Proper 13B, 4 August 2024. The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz
- 2 Samuell 11:26 -12:13a. There were two men in a certain city, one rich, and the other poor.
- Ephesians 4:1-16. Speaking the truth in love…promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love.
- John 6:24-35. I AM the bread of life..
O God of continual mercy, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth – come when it may and cost what it will.
I will confess to you that when I looked at the Gospel lesson for this Sunday, I wondered if I’d made a mistake starting my vacation tomorrow instead of last Thursday. John’s emphasis on believing and his assertion that whoever comes to Jesus will never be hungry or thirsty are teachings that are complicated for me. I don’t think they were intended to be stumbling blocks, but I find that they often are. So here goes! I’m stumbling forward.
Some of you will remember that last week I mentioned that I think the feeding narratives in the Gospels are the most important stories about the ministry of Jesus because of how often they are told. Whether memory or metaphor (both, I believe), they tell a powerful truth about Jesus’ ability to satisfy hunger for huge numbers of those who crowded around him. To further emphasize this, our lectionary assignments for today and the next three weeks are from the sixth chapter of John, which follows John’s version of the feeding of the multitudes: today begins four consecutive Gospel readings in which Jesus’ message is a variation of “I AM the bread.” “I am the bread. I am the bread that came down from heaven. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever.” I AM is the divine disclosure.
In How to Eat Bread Miranda Threlfall-Holmes reminds her reader that bread is one of the most basic foods, taking different forms around the world, and common in a wide range of cuisines. She notes that in the early days of the covid-19 pandemic, bread flour and yeast quickly became hard to find as many people found comfort in baking bread. Home-baked bread (with or without gluten) is comfort food and bread symbolizes provision and security. Daily bread is what Jesus taught us to pray for.
Without knowing the subtitle, you might think Threlfall-Holmes’ book is full of recipes for bread – bread with toppings, oils for dipping, sandwiches, dumplings, tostadas, croutons, stuffings, bread puddings, French toast! Segments of the Great British Baking Show might come to mind. But no, her book, How to Eat Bread, has this for a sub-title: 21 Nourishing Ways to Read the Bible! Threlfall-Holmes is an English priest who reminds (or teaches) that Holy Scripture has long been understood to be nourishing. Indeed, satisfying hunger is not just important for physical health and wellbeing. An empty belly or an empty soul can make us vulnerable to evil, either as a victim or as a perpetrator. The Torah teaches in Deuteronomy, that humans do not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Holy One. [1]
The prophet Jeremiah speaks to God, saying, “Your words were found and I ate them and your words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart because I am called by your name, O Lord God of Hosts.” [2] And the prophet Ezekiel receives this directive from the Divine: “’Son of man, eat this scroll and then go and speak to the House of Israel’…so I ate it and it tasted as sweet as honey in my mouth”, [3] In the book of Revelation in our Christian Testament, John the Divine hears God say, “Eat this scroll; it will make your stomach bitter but in your mouth it will be sweet as honey.” [4] That’s a somewhat less appealing invitation. That kind of scripture needs a digestive aid.
The kind of scripture that will make your stomach bitter is the story of King David’s horrendous behavior with Bathsheba and Uriah that we’ve heard in two parts, last week and this morning. To summarize last week’s portion, King David perpetrated sexual misconduct with Bathsheba. (He was the king, she was married to Uriah, one of David’s military leaders who was doing battle on his behalf). Uriah means “the Holy One is my light,” and Bathsheba means, “daughter of the oath or promise.” Holy and righteous names. When David learned that he had impregnated Bathsheba, he tried to cover up his crime by calling for Uriah to come home from the war and encouraging Uriah to sleep with his wife. But in spite of David’s conniving, Uriah wouldn’t be distracted from his military duties and so David had him killed (along with others).
Enter Nathan, the one whose name means “gift,” sent by God to David to tell him a story about outrageous misconduct of a rich person regarding the only lamb of a poor person. It’s a story that grabbed David’s attention. 2 Samuel tells us that David flew into a rage against the rich person, and said to Nathan, ‘As the Lord lives, the person who did this deserves to die! They shall pay for the lamb four times over, because they did such a thing and showed no pity.’” And Nathan said to David, “you are the person.” [5]
According to Threlfall-Holmes, this scene demonstrates that, it doesn’t matter that Nathan’s story is a metaphor because it’s powerfully true. What matters is how King David responds with anger to the injustice. And this passage from 2 Samuel is not a story being told for King David’s sake, you know. This story is being told for the reader or hearer’s (our) sake. We, too, should be appalled. We, too, should be angry at the injustice. The emotional power of the story is intended to move us toward acknowledgement of our own unjust behaviors and remind us of our own obligation to make reparations, not just restoring a lamb but four lambs to the person whose well-being has been stolen. Nathan was speaking the truth in love to David and Nathan is speaking the truth in love to us. The name David means beloved. And we too are beloved and we are called to behave as though this is true. We are on the path of eternal life whenever we are leading lives that are worthy of the callings to which we have been called, with humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love. And I want to remind you that eternal means timeless, not just an imagined unending future, but without beginning or ending, which includes now.
Speaking the truth in love, according to the letter to the Ephesians, is one of the essential nutrients that promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love. And that is what Jesus is communicating with his offerings of food for eating and food for thought in the Gospel of John. New Testament professor, James McGrath, teaches that the sixth chapter of John is in the form of a first-century Jewish homily about the Torah story of manna in the wilderness, of God’s provision of bread from heaven. The literal translation of the Hebrew word “manna” is “what is it?” It wasn’t as yummy as the Hebrew people wanted and they weren’t always sure it was even bread. But I digress. The homiletical leap John is making is asking the hearers to understand that Jesus is the bread sent from heaven. You probably remember that the Gospel of John begins with the poetry or hymn text about “in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God,” and then we learn from John the Evangelist that the Word became flesh and lived among us in the person of Jesus. Even if John’s audience was not accustomed to hearing synagogue homilies, although they probably were, they would have just heard the beginning of this Gospel. John the Evangelist is asserting again and again that Jesus is sent from God. McGrath points to the Kohelet Rabbah, the early Jewish commentary on the Book of Ecclesiastes that teaches that the “second Redeemer” (the first being Moses) will perform three signs: provision of manna or bread from heaven, the provision of living water, and riding on a donkey. [6]
In the Gospel passage Bob just read, the crowd asks Jesus, “what must we do to perform the works of God?” And the answer is, trust that Jesus is sent from God. Trust the Wisdom of Jesus’ life and love. It’s not an intellectual or academic exercise. “Believe in” means “into” or “toward” a place, time, purpose, or result. Believing means doing in the Gospel of John. When Jesus says, “I AM the bread of life,” have confidence that he speaks truth, and invites you to live into that truth with your own life and love. If you live into the truth of Jesus’ life and love, you will perform the works of God. Jesus says exactly that in chapter 14: “whoever trusts in me will do the works that I have been doing and they will do even greater things than these.” Believing in Jesus doesn’t mean thinking something, it means beloving others, living a life in humble service to others.
You know, the part of the Eucharistic Prayer that is called the fraction anthem happens when the bread is broken for distribution. (Sometimes anthems are set to music and sometimes the anthems are spoken) One of my favorite fraction anthems is when the priest says: “Behold who you are,” and the people respond, “May we become what we see.” It’s more traditional to respond “may we become what we receive,” but since receiving is so closely associated with eating the bread, and Emmanuel strives to include everyone, “seeing” seems more inclusive to me. Seeing is a form of receiving. The “seeing,” though isn’t just for people whose eyes work well – there are many ways of seeing. Believing is seeing. Beloving is seeing. Understanding is seeing. It’s not food for thought! It’s food for loving in visible, tangible ways. I want us all to understand that we are called to be the bread for the world – “bread that is taken, blessed, broken, and given,” so that we might become the means of grace and the vehicles of the eternal love. [7] That is eternal life, beloved. Behold who (and Whose) you are and become what you see.
- Deuteronomy 8:2-3.
- Jeremiah 15:16.
- Ezekiel 3:1-3..
- Revelation 10:9-10.
- The translation from The Tanakh from the Jewish Publication Society, 1985.
- James F. McGrath, “Food for Thought: The Bread of Life Discourses in Johanine Legitimation,” in Theological Gathering 2, Winter 1997. See http://private.fuller.edu/~talarm/iss2a4.html.
- Henri Nouwen, Life of the Beloved (New York: Crossroad Publishing), pp. 41-42.