Bread 1: Who Is Jesus- Rev. Wendy McCormick- August 4,2024
Bread 1: Who is Jesus?
Rev Wendy McCormick August 4, 2024
By now, it seems everyone is familiar with the term NONE – n-o-n-e – as a category of religious preference in this country. It comes from the highly reputed Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan organization that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world, by conducting public opinion polling, demographic research, content analysis and other data-driven social science research. In their research in the field of American religion, Pew has made headlines in identifying the ever-growing category of Americans, particularly young adults, who describe themselves as “none of the above,” when it comes to religion. The headlines this news has generated, together with other challenges congregations face, are causing many a congregation to feel some combination of anxiety, panic and despair. As with most studies like this, the story is far more complex and nuanced than the headlines would indicate. For one thing, “none” is a separate category from “atheist” or “agnostic.” It’s interesting to delve into this a bit and to wonder what we dyed-in-the-wool church folk can learn, how we can take some of the stories these “nones” share not as cause for despair but as food for thought, opportunities to reframe and reground ourselves in what is most essential, eventually being willing to jettison some of the rest.
A few years ago, I spent a good bit of time on the research into the religious and spiritual lives of adults ages 20-40, especially those who identify as “none” or “spiritual but not religious.” Again and again, I come back to a quote that shook me a bit when I first read it. For her book, “Choosing Our Religion: The Spiritual life of America’s Nones,” Elizabeth Drescher interviewed hundreds of those who identify as “none,” talking with them about their spiritual lives and how they make meaning. “I just try to follow Jesus,” one young man told her. “It’s as simple as that.” I try to follow Jesus. It brought me up short. Isn’t that what being Christian is about? Isn’t that what church is about? Isn’t that what being baptized means? How did we get to the point where following Jesus, at least for a segment of people, is unrelated to identifying as a Christian let alone connecting to a church?
Has that core of who we are and what we’re about somehow gotten overshadowed? Have the clear baptismal waters become so cloudy that following Jesus is seen as separate from church or being Christian?
The gospel of John is all about who Jesus is and what it means to be connected to Jesus, in John's language, to abide in Jesus. So, this lectionary mini-series from John gives us an opportunity to look more deeply at those questions for ourselves as individual disciples and for ourselves together as the church, this quirky community that exists because following Jesus is a lifelong journey that draws us together as we imperfectly love and support and challenge one another and try together to embody, to enflesh, to incarnate that same Jesus. So, our framing question for our little series from John 6 is “who is Jesus?”
One of the first things we can say about Jesus from today’s feeding story is that Jesus is very Jewish and very deeply rooted in the Hebrew scriptures, what we know as the Old Testament. The story is set at Passover which evokes the whole Exodus story, and there are little details that reference Moses and the Exodus. Beyond that, good Jews would have recognized the reference to the prophet Elisha who fed a large crowd from 20 barley loaves and had leftovers, the story Scott read for us from Kings. John’s telling of the feeding parallels Elisha’s feeding, just on a larger scale.
God’s provision and abundance represented through food is a theme that runs throughout the Old Testament. That lesser known 2/3 of our Bible is full of such stories and images: manna in the wilderness, miracles by the prophets, “You spread a table before me in the presence of my enemies . . . my cup overflows,” and Isaiah’s wonderful vision of God’s future: 6 On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. So too the theme of hospitality, embodied by Jesus in this story, is a familiar Old Testament theme going back to Abraham and Sarah welcoming and hosting three strangers who turn out to be messengers from God.
Who is Jesus? Jesus has deep roots in ancient and abiding traditions of sharing, feeding, food, hospitality and abundance as experiences of the presence of God. In both stories we heard today, somebody steps up to offer what they have. The un-named man in Kings brings his “first fruits.” This is the ancient tradition from which we get our practice of Sunday morning offering. People brought to God a portion of their earnings --- the first fruits of their crop --- off the top. Like the even more dramatic disproportion in the Jesus story, the amount he offers isn’t nearly enough to meet the need. But both stories and so many others in the scriptures stand to remind us that ours is to share, to offer from our first and our best, not to solve problems of scarcity, but to offer, trusting God’s abundance. And so this story stands in such a long line, where people are fed, where provision is abundantly made, where needs are met, because somebody stepped up to offer what they had. Trusting there will be enough and sharing with everyone present, Jesus shows us how to live abundantly and share abundantly, contrary to the overwhelming message then and now of scarcity. Who is Jesus? Our example of what it is to practice stewardship, hospitality and abundance.
And then, after the sign, after 5000 people are fed and 12 baskets of leftovers are collected, the people say, “This is indeed the prophet who was to come into the world.” Just like Elisha and Elijah before him. Who is Jesus? The prophet who was to come into the world. If we Christians jump too quickly to say that Jesus supersedes Moses and the prophets, we are not only misguided but we miss a lot. It’s important that people see him as a prophet in line with Elijah and Elisha and all the great prophets in the Old Testament.
“This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world.” Who is Jesus? The greatest of the prophets, following in line with prophets before and since. Prophets look at the world with God’s eyes and tell what they see. Prophets fearlessly take on the powers that be in the name of the ways of God. What does it mean to follow Jesus? It means to be prophetic: bringing the eyes and ears, the heart and hands of God to the world around us and fearlessly taking action. The people’s first idea of who Jesus is may be incomplete, but it’s not wrong. “This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world.”
Who is Jesus? In John’s version of this famous feeding, Jesus does the feeding himself, giving thanks and sharing food. Host and servant, embodying and modeling what it is to live and share abundance. Showing us how it’s done. For us, scarcity is a fact of life --- family budgets and church budgets and government budgets and priorities, scarcity is the way it is: how are we to feed all these people? Six months’ wages wouldn’t be enough to give everyone a mouthful. One in five children in Ohio is hungry. Food insecurity is a reality in too many neighborhoods near and far. But Jesus is about abundance. Everyone sit down . . . sit down on – quote – a lot of grass. The one who makes us lie down in green pastures, the one who will soon be called the Good Shepherd is at work. Sit down in luxurious, expansive grass and eat your fill. Eat your fill, there’s plenty, including 12 baskets of leftovers.
Who is Jesus? The one who shows us how it’s done. Showing us that following Jesus means meeting the needs of the hungry with abundance, hospitality, and plenty of leftovers.
Who is Jesus? Well, the end of our passage reminds us he’s not a king. Jesus is not a political ruler. Jesus is not the ultimate human leader come to save us from ourselves and take away our responsibility and agency, as much as we may long for just that. And wouldn’t it be great? Wouldn’t it be great if someone who believed in feeding people and knew how to get it done was in charge? If political and governmental leaders took an attitude of abundance instead of an attitude of scarcity? If they prioritized feeding people over, you know, tax cuts for the uber-wealthy. Wouldn’t that be great?
But over and over the scriptures remind us that it doesn’t work that way. Jesus is not Abraham Lincoln or Franklin Roosevelt or Nelson Mandela. And he’s not a superman version of the best of all leaders rolled into one. That’s not who Jesus is. Jesus is the greatest of all prophets . . . and more, as we will see in the coming weeks. But not the king/president/prime minister/super-ruler to absolve us of our responsibility and take away our agency. Nope. Sorry.
There will be no abdication of responsibility for those who would follow this Jesus. Following this one who is showing us how to feed and tend and host and serve is no free ride. Making Jesus king, even calling Jesus king, is a slippery slope indeed.
And so he disappears. “When he realized they were about to take him by force to make him king, he withdrew by himself,” John says.
It’s an anti-climactic ending to this amazing sign, in which 5000 people have been fed with no more than some kid’s lunch and everyone’s had plenty, and 12 baskets of leftovers have been collected. Who knows what it looked like when they began to try to take him by force to make him king? But he slipped away.
Who is Jesus? Fifteen verses into this chapter we have our first clues: Jesus is our example of host, servant, abundant provider, standing in a long line of the tradition of the exodus and the prophets, in which God liberates people and then provides for them, in which prophets bring God’s ways to kings and rulers no matter the cost. Who is Jesus? No king who will take away our agency and solve all our problems, but the one who shows us what to do, how to live how to share, how to practice stewardship and hospitality, trusting in God’s abundance.
I wonder how a deeper and richer connection to this Jesus might shape today’s church? I wonder if the people who check the box that says “none,” some of whom say they want to follow Jesus, I wonder if they experience a disconnect between this Jesus and the church. How might we enact the truth of who Jesus is in ways that are clear and grounded, compelling and prophetic to a world where church may be seen as irrelevant, unfocused, complicated, or passe, instead of as the thriving, pulsing, passionate gathering of those who follow this Jesus . . . this Jesus, the complex and ultimately compelling one into whom we are baptized and onto whom we are grafted. Amen.
