The Lord's Prayer

"The Bread That I Give" given August 12

The day after the feeding of the multitudes, the crowd found Jesus again. “Feed us again!” They asked. “Feed us, like Moses fed our ancestors in the desert, and we'll believe in you.” They were looking for sardine sandwiches—bread that would fill their bellies

 But Jesus offered them something else. He told them that He was the Bread of Life, He was Bread that would satisfy their inner-most cravings. But they didn't get it. They were looking for bread made of flour and water and leaven. Jesus went and got all symbolic and spiritual on them. 
 Presbyterian pastor Ted Wardlaw once told of the day a slicked-up church supply salesman in a three-piece suit came to this office to try and sell him some Bible games for the youth group. The top of the line game was called "Dollars and Sense." It was a board game, much like Monopoly, and the salesman said it was great at teaching children about "Christian economics." The way it worked was, if the players landed on a square labeled "college graduate," they received a certain sum of money, and if they landed on the square named "middle level executive," they received a greater sum of money. But if they were lucky enough to land on the square labeled "company president," they would get a very large sum indeed. 
 Regardless of the amount of money they received, however, if they gave 10 percent to the "church" square on the board (and here's the alleged lesson in Christian economics), they would reap a bonanza should they land on the "showers of blessings square," being showered in this case with all the money in the game's jackpot. 
 Wardlaw was, to say the least, not impressed. "I think that's a crass lesson to teach a child," he said to the salesman, "that the word 'blessings' is so easily associated with the word 'jackpot.'" 
 The salesman did not flinch. Looking Wardlaw straight in the eye, he said, "Yes, Reverend, but isn't that the way the world works?" 

 Yes, I suppose it is the way the world works. "I'm hungry for a blessing," we say when what we really want is a jackpot. Blessings come as a sign of grace. They are gifts that deepen and enrich our humanity. Jackpots come as a sign of luck, windfalls that give us more of what most people are after - fame, power, fortune. 
 A child in an urban school in Jolliet or Aurora has a passionate and caring teacher and receives a blessing. A high roller in the riverboat casino located in the same town, comes up big at the roulette table and receives a jackpot. Sadly, given the choice, many of us would happily trade the passion of learning for a few lucky strikes at the roulette wheel. "Yes, Reverend, but isn't that the way the world works?" 
 This preference for jackpots over blessings is easy to spot, of course, when it comes at us full force and undisguised. The picture of Wall Street financiers working leveraged buyouts of companies whose employees they neither know nor care about, simply to line their pockets with more cash, is easy to decipher. They may say, "Being in the right place at the right time to find this opportunity was a real blessing." But it is no blessing; it's a jackpot, pure and simple. 
 Despite the fact that no one has ever confessed on his deathbed, "I wish I had worked harder on weekends, stayed more evenings at the office, spent less time with my children, poured more of myself into the pursuit of my career," the fact is that countless of us do those things, hustling at warp speed right past life's blessings on our way to some elusive jackpot. "Yes, Reverend, that's the way the world works," and it's fairly easy to spot. 
 However, it is more difficult to tell the difference between the hunger for a blessing and the lust for a jackpot when it takes a religious form. Take, for example, the crowds, described in John 6, who had been fed by Jesus on the mountainside and who followed him eagerly all the way to Capernaum. At first, we are impressed by their spiritual earnestness. They want to be near Jesus, we say. They thirst for his teaching. They long to deepen their encounter with God. In short, the crowd clearly seems hungry for a blessing. 
 Actually, no. Jesus discerns their true motive and calls it as he sees it. "You are not looking for me because of the signs of God's presence," He says. "You're looking for me because you got well fed on the mountain." They weren't after a blessing at all, but a jackpot. 
 Now, we must be careful here - this is not a simplistic story. This is not the crass account of people who got their bellies filled but who cared nothing for the life of faith, of people who came to church for the potluck supper and not the preaching, who showed up in the sanctuary to make business contacts rather than to sing praises. Not at all. This crowd believes that it is following Jesus for good and true religious reasons. After all, when they had been fed on the mountain, they said of Jesus with one voice, "This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world" (Jn 6:14). 
 So why is it that Jesus challenges their motives? In the first place, Jesus perceives that the crowd is following him because he can make their lives better, but on their terms and in their categories. Jesus wants to give them life; they want an improved lifestyle. "Yes, Reverend, that's the way the world works,"
 Bishop William Willimon writes:
 Many years ago, when I was just beginning my ministry, I managed to save a few dollars from my first paycheck and decided that the wise thing to do was to invest it in the stock market. Inexperienced in such matters, I simply walked into the local Merrill Lynch office and told the receptionist that I was there to make an investment. Quickly sizing me up as a small account, she shuttled me off to the greenest broker in the place. Evidently, he had been trained to make a little small-talk at the beginning with a client, so he asked me what I did for a living. 
 "I'm a minister," Willimon said, "pastor of a church." 
 The young stock broker turned a bit pale. "Give me a lawyer, a dentist, a life insurance agent, anything but a minister," he seemed to be thinking. "What can you say to a minister?" Finally, and with some relief, he thought of something. "I read the Bible when the market's down," he announced triumphantly. 

 Now there it is - the confusion of a blessing and a jackpot. This broker no doubt thought he was doing a righteous thing, reading the Bible when the Dow dropped. But the presumption was that religion's task - or worse, God's job - is to make his life better, to hold him together when the market faltered, or even to turn the bears into bulls. We do the same thing when we assume that God's role is to make the life that we have designed and planned work out smoothly.  "Yes, Reverend, that's the way the world works,"
  "O God," we say, "I have these plans. Make them work." That's not a blessing, but a jackpot. Jesus is not a short-order cook preparing food to suit our whims. He offers not the "food that perishes," but the "food that endures for eternal life" (Jn 6:27). 
 The "food that endures for eternal life" is, of course, Jesus himself. "I am the bread of life," he tells the crowd (Jn 6:35). This is not perishable bread that feeds a passing whim, but the nourishment of God that feeds our souls. 
 This is not bread that we are supposed to knead and bake, as if we could. This is bread that God gives us as a gift. When the crowd, continuing to be confused, asked Jesus, "What must we do to perform the works of God?" (Jn 6:28), He said in effect, "You cannot 'perform' the work of God. It will transform you, but you cannot perform it. God performs the work of God. You are to believe it, receive it, and live it." 
 Faith in Jesus is not something to be measured or calculated. It isn’t an algebraic equation with so many miracles equaling so much of a savior. It isn’t a matter of knowing Jesus’ parents or discovering his historic identity. Faith is trusting in the poetry that says Jesus is more than you can wrap your mind around. He is Word that can never be fully spoken. He is bread that will not much feed your body, but will eternally nourish your soul. 
 So what Jesus was offering the crowd was much more than filet-o-fish sandwiches. It was more than even the Sacrament of Bread and Cup that we cherish so much. It was what the Bread and Cup symbolize and can convey to us. It was a relationship with Him. He was calling them—and us to a radically different attitude, a radically different way of living and being in this world. It was—and is a life lived for others, turned around and lived in a totally new direction, a new version of human existence.
 He called them—as He calls us today to a life lived without violence, a life filled with love, a life lived always with respect, a life of generosity, of compassion,  of surrender that mysteriously becomes total freedom. A life of vision, a life of poetry if you will. It is, unfortunately a life that is all too rare in our broken world.
 I wonder if you've ever heard the expression that something or other is “bread and butter to me”? By that expression I think we mean that something is so familiar, so much a part of who we are that it literally becomes second nature to us. Maybe that's a way of decoding some of Jesus' poetry that day. 
 Take me as the bread of your life. Take me as bread in your life. Take me as the bread God sends to you from heaven.  Take my life as your example for living. Take my teachings as your underlying principles for living. Take me as your foundation. Take me as your bread and butter. Have faith in me and my words.
 Faith takes vision-- imagination. It takes a heart that is open to see what the mind cannot.  That kind of seeing—seeing with the heart and not with the mind is something that adults grow out of. But children can teach us how to see things that don’t appear to be there. “Do you want a cookie, Grandma? Here you go. I made them myself. And how about a glass of milk? Don’t they taste just yummy?”
  Imagination. That’s what faith is all about. A torn off piece of bread hand dipped into grape juice becomes the Bread of Heaven and the Cup of Salvation. It takes imagination, but in faith, Christ is truly there.
 I am the bread of life,” Jesus said. If this is true, what does it mean? It means that your soul will never be fully satisfied with the things that fill your belly. No food, no loved one, no job, no wealth, no success, no fulfillment, will satisfy a lover of poetry. 
 The open heart will understand when Jesus says that he is the Good Shepherd, the Vine, the door of the sheepfold, the Way, the Truth, and the Life. The open heart will be moved by a world in need because it sees beyond the surface. It sees the face of Jesus in every person who is poor or ill, is naked or in prison. The open heart will be moved and transformed by the message of the poet. 

There are times, of course, when even the person of faith loses his or her vision. To live in the world means to be bombarded by its calculating ways. These hits take their toll and weary the imagination. At such times, faith can seem distant and impractical. These are the times when we rely again on the poetic power of Jesus’ unrealistic words. In a way that defies observation and cannot be measured like sugar content or calories, ordinary bread and grape juice become for us the Bread of Life

Neither the sacrament of Bread and Cup nor the Bread of life relationship will fill your belly. But they will fill our spirits, and our lives. Through our faith, our relationship with Jesus will provide nourishment for the soul and strength for the imagination. The unreal becomes real; the metaphor becomes a meal; the meal reminds and points to and strengthens the relationship.

In this discourse, Jesus is talking about about bread given, more than bread eaten. He reminds us that the bread that He gives comes down from heaven as a gift. All bread, when you think about it, "comes down from heaven." All bread is a gift of God, of God's rain, sun, and soil. Our relationship to Christ is utterly dependent upon Christ.

And, in today's gospel, Christ Jesus promises to give us what we need to fill our hearts, to empower and strengthen us for life's battles, to keep us going on in faith through the challenges, the victories, even the defeats.

 A preacher was conducting a workshop in a little church on the meaning of the sacraments. They had discussed baptism and its meaning. Now they were working on the Lord's Supper.  The pastor had told them that a sacrament is something, some experience from everyday life that is lifted up, in the context of worship, and thereby sanctified, given sacred significance because of its use in worship. But that sounded too sanctimonious, too abstract. So he asked them, "What is the most memorable meal you ever ate?"
 They told of memories of meals in fancy French restaurants in Toronto, of a great little bistro they discovered on a trip to San Francisco, of an elaborate ten-course extravaganza in an expensive hotel in New York. Then one man said, 
 "The best meal I ever had was in World War II, the morning after a night of terrible battle. I staggered up over a hill and saw a woman from the Red Cross in a little trailer in a muddy field. I staggered through the muck to her trailer. She was handing out stale doughnuts and cold coffee. When she handed me mine, she smiled. After the night I had suffered, in that place, at that time, I'd have to say that was about the best meal I ever had."
 Jesus says, "I am bread. I am bread come down from heaven to nourish you forever." I believe in such bread. Come to him and be fed forever. Amen.

"Speaking the Truth in Love" given August 5

Have you heard the story of the young Pastor's first sermon in a new church? This Pastor was newly ordained. Since it was his first sermon, he wanted badly to impress the congregation with what a good preacher he was, and with the outstanding moral standards he preached.

This young preacher had been given to understand by his predecessor that his new congregation were not above expressing themselves during worship with a "Amen" now and then. So he figured, what the hey, he'd go for broke-- try for some "Hallelujahs". So he worked harder on this sermon than he ever had on any of the ones he'd written in seminary. The first Sunday came. After his introduction, he began to preach. It seemed to be going allright, and then he came to his first point.

"All of those people in this town who hang out down at the corner bar are sinners, and going to go to hell."

"Hallelujah!" came a chorus from the congregation. Hey, that was all right. He liked getting an "Amen." So he thought he'd try for another one.

"And I know that while very few of you may hang out in the bars, some of you are not above tipping the bottle at home every day. And those of you who do that are no better than any of those sinners, even though you do go to church."

"Amen!" Came the chorus. It seemed to him this was a little weaker than that first Hallelujah. But he might have been mistaken, so the new preacher plodded on.

"And all of those of you who covet their neighbor's spouse and sneak around cheating on your own spouse are sinners, and you're going to go straight to hell. Do not pass go, do not collect $200."

"Amen." There were distinctly fewer voices this time. Since he was new in ministry, he was too inexperienced to preach off the cuff, or to vary from his text.

"And all you who smoke that devil's weed, those cigarettes, and pipes and cigars, you're just getting your mouths set for the smoke you're gonna be breathing in hell!"

"That's right, preacher." Came even fewer voices. He couldn't help notice though, one elderly sister down in front enthusiastically leading the chorus of affirmation. Not knowing what else to do, he continued.

"And all of you women who wear that sinful lipstick and rouge, you're going to hell too!"

"Uh huh!" There were very few women's voices that time. But he noticed that his cheerleader was right there, leading those in agreement. “Amen!” she said.

"And all of you people who gossip and backstab and tell tales about neighbors are headed for perdition!"

"Yes sir." Only four or five people responded. But he could still hear the voice of that sister down front. “Amen!”

"And all of you who gamble on those horses and play that sinful bingo at the church down the street are going to hell."

"Amen!" Came the thin voice of that single elderly woman.

"And all of you who chaw on that nasty old tobacco, you're going to hell."

In the silence that ensued he could hear his last supporter turn to her neighbor and comment aloud,

"Now he's quit preachin' and started in to meddlin'."

That young man didn't know how to get his point across. But the prophet Nathan knew how. In this morning's OT Reading, we see him sneak up on his erring King. Before David is aware of what's happened, Nathan has zapped him.

The Apostle Paul calls it "speaking the truth in love." Whatever we call it, the fact is that poor old David doesn't even get a chance to claim that Nathan has started in to meddlin'.

"The man who did this thing surely deserves to die", says the King in a straight line that's too good to ignore.

"You are the man!" Ouch! Down through the ages, many commentators have objected to the historicity of this story. And certainly, as a piece of literature, Nathan’s parable is no great shakes. How could a sharp operator like David have been so dumb as to not see where Nathan was going with his parable? It does after all, seem like a pretty obvious parallel between the wealthy man in the parable who stole his neighbor's only sheep, and the King who stole his servant's wife.

But it was indeed the custom for the King to hear cases brought to him for judgement. David had no reason to believe this was not such a case. And we need to recall the power of parables as well. Especially if we don't know we're hearing one, they can slip in on us and crawl in between the cracks of our minds' o-so-carefully-crafted mental defenses. They lure us into agreement, after agreement, and then, "gotcha"--

"You are the man" proclaims God's messenger. And our eyes are opened. And we find ourselves convicted of our own sin. And we find that we have been convicted by our own agreement, our own words, our own consciences.

It was no accident that Jesus used parables so much. Like a joke, they depend on common understandings of reality. They depend on a shared agreement as to what is right and wrong and funny and tragic. But in this context, parables also depend upon a shared faith, a shared experience of what it is to worship God and a shared understanding of what it is that God expects from us.

The irony then, is that in order for the king to be surprised and caught by the prophet's parable, he must first of all be formed and converted by the prophet's God. The irony is, that in order for us to hear the truth of God spoken in love, we must share that common faith as well.

The other reason that Nathan's parable struck King David so close to home was David's own moral and spiritual blindness. Granted, he had committed adultery with Bathsheeba. But David had tried to make it right! It wasn't his fault Uriah had gummed up the works by refusing to sleep with his wife on his weekend furlough! David had no choice! If he hadn't acted to protect her, Bathsheeba could have been convicted and stoned as an adulteress! It was too bad for Uriah, but it had to be done.

David's not so different from us. We're blind too. We're all whizzes when it comes to rationalization and justification. We're great at fooling ourselves that our sin "didn't really hurt anyone", or "turned out for the best", or that "it would have turned out that way anyhow". We're great, like David, at turning a blind eye to our own short-comings, or to those of our friends and families while being ready to condemn someone else.

"C'mon Terri. You'll do it if you love me. No one'll ever know. Nothing's gonna happen."--- "How do I know it's my baby?" "I'm sorry, honey. I swear, I'll never hit you again. It's just that I love so much." But the truth is, you are the man, you are the abuser.

"No you can't have them over. I just cleaned the house. Go over to one of your friend's. Besides, I'm talking on the phone to Aunt Susie right now."-- “Well Susie, I know that my kid would never have a thing like that. It's those other little monsters. I don't know why the school board didn't prosecute. I can't imagine how those other parents can let their children run wild in the streets of this town." But the truth is... You are the woman.

"Well, by the time the store sends the check to the bank, I'll have made my deposit--with any luck." "Hey, it's not really lying. It's creative accounting. Besides, the government wastes so much tax money that they won't miss this little white amount." But the truth is....

"One little lottery ticket can't hurt. Besides, the money goes to education.” “One little poker game can't hurt. One little bet can't hurt. It's no worse than playing the lottery." But the truth is....

"Hey, you distract the clerk, and I'll cop this candy bar. It's just one. They'll never miss it." "Hey, you distract the clerk while we sneak into the adult room. What the heck. It's not hurtin' nobody." But the truth is....

"I feel trapped in my work. But I have to do it. It's expected of me.” "I feel trapped in this marriage. But we're staying together for the kids. So how about you and me getting together some time?" "They never really had a stable marriage. If it hadn't been me, it would've been someone else." “What she doesn’t know can’t hurt her—or me.” But the truth is... .

We human beings have a seemingly endless capacity for self-deception. We kid ourselves about who we are. We kid our selves about what we do. And we kid ourselves about what are the consequences of what we do. We blind our selves to the truth.

That way, we don't have to take responsibility. That way, it's somebody else's mess to clean up, somebody else's baby to raise, somebody else's kid who gets in trouble. Or, like David, if we do recognize there's a mess, we concentrate on covering up, keeping the public image, rather that recifying the real harm that has been done.

David figured he had the situation handled. Bathsheeba's reputation was saved. Her baby had a name and a father. And David had her. David had provided a neat solution to every aspect of the problem.

Except... David forgot about someone else who felt wronged--someone else who had a stake in the King's moral behavior-- someone who is far more concerned about honesty than about appearances-- someone for whom questions of right and wrong are paramount, rather than peripheral.

"Once there was a man...." began the prophet.

"Surely this man deserves to die!" decreed the King.

"You are the man!" declared the prophet.

"I have sinned against the Holy One."

But David does not die. His recognition of his sin, his act of confession is his salvation before God. This Sunday's reading ends here. But the story doesn't. There's no happy ending.

Though David eventually gets right with his Maker over the murder of Uriah, the human consequences of that act are not so easily erased. The story will haunt not just David, but Israel. It is the beginning of David’s fall. David's spiritual blindness continues as well. Eventually it will cost him the affection of his children, and the deaths of four of them.

The plain fact is, that our sins or wrong-doings do have a way of boomeranging back on us and zapping us. The plain fact of the matter is, there are consequences when you and I stray from the path of righteousness and integrity. The plain fact is that those consequences have a way of haunting us, and wrecking havoc on our lives, and even on our families and their lives.

There’s a dark, self-centered, shadow side—a secret sinner-- within each and every one of us-- buried deep down inside-- that wants what it wants when it wants it. And it wants because it is wounded, or incomplete, or broken, or scarred, or scared, or just plain immature. And it wants regardless of what the better part of us wants.

It wants regardless of what reason or faith or ethics or morality tell us. And it wants regardless of the consequences-- for us or for others. And in order to achieve what it wants, our shadow side wraps itself in inner darkness that blinds us to the truth about itself, and about ourselves, and about our motives, and about our actions. And in order to achieve what it wants, our secret shadow sinner will generate ferocious energy in us, and can lead us to develop amazing abilities solely directed to acquiring those self-centered shadow goals.

Part of the process of becoming a real, live, adult is recognizing and naming that shadow side of ourselves-- its nature, its desires, its roots, its power over us, its perils and yes, sometimes its gifts. Part of the process of becoming a real, live, mature Christian is learning to give that energy and those gifts over to our Maker, the Source of all truth and light--the only One who can teach us to harness and channel them for growth and ministry.

Make no mistake. Our God is willing to forgive us our sins when you and I honestly repent. But we also have to be willing to clean up the mess we have made. And after we’ve done that, after we’ve accepted the consequences and made our amends, sometimes we can even go on to make a positive contribution to God’s plan and to our world.

But in order to do all that, you and I first have to be willing to look at ourselves-- our lives, our work, our world, our actions, our deepest natures. We have to be willing to look all around us and look within us through eyes that are open, not blinded by shadow and self-deception.

Let us pray,

Lord, open our eyes to the truth spoken in love. Open our ears to the cries of others. Open our hearts to your word. Amen.

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