These two mini-sermons were prepared for Mountainside United Church, Westmount, for their Sunday service on Aug. 5, 2018 (Year B, Pentecost 11).
Application for Today #1 – John 6:24-35
Crowds, in the Gospel of John, don’t ask smart questions. And the Johannine Jesus never gives straight answers.
But, in all this cryptic dialogue, something new is being revealed.
Moments before Jesus was working miracles, and now the crowds have followed him to learn more about who he is.
What kind of teacher is he?
Where does his power come from?
Is he Moses?
He works wonders like Moses did. He fed them like Moses fed the Israelites.
But, he’s not quite like Moses; instead, he’s like the one Moses’ power came from in Exodus.
His words echo the words of the Burning Bush who declares… “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.”
When Moses says “If I come to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What’s his name?’ what shall I say to them?”
The Burning Bush responds by saying, “I am who I am. Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘I am has sent me to you.’”
Jesus is not Moses. He is so much more. He positions himself as both the messenger and the message—I think Marshall McLuhan would approve!
He is the bringer of and the gift of life.
The verses in John we read today include the first “I Am” statement in this Gospel.
“I Am the Bread of Life” is the beginning of a larger exhibition where Jesus will reveal different parts of his character.
He doesn’t just bring Manna, but his very body will become like Manna to us.
Now, this first “I Am” statement is curious to me.
Why not start with… “I am the way, the truth, and the life” or “I am the Good Shepherd”? Out of the seventeen times, Jesus declares “I Am” in the Gospel of John this is where he starts, the first part of his character he reveals.
This declaration follows his Feeding of the Five thousand. After caring for the needs of the crowd, he then compares himself to the sustenance he nourished them with.
It is a declaration based on the mundane experience of being fed—a basic need being met.
Jesus spends much of his ministry caring for the bodies of his followers. He cares if bellies are full… if mouths are parched… if they have clothes on their backs. And, he offers human connectivity and healing—calling his students to do the same.
“I Am the Bread of Life” is a declaration that, as children of God, we are cared for, but that this nourishment is holistic—inside and out.
The mystical God who speaks from the Burning Bush first meets us in our human experience and need. God doesn’t reject our “fleshly” selves—or ignore our pain. This is where God meets us—in our humanity.
The Hebrew Scriptures are filled with reminders of this. A favourite of mine is Isaiah 49:15, which says:
Can a woman forget her baby who nurses at her breast? Can she withhold compassion from the child she has borne? Even if mothers were to forget, I could never forget you!
What a powerful sentiment to begin this delve into who Jesus, the anointed, is. “I Am the Bread of Life”.
Over the centuries this will give way to rich imagery of Christ as a parent, a mother who nurses, a source of nurturing goodness.
Let’s reflect together on God as parent, as a source of goodness and compassion by singing together … HYMN MV157 I Am a Child of God
Application for Today #2 – Ephesians 4:1-16
Friends, I live in the wake of General Council 43; the gathering of our church from across the country every three years to discuss, discern and decide together. I was privileged to attend the week-long gathering of our church at the end of July. It was a first for me, and I found it to be an intense experience.
Not just because there was so much work to be done, and people to meet, but because there was also a breaking open in our church.
The last afternoon, two Fridays ago, there was a disruption in our business session; a discombobulation, as Rev. Philip Peacock put it in his sermon from earlier that morning.
You see, the Spirit moved in the gym, as the Rev. Paul Walfall spoke to our church about the erasure of black people in our community.
We all stood and clapped when he was done—but it felt empty and disjointed. How do you respond to a deep challenge like the one Paul had given us?
Well, we didn’t. We didn’t respond, we just went on business as usual.
Until God broke us open. Someone got up and called us to stop. We suspended our business, and our Moderator, Jordan, asked white brothers and sisters to step back from the microphone.
Space was opened for our racialized brothers and sisters to speak—space we hadn’t made all week. For over two hours, through the rest of our business time and over our dinner break, we listened to our Black, Brown, Indigenous, Asian, and Disabled siblings share their deep pain and frustrations with us.
They shared stories we had refused to hear, about the racism and white supremacy that exists within our church.
It was hard to hear but necessary.
In the 1980’s theologian, James Cone decried “American white theology” for how it had justified atrocities against racialized people like Native Americans and Black; and failed to “relate the gospel of Jesus to the pain of being black in a white racist society.”
This was that same cry.
Our Ephesians reading tells us that there is one body, and one spirit. And, we are all called to tend to it; to tend to one another.
But, we have not loved our siblings equally.
If we truly believe that we are all children of God, and that God desires to provide for us, to bless us with abundance and goodness, how can we hoard our blessings? How can we turn our backs on the stories of rejection and oppression from our sisters and brothers?
Our first reading today told us a little bit about who Jesus is, and this second reading tells us who we should be.
A community, knit together by love and truth, called to stand steadfast in the face of doctrines and theologies that would pull us away from the liberating Good News.
As our Song of Faith tells us sin is “a disposition revealed in selfishness, cowardice, or apathy,” that “Sin is not only personal but accumulates to become habitual and systemic forms of injustice, violence, and hatred.” And, we acknowledge that “we are all touched by this brokenness”.
Reconciliation is not possible without acknowledgement and repentance—we can’t put right our relationships with one another without it.
What I heard at GC on that Friday afternoon is that we need to acknowledge that racism is not merely a historical problem, but a present-day reality in our churches and wider communities.
We are called to unity, but have been complicit in disunity.
Friends, there is healing to be done, and new paths to be found, but we need to take an honest look at ourselves before that journey can begin.
I am living in the wake of General Council 43—it has made my heart raw, and I know I must live differently now.
Part of this new path means returning to my corner of our church and sharing what I’ve heard from my racialized siblings, that there’s work to be done.
But fear not, because we are not alone in this. We are surrounded by fellow travellers, who know our strength as a community comes from love and truth.
And, we have a wonderful example to follow, a role model who crossed divisions, who cared deeply about the suffering of others and calls us into a kinship that honours each member.
So may God continue to break open our lives with the radical call to seek justice, love kindness, and walk humbly together. Amen.
***
To read Rev. Paul Walfall’s initial reflection on July 27, 2018, at GC43 you can find it here on the UC Observer’s website.
Additionally, Paul wrote a piece called The Journey Now Start! for the UCC website where he reflects on the events of GC43, the response, and how we can move forward together.
