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Sermon for August 2, 2009
Pastor Sara Kay Olson-Smith
Ninth Sunday after Pentecost
Texts: Exodus 16:2-4, 9-15; Psalm 78: 23-29; Ephesians 4: 1-161; John 6:24-35
Grace to you and peace, from God our Creator and from Christ Jesus who is our bread of life.
As I was reading the New York Times online on Thursday morning I read a book review about a new memoir. Because the woman told the story about her life, you’d expect it to be dramatic one, or at least she would have some grand adventure which brought her to some wisdom or epiphany, like the woman who spent a year in Tuscany and was renewed, or another who traveled through India and Thailand and Italy, or others who found themselves in Provence. This woman, Melanie Gideon, however, wrote a memoir of trying to find this same kind of enlightenment and wisdom in her daily life. She said in the interview, “Sometimes you have to leave the country to jar yourself awake, and sometimes you have to just go more deeply into your own life.”
While the book got a not-so-good review by the New York Times, it made me think about this gospel reading. Her memoir, which tells of her journey to pay more attention to her daily life, to find the joy and promise of each day, carpooling and cooking and working, seems to have a particularly Christian way of looking at things. While I have no idea what her faith convictions may be, this way of seeking insight from the ordinary and dailyness is part of what Jesus talks about in his long bread of life sermon.
As our gospel continues from last week’s feeding of the 5000, the people continue to seek Jesus out, coming to and fro to find him, hoping to experience another miraculous moment, to see something amazing, and maybe be able to perform some amazing works themselves. However, Jesus continues to point them away from the amazing signs to God and God alone. It is not about being able to do amazing things, but about believing. It is not about Moses’ incredible acts which gave the manna, but about the daily ways that God fed the people in the wilderness. It is not even about Jesus’ amazing acts, but about the way that he, in his living, and dying and resurrection, daily feeds us and nourishes us, and points us always to God. Jesus calls himself the bread of life, bread - the simplest and most important thing to survive. In those days over 70% of peoples’ diet was from grain, from bread. Every day they needed bread. Every day they had it. Every day they were nourished by it. And so Jesus, in calling himself the bread of life, invites those gathered to depend on him in the midst of their daily, ordinary lives.
Jesus – the bread of life – is bringing these people into daily relationship with him, to depend on him just as they depend on their bread each day, to encounter Jesus just as they do their daily meals. For Jesus, it’s not necessarily about some incredible experience that changed everything, some “mountaintop moment” as they say, but about every day, being nourished, filled and fulfilled by Jesus - our daily bread, our living bread, our manna which sustains us for the journey.
Every day God showers upon us God’s goodness, like manna, and nourishes us with bread that will truly fill us. The problem, however, is that it is often hard to see this. The Spirit blows in often subtle and difficult ways, seldom do we wake up with manna lying on our front lawn. We sort of have to practice paying attention, looking and expecting to find it. The word manna, in Hebrew means, “What is it?” In our lives, we, too, can live this sort of “What is it?” way of living, to pay attention to God’s work in our lives.
One way to begin to pay attention to God’s work in our lives is a simple Ignatian prayer practice called the examen. It’s very simple. At the end of the day, by yourselves or as a family, prayerfully ask these two questions, in one form or another, “For what, today, am I most thankful?” and “For what am I least thankful?” Or maybe another way to ask it is “When, today, did I feel most alive?” and “When did I feel least alive?” Or maybe, “What were my highs and lows from today?” These purposeful questions lead us to see the ways that God is moving in our lives, active and guiding us. We also can see the ways that we turn away or move apart from God. Often our moments of gratitude and life point us to the gifts that God has given to us, as we heard about in Ephesians. These moments are those when we felt most fulfilled and alive, when we tasted the daily bread of heaven. The hope of doing this daily practice, for all of us from the youngest to the oldest, is that, as we examine our lives, we see patterns in the way that God is working in them, nourishing and feeding us. So we start to do those things which feed us and fulfill us more and to let go of those things which kill us and which keep us from living out as followers of Jesus.
So often we lead our lives doing things that we hope will satisfy us. We buy things and spend our time seeking to be fulfilled. Most of the time, the cost of these things, to our souls and our pocketbooks, and to the livelihoods of countless people who we know and who we will never know, is enormous. This is the bread that perishes. Jesus, instead, calls us to him, to a relationship with him where we will find true fulfillment, in whom we will know true satisfaction. This is the bread that endures. The practice of praying the examen, or other practices of faith (worship, bible study and prayer), help us to pay attention to those times in our day to day lives. It helps us to taste and experience the joy and fulfillment of God. Manna still comes to us. Jesus still works in our lives to feed us and nourish us and remind us of our gifts which bring us, and this world, life and fulfillment.
Like the people in our readings, it is so easy to look back and remember those times that were so good, when God was doing so much and so present. The Israelites dreamt of the meat pots of Egypt and the people with Jesus remembered the time long ago when God brought Manna. We all have those memories of God raining down God’s goodness upon us, when the pews were filled, or when our faith was unshakable. The promise we know is that Jesus is still our bread of life and still feeding us. God is still working in our lives, still raining God’s goodness upon us, still calling us to depend on God, still using us and our gifts, still feeding us, still growing the church, day to day, moment to moment, not just in Provence or down the shore, but here in our daily lives and work and rest. God is still up to the same stuff, feeding and fulfilling God’s people, day to day. Jesus, still says to us, “Do not work for food that perishes, but for the food that endures. I am the bread of life.”
We search all over, scour through catalogs and web sites and travel guides and books, hoping to find something that will satisfy us, that will fill us, hoping to find the thing that will bring us life and joy, but it’s right here in front of us. Daily, God is working in our lives, loving and supporting and guiding us. Daily, Jesus is calling us to depend on him. Here, right here, we receive what we are looking for - the bread of life. Around this table we receive the only thing we really need - Jesus, who brings forgiveness and grace and life- eternal and abundant. We also receive a purpose, to go out to live as bread for the world, to do and be the things that truly fulfill us, and fill the world. We don’t have to search anywhere else. All we need is here - Jesus, the bread of life. Whoever comes to him will never be hungry.
Thanks be to God.
Amen.
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