Abridged Worship – August 25, 2024

Our Gospel readings today continues with this theme, which we have encountered over the last few weeks, where Jesus speaks of himself as the bread of life; a bread that is crucial for salvation. It is so critical to understand Jesus as the Bread of life, that Jesus shifts the perspective of Manna, the bread from Heaven, to be merely a parlor trick of God’s divine power.

Without the consumption of the bread of life, you starve to death spiritually. More transparently put, without Jesus, there is only death.

In the passage some of the people who had witness the feeding of the multitude followed Jesus to continue to hear him speak. But when they heard this proclamation, of Bread of Life in contrast to the story of Manna in the wilderness, suddenly, the listeners were not as enthusiastic about Jesus as they once were.

Why the shift from ‘yay Jesus’, to walking away from Jesus, why would people who are seeking a messiah; the one that had been prophesied to come and who was now there preaching wisdom, performing miracles, and feeding them both in body and soul, why would suddenly hearing this reference to manna cause them to up and turn away.

Well, if you jump back to the story about manna, when Moses led his people out of Egypt by God’s hand of liberation, they ended up in the desert for a long time and eventually ran out of food, God provided them with Manna, which is described as the following, the manna was like coriander seed, and looked like resin. The people went around gathering it, and then ground it in a hand mill or crushed it in a mortar. They cooked it in a pot and made it into loaves. And it tasted like something made with olive oil.  

But despite God, liberating them from Egypt, and providing them food where there was only death, the Israelites began to complain and cry, Book of Numbers records their response,

…the Israelites started wailing and said, “if only we had meat to eat! We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost – also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic. But now we have lost our appetite, we never see anything but this manna.

I think the reason the people who were listening to Jesus, when they heard the comparison between the Bread of Life and Manna, reacted the way they did, is because many people struggle to trust in God to the point that they will endure hardship for God’s sake.

People are willing to serve God when it is easy when they get a life of comfort as a reward, but it is another story if the life before you is manna and the open desert.

You can say the reverse of this too. People are willing to enslave themselves to maintain comfort and the luxuries of life. And because of this fact, people in power, looking to control others, will offer material goods, luxuries, and grass-greener realities to get others to enslave themselves.

It is tempting to think, no, people are too smart for that. But don’t be fooled. Remember two weeks back I spoke about my struggles with weight. I commented about how sometimes I’m tempted and sometimes I fall into the temptation of eating food I know is poison for my body. We have all seen people do this on a smaller personal scale with food, drugs, materialism, or lust. Is it so hard to believe that a nation of people might be tempted by the easy way out.

It is the same broken disposition that the people listening to Jesus had. Jesus says I am the only thing that will give you life, the other paths in life are roads to enslavement, imprisonment, poisoning, and death. And the people listening do not want to let go of their comfort, their desires, their lust, their temptation. They would rather eat what will kill them because it is an easier road than enduring the path with the Bread that gives you life.

Last week I spoke about the sinner’s prayer, and how people wrongly mistook the sinner’s prayer as the pinnacle of the mountain, rather than what it is, the base of the mountain. People want faith and a relationship with God to be an easy thing, and in some ways it is a lighter yoke, but the Bible speaks to us that in our faith life, we will need to endure, and the only thing that will grant us true life as we are enduring is what God give us directly, and God has given us the bread of life, Jesus Christ to sustain us, for what is coming.

Our Ephesians passage depicts this reality in the metaphor of the armor of God. It’s no mistake that armor is used as a metaphor for God’s protection, because to be faithful can very much feel like a battlefield. There are dark forces of this world that will continually bombard you with the temptation of the flesh, the hunger of envy, greed, pride, and gluttony trying to pull you away from your diet of living bread, towards false bread laced with poison. Thus, you need to have your armor on, you must be continually ready to cast away the temptations of this world, and only use the fuel you can truly rest upon for strength in battle, God.

You know the Israelites as they grew weary of manna, instead of complaining and wishing for the shackles once again, they could have gone to God and prayed, saying…

God, we thank you so much for Your faithfulness and mercy which has freed us from captivity, we thank you so much for Your daily gift of manna to sustain us, in our weakness and desire for comfort, we moan and complain, help us to find appreciation for what you have given us, help us to endure humbly without longing for what once was, help us to keep our mind on the promised land you direct us towards, help us to resist the temptation to look upon our captivity with desire. Help us to trust, help us to be content, help us find peace.  

If the Israelites had returned to God, seeking his will, his wisdom, being humble and repenting, I have no doubt God would have equipped them with the armor of God, he would have given them what they needed to endure because they would have chosen God over their destruction, masquerading as comfort and easement.

We see the wisdom of circling back to God, in a moment of doubt, when Jesus turns to his twelve disciples and asks them, are you going to leave too? They respond with, where would we go, you are the bread of life, you are the only source we need. Even when the world walks away from Jesus, we need to always remember his is the only source to eternal life. He is the only source of salvation.

So here is the take home, ask yourself, spiritually, how are you sustaining yourself, do you come to God, to Jesus Christ as your Daily Bread to eat every day, do you reject the false offerings of the world, prepared in your armor of God to protect your mind, heart, and soul.

This is a part of faith that is so like climbing a mountain, wandering the desert, or facing a fearsome army, it is that pursuit of God with our entire being, through all things. It is the part of faith that forces us to look at our lives; what we like, what we enjoy, what we prioritize, what we think is morally good or just, what we think is wise and good, and puts it in contrast to what God: Father, Son and Spirit, say is good, wise and true.

We all have our mountain, our deserts, and the armies on the horizon. It could be something we are addicted to, it could be illness we are facing, it could be relationships we feel are collapsing, it could be a war inside our hearts between our love for God and our wandering eye for the things of this world. We all have these regular human struggle and it will be tempting for all of us to look upon the shackles of a faith-free life, and think, maybe that would be easier, maybe I can escape into that, but remember God is with you, if you turn to back to God as the disciples did, if you can do what many of the Israelites could not, then God will give you what you need. Just to clarify, I said God will give you what you need, not what you want, but what you need to get through your trials and tribulations.

He will give you more of what he has already give to the world, Himself: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, for you now, and forever.

So let us take a moment and approach God, seeking his daily bread, his spiritual armor, to help us prepare for the journey of faith ahead.

Let us pray…

Gracious God, we long to look upon Your face and live.  We yearn to shine with Your glory, despite our tarnished lives.  We seek to stand firm and faithful, even when the storms of life threaten us.  Lift us up with your mercy, that we may perceive Your loving grace.  Light our paths with Your wisdom and strengthen us with Your powerful Spirit, that we may follow you faithfully all the days of our lives.  Amen.