One Final Discourse

Joshua 24:1-18 and John 6:56-69

Photo by Stephen Radford on Unsplash

Two married couples got together one evening and they started to tell each other about some nice restaurants in the area where they had eaten. 

One husband proclaimed to the other three folks that he had eaten at a great Italian place but he couldn’t remember the name. 

He asked the other three, “What’s the name of that flower? It smells good, people grow it in gardens, and it’s red?”

“A rose?” all three responded.

“YEAH YEAH, that’s it!”

He turned to his wife and said “Hey Rose, what was the name of that restaurant we ate at Wednesday night?”

I have shared with you all a number of times and in a number of different ways, that I’m not sure I want to be remembered. 

It sounds a bit self deprecating, or an effort to make myself into a martyr,  but this is truly my wish for you as a congregation as I look to your future mission. 

It isn’t that I am not proud of the work I have done or the ministry that we have shared together.

It is just that I cannot see a fruitful ministry for ANY congregation, which is rooted in any one person outside of Jesus the Christ. 

It doesn’t matter how “good” a pastor is or what gifts they bring to the table. 

If ministry isn’t centered in the Word, the meal, or our baptism,  it really isn’t the ministry of the God’s Church. 

I’ve always tried to express the importance of this, but given that today is probably my last time in this pulpit, I really want to emphasize that point to you. 

Because those sacraments and this Word are the clearest window we are given into God’s grace, God’s mercy, God’s love, and the invitation we receive to take up that call for ourselves. 

Today’s first lesson finds Joshua in a place similar to mine. 

Karolingischer Buchmaler, Joshua and the Israelite people, 840 (PD)

Just as today serves as my final discourse, this lesson from Joshua serves as his final discourse. 

Now, I’m not sure how early he mailed out his letter, because he was able to gather ALL the tribes of Israel together.

We may be short a tribe or two this morning, but regardless, I hope you will carry on this message to all those who couldn’t be with us today.

Because I think Joshua’s message is truly relevant to us today as we celebrate these past few years, and we look to what God calls us to now, as we move forward. 

Joshua is as aware -just as I am- that nostalgia can distract us from who, where, and what we are called to be. 

He demands that the people put away the gods of their ancestors, including the gods of Egypt, the gods credited with their enslavement, the gods that could very well enslave them again, this time to idolatry. 

Think about it, even in a state of slavery and abuse, many of them are looking back on those days as if those were their best of days!

If they look back on a time of slavery as their “good times,” that should tell us all a little bit of something.  

Because we have a tendency to make an idol of the past, to make gods out of the past, and when we are too busy looking through the rearview mirror to see the car in front of us, we all know how that one ends. 

It's a trap we all fall into, but it is also a danger we need to be aware of, because God’s mission doesn’t happen in reverse or rewind, and it doesn’t take detours. 

God’s mission plows ahead, full steam, with us or without us. 

And when we dwell on how good it was, it is far too easy to lose sight of that. 

My favorite part of Joshua’s discourse, though, is when he backs away from the demand to follow God and instead demands they make a clear choice. 

If you are unwilling to serve the Lord, choose who you’ll serve.

Make that decision boldly and loud and stick to it. 

He basically says, “God big, or go home.”

There is no middle ground in this address Joshua makes. 

There is no Sunday off because your team is showing a solid performance in the playoffs. 

There isn’t a “thanks for giving it your consideration” when the call comes in to teach Sunday school. 

There isn’t a stewardship letter in the recycling bin. 

This is the call to put all the chips on God, because if we do, it is a guaranteed double your wager. 

Joshua knows that if all of Israel bets it all on God, they as a people will be unstoppable. 

József Molnár, Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt, 1861 (PD)

Their mission will expand until all the world knows just who God is, until all the world knows just how GREAT God is. 

I think by now most of you know I like the Boss, Bruce Springsteen. 

One of his biggest hits, the one that I would say put him on top of the charts, was a song I remember listening to as a kid on a little handheld radio, Glory Days. 

Each stanza of the song follows someone from his past, someone dwelling on their own past. 

The first is a friend from high school who played baseball. 

After meeting up outside a bar, they go back inside have a few drinks and as Bruce says, 

“But all he kept talking about, was Glory Days.”

The second stanza is about a girl he knew from high school who could “turn all the boys heads.”

Now, a divorced single mom, she and Bruce also sit down at the bar and she confesses that when she feels like crying, 

“She starts laughing thinking about, Glory Days.”

In the final stanza, Bruce finds himself alone at the bar. 

After seeing how trapped in the past all these other friends and family have become he says, 

“I hope I don’t sit around thinking about it, but I probably will, just sitting back trying to recapture a little of the glory of, well time slips away and leaves you with nothing mister but, boring stories of…. Glory Days”

Time slips away and leaves you with nothing but boring stories of the Glory Days. 

It’s good advice for Joshua’s audience.

Let go of the past and look at the mission God is continuing through us. 

It may be good advice but throughout the story, we see Israel fail to take it. 

Jesus’ audience doesn’t seem to take the advice either. 

In this final week of the bread discourse, Jesus gives one final discourse on the subject, we could title it:

“Come for the snacks, stay for the meal”

because as we have seen over the past several weeks as we talked about bread, bread, bread, bread, bread,  that’s all the people wanted. 

When they came back seeking more, they are asked what they will now offer as followers of Christ. 

But they are too busy looking backwards for another free snack. 

After reading through this 6th chapter of John, we can see how such an incredible crowd gathered when Jesus had something to offer them. 

And today, we can see how quickly and how many fell away when they were asked to listen, to learn, to follow, to believe, and to offer that same bread of life to others. 

In today’s Gospel, that entire crowd seems to have fallen away, and now even some of his own disciples fall away after they’ve become offended and proclaim that his teaching is far too difficult. 

Duccio di Buoninsegna, Christ Taking Leave of the Apostles 1308-1311 (PD)

They are all looking back on the miracle of Jesus the automatic bread machine, cranking out loaves faster than they can eat 'em.

But when the well drys up, the luster seems to have worn off. 

If the miracle they are looking back on isn’t the reward for their continued ministry, then the decision is easy for many of these followers. 

And sisters and brothers, keep in mind these are not the last disciples to fall away because it got too difficult or too offensive.

Because when he ends up on that tree, he dies alone. 

When I was interviewed for this call, I remember my answer to a question, but I cannot remember the question itself. 

I remember the answer because I thought for sure I stepped in it when I gave this reply.  

Stephen’s laughter bailed me out of it, because he knew what I meant. 

I told the call committee that I didn’t want to be a pastor that could draw people to his personality,  because I’m not Jesus and I don’t want to be. 

It didn’t turn out so good for him, did it?

I pray over these past few years you haven’t seen me in that light. 

I pray that, instead, you’ve seen yourselves in that light. 

Because collected into one people, you ARE the Body of Christ. 

I’ve seen you BE the Body of Christ, in the ministry we have shared, the gifts we have offered in this community, watching your children grow, watching this congregation grow, and seeing children grow into vital members of that Body. 

But never forget. That Body only has one head. 

Amen

Photo by IV Horton on Unsplash

Sources

Springsteen, Bruce. Born in the USA. Columbia Records, 1982.

Together again...

Proverbs 9:1-6, Ephesians 5:15-20, and John 6:51-58

Leonardo da Vinci, The Last Supper 1490 (PD)

This past week, after sharing with you all that I have accepted a call to serve in the Navy Chaplain Corps, 

I have experienced an outpouring of emails, text messages, Facebook messages and posts, phone calls, face to face conversations, and even notes expressing your appreciation for the ministry we have shared over these past few years. 

It has been both a blessing and a curse to receive these communications from you all. 

They have served as both an affirmation of the ministry I’ve been part of and an expression of your love and support. 

Each day I drive to and from this building, I can recollect all the late nights and early mornings. 

I’ve reminisced about events I have attended, hospital visits I have made, joys and griefs that we have shared. 

When I walk through my neighborhood and I greet people I realize they are no longer just folks who own a home near mine, but they are now friends whose children have played and grown with mine. 

My family and I have left some surprisingly deep roots in this place and in these communities.

And these communities have taken root in us as well. 

It makes the time remaining more emotional and far more difficult than I could have anticipated. 

We loved it here, and we still very much love it here. 

Yet, as our time comes to a close, the reality is setting in and I am being pulled closer and closer to a new ministry. 

It is inevitable as the days tick down that I am leaving, yet my grip tightens on the memories and experiences here.

It isn’t an experience that is exclusive to me or this moment. 

We’ve all experienced entering into a new community, and departing from another. 

And it never gets any easier. 

It does deepen our understanding of the texts we’ve heard over the past few Sundays though. 

It also deepens the meaning of these texts in our own lives. 

For the first century church, departing from one community in order to be part of this new Christian community meant leaving behind a sense of familiarity. 

It meant leaving behind the comfort of one’s home community. 

The early church in Ephesus was built out of a small secret group of followers, one far smaller than the community that worshipped at the temple of the Greek god Artemis in that same city. 

For many, leaving the cult of Artemis meant leaving behind more than just people. 

Christianity was a radical new religion that was frowned on because it made little sense to most Greeks. 

It was especially looked down on for its offensive practice of cannibalism, as rumors of the Christians who ate the body and drank the blood spread throughout Rome. 

It was no easier for John’s community. 

The community, to whom John’s Gospel was written, was banished from their own synagogues and households. 

They were also declared blasphemers by their own community for this practice of eating flesh and drinking blood, which certainly was the most unclean thing imaginable to that culture. 

Two very different groups of Christians. 

One group that was grounded and rooted in the gentile Greek culture. 

Another group grounded in the traditions and culture of a first century Jewish practice. 

Cast out and banished, alone. 

Yet the central theme in both of these texts is a theme of encouragement and joy, in the face of banishment and grief. 

In the face of uncertainty and the unknown. 

As they depart from what they have known. 

What they have loved, even family and friends. 

Hungering for the protection, care, love, and acceptance that we all long for in being part of a community. 

Agape Feast/Painting found in Early Christian Catacombs (PD)

We all hunger to be part of a community. 

We hunger for the love and acceptance we receive in our marriages, our families, our worshipping communities, our neighborhoods, even our places of work. 

And when we do not find it there, we have a tendency to seek it elsewhere. 

When we hunger in our marriages, many look for companionship in other places. 

When we hunger for acceptance among friends, many of us will compromise our own beliefs and values to find that acceptance. 

When we hunger to be valued in our work, many are willing to give up marriages, families, even sacrificing friendships to competitively make our way to the top. 

It’s a sacrifice we make, and it is a choice we are given between two communities, 

Because when we hunger for that love and acceptance, we only get to make reservations at one of those feasts. 

The passage from Proverbs today is one of my favorites from Old Testament wisdom literature. 

King Solomon.
From Dore's illustrations for the Book of Proverbs
1866 (PD)

“Wisdom has prepared the feast, mixed the wine, and has also set the table. She sends out her maids to announce on the heights of the town that even the simplest of minds may enter here.”

Wisdom has an open door for all to enter in, 

no exclusive dress codes,

not even a prerequisite test to see if one can grasp what is being served at Wisdom’s table. 

But Proverbs tells of another feast, a few short verses later which we didn’t hear today. 

Another feast meant to contrast and compete with the feast Wisdom is hosting.  

Another feast across town where another lady sits and waits for the simple. 

Even today the poetry of this passage implies something carnal, erotic, and forbidden. 

An invitation that preys on what we crave when we grow far too hungry.

Simple answers, 

selfish desires, 

and 

a feast of worldly foolishness that leads us away from God’s wisdom. 

One translation of the Bible seems to capture this passage the best. 

"As this lady calls out to those who pass by, proclaiming; 

“‘Are you confused about life, don’t know what’s going on? 

Steal off with me, I’ll show you a good time!

No one will ever know - I’ll give you the time of your life.’

But they don’t know about all the skeletons in her closet, that all her guests end up in the depths of Sheol.”

These two feasts in Proverbs are meant to illustrate this challenge we face. 

Where we turn when we hunger. 

Do we turn to the feast we need, bestowed upon us by God? 

Flavored by the love we experience.

In marriages that take hard work and time to nurture.

In families that don’t provide us the same recognition as that next step up the ladder at work.

In friendships that value us for the beliefs that make us who we are, rather than the friendships that give us the notoriety to enter into that next social circle. 

It's a hard choice to make when we hunger for love, acceptance, and community. 

In those moments, perhaps it is best to consider why both John’s Gospel and the letter to the  Ephesians demand these first century followers find refuge in a simple meal.

Because in spite of what they are leaving behind, these very different people; Gentiles and Jews, are being drawn together THROUGH Christ!

Painting of another feast from the early Christian catacombs (PD)

Leaving behind the comfort of the community they know, in order to be united with one that is very foreign to them. 

Joined together as God’s Church. 

So, this is where I need to explain how to tie this all together. 

It's a pretty crummy sermon if I am equating you all to the community that I must leave because it is the only way I can truly follow Jesus Christ. 

The point is this; 

No matter where I go, or where I serve, 

we are bound together when we gather around this table. 

When you share in this Body and Blood it will join me together with you, just as that meal united the community that followed John with the people of Ephesus. 

This meal is what unites us all to a community that is far greater, far more loving, far more accepting, far more caring, and far more uniting than any feast this world can host. 

And each time WE celebrate this feast, it will join us together. 

And I will be kneeling beside you with my hands desperately reaching out for that meal that unties our bonds to this world and unites God’s whole Church together in Christ Jesus. 

Amen

Photo by Debby Hudson on Unsplash

This sermon contains gluten.

Exodus 16:2-15 and John 6:24-35

Giovanni Lanfranco, Miracle of the Bread and Fish 1620-1623 (PD)

There was a reporter who went on vacation out west. 

While on vacation he heard of an old Lakota Chief who was famous for his old age and for never forgetting anything. 

The reporter thought it would make a great story, so he stopped in to check it out for himself. 

The reporter knocked on the chief’s door and when the chief answered the reporter said “How” raising his right hand in respect. 

The chief motioned for the reporter to come inside after the reporter explained he was interested in writing a story on the old chief. 

The reporter pulled out his notepad and pencil and asked the chief; “So, since you have such a good memory, can you tell me what you had for breakfast on August 5th 1979?”

The chief simply replied “eggs” and stared at the reporter, who seemed unimpressed with the answer, since anyone could have answered the same way. 

The reporter left, but ten years later, while again traveling he remembered the visit and was curious if the old chief was still alive. 

He went to the chief’s door and was delighted when he answered shortly after ringing the bell. 

The reporter raised his hand in respect, looked the chief in the eye with a smile, and said “How!”

The chief stared at him unimpressed and replied “over easy”

Photo by Dan Gold on Unsplash

There is something memorable about a good meal. 

There’s a number of meals that seem to have made lasting impressions in my life. 

A special meal I shared with my father and his best friend, my Uncle Tim, while I was in college, discussing my vocational calling. 

A special Burger King value meal I shared with my mother, when she picked me up from Camp Lejeune to come home for Christmas my first year in the Marine Corps. 

A special meal I shared with my wife, when we first started dating. 

Another special meal I shared with her parents, when I asked if I could marry their daughter. 

A special meal that Pastor Stephen treated me to, when the call committee and I began to talk about serving at St Michael. 

And special McDonald’s meals I shared with my children, in my first year at St Michael to celebrate each of their birthdays. 

The thing that seems to make the biggest impression in all these meals was not the food that was served, it was the company that was shared around that bread that was broken. 

They were all special moments that were shared, with special people, at special times. 

I don’t recall each course that was shared at each of those meals, but I can certainly recall the meals themselves. 

Sometimes those meals have been so special and nostalgic that I’ve tried to relive them, 

Like when I asked my wife to marry me, we returned to that same restaurant a year later. 

Although I ordered the same thing, from the same place, the prime rib just didn’t taste quite as perfect a year later, 

Or maybe it is just in how I remembered it. 

Perhaps that moment was just so perfect at that time, that I should have savored it for what it was. 

James Tissot, The Miracle of the Loaves and the Fishes 1886-1894 (PD)

Today’s Gospel is a continuation from last weeks story. 

It is the aftermath of the feeding of the five thousand. 

When a few holdouts decide to come back for more. 

Searching high and low for Jesus. 

At least it SEEMS they are searching for Jesus, 

But Jesus once again proves to be a strait shooter, 

He knows what they are seeking, and it ain’t him. 

They are seeking round two of an all you can eat carbohydrate buffet. 

They want more, more of what they had, more of the same, more of what they believe that they need. 

The story isn’t all that different from our first lesson. 

Another story of people seeking what they think they need. 

A story in which they will eventually horde so much of God’s gift that it will spoil and it will rot, 

for no other reason than they were too selfish to consider the difference between need and want. 

But people don’t change that much. 

Generations removed from this story, the crowd that is speaking with Jesus invokes the story of Moses and the manna, proving that they still don’t understand. 

Proving to us all, that sometimes even when we think we understand, we fail to follow through with what the lesson teaches us. 

Miracles serve a distinct purpose in scripture. 

Miracles are intended to prove a particular truth about God. 

In both the feeding of the 5000 and in the story of the manna in the wilderness, 

We are called to hear the truth that all good things come from God, 

In God’s due season and in God’s due time, 

NOT IN OURS. 

It also calls us to recognize the most important truth of all. 

GOOD THINGS COME FROM GOD!

For the Hebrew pilgrims that have been liberated from the Pharaoh’s shackles of slavery, 

It proves that not only will God provide, but God was in fact the provider of those fleshpots and breads that filled their bellies while in Egypt, NOT THE PHARAOH!

It proves to those who came to hear Jesus teach, that not only does God provide the bread to fill them up, rather than Rome or Herod, 

But God can produce enough for all, even from an empty cupboard. 

Something that no Empire, no Pharaoh, no Nation, and no King can do. 

Nicolas Poussin, The Jews Gathering the Manna in the Desert 1637-1639 (PD)

Comic John Pinette once did a bit about the no carb diet. 

He said that his doctor recommended it because he was eating way too much pasta and bread. 

He claimed that when he discovered low carb pasta and bread he was pretty happy, 

Until he tasted it. 

He claimed that the low carb bread “looks like bread but it has no other properties of bread”

“It tasted like it still had the rapper on it.” 

He said,  “I put butter on it, but it wouldn’t go on. Peanut Butter and Jelly would just bead up and fall off”

He said he began to believe they had sprayed it with scotch guard at the factory. 

He even tried to toast it but it wouldn’t toast, he said he even took it into his garage and attempted to toast it with a blow torch but it only “absorbed heat like a space shuttle tile”

He finally concluded that if he ate it, it would never break down in his system, and they would dig him up in five thousand years, and conclude that he had been on the Atkins diet. 

Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash

Whether it is the disciples or this crowd, 

We always have an easy time casting stones at those in scripture who just don’t seem to get it. 

The problem is that we too just don’t get it either. 

It isn’t because we aren’t faithful, we aren’t good enough, or we aren’t smart enough. 

It is just that God is too good to describe, too good to grasp, too good to comprehend, and at times…

God can just be too good to believe. 

We, like the crowd seeking -NOT JESUS- but more bread, 

have a tendency to seek the god that provides what we want when we want it, 

not the God that gives us what we NEED when we NEED it. 

So, when we get what we actually want, we hoard it for ourselves until it rots. 

God gives what is needed and when there is excess, it is our call to ask just where God wants it to go, 

Because THAT place, sisters and brothers, is most often where it is needed. 

Now, this could be a great stewardship sermon. 

Maybe you need to think about that bread as money, or time, or talents?

Maybe you need to discern what God has called you to in your own life, with your own gifts?

But I want to see if you will consider one last crumb from this Word we have heard today?

I want you to think about what will happen up at this alter in a few moments, and what kind of excess that produces in you?

What will you do with that abounding grace that we will receive in that meal?

How will it change your life when you walk away from that meal? 

What will you do with that excess grace and mercy and love?

How will it impact the community around us?

Photo by Matt Collamer on Unsplash

This is the power of the sacrament in our faith tradition, and it hit me like a brick two weeks ago. 

My chaplain, who served with me in Iraq, reached out to me. 

We had not seen each other in 13 years. 

Many of you have heard the story, but as a Lutheran chaplain, he shared that meal with me at a moment when I knew it would be my last meal. 

Obviously it wasn’t, but it changed that day for me, and the months that followed. 

As I was driving to meet up with him again for lunch after 13 years, I kept mulling over what he had done and who I was now. 

I wasn’t sure what I would say or how I would explain to him how I had come to put on this black shirt and white collar. 

I wanted to tell him what his ministry had meant to me at that time and in that place. 

Then it dawned on me that I didn’t remember a single word from a single sermon he preached in that place, a single note from a single hymn that we sung together in that place, but what I DO remember the clearest of all were the words; “THIS is the body of Christ, given for YOU”

~

Each week, I dig through the languages of these texts and the stories come alive before me. 

I try my best to put that to paper but it is impossible, 

Because God’s word is like trying to describe the beauty of a landscape to someone who is blind, 

or the taste of a delicate and rich dessert to someone who cannot taste,

or the sound of a string quartet to someone who cannot hear. 

Sisters and brothers, we are all too deaf, too blind, and our palates are far too dull to know the taste of something so good. 

And no matter how hard I try I will never succeed, 

Because I too only catch a glimpse, hear one soothing note, and taste only a fragment of how good it is. 

And that is why we have both the Word and the meal. 

Because that meal is beyond Words, 

That meal is the Word and it is made flesh and blood. 

Amen. 

Photo by James Coleman on Unsplash

Sources

Pinette, John. Making LIte of Myself. Low Carb Diets and Dr Phil. Uproar Entertainment, 2007.