Year B Proper 14 2024 Getting Fed

 Year B Proper 14, 11 August 2024

St. James the Less Episcopal, Ashland, VA

“Getting Fed”

Collect: Grant to us, Lord, we pray, the spirit to think and do always those things that are right, that we, who cannot exist without you, may by you be enabled to live according to your will; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

John 6:35, 41-51

Jesus said, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”

Then the Jews began to complain about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” They were saying, “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” Jesus answered them, “Do not complain among yourselves. No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me; and I will raise that person up on the last day. It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me. Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father. Very truly, I tell you, whoever believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. 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.”

We need to eat to live. Consumption is necessary. But people need to get fed by more than food.

I have had the good fortune to travel, and one of the great joys of wandering around on this wonderful world of ours is all the amazing and different foods I have encountered along the way.

Before we left Costa Rica I had a whole Red Snapper that had been caught that morning. That was a good meal.

Or the Wiener Schnitzel my German exchange family mom makes with the Jaeger mushroom gravy. So good.

It does not have to be fancy to stand out though. Sometimes the context and the company takes something so simple and makes it extraordinary. 

When the kids were small we went to a fantastic progressive Christian conference that still goes on called the Wild Goose Festival. Now the year we went it rained pretty much most of every day. And most of every night. By the 4th and final day we were drenched, sleep deprived from the puddles our sleeping bags tried to avoid, and we were, in a word, miserable. 

We had gone with another family from St. Thomas in Richmond’s Ginter Park neighborhood where I was serving at the time. And we were at our final meal on our final miserable day. It was pouring that night and we put the camp stove in the middle of our 10 by 10 pavilion and stood around it to avoid the cats and dogs of the rain coming down. 8 of us huddled, hungry, and waiting.

Because it was our last day I had planned on making something that took little to no refrigeration because our ice was all but gone in our cooler. So I had planned on quesadillas done on the griddle and a roasted red pepper soup. Tortillas and grated cheese would not go bad, and the soup was “heat and serve” from brick boxes we had gotten at Costco.  But I tell you, that meal was one of the best meals I have ever eaten. 

When my oldest was commissioned before his year at Liverpool Cathedral at the diocesan offices last summer, the preacher (who happened to be in the other family that went) invoked that meal as one of the best she has ever eaten, too. 

Was it the food? I was the cook and I can tell you, no, probably not. But it was the attitude. We were so thankful, and so grateful, and we knew that once we ate this and slept we could go home and get dry after the 8 hour drive. But it was also the company, our co-commiserators who were suffering, and laughing, and eating till it was all gone together.

Food is about the attitude. Food is about the company. Food is about the love and care taken to make and serve it. And it is about the food, too. It is the same for life. It is the same for church. It is like how we take a little bread and a little wine, and make it the Great Thanksgiving. The best meals and the best food is greater than the sum of its parts. Jesus was like that, too, in today’s Gospel reading. 

But we need to start long before Jesus said what he said to fully get what he said. We need to go back to the Exodus, and God’s people wandering through the wilderness. We need to be reminded how the people of God had to rely on him in the arid and rocky places for a whole generation. God provided for them, day in and out with manna from heaven. That idea of God feeding us is the foundation of our reading today.

At the Feeding of the 5,000, Jesus had to run because they wanted him to be king so he could feed them, their bodies and they could escape their mortal worries of providing for themselves. But God did not send Jesus to make us babies that have to have their needs met, but for us to be fully grown and mature in our lives and in our faith. God sent Jesus to make us sisters and brothers of him, not infants or sycophants. While our physical selves need to be fed, so do our spiritual selves. And our souls need to be fed with spiritual food. Or should I say Soul Food? Anyway, and that is why Jesus came. To show us how to live, but even more, how to thrive. He told us, “I have come that you might have life, and have it abundantly!” (John 10:10b) What we do here today and every day of our lives echoes through eternity. We are preparing for our eternal home, but that is not the focus. We are preparing, but while here our focus needs to be here. We need to be fed so that we can do what God would have us do to care and nurture our sisters and brothers, and point them heavenward.

When Jesus went home to Nazareth, they asked him to read from the Scriptures. He chose the scroll of the Nevi’im, the Prophets. He read from the prophet Isaiah, Jesus said clearly what he was, and I believe we are, to be about.

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,

    because he has anointed me

        to bring good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives

    and recovery of sight to the blind,

        to set free those who are oppressed,

to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (Luke 4:16-19)

Jesus came to feed us with the food we need. To the poor, good news. To the captives, release. To the blind, sight. To the oppressed, freedom. And to all of us, the time has come for God’s Way to rule. 

This idea of bread is universal. It comes in so many forms, rolls, slices, tortillas, and pitas. Flatbreads, cornbreads, buns, steamed and cinnamon, and shortbread. Whatever your culture, whatever your bread, Jesus is the Bread of Life. 

I have spoken of this before.  Manna means “What is it?” Whatzit would be an apt translation. Jesus is much the same way. Who do you say that I am? Jesus is a Whatzit until you name him for what he is, or is not, to you.

Today I begin a journey, and I am pretty excited about it. I have wanted to start this journey for over 10 years now, and I never thought that I would ever really get a chance to do it. And then God said, “Ha!” Here you go.

I have always been a planner and schemer. I try not to go into meetings without knowing the probable outcome. But the lesson of the first part of sabbatical was about letting go. And letting go took me months. One of the biggest things that I am trying to do with my walk across Spain is to be ready and open to what God has in store. I, for once, have no expected outcome.

I hope to be like the paralyzed man lowered through the ceiling by his friends. They wanted Jesus to heal him. He wanted Jesus to heal him. But before that, Jesus gave him what he really needed. “Friend, your sins are forgiven.” That is not what he wanted but what he needed. Some churchy types got upset, “Who is he to forgive sins?!?! Only God can forgive sins!” Jesus heard them, or knew what they were thinking. And said, “‘Why do you raise such questions in your hearts? Which is easier, to say, “Your sins are forgiven you”, or to say, “Stand up and walk”? But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins’—he said to the one who was paralyzed—‘I say to you, stand up and take your bed and go to your home.” (from Luke 5:17-39)

That is what I am seeking on my journey. I want to meet Jesus in his authority. I want him to give me what I need. And maybe I might get those things I want, too. I trust Jesus to do what is right and good and true.

While I have the luxury of getting to get away and take my pilgrimage, we all can meet Jesus where we are and how we are. He wants it. I trust you want it, or why are you here?

As the Rolling Stones have been singing to us for 6 decades:

You can't always get what you want

But if you try sometimes, well, you might find

You get what you need

We have a God of Abundance. We have Jesus who came so we could live in that abundance. Recognize that today! Really believe today! Live into it today, and forever! Amen