August 5th:
No Crust
Call: Psalm 51: 1-12 (785)
Text: John 6: 24-35tree brank
No Crust
I have always been fascinated - and reminded - by the old story
Of the three blind men and the elephant.
One of the blind men touches the trunk
The second touches the tusk
The third touches the body
Then they talk with each other
"An elephant is like a snake without a head" the first one explains
"No, an elephant is like a very hard, but smooth tree branch"
Chimes in blind man number two
The third corrects them
"You are both wrong, an elephant is like a big, roughly carpeted wall
All three men are right.
But all three have given us inadequate descriptions of an elephant.
Certainly, those of us with sight would not recognize one.
The story of the blind men and the elephant
Is a caution to each of us that
when one limits his/her thoughts
to only one aspect of anything, anyone, or any place
that person will come away with an inadequate understanding
of the thing the person or the place.
Even though those thoughts are accurate
Even though those thoughts provide useful information
Information that is valuable and worthwhile
- so long as its inadequacy and limitations are recognized
This caution applies to how we view and understand God.
All we have to do is turn back to hymn 113
The hymn that we sang just about fifteen minutes ago
The words of the hymn are almost exclusively images of God
Source and sovereign Rock and cloud
Fortress, fountain, shelter, light
Judge, defender Mercy, might
Life whose life all life endowed
God is the source of everything
And God is the sovereign or king over everything
God is the rock which supports us and prevents us from sinking
And God is the cloud
The cloud that that leads us like it led the Israelites out of Egypt
The cloud that symbolizes Christ's presence
Like was promised at his ascension
God is our fortress of protection
God is the fountain of everything
including knowledge and wisdom and love
God is our shelter from the elements
God is our light that brightens the path so that we can see where to go
God is mercy and yet God is might
And God is the life whose life all life endowed
In other words without God there would be no other life.
Thirteen images! And this is just the first verse. There are two more
Two more verses made up of images of God
Each valid - none complete.
And these verses are connected by a refrain
That is a prayer that God's church will always
Recall, remember, and be aware
That no single holy name
But rather the truth behind them
Is what we Christians proclaim.
When you and I limit ourselves to seeing God as only one
"God is love" "God is king"
We limit our ability to understand, appreciate, serve, and share God.
We then are the blind men - or women, this error is not gender specific-
Thinking we understand the elephant.
That is why Tom Troeger wrote this hymn
That is what we are saying when we sing it.
Recognizing this should inspire us to look at each of the images
But while looking at each, continuing to understand that that image
May describe the trunk, the tusk, or the big body
But not the full elephant
For that we need all three - and we need more
Likewise, when trying to understand God,
Even Troeger's three verses are incomplete
Today, we look at one of those images
an image we find in Troeger's second verse.
Word and wisdom root and vine
Shepherd, Savior servant lamb
Well and water bread and wine
Way who leads us to "I AM"
In the scripture John presents Christ as the "bread of life."
[John 6: 24-35]
John was a fine writer.
To impress this image on us, he introduces it
Not at the last supper
Not at Emmaus (which only Luke describes)
Even though they are the scriptures
Which we most closely identify with the sacrament of communion
Instead John introduces the image shortly after telling of
the feeding of the multitude
and of Jesus, after praying on the mountain,
walking across the water to meet his disciples.
The crowd referred to in the beginning of the text
Is the very same crowd that, on the day before, Christ had fed
With the five loaves of bread and the two fish.
And Jesus tells them
Not to be motivated and controlled by that bread
For that bread perishes
But rather to be motivated and controlled by the food that endures for eternal life.
As they question him about this, he finally declares 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."
In other words, believing in and following Christ
are more important than our human needs
Even the most essential of those needs: Food and drink
If you really want to live, [Christ says]
then accept me as the most essential thing in your life.
This tells us that in our sacrament
We are to accept the bread baked with human hands
as the bread that gives us life
As we physically take and eat the bread
We see it as Christ putting his love and his life into us
And our receiving the nourishment that we need to really live.
To the people of Christ's day and place
There was nothing more essential than bread
And so in this image of Christ as the bread of life
Christ tells us that as the bread of life
There is nothing more essential than he.
And then he offers himself to us.
As you and I move to the sacrament we have a choice
We can go through the motions
Or We can be awed that we are receiving the bread of life,
A bread that is wrapped not in crust
Which many children - and some adults - won't eat
But wrapped in his love
which even the children embrace and seek
a bread that he used to illustrate and foretell his death for us
A bread that we receive as a gift
Not as an award or a payment for anything we have done
It's your choice. And it's my choice
We can choose the perishable bread baked by human hands or
We can choose the nonperishable, eternally lasting bread of life.
The truth is that it shouldn't be a hard choice for either of us.