10 Pentecost B/Ordinary 18/Proper 13 August 2, 2015
Luther Memorial Church Seattle, WA
The Rev. Julie G. Hutson
Exodus 16: 2-4, 9-15 + Psalm 78:23-29 + Ephesians 4: 1-16
John 6: 24-35
Break the bread of life open for us, you who are bread of heaven, broken for the life of the world. Amen.
If you were here last Sunday you heard me mention that Bruce and I moved into our new home this week. We downsized by more than half, which was a challenge in itself. But let’s face it, moving is never, ever easy. Because I’ve moved so often, I have a lot of moving stories….some pretty awful and some funny and one that is a seminal story in my life. But that’s for another day.
What I’ve found to be true every time I’ve moved is that it helps me to remember that I don’t need to have everything in place on the day we move in. Even though that would be my strong preference. My sweet mother in law called us on Thursday to wish us a happy first night in our new home and to offer this wise advice: “Don’t worry about unpacking everything at once”, she said, “Take some time to enjoy each day.” Wise advice no matter what we are doing.
In our reading from Exodus this morning the LORD speaks to Moses and says: “I am going to rain bread from heaven for you, and each day the people shall go out and gather enough for that day.” It’s helpful to remember what was going on with the Israelites….they were wandering in the wilderness, which is never a place you want to be left to wander, but in Scripture, the wilderness is the place where the hardest and best lessons are learned. Jesus’s entire ministry began with a time in the wilderness. So, here are the Israelites, in the wilderness, being led by Moses and Aaron, his brother. And they are tired and hungry and they begin to complain that they just wish they had died in Egypt, where they had been held captive. At least there, they note, they ate their fill of bread.
So God hears their complaining and tells Moses that God will provide for them enough bread for one day. For that day, specifically. Not for tomorrow and not for the next day, but for that day. And to prevent the Israelites from hoarding bread from day to day and eating the leftovers, God provides quail for their evening meal and in the morning a fine, flaky bread like substance. Enough to eat, meat and bread, for that day.
If we were paying close attention this morning, we noted that the psalm we read was a song written about that very event from the Exodus reading. The psalmist would have written this song much later than the story from Exodus. Just like we sing songs about historical events, (like the day the music died J ), so did the people of Jesus’ time. But what is more important than this is that this provision of meat and bread from the LORD was a well known story. The words of the Lord to Moses rang as song from the mouths of the Hebrew people: “I am going to rain bread from heaven for you, and each day the people shall go out and gather enough for that day.”
The Israelites learned a great lesson in the wilderness on that day. They learned to depend on God and to look only to the day at hand. But there’s something else in the story that I don’t want us to miss. The reading from Exodus says that God told Moses that God had heard the complaining of the Israelites.
And this is a great piece of what we hear over and over again in Scripture. The people of God trust God enough to offer to God their complaints. Not only their joys and not only their intercessions, but their complaints. The psalms are also full of the laments of the psalmist – complaints about enemies and life circumstances that are hard and people who have done the psalmist wrong. In our culture, and in our upbringing, we seem to have lost the capacity to complain to God. And I am not suggesting at all that God will magically rain down birds and bread when we complain, but I am saying that laying before God our complaints and our laments is a worthwhile part of our prayer lives. I am certain that God can take it; we have an entire Biblical canon to offer proof of that. But more than that, I am certain that we find ourselves dwelling with God in a fuller and more honest way when we offer both joy and sorrow…consolation and complaint.
This story of the complaining Israelites and the food from heaven becomes the story that the crowds following Jesus quote back to him in the Gospel reading from John today. When they ask how to perform the works of God, Jesus tells them that they only need to believe in him. And then, of course, they ask for a sign, so that they can believe him. In verse 30 they say: “What sign are you going to give us then, so that we may see it and believe you? What work are you performing? Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”
Jesus responds by telling them that the bread their ancestors ate was nothing compared to the bread from heaven, which gives life to the world, and so of course….that is the bread they want. “Sir, give us this bread always”, they implore, and Jesus says “I am the bread of life.”
Wow. Jesus is the bread of life, given by God, for the life of the world, he says. Not just for some and not just for people, but for the life of the entire world…..for trees and grass and birds and wild animals. Inherent in this statement is a call to creation care. Inherent in this statement is why we do everything from recycle to not illegally hunt down and kill one of the most majestic of all of the creatures. Jesus is not given for the life of Christians – the Church didn’t even exist at the time of John 6. And Jesus wasn’t given for the life of some people and not others. Or for the life of just people. Jesus was given for the life of the whole world.
Sisters and brothers, that understanding is a key point to interpreting this reading. What would it mean to us if every day we were to consider that we are given enough for this day and that the day is gifted to us to live with all that God has created as equal partners in the Kingdom of God?
I imagine that some days it would be hard….ok, most days it would be hard. Because the truth is there are a lot of things I can’t do. There are tasks and challenges and jobs in the work of the kingdom that I simply do not have the skills to do. But you do. We all have something we can accomplish, for this day. Paul wrote to the Ephesians that the gifts given were that “some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ…”
And this is the good news….we don’t have to do it all, but together, as the Body of Christ, we can do what God has called us to. And when it is hard and we feel as though we have wandered through the wilderness for far too long with empty bellies, our complaining to God is right. And when we imagine that we do not have what it takes for this one day, we feast on the bread of life….Jesus himself, sent to give life to the world. And life to us.
I want to close this morning with a prayer poem that I once found by an unknown author, several years ago. I keep it tucked in my Bible at the Sixth chapter of John. It sustains me on those days when my worry is more than one day’s worth and reminds me of the true bread of life. May it bless you:
When the journey is long
and we hunger and thirst,
Bread of Life, you sustain us.
When the road is hard
and our bodies weak
Bread of Life, you heal us.
When our spirits are low
and we can’t carry on
Bread of Life, you revive us.
When we offer our hand
in love and in service
Bread of life, you bless us.
When the challenge is great
and the workers are few
Bread of Life, you empower us.
When the victory is won
and we see your face
Bread of Life, you will rejoice with us!
Thanks be to God, Amen.