Do You Think My Life Is Getting Easier Or Longer?

Sermon-Year B 10 Pentecost-Proper 14-August 9, 2009
The Cloud of Unknowing, "O God, our great companion, lead us ever more deeply into the mystery of your life and ours, that we may be faithful interpreters of Life to each other, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen."
I hadn’t been at Trinity too long, back in the mid 80s. I was trying to get around and visit some of the older people of the parish who couldn’t get to church very often. So I call up this woman who is in her 90s and ask if I can visit. “Sure,” she says, “come on over anytime.” “Ok,” I answer, “I’ll be over later today- and I’ll bring communion with me.” There’s this long pause, then she says, “Why are you doing that-I’m not dying.” I splutter, and try to explain that communion isn’t just for those who are dying, but I can tell that I’m not making any headway. A few minutes later, her son who was in his 60s calls me up and wants to know where do I get off telling his mother that she’s going to die. A few months later I call up a different older woman who was a long time member of Trinity and ask if I can visit. She says “yes”, and with great trepidation I asked if she would like me to bring communion with me. “Hell yes!” she shouts into the phone, “what took you so long? Do you think my life is easy-or getting longer!?”
We have been reading every Sunday this year from the Gospel of Mark, but Mark is short. S o when Mark reaches the story about the feeding of the 5000 by Jesus, the only miracle story in all four gospels, the lectionary switches us to the Gospel of John for 5 weeks. In this gospel Jesus always explains what his miracles mean. So for 5 weeks after the feeding of the 5000 we have several verses, a whole chapter, of Jesus teaching. This teaching can be confusing-and difficult. Jesus wants people to understand that he doesn’t do magic tricks, that feeding a large group of hungry people isn’t his purpose. He has come into the world to save it. Each week Jesus engages a different set of people to help them understand. Two weeks ago it was a large crowd. Last week and this week it is “the Jews” (by which John the evangelist means the religious authorities). So Jesus is trying to make sense to them of who he is-and why he’s here.
It was not easy for “the Jews” to understand how he was the bread from heaven. It is not easy for us, and we have had 2000 years and are on the other side of the story. How is Jesus the Bread of Life and what does that mean?
I’m going to read a short piece by Brian Peterson, Professor of New TestamentLutheran Theological Southern Seminary Columbia, SC , about today’s gospel.
" A diet of bread, week after week, may get rather tiresome and stale – unless careful attention is paid to the movement of John 6. … In last Sunday's text, the center of attention was upon Jesus as the gift from the Father for the life of the world. Building on that claim, this Sunday's text focuses on Jesus as the center of faith to which the Father draws people. The movements within chapter 6 for these two Sundays, and for the one that will follow, are certainly interconnected, but they are not identical. Jesus is not simply repeating himself, and John is not writing in circles…. The crowd concludes that Jesus has not come from Heaven, because they know his parents. Familiarity is breeding contempt. One who has been among them cannot possibly be what Jesus claims to be. …The truth is not found in knowing the human parents who have nurtured Jesus' childhood. Rather, the truth is found in knowing that Jesus has come from the Father in Heaven. The crowd's self-assured "knowledge" stands in their way of seeing the truth. ….The only way out of such deadly unbelief is to be drawn into faith by the Father, and this activity of the Father is a major focus of today's text. …. Faith is not simply a human choice to be made, but is the activity of the Father drawing people to Jesus. The word used in verse 44 is the same word used to describe fishing nets being hauled into the boat (21:6). We must be dragged into faith by God; there is no other way to come. …. there is promise and hope in this text's declaration that God does in fact draw people to faith in Jesus. God is busy doing that right now ("the work of God", verse 28) through the words of Jesus read in this text ….Even to the grumblers, Jesus comes as the bread of life, opening our eyes and hearts to new possibilities. …..Jesus seems intent on making his claims as difficult and offensive as possible. As conversations go on and objections are raised, Jesus does not seem interested in making it easier to swallow. ….If the crowds have been offended by trying to reconcile Jesus' heavenly claims with Jesus' familiar parents, what will happen when they are faced with the brutal reality of the cross? The bread from Heaven will give life to the world, astonishingly, by dying for it. This bread of life from Heaven is no "free lunch;" it will cost Jesus his life. Feeding on this bread will bring us as well to the cross (12:32).”
This is not an easy teaching. One theologian called this “obnoxious discourse” and Jesus uses it often in John. It means that faith is not easy (we’re dragged into it!), understanding can be difficult, and following Jesus as the bread of life will be costly. Here is a story I found helpful.
At the foot of a great mountain in China lived a father and his three sons. They were a simple and loving family, whose great joy was sitting, eating a meal together and sharing their lives. The father noticed that travelers came from great distances eager to climb the dangerous mountain. But not one of the travelers ever returned. The three sons heard stories about the mountain, how it was made of gold and silver at the top. Despite their father’s warnings, they could not resist venturing up the mountain. Along the way, under a tree, sat a beggar, but the sons, ignoring him, did not speak to him or give him anything. One by one, the sons disappeared up the mountain, the first to a house of rich food. The second to a house of rich wine. The third to a house of gambling. Each became a slave to his desire, and forgot his home. Meanwhile, their father, more and more depressed at his sons’ absences, missed them terribly. “Danger aside, “ he thought, “I must risk everything and find my sons.”
As he climbed the mountain he reached the summit, he found indeed that the rocks were gold, and the rivers ran with silver. But he hardly noticed, so intent was he on recovering his sons. He only wanted to find them and help them remember the love they had once shared. On the way down the mountain having failed to discover them, the father encountered the beggar under a tree. He asked the beggar’s advice. “The mountain will give you your son’s back,” the beggar advised, “only if you can bring something from home that will cause them to remember their father’s love.” The father raced home, grabbed a bowl of rice. He returned up the mountain, and gave some to the beggar. He then found the three houses where his sons were living. Carefully he placed a single grain of rice in the mouth of each son. And as the rice touched each boy’s tongue, each son20realized how stupid he had been, how empty his life truly was, and that he wanted only to return to his father’s home. One by one the sons and the father walked down the mountain, and returned to their house.
The simple piece of bread that we receive each week in the Eucharist is but a taste of love, an invitation to come home, a reminder that a loving parent is waiting. These morsels we pass out at each service, are supposed to bring us to our senses. This is the Bread of heaven dragging us into faith-and keeping us there. This is both the reminder, and the reality, that Jesus is with us, and in us, as we move forward in faith. In the Catholic tradition, when someone is dying, communion is brought to them. It is called, the Viaticum. It is from the Latin, meaning, “bread for the journey”. Life is not easy. And it isn’t getting longer. And this small piece of heaven we receive each week, reminds us that we need bread for our journey, that we need Jesus in us, and with us as we move through life. Quite often we don’t understand, and even more often we are dragged into faith. But that is ok. The father is always climbing the mountain to find us. Amen.