The Scandal of Bread and Wine, Body and Blood - John 6: 51-69

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

When many of the disciples heard [the teaching of Jesus], they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?”

They just couldn’t take it anymore. His teaching about His flesh being true food and His blood true drink was just too much. No self-respecting, Torah-living, Scripture-believing Jew would dare talk that way, let alone do such a thing. Eat human flesh? Never! Drink blood? Not only was blood unclean, but the drinking of blood was forbidden. Eating and drinking such a meal would surely put you outside the community, strip you of temple worship, and leave you as unclean as lepers, pig farmers, or even [shudder the thought] Gentiles. For Jesus to speak of Himself this way, for Him to invite – nay, encourage! – His listeners to participate in such a thing as cannibalism, it was just too much to hear, to believe, to follow anymore. And, what kind of foolishness was this disrespectful talk about the manna that the Israelites ate in the desert? Forty years of God-given bread is part of the history of Israel. But the final straw was His referring to Himself with Godly language like Son of Man and being coequal to the Father. 

It was too much; they couldn’t take it anymore. St. John says that “many of His disciples turned back and no longer walked with Him.”

What happened? We’ve been following the story for the last month. After He fed the 5000 with five loaves and two fish, the people wanted to make Jesus their king. Who wouldn’t? Could you imagine: an unlimited supply of food without having to either work for it or pay for it? Oh, wait…the Israelites had that in the wilderness for 40 years, didn’t they, and they grumbled constantly about having the same thing day in and day out. Yeah; that didn’t work out so well. And when Jesus brings this up to the people who have gathered around – both Jewish leaders and his disciples (the larger grouping of people who followed him, not just The Twelve), and then teaches that He is the Bread of Life and those who eat – that is, believe – will live forever, unlike their fathers in the desert, they were taken aback. “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?” they asked.

Jesus, in turn, asks them, “Do you take offense at this?” In fact, the Greek word used for our English word, “offended,” is “skandalon” – you can hear our word “scandal,” right? They weren’t just offended…they were scandalized by what Jesus had to say. 

Scandal helps us understand how severe this was. We use the word “offended” all the time, describing everything from politics to haircuts, but generally we get over that mess. But a scandal is something that is literally a stumbling block – a scandal causes me to lose faith in someone. It makes me rethink my whole idea about something. It might change my opinion, force me to rethink my ideology, even doubt what I have believed in the past. We move past an offense; but a scandal is a major hurdle to overcome. 

Jesus asked them, “Do you take offense?” Literally, the question is rhetorical – “You are scandalized, aren’t you?” He knew they were murmuring and grumbling the same way their forefathers had in the wilderness against Moses. They are being scandalized by who Jesus is. He’s not just a bread maker; He is the very Bread of Life itself. He’s not just the son of Mary; He is Bread which has come down from Heaven, meaning, from the very hand of God Himself. They are being scandalized that Jesus instructs them to believe in Him as God in flesh, and that by eating His flesh and drinking His blood – and here, he means in a spiritual sense, not a sacramental sense – one will live forever. A Jew would never dare succumb to cannibalism or touching blood. Such things made one unclean, and that Jesus seemed to be expecting this was simply too much. But the icing on the cake, the idea that made the tabloids of Jerusalem, was the idea that this Messiah would have to die to attain His throne. Body and blood talk is death talk, and – to paraphrase General George Patton – every Israelite knew that no Messiah becomes a Messiah by dying at the hands of the enemy. A crucified Messiah was no Messiah at all because everyone knew that someone who died at the hands of the Romans was not only a criminal but a man cursed by God. 

The scandal was just too much for many of those who had been following Jesus. They had their bellies filled on the hillside, they chased Jesus around the shoreline, they listened to what He said, but all of this bread, body and blood talk…it was too much. It gave them spiritual indigestion. The cross was the final stumbling stone and it put people at a cross-roads: follow, or not follow. When something bothers the tummy, you don’t eat it. This bread, body, eating and drinking talk bothered them so much, it was such a great stumbling stone to their faith, it was such a scandal that they simply could not tolerate it any further. They changed their opinions of Jesus; they turned and walked away.

The Gospel of Jesus still causes offense today. People outside the Church – Capitol C, the Christian church - still walk away from Jesus and His gifts. To those who seek offense, Jesus’ teaching has plenty to be offended by. They are scandalized by His teaching that He is the only way that leads to eternal life. They are shocked that He tells us to receive His body and drink His blood, not only spiritually, but also sacramentally in bread and wine for the forgiveness of sins, and that He is truly present in this meal. They are outraged that there is salvation in no other name under heaven given among men by which we may be saved. They refuse to believe Jesus forgives sinners – you know, like those people. And, sadly, there are some who refuse to believe Jesus’ death is truly all-sufficient, and that by faith in Him one may have eternal life in His name. 

What’s worse, though, is when the church causes people to be scandalized. Now, here, by church I am talking church with a lower-case c – the local church, the congregation. Every congregation has the same struggle: they are filled with sinners, and they are served by a sinner. Put sinful people together in one group and, sooner or later, something sinful will happen. There’s gossip and rumor, suggestion and inuendo, selfishness and arrogance. What does that do to the body of Christ when brothers and sisters in Christ speak of each other in the worst of names. What does that say when little Christs take their baptismal blessings and behave as if forgiveness, compassion, giving the benefit of the doubt, mercy and grace are all dumped in the ditch, and memories of sins past are dredged to the surface, “rights” are espoused, vile and vitriol and sharpened like swords, and hearts grow hard.

People stumble in faith and, sadly, some not only stumble but fall – fall away from the congregation: “I don’t want to be part of a church like that.” Worse, some even fall away from faith in Jesus. “If that’s what the body of Jesus is like, He isn’t much of a head.” 

Our Lord calls us to repentance so that our behaviors do not scandalize His name, or scandalize others in their faith. “Thy kingdom come,” remember? Not ours, not our reputation, He leads us to turn away from ourselves and turn toward our brothers and sisters in Christ with His compassion.  He opens our eyes to see our own sins before we consider those of others. He gives the strength to let gossip die in your ears and seal your lips so that inuendo never passes your mouth. He fills you with His spirit so you speak tenderly, gently, and with understanding. And He leads us to surrender ourselves for the body of Christ.

The irony is there is nothing to be scandalized by. He came to seek and to save the lost; he came to rescue and redeem sinners; He came to give himself for those who had nothing left to give; He came to feed with food that has no expiration date and never spoils or fades. He is the great physician of body and soul Who comes to heal those who could not heal themselves from eternal damnation. He didn't come to establish an earthly Kingdom. His Kingdom, on earth and in heaven, endures into eternity without beginning or end. He doesn't demand foolish allegiance but he does call us to faith in him, trusting that His life , death, and resurrection are the all sufficient payment for all of your sins and mine. He doesn’t come to be served, but to serve and to give His life for many. Simply, this is why Jesus came:  “that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in Him should have eternal life and I will raise Him up on the last day” (v. 40).

The cross knows no limits. There are no oversized loads at the cross. Jesus doesn’t weigh or measure sins and determine that the cross can’t stand the weight and has to be left on the sinner’s back. Jesus takes them all. He even takes yours. Remember: all sins deserve condemnation. Jesus died for them all. He died for you. In faith, repentance dumps your sin, my sin, their sins at the foot of the cross and says, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You died for this damnable burden, so I am leaving it where You paid it’s price. Strengthen me, so I don’t do it again. Preserve me against temptation. Because You rose, I know that my sins will no longer be held against me into eternity. These are the words of eternal life. I know them, believe them, trust them and rely on these promises and on these promises alone.” 

These are the words you have heard today. Blessed are you. The Father has drawn you, the Spirit has birthed you, the Son has redeemed you. Blessed are you. “Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he will also live because of me. So, to you, Jesus says, “Come. Eat and drink. My body and blood is here, for you.” He fed Israel with manna from heaven for forty years. He feeds you, today, with food that lasts into eternity, with drink that quenches the insatiable thirst for mercy. In the eating and drinking, He comes to you, strengthens you, forgives you.  You take His body and blood with you wherever you go. To your work, to your home, to your grave. And He will raise you up on the last day.

 

 

 

 

 

There Is Bread Under the Broom Tree - 1 Kings 19: 1-8

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

The text is this morning’s Old Testament lesson[1], especially these words, “But [Elijah] went a day’s journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a broom tree. And He asked that he might die, saying, “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life for I am no better than my fathers.”

Hmm. Pretty dark stuff, isn’t it? Not the kind of text one would expect in a Sunday sermon. But it is there, in the story of Elijah, and it shows us just what kind of a place he was in, mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually. It leaves us, as God’s people, wondering, “How did this prophet of God get to that kind of low spot? What happened that he found himself sitting under a tree, praying that the Lord takes his life?”

I would invite you to take your Bible this afternoon and read 1 Kings, chapters 17 thru 19, and read the story of Elijah – it’ll take you 20, maybe 30 minutes. King Ahab and his wife, Queen Jezebel, were wicked rulers of Israel – so wicked that their names are still used today to describe someone filled with evil intent.  The Lord called Elijah to preach a specific message: there will be a massive, lengthy drought in the land because of their leading Israel into unfaithfulness. The purpose of the prophesy of the drought was this: if the drought happened as Elijah prophesied, that served as proof that the rest of his words from God were also true. Three years into the drought, food and water were scarce. When Elijah stayed at a widow’s home, as commanded by God, the Lord provided just enough flour and oil that she, her son, and Elijah had daily bread. But it was when the widow’s son died, and Elijah laid over the corpse, prayed, and the child was raised to life, the woman’s response was one that would be a theme in his prophetic ministry: “Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.” The miracles proved Elijah’s divinely given authority to the woman.

But it was the duel at Mt. Caramel that proved for all of Israel that Elijah was a prophet of God and, more importantly, demonstrated that Yahweh, the God of Israel, was the only true God. In what can only be described as a prayer duel, Elijah and the prophets of Baal offered sacrifices and prayers to their respective God/god and whichever would answer would be declared the true God. Despite the false prophet’s best efforts to stir up Baal, their prayers were answered with only silence. But when Elijah called on the name of the Lord, fire fell from the heavens, consuming the wood, sacrifice, even the stone and water that had been poured over it. As the people fell on their faces, Elijah ordered the false prophets be captured and killed. Rain began to fall on the parched land, a baptismal blessing of new life of repentance for the nation.

From any human measurement, this was an overwhelming moment of glory as a prophet of God! His prophetic work was validated; there was rain, water was flowing, and Lord was demonstrated to be the only true God. By any measure, by any mark, by any stretch of the imagination, Elijah should have been floating on a prophetic cloud nine. But then Elijah received word that the wicked and evil Jezebel had ordered that he be hunted down and killed, slaughtered as he had done to her prophets. And Elijah ran. He ran a full day’s journey into the wilderness until he collapsed, tired, hungry, afraid, and then he prayed that the Lord would take his life. He wanted to die.

I do not take that as a euphemism or over-exaggeration to make the story more interesting. I take it as it is written: Elijah had gone from success at Caramel to fleeing for his life. He was exhausted, hungry, and so overcome with what faced him, should he be caught by this wicked, evil woman who would take great pleasure in seeing him die a terrible and painful death, that he wished he would die instead.

Those words resonated with me as I began studying for this morning’s sermon because of the young woman in Cuero two weeks ago, but I also found out that a brother LCMS pastor took his life last weekend. Truth be told, I didn’t know him, personally, only as a friendly face and Godly voice on a Facebook page for LCMS pastors. There is part of us that wants to know the morbid details - that’s why we gawk at accident scenes – and this is no different. The fact is I don’t know any details, and even if I did know, it doesn’t really matter because it would be too easy for us to sit here, thousands of miles away in our own homes, lives, and worlds and not begin to understand what he was dealing with. “What would make him do that,” we would say as we shook our heads, “Didn’t he know what he had to live for, that people loved him, that help was there for him?”

I would suspect that, yes, he did know all those things. He knew his wife and kids loved him dearly and needed him as a husband and father; that his parish was expecting him to return from vacation, rested and prepared to continue serving. Maybe there were family problems, or a crisis in the parish, or an issue in the community, or a combination of them, weighing so heavily on his heart and mind, making the darkness so powerful that no light of hope, joy or peace could penetrate. Perhaps there was a medical condition and he was afraid of being a burden on those whom he loved. Or, maybe he was one of us unfortunate souls whose glass is always half-empty, and no matter how much is poured into it, and no matter how often we read Psalm 23’s promise of a cup that overflows, it just doesn’t seem to make a difference. Perhaps he had even sought help before. I don’t know. What I do know is that this was a man, a baptized child of God, a fellow Christian, a husband and father,  a fellow pastor, a man whose vocation was centered in Christ, the forgiveness of sins, the strengthening of faith, the encouragement of others who are broken, hurting, and half-empty, who baptized, absolved, blessed, distributed the Body and Blood of His Lord, and who believed in Jesus as the Savior of the World and who proclaimed the same. 

But something happened the other day. This was a faithful man of God who strived to be Christ to the least, the poorest, the humblest, the overlooked in the community and in the parish, so they, too, would know that they had incredible and eternal value in the eyes of God, so much so that He gave up His Son for them. But, for some reason, that day, he could not see himself as that one, the broken one, the hurting one, for whom Jesus died and gave hope. Whatever it was, it was just too much, so much that child of God went out and, instead of praying like Elijah, “It’s enough, O Lord, take my life,” he did it himself.

I still remember one of my preaching professors said, “You don’t even talk about suicide in a sermon because it could put the idea in someone’s head.” Satan doesn’t wait for our permission, our decision, our words to put a wicked idea in someone’s head. If we can’t speak of suicide in the church, if we can’t address it from the position of faithfulness, if we can’t call it what it is, then he wins. So, against his admonition, yet with some fear and a wee bit of trembling, I do so today.

Suicide is a sin. Period. The taking of a human life, outside one’s specific vocational duty in the protection of others, is a sin condemned by God. This is true whether it is the life of someone else or taking one’s own life. Don’t let anyone fool you by such polite-sounding words like “mercy-death” or “euthanasia,” it’s suicide. It comes from the Latin: to kill one’s own self. At the risk of great over-simplification, psychologists and doctors tell us that, usually, people choose suicide because they simply want the pain to stop – whether it is physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual, or a combination of them all. Make no mistake, pain that is caused by shame, guilt, and the words of others can hurt even worse than physical pain. The limerick is wrong: sticks and stones certainly break bones, but words cut even more deeply. Often, suicide victims have tried many things to stop the pain – medication, therapy, prayer, blessing, and other treatments – but the pain remains. With seemingly no other answer, a person chooses to take their life.

A generation or two generation ago, the church treated suicide as the worst of all sins because, the logic said, one could not repent: the last cognizant act was a sin and there was no opportunity to change the mind or heart or to live a life of repentance. Sadly, again this was 50, 60 years ago, the church would even bury a baptized Christian who died by suicide outside of the church cemetery – a final, temporal insult to the child of God and his or her family, branding him or her as unfaithful.

How often have you caught your own self, having done something, that when asked, “Why did you do that?”, your answer, truthfully, is “I don’t know…just because.” You weren’t denying Jesus; you weren’t rejecting His love or mercy. In a terrible moment of weakness, the Old Adam makes a sinful decision that, yes, is contrary to the will and word of God and, yes, in the case of suicide, it cannot yield a life of repentance. But the church has also come to understand that in moments of weakness and despair, the old adam and the old eve does things in the darkness that otherwise he or she would not do.

Thank God - and I use that phrase literally - that the church now understands that suicide is often done in weakness and in desperation, not necessarily an abandonment of God, a denial of His love, compassion, strength and mercy, or a rejection of Christ as Savior. As to it being a last, sinful act from which one cannot repent, remember: this side of heaven, you are always a sinner, but as God’s baptized child, you are always forgiven, not because you repent but because Christ died for you and you trust His death as complete for you. Repentance is part of that life, a result of God’s forgiveness for the sake of Christ. Repentance is not the cause for His forgiveness.

But, just because suicide isn’t necessarily eternally damning – it is still a sin, remember - that doesn’t excuse it as a temporal answer for a Christian, any more than grand theft is an answer for being overdrawn or spreading lies about someone is acceptable because you disagree with their ideology.

I want to draw your attention to a powerful detail in this morning’s reading. The past few weeks, we’ve spoken of how God answers prayer. Notice how He answers Elijah’s prayer here. Elijah prays that the Lord takes his life. God answers by sending an angel. Angel, remember, means “messenger,” and this angel’s simple message was wake up, get up, eat and drink the bread and water the Lord has provided you. This was real food, not some kind of metaphorical “spiritual food.” A real angel provides real food for the real man to continue in his real journey towards Mt. Horeb.

We speak of “daily bread.” In his Small Catechism, Martin Luther says daily bread is everything we need for the support and needs of the body. He goes on to list things like food, clothes, shelter, and family. The full list is a parallel to what he describes as First Article gifts, the material blessings that God gives us out of His love as our Heavenly Father. God provides daily bread to us all – again, not just Mrs. Baird’s finest, but everything we need - and that includes to those struggling with depression, melancholy, and deep sadness. Daily bread, First Article gifts include doctors, mental health professionals, therapists, medication, family and friends, pastors and teachers, all gifts and blessings from God. A very old idea in Christianity was to say that if you have enough faith, you shouldn’t need a therapist or mental health medication. That was wrong thinking then, and it is wrong today. That’s as ridiculous as saying if you have enough faith, you shouldn’t need glasses, hearing aids, Tylenol, high blood pressure medication or chemotherapy.  God’s gift of mental healthcare is just as good and valid as his gift of physical and spiritual care. So, if this is you, getting up from beneath your broom tree, getting up and availing yourself to the daily bread of a psychologist or psychiatrist, a primary care doctor, a pastor, a therapist, or even a friend or family member while saying, “Please – I need help,” that is availing yourself to the daily bread that God provides.

I know those four words are not easy to say – especially to us of German and Czech ancestry. It’s even harder for men who, stereotypically, pretend everything is fine when it’s not. I said them to my wife, to my doctor, to my therapist and my pastor in February of 2016 as tears ran down my cheeks and my heart broke in my chest. Those four people, my wife, my doctor, my therapist, and my pastor were gifts of God that He used to help get me well and pull me from the darkness into the light of Christ. That little pill I take every morning? It’s a daily-bread gift of God. Those phone calls and visits I still make, those are daily-bread gifts of God to help keep me centered. And the words I receive, the blessings, and the absolution, those are daily-bread gifts of God that continue to feed me in my daily journey as a child of God, a husband, father, pastor, and neighbor.

For some, that journey is relatively short and a straight line. For others, it is a long difficult path. Occasionally, it will be a lifelong journey that is filled with potholes and switchbacks and successes and setbacks. Whatever your journey, whatever that path might look like, if you need help, the Lord provides daily bread for you. If you need help, call me – my number is on the front of the bulletin. I don’t care if its just the “blahs” or serious, heavy-duty depression. I count it an honor to sit with you, pray with you, or go with you to get other, professional help. And, to the rest of you, if you get that phone call from a family member or friend, reaching out to you for help, be bold, be prayer-filled, and be an angel, a messenger, with daily bread from God for that person.

As Christians, our journey is grounded in the journey of another One. Elijah’s 40-day journey to Horeb is a foreshadowing of Jesus’ own 40-day journey into the wilderness where He was tempted by the devil[2]. Your Savior knows full-well the difficulty in this world and life. He knows what it is to be hungry, to wonder where the next meal might come from and when it will arrive, “Turn these stones to bread…”. He knows what it is to have His identity as the Son of God challenged, “If you really are…”. He knows what it is to be tempted by physical harm as an answer to stopping the hurt, “Go ahead – jump!” Our Lord answered each temptation perfectly by returning to the Scriptures, to the Word of the Lord as the sure and certain means to end satan’s lies. He was placed onto the Tree of the cross, dying for you, and then rising for you. He did this for you, so that when faced with Satan’s lies, you have a Victor who has already conquered satan for you, who lived the perfect life in your place, who suffered the agony of the cross for you. His suffering sanctifies your suffering. His hunger makes your hunger holy. His identity as the Son of God makes holy your identity in Him. His enduring the pain of the cross sanctifies the pain you feel in your body, mind and soul.

I realize this was heavy stuff, and I also realize that for most of you, you’ll never crawl under a broom tree, or a mesquite tree, or a weesatch bush and pray “It’s enough, Lord, take my life.” You might find yourself there with a bad case of the “blahs.” That’s most of you. But, there may be someone listening, here or on-line, or who will read this later, who is there in the darkness.

If you ever find yourself under the broom tree, whether just with a case of the “blahs” or in the depths of deep, dark depression, remember this: Get up. There is daily bread under the broom tree for you. More than that, there is Bread for you on the Tree. It is Christ, and He is risen. He is risen, indeed. Alleluia.

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[1] https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+kings+19%3A+1-8&version=ESV

 

[2] Matthew 4: 1-11

"What is it?" The Bread of Life! - Exodus 16: 2-5 & John 6: 22-35

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

It all came about because the people were grumbling. Two months into the wilderness journey, just sixty or so days since they fled from the Egyptians and the wicked pharaoh, and the people were already lamenting how they left behind pots of meat and baskets of fresh vegetables. If you want to talk about romanticizing a situation, this was it. Back in Egypt, they weren’t shopping at Central Market, they were digging in the scrap bins. It wasn’t “Here Everything’s Better” – it was here, everyone was begging for their lives. It wasn’t “Save Money – Live Better,” it was save our necks and live one more day.[1] But their scrap stew and stale crusts of bread seemed like a 5-star Michelin meal compared to the hot air that they were dining on in the desert. What they had in Egypt wasn’t much, they could honestly say, but it beat starvation. And so they grumbled – they grumbled against God and grumbled against Moses. “It would have been better if we died in Egypt than to die out here in the desert,” they lamented.

No. It would not have been better had they died in Egypt. Nor would it do for God’s people whom He rescued to die in the wilderness. How terrible that would be. Could you imagine the laughter back In Egypt, anywhere where God’s name was spoken? “Oh, yeah…that Israelite God. He was strong enough to perform ten incredible plagues over Egypt and part the Red Sea, but he forgot His logistical supply train out in the desert…” No, that wouldn’t do at all. So the Lord, in His grace and mercy, reaches out His hand and rains down blessings upon His hungry, grumbling people.

Manna. In Hebrew, manach. We know what it is, sort of, because Exodus describes it. We talked about it Wednesday evening, trying to imagine it: fluffy like mixed feed for cattle; flaky like frosted flakes; light enough to be left like the dew, like cotton candy; something, somewhere in between. The ancient Israelites had no clue, so the name of this flaky, semi-sweet, coriander-like, bread-ish substance means exactly that: “What is it?” Vas ist das? It’s not exactly bread, lechem, at least not like the bread they had always known, but that’s what God called it. It came to the ground overnight, a left-over remnant after the dew. The Children of Israel were to harvest it in the morning, enough for each person in the family to have enough for three meals in a day – nothing more. If they tried to store up extras, to squirrel away a little manach for a rainy day, so to speak, they were left with a stinky, bug-infested mess. They were to only collect a day’s ration at a time, enough for each person in the household. It was as if God were saying, “I will provide. Do you trust me? You have My word and my word does not fail. Do you trust me? Every day, go collect the daily ration – with the exception of Friday when you collect a double portion for Sabbath – and you will not hunger.” And the Lord did as He promised. Every night the dew lay on the ground and every morning the manna was ready to be picked up.

Ah, yes. Every morning. Every morning for forty years the Lord provided perfectly for His people so their bellies didn’t growl in emptiness. Every morning, three times a day, seven times a week, 365 days a year, times forty. That’s over 45,000 meals of manna that were eaten over 40 years. Every morning, God’s blessing literally appeared on the ground and every day, mana in the morning, quail at night, and the people were fed.

But it was an every morning ordeal. Every morning they had to go pick it up. Every morning they had to go collect the manna so they would survive. That’s 14,000 mornings of going out and gathering manna, 14,000 nights of gathering quail, with a weekly day off. Every morning, baskets of manna to provide the day’s meals. Israel was experiencing God’s curse to Eve in a very personal way: “By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground…” (Gen. 3:19). God was again using bread to save His people, but it was only a temporal salvation that had to be repeated every day until they entered the Promised Land. 

Daily bread. We know about daily bread, don’t we, and the work it takes to have it. Now, by daily bread, I don’t just mean Mrs. Baird’s finest. That’s part of it, sure, but daily bread encompasses much more. Luther says it’s everything that we need to support this body and life such as food, drink, clothing, shoes, house, home, land, animals, money, goods, family, employment, good weather and more. We know about this bread and we know about getting it. We get up in the morning and go to work. For some, that’s going to the plant; for others, that’s planting in the ground. For some, it’s an office or a classroom; for others, it’s an oilfield or a warehouse. For some, it’s driving a vehicle for sales or delivery; for others, it’s crawling under a car to service it. But every morning, except our Sabbath, it’s up and at ‘em, making hay while the sun shines, turning and burning, trying to gather the daily bread that the Lord provides through our work.

But daily bread is just that – it’s daily. It’s fleeting. It passes. Whether it’s the food in the pantry, the clothes on our backs, the health of our bodies, the money in our IRA and 401Ks, or the stability of our families, they don’t last forever. Do we work to live, or live to work? It’s tempting to become jaded. It happens to me, too. I’ve been there, myself. Some days, I understand the words of the writer of Proverbs 1 a little more clearly than others: “Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher. “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.”  What do people gain from all their labors at which they toil under the sun?” (Prov. 1:1-3)

Jesus picks up on this in today’s Gospel lesson. “Do not labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you.” (Jn. 6:27). He is teaching the crowds that followed to stop following Him because of the miracles and the baskets of bread. Instead, follow Jesus to receive the gift that lasts into eternity.

The gift isn’t earned by going to work each day. This is a food that’s given you free, gratis, from the Son of Man, from Jesus, marked in His Baptism as the Son of God and Source of salvation.  Jesus alone, and there is no other.

Jesus our bread; Jesus our drink.  If you’re thinking Lord’s Supper, you on the right track.  But today it’s about trust in Jesus and His work to save you.  So that you don’t doubt, so that you don’t wonder if this bread is for you, He gives you a sign. It’s not changing a lunch into a massive potluck. It’s something greater: His death and resurrection.  That’s how this Bread of Life is baked - in the fiery furnace of God’s wrath against our sin and in the burning heat of His passion to save His fallen creation.  Like wheat ground up by the mill and put into the fire, Jesus endured the cross bearing our sin in order to be our Food, the Source of life.

“I am the Bread of Life,” Jesus said.  Think about it: bread.  Not croissant, not challa, not fancy, crusty gourmet loaves, not a delicacy to be indulged in once and a while.  Bread.  Daily, ordinary, earthy food.  Jesus is manna for sinners - those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.  You, in all the ways that sin has left you empty and hungry.  There is food that endures forever.  A Bread that gives life forever.  A drink that quenches your thirst and soothes your parched soul.  Not “chicken soup for the soul,” but bread of life for your life.  And it is free.  Not earned but given, received.

When I was a student at the Seminary in St. Louis, there was a cooking show on the local PBS station that I loved to watch. The host was a Dominican monk from the nearby monastery in Illinois and his show was called, simply, BREAKING BREAD WITH FATHER DOMINIQUE. I guess I was a groupie – I got his cookbook for a Christmas gift. And, I have to admit, as I was writing this I googled “Breaking Bread with Father Dominique” and I was pleasantly surprised to find that not only is he still baking, but I also found both his blog and his video channel.

One of his first episodes, he was discussing the basics of how to bake bread. Apparently, a lot of people are intimidated by bread because of the yeast involved, and then the kneading process, and the time it takes to bake bread – about three hours, start to finish – so he was trying to soothe first time bakers. Short of killing the yeast, it takes a lot of work to really mess up a batch of bread.  He said, “Don’t worry about the bread. It is your friend. Bread is very forgiving.” 

That Bread is Jesus Himself - Jesus in the Word, Jesus in your Baptism, Jesus in the Bread and Cup.  Jesus, for the full and free forgiveness of all of your sins. Eat and drink, trust in Him, and you will filled with life forever.

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[1] Slogans for HEB grocery and Wal-Mart, respectively.