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'Jesus said, “Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live forever.” He said these things while he was teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum.

When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?” But Jesus, being aware that his disciples were complaining about it, said to them, “Does this offend you? Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is useless. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But among you there are some who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the first who were the ones that did not believe, and who was the one that would betray him. And he said, “For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father.”

Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him. So Jesus asked the twelve, “Do you also wish to go away?” Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.”'

--John 6: 56-69

*This blog post is a copy of the final sermon I preached at St. James' in Skaneateles as Interim Rector.*

The people of St. James', Skaneateles at their Fourth of July Family BBQ.

How do you measure a year? I’m a theatre kid, so this part of the song, ‘Seasons of Love’ from the musical RENT, is one of my favorites. In daylights and sunsets? In midnights and cups of coffee? In contracts, dollars, and funerals, and births? I wonder what the St. James’ version of that song would be. In Rite I’s and Lakesides? In Prayer Teams and Table Top groups? In RJRC and community service? Liturgically speaking, today, the 14th Sunday after Pentecost, is exactly 525,600 minutes – one year – from the day I preached for the first time as your Interim Rector. What a difference a year can make!

I could stand here and rattle off all of the meaningful moments of this past year, all of the good work that you have done to get to this place, but you called me here first and foremost to preach the Gospel, and by God, that’s what I intend to do today. Fortunately, the wisdom of our lectionary shines through yet again, and we get a Gospel text worthy of such a moment in our common life together.

At long last we come to the end of Gluten-tide, to this four-week lecture series that Jesus has given us on the Bread of Life. We started with the feeding of the 5000 in Tabgha, then crossed the Sea of Galilee to Capernaum where the crowd tracked Jesus down wanting more bread, only for him to say that the real bread they were after was himself, the bread that came down heaven, and that in order to share with him they would need to share in his flesh, which is bread indeed, and his blood which is drink indeed. This is too hard, they grumble, who can understand or accept such a teaching. Well, Jesus tells them, you ain’t seen nothing yet; if these words offend you, then you got a whole other shock coming later because what will you think if you see me return to heaven? Folks start getting nervous, and wouldn’t you know who won the pony, most of them have the same reaction I suspect a good number of us might have: they done up and r-u-n-n-o-f-t! 

Why’s it gotta be so hard, this following Jesus thing? It’s hard because it’s hard. It challenges us because it’s supposed to challenge us. My father used to ride his bicycle cross-country, and even managed to connect enough dots to have ridden in all 48 continental states in a continuous loop. In his very first ride, though, with his pack loaded down on his bike, he came upon a really tough hill not far from our home on the Virginia-Kentucky border. An old man on the porch saw him and commented it was a nice day for a bike ride, to which my dad said, “Yeah, except for this hill.” The man didn’t miss a beat and told him, “If it weren’t for the hills, we’d all be biking.” It’s hard because it’s supposed to be.

And following Jesus ain’t no different. I heard a theologian once describe Christianity as the “anti-religion,” due to it being more concerned with the world we live in now than the one we’ll inherit later. This makes the Gospel pretty scandalous, pretty hard and challenging to actually put into practice. To pray for your enemies, that’s the Gospel, that’s scandalous. To cast down the mighty from their thrones and lift up the lowly, that’s the Gospel, that’s scandalous. To stand on the side of the crucified, on the side of the ones who are humiliated and ridiculed, scapegoated and demeaned, that’s the Gospel, that’s scandalous. To preach love in a world of hate, to give when it hurts not just when it’s comfortable, to take risks for the Kingdom that has, indeed, come near, that’s the Gospel, that’s scandalous. Not everyone is willing or able to accept such teachings. They’re hard because they’re supposed to be, and yes, sometimes, even offensive. A professor in seminary once told us that if we priests weren’t offending somebody we weren’t doing our jobs. I’d extend that invitation. If y’all are getting under somebody’s skin with your love, your witness, your passion for justice, your belief, nay, your certainty that all can be fed and cared for when we don’t let ourselves succumb to the Gospel of scarcity, then you’re doing something right. 

Not everyone can accept this, which is why an exasperated Jesus turns to the 12 and asks if they’re gonna r-u-n-n-o-f-t. But for once Peter gets it. “To whom can we go?” he asks rhetorically. “You alone have the words of eternal life.” To whom can we go? To whom can any of us go but to Jesus?! Our flag decals won’t get us into heaven anymore, and our favorite sportsball teams won’t fulfill our greatest needs – believe me, I know, I’m a Cleveland fan! But there is only Jesus who has the words of eternal life, which, of course, is not just for the eternity that waits for us when we die, but the eternity that starts right here and now, that you and I are actively dancing in with each other, just like God dances within the Holy Trinity. Yeah, it’s hard, yeah, it’s scary, yeah, it’s sometimes sad, but we lean in, we don’t leave, we don’t abandon the work or each other because: to whom can we go?

Clergy come and go. That’s part of the deal. We are all interims, it’s just a matter of how long we stay. We do not abandon you, oh no, we walk with you like a parent walking along with the child on their own bicycle, and before you know it, you’re off on your own journey, and you don’t even notice that the parent’s let you go. I am letting you go today, St. James’, because you’ve done the work, you’ve loosened your grip and dreamed of who you can be at your best. You’ve found your spirit of curiosity, of “yes, and” rather than “no, but.” You’ve tried new things, failed at some, and discovered that you’re ok, regardless. It is time for you to be off on your own new journey. You have the tools and the lessons learned from this interim time. Ain’t nothing stopping you now. Go preach with abandon – and use words when necessary. Go be in solidarity with the poor. Go be scandalous in showing love to this bitter world. See how many you offend, and see how many lives you change through the evangelion, the good news, the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

It is, has been, and always will be about him. He’s the one you come here to meet. He’s the one who brought me here. He’s the one who has called Mo. Pilar to take her place right here in two weeks to continue the good work done by the good people of St. James.’ And to anyone who may be at all apprehensive: to whom you can go? Jesus is alive in this place, and the best is yet to come. I hope, in this next season, you have the time of your life. I sure did. I don’t know if I’ve been changed for the better, as the lady says, but because I knew you folks, I have been changed for good.

So it’s closing time, I don’t have to go home – because I don’t really have one of those at the moment – but I can’t stay here. What final pop culture reference does Fr. Joe leave you with? I could quote Masters of the Universe and wish you “good journey,” or tell you in the words of Elwood Blues to “take it easy.” Instead, I’ll paraphrase the very last scene of what is, for my money, the greatest television show ever made, Neon Genesis Evangelion: Thank you to the staff, goodbye to the lake, and to all the children of God at St. James’: congratulations! 

The final scene of Neon Genesis Evangelion.

Bread for the Journey

'Jesus said, “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

The crowd then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” So Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day; for my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live forever.”'

--John 6: 51-58

More bread, huh? Well…that’s just prime As I had into my final days as Interim Rector of St. James' Church in Skaneateles, this lameduck preacher is starting to run out of material but we can always count on Jesus to give us something, and in this third week of Gluten-tide, he shifts from talking about bread to talking about flesh. I saw maybe worst church meme ever this week, which was a picture of the resurrected Jesus that had the caption: the only zombie who lets you eat him. Just the worst. This is the material we’re left with, y’all.

To recap: Jesus fed 5000 folks in Tabgah three weeks ago, he left to go to the town of Capernaum where, two weeks ago, that same crowd tracked him down demanding more bread, but he told them that the real bread they wanted was the bread that came down from heaven, and last week folks began to turn on him, getting crankier and more confused as he rattled off all this jargon about bread from heaven. Once again, the final line in last week’s Gospel is the first one today: “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever, and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” 

It's worth pointing out that that line right there has been really problematic. Maybe it’s obvious to you, maybe it isn’t, but Jesus is alluding is to the Holy Eucharist, to the bread that we say is his body and the wine that we say is his blood. The community that produced the Gospel of John was steeped in the practice of the Eucharist, so for them this line made perfect sense: it was about full participation with Jesus, a sharing in his life and his love. But if you think this sounds a wee too much like cannibalism, you’re not alone. For what’s it’s worth, cannibalism is, in fact, forbidden by the Bible in the book of Leviticus, so many of those in that crowd that day who faithfully abided in the Judaic law, felt that Jesus had crossed a line, and as we’ll see next week, folks will abandon him because this teaching is just too hard. Remember that what the Gospels are saying and doing are reflective of what is going on in the real world for the communities from which they sprung, and for John’s community the whispers kept stirring – “those Christians eat flesh, have you heard this?” “I think they drink some guy’s blood. Disgusting!” It’s true that folks really did believe Christians were cannibals, that Jesus literally expected people to eat flesh and drink blood in order to be his followers.  Literalism, man, it ain’t a good look. 

Without spending this whole blog post rehashing one of my favorite Episcopal 101 classes, I want to mention how the institutional church finally got around this pesky cannibalism issue. Let’s be clear, the earliest followers of Jesus understood that he was present in the celebration of the Eucharist. Both Ignatius of Antioch and Justin Martyr – that wasn’t his last name - said so less than 200 years after Jesus was gone. It wasn’t just in the hearts and minds of those gathered, no, he was really there in the meal; after all, he did say this is my body, this is my blood. So how is it possible? It wasn’t until shortly before the turn of the first millennium that the Church found an answer in an unlikely place: Aristotle. That's right, in order to understand the Eucharist, you have to understand Aristotelian thought! The Greek philosopher who lived some 400 years before Jesus, said that all matter is composed of two properties, accidents and substance, which communicate who and what they are. Accidents are things like a person’s, height, hair length, or whether or not they wear glasses. These tell others who you are, but they change. Substance, however, doesn’t change. It is the unseen thing residing in all matter. Aristotle called it a soul, the spirit within you that makes you who you are but never changes. Accidents change, substance doesn’t. The miracle of the Eucharist, then, is the flipping of the natural order. When we eat the bread and drink the wine the accidents – the outer texture, the taste – those remain the same, they stay bread and wine. But the substance of bread and wine – the soul of the bread and wine, if you will – is transformed into the substance, the soul, of Jesus. We call this transubstantiation, and I’m willing to bet many of y’all who’ve heard it thought it meant you were literally crunching on Jesus’ bones. It doesn’t. Rather, it means that you are feeding on the very soul of Jesus, mingling his life with yours, so that, as the bread and wine are transformed, you will be.

The guy who helped give birth to theology for a religion that wouldn't exist until he was dead for four centuries.

Transubstantiation provides the middle ground between taking Jesus literally or thinking that it’s all just metaphorical. I had a seminary classmate who got irate when folks spoke about meeting the living Christ in the bread and wine, and he would yell “It’s just a memorial!” He never ended up becoming a priest, by the way. If it’s all just done to remember something Jesus did, then how can that be a full sharing with Jesus? How can that transform our lives? We Anglicans, being the product of both the ancient teaching on the Eucharist and the reforms of the 16th century, usually resign ourselves to saying that we believe Jesus is in the meal, but as one of our Archbishops of Canterbury, Lancelot Andrewes, once said, “we are not so arrogant as to explain how.” Transubstantiation is not an official doctrine of Anglicanism, though many of us believe it. The how of Jesus’ presence with us in bread and wine made holy doesn’t matter as much as the fact that he is present, and to know that deep down is empowering.

You have heard me say that Sunday morning is the dress rehearsal for the rest of our lives. What we do in church is meant to not just give us a good feeling as we leave and head into a new week. It’s meant to transform us, to change us evermore into the likeness of Jesus. This is what he means when he says those who do not share in his flesh and blood have no life in them. It’s less of a condemnation of folks who don’t take Communion, and more of an acknowledgement that when we come to the Table of the Lord and we are given food and drink for our journey, we share in the loving, liberating, and life-giving essence of Jesus Christ, so that we can go and break bread with others, and in doing so, share in their life, their essence, their love. Mingle our hearts, minds, and spirits with theirs. That is how the world is transformed and turned upside-down, or rather, rightside-up. 

St. Augustine of Hippo said that we eat the Body of Christ so that we may be the Body of Christ. St. John Crysostem said that in the Eucharist we unite our flesh with Jesus’, and in so doing unite ourselves to his presence and his love. As I asked folks on Sunday: I wonder what the saints of St. James’ would say? What is the altar, the holy Table and its Great Thanksgiving, to you? Is it the place where heaven and earth meet? You will meet Jesus there, but are you prepared to take him with you as you leave?

He said if we eat and drink of him we abide in him. Jesus always abides, just like the Dude from the Big Lebowski. Another, older way of saying it is we tabernacle with him, we live with and rest in him. Saint James' Church in Skaneateles is such a gift, a place where saints and sinners come to live and rest with Jesus! But as I told them, they must remember that the church of Christ isn’t the building, but it is them, the ones who will take Christ from the Table into a world that is so hungry to meet him. I can’t wait to see all the ways that they do. 

Maybe from here you will teach someone the real meaning of transubstantiation. Or not. Wherever you go, whatever you do, be sure to get some food and drink for your journey. 

In Need of a Snack, Nap, and Renewal

'Jesus said, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”

Then the crowd began to complain about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” They were saying, “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” Jesus answered them, “Do not complain among yourselves. No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me; and I will raise that person up on the last day. It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me. Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father. Very truly, I tell you, whoever believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”'

--John 6: 35, 41-51

'Elijah went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a solitary broom tree. He asked that he might die: “It is enough; now, O LORD, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.” Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep. Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, “Get up and eat.” He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones, and a jar of water. He ate and drank, and lay down again. The angel of the LORD came a second time, touched him, and said, “Get up and eat, otherwise the journey will be too much for you.” He got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God.'

--I Kings 19: 4-8

I remember kindergarten. And I remember the part that I enjoyed the least, which was nap time. I hated it. Maybe I don’t show it, but I had an awful lot of energy as a little kid – broke a lotta stuff and gave my parents a lotta gray hairs. But whether it was me or some other rambunctious young’un, we always had to take a nap and have a snack late in the day when we got really cranky and hungry.

There’s wisdom in that, you know? When the prophet Elijah got scared and cranky because folks were trying to kill him, he just wanted to lie down and die. What did God do? Had him take a nap and gave him a snack, a cake baked on a rock. The times when we are least able to understand what is going on around us are usually the times that make us the crankiest. Ask Kristen sometime about the occasions when I most get cranky. It’s when I don’t understand what’s going on, to which she will ask, “Why are you so upset?” and all I can say is “I don’t know!” The best solution I’ve found is to stop, maybe lie down for a bit, and even have a snack. Those Snickers commercials aren’t wrong.

Unknown artist's depiction of Elijah under the broom tree.

When we don’t understand, it often leads us to lash out, to get defensive, and to complain and gripe. It happens to kids, and to adults; after all, we're just taller children. After Jesus feeds 5000 people then explains to them that what they’re hungry for isn’t physical bread that will perish but a different bread, a bread from heaven, he him-self, the people get real cranky. The final line of last week’s Gospel is the first line this week: “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” Turns out, folks took Jesus pretty literally with that one. Immediately the crowd grows cranky, even angry over what Jesus is saying. None of this is making any kind of sense. How can bread come from heaven – and how can this guy that they all know, who is just an ordinary son of an ordinary family, claim to be from heaven? What’s he trying to pull? 

Perhaps the crowd isn’t that much different from us. Folks today have a tendency to want to read the Bible literally, and when they do they come upon a passage like this, they grumble that that just don’t make no sense. What’s more, our post-Enlightenment minds don’t do well with symbolism and metaphor, so we waste our time worrying whether or not we understand or are being under-stood, and we get cranky when we don’t or aren’t. Bread from heaven. Eternal life. The bread I’ll give for the life of the world is my flesh. Who wouldn’t need a nap and a snack after trying to listen and understand all of this?

There are a few things that we can unpack, though. Jesus brings up the story from Exodus that we heard last week, about the people eating the manna in the wilderness, and he says that they ate it and died. Was the manna poisonous?? Not as far as we can tell. Again, it’s not literal. Rather, what Jesus is saying is that bread alone – physical stuff – is not enough to sustain life. Yes, they died…eventually, not because they ate the manna, but because all things die. What Jesus is offering is not a physical bread that only temporarily satisfies and then is gone. He offers himself, his teachings, his love, his grace, his mercy. These are the things that we “feed on” , that give us a kind of life that is not encumbered by the threat of loss or death, a life that is more attuned to the goodness of God in the world and recognizes to the Christ-light that is within all creation, within our neighbor, and yes, even within ourselves. 

It is our deepest held conviction that at the holy table, the altar of God, we receive the very bread of heaven and, to borrow words from an older version of our Prayer Book, we feed on him in our hearts by faith with thanksgiving. St. Ignatius of Antioch called the Holy Eucharist the “medicine of immortality.” It is here with outstretched hands and open hearts that we taste eternal life.

Still, we have to remember that when Jesus talks about eternal life he doesn’t mean something that is waiting on us when we die; after all, he uses the present tense in his teaching today: “whoever believes HAS eternal life.” It’s not later, in some future heavenly realm where we get our reward, it’s now. And right here, in this place, surrounded by these saints, we step outside time and share the same feast as all those other saints. We don’t have to understand how or why. A little boy I once knew, who isn’t so little anymore, used to come up to Communion and put his hands out and say, “Gimme a cracker!” That cracker is the bread for our journey, out into an ever-changing and confusing world. It sustains us as the cake sustained Elijah for 40 days in the wilderness. We need only believe this, or so we’re told.

The Greek word we translate as ‘belief,’ is pistis, which means a self-surrendering trust. To believe is to surrender, to let go of our need to have everything figured out, our need to be in control or to understand. Sabbath rest is at the heart of this self-surrendering trust. More than a mere nap, the practice of Sabbath leads to transformation, it is the quiet space we cultivate for God to once again take up residence, our greatest weapon to combat the overwhelming feeling that we have to know or do everything. As Thomas Merton, one of my spiritual heroes once wrote, “Lord I do not know what I am doing, but I believe that the desire to please you does, in fact, please you.” Even when we don’t understand, the fact that we want to, the fact that you showed up today, that matters, and that’s enough for God. Maybe it could be enough for you too.

So brothers and sisters, in the times when you feel confused or cranky, remember the kindergarten method: return to the altar of God for nourishment from the very bread of heaven, and find your Sabbath rest to remember who you are and whose you are. Remember that you are enough, and cultivate that self-surrendering trust in Jesus to continually transform you into who you already are. 

Hungry For What??

'The next day, when the people who remained after the feeding of the five thousand saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they themselves got into the boats and went to Capernaum looking for Jesus.

When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, “Rabbi, when did you come here?” Jesus answered them, “Very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For it is on him that God the Father has set his seal.” Then they said to him, “What must we do to perform the works of God?” Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.” So they said to him, “What sign are you going to give us then, so that we may see it and believe you? What work are you performing? Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’” Then Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” They said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.”

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”'

--John 6: 24-35

Welcome to what the organist at my parish calls Gluten-tide! Each Sunday during August we will be reading this section of the Gospel of John that we call the Bread of Life discourse. So I hope you like hearing about bread. As I told the folks on Sunday, by the time Kristen and I leave at the end of the month, y’all are gonna be experts on the Bread of Life!

An icon of Jesus as the Bread of Life.

Let’s take a second to recap last week and how Jesus gets on this kick about bread. Through the faith of a young boy who offered his five loaves and two fish Jesus managed to feed a crowd of 5000.  You might think that Jesus would take a moment to bask in the accomplishment, but if you remember last week’s Gospel, he heads to the other side of the sea under the cover of darkness. He does the deed, and then he moves on.  Our modern, celebrity-obsessed culture would not take so kindly to Jesus’ insistence on being so discreet!  

But the crowd does eventually catch up to him on the other side of the sea in the town of Capernaum, which is where we pick up the story today.  Picture, if you will, that you are part of that crowd.  You have just witnessed something that is beyond explanation.  Each and every day you experience hunger, real, painful hunger, and you have just witnessed a man feed roughly the population of Capernaum itself!  How might you react to him?  Would you try to get him to stay in your town, like forever?  Would you try to get him to help with other problems in your life?  If you’re nodding your head then you’ve got a good idea of what is going on for the folks when they track down Jesus.

So they find him, and the first thing they ask is:  “When did you come here?”  In other words, when did you leave us?  They’re persistent, having tried the day before to make him king after he looked like he could be a perpetual food supplier.  But their persistence is misplaced, self-serving, and Jesus knows that and calls them out on it.  They are preoccupied with the literal loaves and fish, the food that has just perished, and they’re looking for Jesus for all the wrong reasons.  Their primary motivation for going across the sea to find him is that they want more bread to hoard, so that they won’t be hungry again.  But Jesus isn’t a Cosmic Vending Machine, and he points out to them that while satisfying their physical hunger is important—after all, he did feed all of them—they must not think that hoarding up more magic bread will satisfy their real desire.  Despite what he tells them, they plead with Jesus:  Show us some more miracles, they beg, and fix all of our problems!  

They wanted signs. They kept asking for more and more, but what they were asking for was something they already had, which was Jesus, right there in their midst. Makes a person wonder: if even they who had him right there with them still don’t get it, what hope do we have? We, like them, ask for greater understanding, for more meaningful work to do and people with whom to journey. We ask to be empowered by him, fulfilled by him, and blessed by him. Again. And again. Meanwhile, we fail to see that everything we need has already been given.

Like a modern church-goer who just wants the preacher to tell them what to do so that they can get their reward, that crowd was only capable of thinking on a surface level. What they truly desire is deeper than that. What Jesus offers is deeper than that. The crowd might feel comfortable in a church that preaches the heretical Prosperity Gospel, that claims God’s favor for a person is measured in their material wealth and possessions – an abundance of food being a sign of both in the ancient world. If you are never lacking for anything, it must mean that God has blessed you, that false gospel preaches. Yet this is neither the Gospel of Christ, nor is it in line with the teachings Jesus himself was taught. Recall the story from the book of Exodus, when the people complain that they do not have enough to eat, and God provides for them manna, a flakey bread-like substance that falls during the night. There is a catch, though, and that is that the people are not to hoard it, otherwise it will go bad. Each will be given just enough to meet their needs. But they want more. The crowd wanted more from Jesus. Like a Jedi who has had a taste of the Dark Side, we too want more: more signs, more bread, more wealth, more security. All we have, though, is Jesus. Is that enough?

We have been allotted just the right amounts of giftedness and have just the right failures to now be and do all that we are meant to be and do. We have even been given companions for the journey, so numerous we have yet to meet them all - and in the case of St. James' in Skaneateles, there is one very important companion, their next Rector, whom they will meet very soon.

Brothers and sisters, we already live in the shadow cast by so many blessings heaped upon blessings, though they may not be the kind of blessings that the heretics preach. The blessings are not the materials themselves, they are the gifts of grace, of manna and mercy, of love, and of beloved community in which Jesus not only lives but thrives. Look around you, this is the miraculous sign; we need no other. Whether or not we see it or believe it, the miracle is radical abundance. Enough for all. Whoever comes to Jesus will never believe the heretical gospel that signs and stuff will assuage our deepest hunger and thirst.

I invited our parish on Sunday to consider three questions: What miracles have you already witnessed in this place? What is still on your secret wish list to see? Are you at ease yet with having just enough, of being good enough, of knowing, in your very soul, that the hunger and thirst you feel is so much deeper than what your outward senses and reactive feelings will tell you? 

We all hunger, we all thirst. But for what, exactly? That’s the question the crowd in Capernaum couldn’t answer. But perhaps you can. Because of who you are, where you’ve been, and where you’re going. Allow Jesus to break through any misconceptions you may have of how the whole of existence functions, and you will never hunger or thirst for the things which will perish because you’ll be too busy performing the very works of God. 

A Gospel of Abundance

'Jesus went to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, also called the Sea of Tiberias. A large crowd kept following him, because they saw the signs that he was doing for the sick. Jesus went up the mountain and sat down there with his disciples. Now the Passover, the festival of the Jews, was near. When he looked up and saw a large crowd coming toward him, Jesus said to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread for these people to eat?” He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he was going to do. Philip answered him, “Six months’ wages would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little.” One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish. But what are they among so many people?” Jesus said, “Make the people sit down.” Now there was a great deal of grass in the place; so they sat down, about five thousand in all. Then Jesus took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated; so also the fish, as much as they wanted. When they were satisfied, he told his disciples, “Gather up the fragments left over, so that nothing may be lost.” So they gathered them up, and from the fragments of the five barley loaves, left by those who had eaten, they filled twelve baskets. When the people saw the sign that he had done, they began to say, “This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world.”'

--John 6: 1-14

How many of you remember the game Musical Chairs from elementary school?  Or the card game Spoons?  Do you know what both of those games have in common?  They're both based around the principle of scarcity. In Musical Chairs several chairs are set up in a circular pattern, the music plays, you and your friends walk or dance around the chairs, and when the music stops you try to find a chair to sit in, only there's always one less chair than there are kids playing, so someone always ends up without a chair, and if you're that someone, you're out.  In Spoons you and several others dig through a bunch of cards in an attempt to get four of a kind.  If you do you pick up a spoon, but like Musical Chairs, there's always one less spoon than people playing, so if you can't get a spoon, you're out.  I find it somewhat ironic that we are entertained by games with the message that there is never enough for everyone, and children's games at that.  

Why did we think this was fun??

 The very idea of scarcity is frightening, isn't it?  Think back to the days of the pandemic and people who were so afraid of running out of milk, bread, and toilet paper, that they raided stores and hoarded so much and it became a self-fulfilling prophecy. The fear of not having enough was what drove folks to stock up on way more than they needed.  We do it, though, all of us, to some degree, when we are scared of not having enough. Gospels of scarcity are powerful and powerfully effective at getting us to buy more and share less. Capitalism itself is a gospel of scarcity.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ, however, is not a gospel of scarcity.  It should be, but it isn't.  Think about it:  we're told that Jesus was a carpenter, but he never actually works in the Gospels, so what's his income?  It ain’t coming from his apostles, either, because they all left their jobs to follow him.  They don't have homes, they just wander around--Jesus makes note of this when he comments that the Son of Man has no place to lay his head--and most days they don't even know where their next meal is coming from, they just have to rely on someone inviting them to dinner, like Simon the Leper, or hope that the women of their group brought enough cash since, according to the Gospel of Luke, they helped finance the ministry. Put most of us in the same situation--no income, no regular housing, no idea how we're going to feed ourselves, and we would be terrified, wouldn't we?  We would be preaching a gospel of scarcity, of not having enough, but blessedly this is not the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  

The word Gospel comes from the Greek εὐαγγέλιον which means Good News.  A message of scarcity is not good news, but a message of abundance is.  The great irony of the Gospel of Jesus is that the story of a homeless, jobless, itinerant preacher is actually a story of the abundance of God's grace and love and mercy.  Take the story we heard this week, the feeding of the 5000.  It's in all four of the canonical gospels, though a bit different. In the version we hear in John’s Gospel today, two of the apostles, Phillip and Andrew, address the situation from a place of scarcity.  Phillip remarks that six months' wages wouldn't feed everyone gathered on that hillside in Tabgah of Galilee.  Andrew points out that there is a boy with five loaves and two fish, but then he pessimistically asks, "What are they among so many?"   Even those closest to Jesus can't help but be fearful of not having enough.  But you know who isn't fearful?  The boy.

An icon of the feeding of the 5000, as depicted in the Fourth Gospel.

He's only found in John's version of the story. This boy offers what he has, and he shares it, not only with Jesus but with the crowd as well.  This is the great miracle of this story:  that out in the desert, tired and hungry, a single individual would be willing to share what he has for the sake of so large a community.  Can’t you see the whole hillside stir to life as now everyone begins to take some of their supplies for the journey and starts sending them forward for Jesus to take, bless, break, and give. In this neighborly sharing what little they have, all end up being fed. 

That’s the gospel of abundance, the good news that there is always enough, so long as we are willing to let what we have pass through the hands of Jesus. Five loaves and two fish CAN feed 5000 people, not because Jesus performed a magic trick, like he’s Madrox the Multiple Man, but because one person offered what little they had, and the people responded with generosity so great, that by the time Jesus was done, everyone got fed. They all shared instead of hoarding for themselves, and that is a miracle. 

Multiple Man as a member of Marvel's X-Factor.

Brothers and sisters, do you realize that a miracle occurs here in your church every single week?  At the altar we do as Jesus did. We take, bless, break, and give, and a tiny piece of bread and a little sip of wine are given to everyone, and miraculously we are filled. If sharing just a little bread and wine can do that, imagine what we can do if, like that like the boy in the story, we shared our loaves of bread, our fish, our time, our resources with those who are in need, stranger and friend alike.  Imagine what could happen if we focused less on the myth of scarcity and more on the truth of abundance, the truth that the hungry can be fed, the sick can be made well, and the poor can be given hope for their future if we are willing to let what we have pass through Jesus' hands and be offered for the sake of others.  If we could do that, well, that would be a miracle.

Miracles, it has been said, are not something that just happen, they're something that people make happen.  We don’t know if this is a factual story, but it is a true one because it speaks to the truth of what being followers of Jesus means, that there’s always enough. So why not share it. Maybe we hear that this small offering didn’t just feed all these folks but that it also resulted in 12 baskets full of leftovers, and we just can’t believe it. But knowing how true abundance likes to hide in very small places, and how even a tiny acorn of faith can inspire great movements, makes it very difficult NOT to believe this story. 

This past Sunday, the parish where I've been serving as Interim Rector for the last year - St. James' in Skaneateles, New York - shared that they had called their next Rector, who will be joining them on September 8. I closed out my sermon with these words for them:

You have so much to give, St. James’. To one another, yes, to the people out there, yes. And to your next rector. Soon and very soon. You have fed and nourished the Mitchell family in ways you will never know. Maybe it seemed small to you, but when what you offer passes through Jesus’ hands, abundant love, abundant life, flows. As you head into your next season of ministry together with your new rector, be on guard against the gospel of scarcity, which will try to tell you that you don’t have enough, whether it’s butts in the pews or bucks in the plates, that you’re not doing enough, that need is just too big, and the work just too hard. Don’t believe it. Continue to preach the gospel of abundance, and when necessary, use words. Offer up whatever you’ve got for the sake of the other, and all will be fed and filled, and miracles will happen.    

We Shall Not Be In Want

During seminary I worked with hospice, and I was routinely moved by the people that I visited.  As a chaplain, I would offer prayer, songs, and Scripture. No matter how debilitated or far gone those folks were, they always remembered one prayer—the Lord’s Prayer—they always remembered one song—Amazing Grace—and they always remembered one Scripture—the 23rd Psalm.  These pieces were just in their bones. This past Sunday we prayed the 23rd Psalm, which is a rarity on Sunday mornings for us Episcopalians because the Psalm is usually reserved for funerals. But we are blessed by its words of wisdom this week.

"The LORD is my shepherd; * I shall not be in want.

He makes me lie down in green pastures * and leads me beside still waters.

He revives my soul * and guides me along right pathways for his Name's sake.

Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil; *

for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

You spread a table before me in the presence of those who trouble me; * 

you have anointed my head with oil, and my cup is running over.

Surely your goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, *

and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever."

--Psalm 23 (Book of Common Prayer translation)

A visual depiction of Psalm 23.

There is power in this Psalm, maybe more so than in any other. It’s sacred to Jews and Christians alike, and even those who aren’t fans of organized religion are often still familiar with and moved by it. The consensus is that Psalm 23 was written around 1000 years before Jesus by King David, the onetime shepherd boy who wrote it as a hymn of praise to the God who had been his shepherd throughout his life. The kind of protection and guidance that this Psalm articulates are things for which we all have longed. The power of the Psalm, it seems, lies in its relatability for every single person.

We experience this in the very first simple, yet profound profession: “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.” This has some radical implications when we consider that we live in a culture that preaches to us that we are supposed to always be in want, so that someone can sell us something that we’re told we need: Power, prestige, possessions, and protections. But this statement declares that no, in fact, the Lord our God is our shepherd, and thus is the only one who can provide the real wants and necessities of life. This declaration sets the tone for the rest of the Psalm, which explicates this fundamental profession of our trust in God and God alone.

That trust itself is revolutionary when we consider the ways folks have often had the tendency to prop others up as the shepherd, pointing to them as if to say that if we follow them we’ll all be ok. Even in Israel’s own story this backfires spectacularly. Remember when the people told God they wanted a king because everyone else had one, only for God to say no – because God was their sovereign – and then for the people to demand one anyway? Remember what happened? They got Saul, who decided to do his own thing and ignore God, and for his troubles ended up dead. David himself, whom God named as Saul’s successor, fell victim to his power when he had Uriah the Hittite killed in battle so that he could steal his wife, and for that his house was cursed. And that’s just in the Bible alone! Plenty of strongmen have said (and still say!) they’re the shepherd who will supply our needs, but this Psalm says otherwise, and each verse shows how.

Verses 2 and 3 relay how God provides all the basic necessities of life. For sheep, green pastures mean food, and still waters mean drink. And to be in right paths for sheep means that danger is averted and proper shelter is attained. Thus, God is the shepherd who provides food, drink, and shelter, the basic necessities of life, to all of God’s flock. We are part of that flock, along with all creation, and it is our deepest conviction, that all our needs are provided by God, as long as remember that there’s enough for us to share.

Verse 4 is both the structural and theological center of the Psalm. At the moment of greatest threat, of greatest peril and fear, God still provides, even if all that is provided is God’s presence through the valley of the shadow of death. Perhaps this is the verse that captures so many of our hearts. Who among us hasn’t walked that path? It is the hope of the Psalmist that when we lie in greatest weakness, need, and want, God’s promise to us is an abiding, everlasting presence that will, in God’s way, deliver us. Just like the angels and prophets always proclaim in Scripture, “Be not afraid,” the Psalm puts the words on our lips and in our hearts to affirm that, no, we shall not be afraid, even in the midst of such painful and fearful times because you, O God, you are with us, comforting us with a presence that is everlasting. Oh yeah, there’s power in this verse alone!

Then the Psalm shifts to the second person and addresses God directly, reinforcing the closeness of God to each of us. YOU are with me, says the Psalmist, an affirmation of God’s abiding presence and a reminder of the closeness of our relationship to God. The word we translate as “rod” is more often used to refer to a scepter, which evokes the majesty of God. The provisions of God are reliable because God – and God alone – is sovereign, the only one to whom our allegiance is owed, and the one who, even in the darkest, most frightening moments of our lives, can never be separated from us.

Something interesting happens in the final two verses, as here the metaphor shifts from shepherd to a gracious host that invites the Psalmist into a meal in the ever-welcoming house of the Lord. As Jesus reflects in his own earthly ministry, God invites all of us into relationship with one another around a table. You see, when we gather around a table, we see one another, we look into one another’s eyes, and we share the provisions of the table with one another. It’s impossible to not be in relationship when you are eating together, even if you’re not talking! God invites the Psalmist, and us, into such a relationship – one we experience at this table – so that we can invite others into the same relationship, so that we can spread our table for a brother or sister – or even someone who troubles us – and, like the shepherd, provide for their necessities of food, drink, and shelter for others because it is, after all, Jesus, whom our Prayer Book calls the shepherd and bishop of our souls, who does this through us, our hands, feet and heart. Finally, as David was anointed as king with oil on his head, we are anointed, both with actual oil at our baptism, and with the Holy Spirit on a daily basis. These anointing give us power to know the love of such an amazing God, and it is that anointing that follows us all the days of our lives and reserves our place in the house of the Lord forever.

There is a kind of trust in this Psalm that we might call childlike, trust in one to care for us, to tell us we’re ok. Jesus says we are to receive the Kingdom as a child; that is, placing all our trust in God and with the curiosity a child has for anything to be possible. That trust is renewed each time we pray this Psalm, each time we are reminded that with the Lord Jesus as our shepherd, anything is possible and the needs of all are met. Maybe this is your favorite Psalm. Maybe it’s not. But let its wisdom guide you in the days and weeks to come, let its comfortable words give peace to your wearied soul, and let its power set your hearts ablaze with the shepherd’s love. 

More Than Enough of Contempt

"To you I lift up my eyes, *

to you enthroned in the heavens.

As the eyes of servants look to the hand of their masters, *

and the eyes of a maid to the hand of her mistress,

So our eyes look to the LORD our God, *

until he show us his mercy.

Have mercy upon us, O LORD, have mercy, *

for we have had more than enough of contempt,

 Too much of the scorn of the indolent rich, *

and of the derision of the proud."

--Psalm 123

It has been quite a fortnight in our country, hasn’t it? I know a lot of folks say that politics needs to stay out of sermons (or, in this case, blog posts) – and when it comes to endorsing candidates or parties, I agree with that – but saying we should or we even can forget about what is going on in the world around us when we show up to church on Sunday mornings is just not realistic. During the last two weeks we witnessed a presidential debate that literally everyone has called a disaster, with two gentlemen who are, how shall we say, divisive for a lot of folks. The highest court in the land made some decisions that could have harmful ramifications for the future of this democracy. In the midst of all of that, just a few days ago, we donned our red, white, and blue, made some jokes at England’s expense on social media, and celebrated being Americans, though I’ve wondered what exactly we’re celebrating. It’s been a tough two weeks. 

The presumptive candidates for President of the United States.

During that time I did what I do first thing each work day when I come to work: I prayed. I went into the sanctuary of our parish, sat in the second pew on the left (my family's pew in the church where I grew up), and read Morning Prayer. On Tuesday of last week one of the Psalms appointed was Psalm 123 – the same one that we read together in church on Sunday– and later that same day I made a post on social media asking: are there any better words right now for us in our country than the last two verses of this Psalm: “Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy, for we have had more than enough of contempt. Too much of the scorn of the indolent rich, and the derision of the proud.”

When something shows up in the readings twice in one week, I usually see that as a message from God that I sure better preach on it, which is exactly what I did on Sunday. The circumstances around the creation of this Psalm, this prayer for deliverance, are never stated. It’s generally understood to have been written during the period of Jewish exile in Babylon, when trust in God seemed to have failed, and scorn and contempt were all around. The prayer is a petition, an ask, one so sincere and fierce that the author makes it twice – have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy. And what IS this mercy? It is a free, undeserved act of enormous kindness, and it is the most often-repeated word in English translations of the Hebrew Bible. The Christian New Testament might, instead, use the word grace. Personally, I’ve always seen them as going hand-in-hand, the grace and mercy of God, undeserved, free gifts of God’s abundant kindness. This is what the Psalmist most needs and wants and counts on from God. 

The Psalms are so wonderful because they speak to the whole human condition, and thus are timeless. How many of us, I wonder, have made similar pleas in recent weeks? We have had far too much of our share of contempt. The rich continue to be indolent; that is, averse to any activity or movement of change, filled with scorn at those who cry out for something different because it would mean losing their power, prestige, and possessions. The proud deride those who cry out for the indolent to be stirred out of their stubbornness, just as the prophets of old cried out. The rich keep getting richer with no consequence, while the proud remain so stubborn that they’ll go down with the ship. It’s not hard to find the similarities between what we’ve been seeing and what the Psalmist saw.

The remarkable claim of Psalm 123 - the "Good News," if you will - is that God’s mercy can override the contempt that we experience because that mercy is the only thing that is constant in such a struggle. It is a sense of God's presence and solidarity, a courageous refusal of the rich and proud, even when we are at our lowest points.

Our Gospel text on Sunday tied in nicely with the Psalm, as it portrayed Jesus at one his lowest points, being met with scorn and contempt from the very people that, one would think, knew him best:

'Jesus came to his hometown, and his disciples followed him. On the sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astounded. They said, “Where did this man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been given to him? What deeds of power are being done by his hands! Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him. Then Jesus said to them, “Prophets are not without honor, except in their hometown, and among their own kin, and in their own house.” And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. And he was amazed at their unbelief.

Then he went about among the villages teaching. He called the twelve and began to send them out two by two, and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. He ordered them to take nothing for their journey except a staff; no bread, no bag, no money in their belts; but to wear sandals and not to put on two tunics. He said to them, “Wherever you enter a house, stay there until you leave the place. If any place will not welcome you and they refuse to hear you, as you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them.” So they went out and proclaimed that all should repent. They cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them.'

--Mark 6: 1-13

How discouraging it must have been for Jesus to return to Nazareth, only for the folks there to ridicule him in such fashion: . Who is this, they say? Isn’t he one of Mary’s kids? Where does he get off thinking he can talk like this? They’re too proud to see Jesus as anything more than the little boy they once knew, and in Luke’s version of this story, they even try to kill him. That couldn't have been easy to take. Why couldn't they see what was actually going on around them? 

Image of Jesus rejected at Nazareth (artist unknown).

When a leader gets discouraged, what happens to the ones following? No doubt the 12 were feeling pretty low at that point. How is this going to work if Jesus’ own people refuse to support him? Yet despite the rejection from his hometown, he withdraws and calls the 12 together and commissions them, sends them out – this is why they’re called apostles, because they are sent. Despite opposition, Jesus’ mission can and will regroup, refocus, and continue. 

And how does he send them out? In pairs. No one goes alone. Not even Judas! That's because we can’t do the work of Jesus alone. We can’t preach love to a world filled with contempt, we can’t offer good news to the poor while the indolent rich remain in power, we can’t create something new as those stuck in their pride deride us – none of it can we do by ourselves, nor were ever meant to. He sent them out together for a reason, because they’re gonna need each other. You’re gonna need each other. 

The road is tough at times; it was for those 12, why should we be any different. Like them, we go where Jesus directs us, like them we run into dangers, and like them we even find ourselves in abusive situations and relationships. But also like them, we are not meant to remain there, and like them, when we need to walk away and shake the dust off our feat as a testimony to such derision. But even that we do with the grace and mercy of God in our hearts. How? Through the Spirit that has marked us as Christ’s own forever, and though we may be dismissed by a harsh world, we trust in a different verdict, as confident of such a verdict from that same Spirit, as we are needful of it. 

Times may be worrisome and downright scary. The path forward unclear, but God is good…all the time. We know this. Like the Psalmist we cry out for God’s mercy and deliverance and at the same time we do the work Jesus has sent us out to do. St. Augustine said to pray as if everything depended upon God but work as if everything depended upon us. This is precisely what we do, and this work is never done alone. 

So take heart. Come what may, you have been given everything you need for the journey, including each other. And at the Table of the Lord we get food and drink to sustain us in that journey. This is the gift we receive so as to carry it and give it away. Despite opposition, the work of Jesus will always regroup, refocus, and continue. Trust in the God of love and grace, the God of deliverance and mercy, who, no matter what happens in the world around us, no matter how much scorn and contempt we must endure, always, always wins.