The Staff of Life

The Staff of Life

John 6:53-59

May 3, 2020 • Mount Pleasant UMC

I like to cook. In fact, I might even say I love to cook. I do most of the cooking at our house and have done so for most of our married life. For me, cooking is a little like therapy; if I’m trying to work through a problem or think through an issue, getting in the kitchen allows me to focus on something else for a while and step away from whatever it is I’m dealing with at that moment. And it’s just fun to take all these ingredients, put them together and find something tasty at the end of process. Well, usually. Not everything has been a success. My mom likes to remind me of an early attempt I made to cook breadsticks in the microwave. Let's just say, that smell did not get out of the house easily. Smoke filling the top half of the house is like that. Anyway, did I mention that I like to cook? But, I have to tell you, in these last seven weeks of quarantine (and, yes, it’s only been seven weeks though it seems like seven years…April was a long year)—in these last seven weeks of quarantine, I’ve gotten tired of cooking. Maybe I should be more precise: I’ve gotten tired of figuring out what to cook every day. We were talking at the dinner table a few days about about missing restaurants—can I get an “Amen”? I’ve never been a big fan of carry-out, especially for what are called “sit down restaurants.” Maybe it’s selfish or self-centered, but I like being able to, you know, sit down at a table someone else has set, order what I want, and have it brought to me, hot and tasty. And then someone else cleans up after it! Oh, the good old days! Maybe I’m the only one, but I miss that and am looking forward to going out to eat again…one day. Hopefully one day soon!

The Bible is full of images of meals, good meals. Lauren Winner says, “It would not be a gross exaggeration to say that the Bible is a culinary manual, concerned from start to finish about how to eat, what to eat, when to eat” (Wearing God, pg. 92). I’ve been doing one of those “read through the Bible in a year” plans this year, and I’ve noticed all over again how true that statement is. Especially in the Pentateuch, the first five books of our Bible, God gives detailed instructions about what to eat, how to eat it, and when to throw it out. I think that’s at least in part because God knows how we’re wired and how much of our time is spent talking about or planning for food. Six years ago, I took a small group on a Lands of the Bible trip, eight of us, and I noticed how at breakfast, we would talk about where we were going to eat lunch, and at lunch—well, you get the idea. I told them they were true Methodists, always wondering where the next meal was coming from! But we were also true Christians, because the Bible is full of imagery centered around food, including imagery about God. This morning, we’re right in the middle of this series called “God Is…,” focusing on some of the forgotten or overlooked images the Bible uses to describe God. So far, we’ve talked about God as a friend, and God as clothing. This morning, as you’ve probably guessed by now, we’re going to talk about God in the kitchen—God as food—the staff of life. And to do that, we’re going to turn to what was originally a very controversial passage in the Gospel of John, a place where Jesus tells his followers they will have to eat his flesh and drink his blood.

If you’ve grown up in the church, you’ve heard passages and imagery like this all of your life. Most often, we jump in our minds immediately to communion, the Eucharist, the Lord’s Supper when we read this passage. But I want you to try to put that aside this morning and, at least for a few moments, try to put yourself in the shoes of those who were standing there with Jesus when he first said this, long before the sacrament of holy communion was a thing. Or try to put yourself in the shoes of those who read this for the first time at the end of the first century, people who maybe weren’t Christians or were fairly new Christians, who didn’t have two thousand years of history to rely on for interpretation. Or, even more, try to grasp the mind of someone who has no connection to the Jewish or Christian faith at all and hears about these strange “Christ-ians” and that they eat the flesh and drink the blood of their leader. In any (or all) of those situations, what would you think? What would you believe about this strange new cult?

In those first centuries following Jesus’ death and resurrection, those who overheard Christian worship and lacked any sort of context accused the early believers of cannibalism (Winner 93). In the second century, we have records of a debate that took place between two men, (great name, huh? History is written by the winners) and Octavius the Christian. In that debate, which covers a whole lot of issues, Caecilius says this: “You Christians are the worst breed ever to affect the world. You deserve every punishment you can get! Nobody likes you. It would be better if you and your Jesus had never been born. We hear that you are all cannibals—you eat the flesh of your children in your sacred meetings” (https://bit.ly/3bxlgXE). They believed these Jesus followers were actually, somehow, eating Jesus’ real flesh and drinking his blood. And why would you not think that? After all, according to John Jesus himself said, “My flesh is real food and my blood is real drink” (6:55). And in the context of the Gospel itself, this takes place not that long after and not that far from the place where he has fed 5,000 men (not counting the women and children who were there, 6:10) with just five small barley loaves and two small fish (6:9). Then, he walks on the water during a storm on the sea of Galilee (6:16-24, and then he begins talking about himself as the bread of life (6:35). Bread of life—just like the bread they just ate on the hillside. So why would they not still be thinking about lunch? And, again in the context, right after this teaching about eating his flesh and drinking his blood, we’re told that a whole bunch of those who had been followers became “no-longer followers.” They left Jesus because this teaching was hard (6:60). It was confusing. It was strange. It wasn’t like the other things he’d been saying. So when Jesus asks the twelve disciples if they are also going to leave, Peter basically says, “Where else are we going to go? You have the truth, even if we don’t understand it. We’re sticking with you” (cf. 6:67-68). It’s as if John somehow puts this teaching in the forefront and knows that we, as followers of Jesus, have to make a decision based on this teaching alone. It is too hard? Or do we believe that Jesus is the truth and that there is nowhere else we can or want to go?

There’s one other piece of context we need to put in place here. John says Jesus said this when he was teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum. Capernaum, we know, is Jesus’ “own town.” It’s the place where he lived during his three years of ministry; it’s his base of operations. In fact, if archaeologists are right, the place where Jesus lived—Peter’s house—was just a couple of blocks straight down the street from the synagogue. So when he was in town, he was probably in and around the synagogue quite a bit. He probably did a fair amount of teaching there; you know, everyone likes to hear the local celebrity speak. But they had never heard him talk like this, and this is not synagogue talk anyway (Card, John: The Gospel of Wisdom, pg. 92). Drink his blood? That would be like cussing in church. They knew the law, how God had told them not to eat any meat that had the blood still in it (cf. Wright, John for Everyone—Part One, pg. 85). God had told the people back at Mount Sinai: “I will set my face against any Israelite or any foreigner residing among them who eats blood, and I will cut them off from the people” (Leviticus 17:10). Which is why every steak should be cooked well done. That’s not just my opinion; it’s in the Bible. (Yes, that is an example of making the Bible say what you want it to say!) But, seriously, this was a vital matter for every good Jew who wanted to live out strict adherence to the law. They had developed elaborate rituals and procedures for “kosher butchering” to make sure no blood remained in the animal (cf. Wright 85). And then along comes Jesus, in the synagogue, talking about drinking blood. This is not synagogue talk. People were “shocked, stunned and scandalized” (Card 92). Some may have actually become physically ill at the description on eating flesh and blood. No wonder so many of them wanted to leave.

So what is Jesus getting at when he uses this image to describe himself, to describe God? Well, let’s get this off the table first, in case there are any lingering questions: “Jesus is not proposing religious cannibalism” (Burge, NIV Application Commentary: John, pg. 202). The clear comparison we have to notice in this passage is how Jesus compares himself as the bread to the manna in the wilderness, back in the book of Exodus. So we have to think Jesus as the bread has something to do with that, with the way God provided manna for the people who had escaped slavery in Egypt. Do you remember that story from our study of Moses last fall? Manna was the food God provided in the wilderness when the people complained that Egypt was better. Back there, even though they were in slavery, there was all the food they wanted. In the wilderness, their tummies were grumbling. So God sent “thin flakes like frost” which fell on the ground every morning (Exodus 16:14). They called it “manna,” which literally means, “What is it?” Exodus says it was “white like coriander seed and tasted like wafers made with honey” (Exodus 16:31). Numbers says it tasted like something made with olive oil (Numbers 11:7). Later on, the rabbis said that manna tasted like whatever you wanted it to taste like. Last week, on my Facebook page, I asked what some of your favorite breads were and I got a wide-ranging list of breads, from name brands to some folks who said “any.” There were votes for sourdough, rye, a lot for whole wheat, French, Italian and Hawaiian among others. Are you hungry for your favorite kind of bread right now? Well, according to the rabbis’ teaching, if you wanted THAT kind of bread, that’s what manna tasted like that day. That’s not in the Exodus text, of course, but it just might be lurking underneath the reference to manna in Jesus’ speech here in John (cf. Winner 97-98). While Jesus is like manna, he is also better than manna. He is God’s perfect provision for our every need.

That’s really the point of the image of bread, of manna. Manna was God’s provision for his people, food for the journey; he provided just what they needed. And, if you remember the story in Exodus, they were supposed to gather just enough for their family for that day. No more, no less. Those who kept some over for the next day found it turned to maggots—gross, right? The only day they were allowed to keep extra was on Friday, because none would fall on the Sabbath, on Saturday. On Friday, they could gather twice as much as they needed (cf. Exodus 16:21-27). Perfect provision. And Jesus is that for us. He even includes that in his model prayer: “Give us today our daily bread” (Matthew 6:11). Not, “Give us what we need for this week.” Or “give us what we need for the rest of our lives.” No, the prayer is this: “Help us trust you for today. Tomorrow, help us trust you for that day. But keep our eyes focused on your provision for us today.” Lauren Winner puts it this way: “To speak of God as bread is to speak of God’s most elemental provision for us” (94).

But I don’t think Jesus just means for us to trust him for literal food on our tables. He means for us to trust him for everything. And that’s a needed word in these days of uncertainty. Some of us have lost jobs or been at least temporarily unemployed. Some have not been able to make contact, at least in-person contact, physical contact, with family members for whom we are used to caring. Some of us are afraid of what the future might bring, of what might happen if we get the virus. We are all missing being together in church and wish we knew when that would change. Maybe like me, you miss restaurants or just being out in public without fearing what you might “catch.” We miss the world where we didn’t view others—all others—as a dangerous threat. Some of us have lost people we cared about to this virus and we get angry when we hear people say it’s a hoax. Some have lost loved ones and weren’t able to be present at their funeral. Travel plans have been put on hold; our trip to the Passion Play this year has been cancelled, Annual Conference has been postponed as have General and Jurisdictional Conferences. Everything is disrupted, and it’s okay to grieve. It’s okay to feel lost and confused. But here’s what we cannot do: we cannot place blame on God for actions taken by human beings or things that have happened in nature that led us to where we are. God is not the reason the world is fallen. And we cannot forget that Jesus has already promised that he is the bread, he is our provision, he is perfect provision. What we need he will provide. He may not, probably will not, give us everything we want. But he will provide what we need. He is our perfect provision.

So there are different words John could have chosen to describe Jesus as bread that we eat, but the one he chose (which I don’t believe was a mistake or a casual choice) is a word that means to “munch or chew” (Wright 86). It refers to the way animals eat, specifically to the way they make noise as they chew. There are a lot of nights when Hershey is eating her dinner that I ask her if it would be possible for her to make more noise; Hershey does not get sarcasm. John deliberately chose a word that refers to real eating, real drinking, and for me, that has a few implications. First of all, bread (or any food for that matter) isn’t useful unless we take it in. Bread and wine left on the counter goes bad. It’s only helpful, it only meets our needs if we take it in. The manna was the same way, and we could say Jesus as bread and wine is too. The provision he wants to provide is not just physical; it’s also spiritual. We “take him in.” As I was sharing last week, we allow ourselves to be transformed by his work in our lives, but we are also transformed as we allow him to live through us. The “meal” we need is a regular diet of prayer and study of the Scriptures. Prayer allows us to commune with him, to spend time with him, and Scripture study allows us to get to know who he is and what he does. I hope you’ve found extra time during this quarantine to grow in your practice of prayer and study, of reading the Bible and asking Jesus what he wants to show you. A Bible that is never opened is of no use to us. The whole point of the written word of God is point us toward the one who is the Word (cf. John 1:1), to help us take him in so that we become more and more and more like him.

It’s also true that bread and wine are enjoyable things. When Jesus described himself, he didn’t use the image of a communion wafer. Have you ever been in a place where they use those little thin see-through wafers for communion? Or what I call the chiclets, the little things that look like gum but taste nasty? I know the churches that use those things for communion are doing so for a particular purpose, but for me, for me, those take my attention off of Jesus because all I can think about is how awful they are! Jesus described himself as bread and wine, and as I learned when I asked about favorite breads on Facebook, bread is amazingly diverse. I learned about breads I had never heard of, breads I am probably going to mispronounce: German brotchen, Agege, and Naan. I don’t know what those are but they sound great! My point is this: Jesus could have chosen any old image to describe himself. He chose bread and wine. He chose things that were not only the staff of life in his culture, things they couldn’t imagine living without, but things that are very tasty, things that bring a beauty and a tastiness to life. His provision is not “just what we need.” It’s what we need plus delight. Bread is “enjoyment and necessity, sustenance and pleasure” (Winner 95). I sometimes say God didn’t have to make the world in color; he did for our enjoyment. He didn’t have to make bread tasty; he did for our pleasure. Jesus could have used any image to describe how he wants to live in relationship with us; he chose bread.

And one more implication I think comes out of this image. As I said, bread and wine were things that were on the table every time they sat down to eat in Jesus’ world. They were common; that’s in part why bread and wine were what he used to institute what we’ve come to call the sacrament of communion. They weren’t things they had to go out and look for; they were common, everyday items. And so, perhaps, just maybe, one of the reasons Jesus compared himself to bread and wine is that he meant for us to constantly remember him. In other words, every meal becomes a reminder that Jesus is with us, that he is our creator, that he is providing for us. That’s part of why, traditionally, mealtime is a time when we “give thanks.” It’s not that we’re not thankful for other parts of our lives, but meals are supposed to remind us in very tangible, physical ways of the presence of Jesus. So do we thank him just for the food? Why not also thank him that he has been with us all day, all night? When we gather at the table, with friends and with family, it’s a moment that should point us toward and remind us of Jesus. Bread and wine. Pasta and juice. Sandwiches and coke. Cornbread and sweet tea. Whatever it is, it is part of God’s provision.

That’s why, when we have communion, when we are able to share in communion again, we talk about it being “The Lord’s Table.” It’s a meal meant to point us toward Jesus, but so is every other meal we share together even when we’re not in church. Even in quarantine, when face-to-face communion isn’t really an option, we can experience the presence of the risen Jesus at the table—at your table, at my table. I’ve been thinking about this the last few weeks (lots of time to think), and I have begun to wonder if maybe that isn’t part of what God is doing during this time of quarantine, this time of limited social contact. We’ve been forced to slow down. I’m usually moving at a pretty fast pace, from the time I get up in the morning until I sit down in the evening. I’m driven to always be accomplishing something. But in this time of quarantine, I’ve had to slow down, as I imagine most of us have had to. We’ve had dinner together more as a family. I’m eating less “fast food” and more sit-down meals, even though I can’t go to restaurants. Ironic, huh? Maybe this time is, at least in part, allowing us to slow down so we become more aware of the presence of Jesus in everything around us, even in simple things like bread and wine. The challenge will be for us to retain that awareness when life goes back to something resembling normal. John Piper once said, “God is always doing 10,000 things in your life, and you may be aware of three of them” (qtd. in Moore, Supernatural, pg. 89). That’s probably about right, at least for my life. Maybe we can up that average. Jesus is bread and wine, right here at the table.

Jesus was not advocating cannibalism, but he was using a strong metaphor to get the people’s attention and to tell them something about the way he would relate to them (and us) in the days, years and centuries to come. Have you taken him in? Do you enjoy his presence like bread and wine? Is he the manna of your life, the one who sustains you even as he provides for you?

In 2010, Christopher and I were privileged to visit many sites across Italy, one of which was Siena in Tuscany. The city is largely famous for its horse race that happens twice a year, the Palio, a wild circular horse dash. But in the world of faith, Siena is important because of one of its most famous residents, Catherine of Siena. The town’s name is right there in her name! Catherine lived in the 1300’s, and very early in her life she knew she wanted to give all of her life to God so she joined a religious order. Unlike most women of her time, she was often sent by the Pope on missions including one in which she was negotiating peace between the cities of Rome and Florence. Catherine, in her writing and her prayers, shows a deep connection with God, and this morning I want to close with a prayer she wrote that seems to have grown, in part, out of this image of Jesus as the bread of life. Let’s hear her prayer, across the centuries, and allow it to lead us into our own time of prayer this morning.

You, eternal Trinity, are Table and Food and Waiter for us. You, eternal Father, are the Table that offers us food, the Lamb, your only-begotten Son. He is the most exquisite Food for us, both in his teaching, which nourishes us in your will, and in the sacraments that we receive in Holy Communion, which feeds and strengthens us while we are pilgrim travelers in this life. And the Holy Spirit is a Waiter for us, for he serves us this teaching by enlightening our mind’s eye with it and inspiring us to follow it (cf. Winner 91).