothing more or less than getting our priorities straight and putting first things first.

I believe that God created the universe, is omnipresent, is always with us, always seeking us, always wanting to be in relationship with us. As I read the Bible—the story of God’s attempts to relate to and lead a people—it is clear to me that most of the time the people just didn’t get it.

And while I am speaking of “not getting it,” this brings me back around to the time mentioned earlier when I went on a silent retreat—seeking answers to what I thought then were important life issues. I thought, as I entered into the time of silence, that answers would come. Like Solomon, I wanted God to provide a concrete plan of action—or at least a hint of direction.

I got my answer, and it was a complete shock. I realized that all of my life I had been an active participant in the life of the church, had accepted leadership positions, taught classes, preached sermons, went on mission trips, prayed, fasted, visited the sick…. I was very active in the business of the church.

I discovered at that retreat, that I was missing something primary—a deep and abiding relationship with God. Jesus was a hero, a servant, a role model. God was the architect of the universe. I believed in God and Jesus, I gave thanks and praise and worship, but in the final analysis I was not in a specific and personal relationship with them.

The answer that I got, important as those life decisions were, was this: until I accepted the living presence of God in me, understood God’s desire, through Jesus, to be in relationship with me, and began to develop that, then NOTHING ELSE MATTERED.

That is what most of the disciples did not get. That is why Jesus consistently, and insistently, implores the disciples to come directly to God through him.

T. S. Eliot, in his Four Quartets poem, talks about leaving home, going on life’s long journey of learning and experience only to come back home and experience it again for the first time.

John’s gospel today brings me back home—seeming yet again for the first time—and brings me back out of my head and my searching and reminds me of something fundamental, yet easily overlooked through the struggles of life.

This is why I can say, one more time, what I said as I child, and you, surely, must have said or sung it as well.

“Jesus loves me;
This I know;
For the Bible tells me so.”

Amen!