11 August 2024 Pentecost 12
2 Samuel 18:5-9, 14, 31-33 Psalm 130 Ephesians 4:25 - 5:2 John 6:35, 41-51
This section of John 6 revolves around the question of Jesus’ identity, and it carries profound implications, not just for the crowd following Jesus, but for us today as well. Jesus boldly proclaims himself as ‘bread of life’, and that those who come to him will never be hungry, and those who believe in him will never be thirsty.
Now, the crowd following Jesus, this morning, regard him as teacher, they have witnessed his miracles, and at least some of them would know him as one of their own; so when Jesus tells them he is ‘bread that came down from heaven’, they start to get a bit ‘twitchy’. In fact, some of them express irritation and doubt. After all, they ‘know’ who he is, he is ‘one of us’, we know his mother, his father, his brothers and sisters’. They begin to get a bit angry because they think Jesus is putting himself ‘above’ them, when they know he is just the same as them, a simple, ordinary, man, so how dare he pretend that he is the answer to their deepest longings and greatest needs.
Jesus compares himself, to manna, the bread that, except on the Sabbath, arrived every morning while the Israelites journeyed in the wilderness. This bread sustained them during this long wilderness journeying. And Jesus desires to sustain us in our journeying too. Jesus desires to be our bread for all the road trips, perilous rides, rocky paths and long hauls that our lives will take. Jesus desires to be our comfort, our joy, our nourishment, our delight, our substance and strength – in ways that meet us in our real lives, our real challenges, our real fears and griefs and hopes. Jesus knows that the journeys we are taking are hard. He knows they are more than one person can manage on their own, and he knows that we need bread that sustains. His bread. His flesh. ‘Given for the life of the world’.
Jesus’ claim to be ‘bread that came down from heaven’, and ‘sent by the Father’, irritates the crowd because he is aligning himself with God, and, as the crowd affirm, he is ‘just a man’, and not only that he is ‘one of us’. Most of this crowd would see God as separate from humanity, they would not see God as someone who would ‘dirty his hands with the mundane, ordinary, things of life, and be willing to suffer pain and embarrassment, problem and indecency’. But that is what Jesus is implying. And that is what has got the crowd all riled up. Because, if Jesus is ‘just like one of them’, how can he save. And, the question is, are we any different to the crowd? When we think about it, the foundation upon which we base our faith is very fragile. The water we use in baptism, it is ‘ordinary’ water, the same water that we use to wash ourselves, brush our teeth, and wash our clothes. The bread and wine we use in communion, are ordinary, common, bread and wine. Hardly worthy of God’s attention. Yet we are bold enough, even audacious enough, to confess that God uses these ordinary things to achieve God’s will and to bring to the world God’s salvation.
Jesus, this common, ordinary, mortal human like you and me, was also uncommon, divine, he was the very Son of God. This is the claim that offends the crowd, and still offends those who take it seriously today. Because, while we may expect God to come in might, God comes in weakness; where we look for God in power, God comes in vulnerability; and when we seek God in justice and righteousness – we find God, (or rather are found by God), in forgiveness and mercy.
This is the claim and promise Jesus makes today – that God became incarnate, took on flesh, became just like you and me, so that God might save us and the all people who come to faith by God’s word. And the promise behind the sacraments is that the carnal God, the incarnate God, the God who does not despise the ordinary or common, seeks out that which will achieve God’s will. God not only does not despise ordinary things like bread, water, wine, but God also does not despise us, who are ordinary and common people. In the sacraments we find God’s promise to take hold of us and make us God’s own, and to remain with us and never let us go. And added to that, in the sacraments we also find God’s promise to use us, make use of our skills and talents, even though they are insufficient and flawed, to continue God’s work of creating, redeeming, and sustaining all that is. Just as God uses ordinary bread and wine to bring to us God’s saving word, so also God uses each of us to accomplish God’s will and work in the world.