John 6: 24–35
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Lord, may we hear your voice in the words spoken in your name. Amen.
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It’s the morning after Jesus fed the 5,000 on the
hillside — with just a couple of loaves of bread and two
fish. The picnic is over and Jesus has taken his disciples to
the other side of the Sea of Galilee. But the crowds of people
who enjoyed that meal – and then tried to turn him into their
king – are not about to let Jesus go. For if he can provide
them with food like that, then who knows what else he might be able
to do? He might be able to give them shelter and
clothing. Maybe he could protect them from their enemies. Why,
he might be able to protect them from all the uncertainties of their
lives. So they pile into boats lined up at the shore and row to the
other side of the sea, to Capernaum – where they finally locate him.
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When they find him they reveal — by the questions they pose to
him — their sense that he now owes them
something. “Rabbi,” they say, somewhat querulously,
“When did you get here? How did you come
here?” In other words, “Where have you
been? We’ve been looking for you all over the
place.” You see, they have made the leap from perceiving that
Jesus might prove useful to them to the sense that he must
now provide for them what they want.
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Jesus hears that note of reproach in their voices and calls them out
on it. For he knows he has not come to supply what they
want. He has been sent by God to supply what they need. And
what they need is not perishable food. . . so
much as spiritual food. But they do not realize that, not yet
anyway. So he tells them directly.
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“You do not seek me because you saw signs of the Kingdom,”
he tells them, “but because I fed your hungry stomachs.
Don’t work for the food that perishes. Work for the food
that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to
you. For it is on him that God the Father has set his seal.”
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What he is doing here is challenging them to see through the physical
loaves they received the day before to the true bread beyond – the
Bread of Life that only God can give. True, he is the source of
both earthly and heavenly bread. And yes, God the Father has sent
him for their benefit. But in this moment he sees that they are
much more interested in full stomachs than they are in fulfilled
lives. And he’s not willing to leave them in that
short–sighted condition.
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And, of course, the crowd standing in front of him in that moment is not
the only crowd he’s interested in speaking to. We also need
to hear what he is saying. And we have a little more understanding
than this crowd has, because we realize that the feeding of the 5,000
the day before was a miraculous feeding. Most of the people in
that huge crowd didn’t see that. Only Jesus’ disciples
saw that a lavish meal for 5,000 had come from blessing two fish and
five loaves of bread. And since we do realize
that . . . we can appreciate
Jesus’ patience with the crowd as they get it wrong time and
time again.
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And, Lord knows, this crowd does try Jesus’ patience. For
when they respond to his rebuke, his correction, though they do begin
to speak to him with more respect, they are still focused on
themselves, on what they can do to satisfy what God requires.
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“What must we do,” they ask, “to perform the works
of God?”
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Ever so patiently, Jesus explains, in yet another answer that leads
them beyond their own understanding.
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“It’s not, entirely, about what you do,” he tells
them. It’s about what God is already doing. You simply
have to believe – and believe in the One he has sent.”
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Once again, Jesus’ response to the crowd leads them — and
us too — into deep theological waters. For how many of us
have tried following Jesus faithfully, in a regular prayer life,
regular church attendance and occasional Bible reading — only to
realize one day that – somehow — we have lost our
way. We’’ve missed him. We can’t remember the
last time we felt truly close to him. And yet, as far as we can
understand, we’ve done all the right things. That’s
exactly what the crowd in front of Jesus in our passage today is
asking. “What must we do to satisfy God’s
requirements?”
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In their effort to understand, they begin to relate the kind of sign
they saw Jesus perform the day before on the hillside to the sign of
Moses giving the Children of Israel manna in the wilderness. Maybe
standing on this familiar Biblical ground will help them find their
way again.
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But once again they are getting it wrong, and once again Jesus corrects
them. “Moses didn’t give you and your ancestors that bread
in the wilderness,” he tells them. “God gave them
that bread, the true bread from heaven. And it’s this
bread – that he gives to me to pass along to you — that
will feed the whole world.”
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Finally, the Word of God has broken through to them, and they get it,
if only for a moment. “Sir, give us this bread
always,” they say. And Jesus replies, “I am the bread
of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever
believes in me will never be thirsty.”
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Now, at this point I want to thank you for your patience as you have
followed me through the twists and turns of this convoluted
dialogue. But that’s what John does, all the way through his
Gospel account. Again and again he takes the crowd’s
incomprehension and constructs a dialogue with Jesus from it. And
certainly, all those verbal twists and turns can be hard to follow.
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But we follow along because deep within we too have a hunger for
him. Saint Augustine put it this way. “Lord, you have made
us for yourself. And our hearts are restless until they find their
rest in thee.” Somehow, in the dialogues of John’s Gospel, we
encounter Jesus. We feed on him. And our hearts are satisfied.
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We don’t always understand what he says, logically and
intellectually. But that’s not as important as his effect
on our hearts. Faith is more than clarity about facts or
intellectual belief in a set of propositions. Faith means
encountering a person who describes himself as “the way, the
truth and the life.” [14:6] And
somehow, in those encounters, we ourselves are transformed.
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A couple of years ago, when I was visiting our granddaughters in
Chicago, I read C. S. Lewis’ fable, The Lion, the Witch
and the Wardrobe to them in one single three–day
weekend. You probably know the book – in which Aslan, the
lion, is a stand–in for Almighty God and the White Witch takes
the part of all that is evil, all that opposes God. We were able
to get through the whole book that quickly because Francesca, who
was eight at the time, and Eliza, who was five, just loved it. They
couldn’t get enough of it. With shining eyes, Francesca
declared, “Nana, this is the best book I’ve ever
read.” And then, when we had finished it, and Aslan and his
forces had won all the battles against the White Witch, Francesca was
quiet for a while.
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Finally, she said cautiously, “Nana, is it true? Is
there really a place like Narnia? I mean, does it really
exist?”
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I hesitated for just a second. And then I said, “Yes. It
is true. There is such a place and there is someone like
Aslan. And one day you will find out more about him.”
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Amen.
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