Bishop Craig Schweitzer

John 6:59-71 • August 26, 2018

Brothers and sisters in Christ grace and peace to you from God our Father and Lord and Savior Jesus who is the Christ. Amen.

If you’ve been paying attention in worship over the last 5 weeks, you know that we have been firmly planted in the 6th chapter of the gospel of John. It is the largest, most concentrated time in one chapter of one gospel that we have together as the church. I wonder why that is. I don’t know maybe, just maybe, this chapter still has something important for us to hear as children of God who claim to be followers of Jesus.

BUT – every time I read the 6th chapter of John, I join the disciples who first heard these words from Jesus and shout out – with a bit of a whiney and complaining tone to my voice – “This teaching is difficult.” Anybody else relate? As we’ve received these gospel readings over the last month?

This teaching is difficult. Actually, if we study the Greek for the word translated in our pew bibles as “teaching,” we will discover that teaching may not be the best translation. A better and more accurate translation is “This Word is difficult.” Capital “W” on the word, Word. Which then brings us back to the opening of John’s gospel, doesn’t it? – “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” The Word is Jesus. This Word is difficult.

John 6 is the midway point of Jesus ministry in the world. A point in time when Jesus is revealing that he is the one sent by God in flesh and blood. This is difficult for us to wrap our heads and hearts around. And for those of us today who already know the rest of the story, we know full well that it doesn’t get any less difficult from here. After all, there is a cross in Jesus’ future. And even more difficult to understand and believe than that, there’s a resurrection of a dead man coming soon too.

This teaching – this Word is difficult.

The Jesus we follow is not the latest and greatest self-help tool or fad diet. The Jesus we follow is the savior of the world. That was difficult for those who first heard him speak and followed him as he walked with them in this world. And it is difficult for you and me to grasp even as we sit in worship today.

Pastor, author, teacher Eugene Peterson reminds us that “This is still the way Jesus is God among us. And this is what is still so hard to believe. It is hard to believe that this marvelous work of salvation is presently taking place in our neighborhoods, in our families, in our governments, in our schools and businesses, in our hospitals, on the roads we drive and down the corridors we walk, among people whose names we know. The ordinariness of Jesus was a huge roadblock to belief in his identity and work in the ‘days of the flesh.’ It is still a roadblock.” Peterson believes. I tend to agree with his insight. [Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places, Eugene H. Peterson, pg. 34-35]

In the sixth chapter of John we witness some of Jesus greatest miracles – Jesus feeding 5,000 people in the middle of nowhere with a couple fish and a few loaves of bread. Followed by Jesus walking on water. And the response to these miracles after all have eaten more than their fill and storms have been calmed … was to complain. To complain that this teaching is too difficult. To complain that you wanted chicken instead of fish. To complain that Jesus isn’t the all-powerful king that will overturn the oppressive rulers of the day. But you and I know better, right? We never complain, do we?

The truth of the matter is that we often do far more than complain, don’t we. More often than we care to admit, when we don’t get what we think we should be getting from this Jesus, we complain a little and then simply turn our back and no longer go with Jesus. Just like so many of his first followers did.

Instead of following Jesus, God’s gift of grace, we follow our own glory thinking that our greatness is because of us, not God working through us.

Instead of following Jesus, God’s abundant and unending joy, we work ourselves to death in order to buy one more toy for our garage that we believe will finally make us happy.

Instead of following Jesus, God’s unconditional love poured out for us in the flesh and blood of the savior of the world, we turn away and follow the next great thing that flashes on our smartphone or across our television or computer screens promising to love us more.

You see, Judas might be the one in the gospels who gets a bad wrap for walking away, for betraying Jesus. But as we heard again in today’s gospel, he isn’t the only one to walk away. Many other disciples did too. That’s still true today.

Eugene Peterson illustrates this by saying, “When it comes to dealing with God, most of us spend considerable time trying our own hands at either being or making gods. Jesus blocks the way. Jesus is not a god of our own making and he is certainly not a god designed to win popularity contests.” [Ibid. pg. 36]

What Jesus is inviting us into is different. It’s not life-based upon wealth or popularity or success or fame or power over others.
It’s life much different from any of those things that lure us away from a relationship with God through Jesus.

As a pastor colleague reminded me this week, “God calls us to a new kind of living.” He said. “To be a Christian means to be grounded in grace, and surrounded by God’s love. It also means to be willing to give of ourselves for the world around us. It means refusing to focus on what’s best for me and my own, but instead on how I might live sacrificially, so that others might come to know God’s love. It means not asking what I have to gain from this faith, but asking instead what I am able to give. It means wrestling with challenging beliefs and concepts – often times being called to stand in direct opposition to the world that surrounds us.” [Pastor David J. Risendal, http://www.onlelittleword.org]

Of the 100’s of volumes and 100’s of thousands of words written and spoken by the 16th century reformer Martin Luther, few ring as true to me and have had as much impact on my faith journey as Luther’s explanation for the third article of the Apostle’s Creed. We’ll share the creed together in a few minutes, but just to make sure we’re all in the same place at this point in the sermon, the third article of the Apostle’s Creed is… “I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.”

If you’ve been paying attention over the last month, hopefully you notice that those words echo a lot of what Jesus is talking about in John six.

And Luther’s explanation, points to that even more as he wrote this explanation of the third article of the creed for the Small Catechism. A document that still serves to guide us in our faith journey today. “I believe that by my own understanding or strength I cannot believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to him, but instead the Holy Spirit has called me through the gospel, enlightened me with his gifts, made me holy and kept me in the true faith, just as he calls, gathers, enlightens, and makes holy the whole Christian church on earth and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one common, true faith. Daily in this Christian church the Holy Spirit abundantly forgives all sins – mine and those of all believers. On the last day the Holy Spirit will raise me and all the dead and will give to me and all believers in Christ eternal life. This is most certainly true.” [Luther’s Small Catechism]

In today’s gospel reading, Peter confesses Jesus as the Holy One of God. Way too often, our confession is “Jesus, this teaching is difficult” rather than “Jesus, you are the Holy One of God.” In every one of those times. Times that may cause us to want to turn away from God, you and I need to hear Jesus say to us again, “Did I not choose you?” Because, that is most certainly true.

Following Jesus is not always easy.
And it’s often different from what we think it is.
Let’s face it, as we walk this journey of faith we are going to frequently complain or may even turn away from what Jesus might be calling us into or inviting us to become.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, if we can learn anything from the sixth chapter of John, maybe it’s a little something like this –John, chapter 6, reminds us of the depth and length and breadth that God will go to be in relationship with us. After all, the bread of life…the Word…the Savior of the world…has come down from heaven, for you, for me, for all of God’s children. God is doing all of this, for us, so we can have life. Have life abundantly here and now. Have life eternally as God’s kingdom continues to come. Amen.

John 6:35, 41-51 * August 12, 2018

Brothers and sisters in Christ, grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Savior and Lord, Jesus the Christ. Amen.

I was blessed to spend this past week in Darien, Illinois outside of Chicago at the Carmelite Spiritual Center with some of the most amazing pastors in our church. I’m always thankful for these opportunities of continuing education that you give to your pastors and staff. And I’m even more thankful for your support of our shared ministry with other congregations in the ELCA that allows for opportunities like this to happen within our church in the first place.

Anyway – I was completing a 3-part continuing education series for Senior Pastors in their first 5 years of call sponsored by the Lily Foundation and United Lutheran Seminary out of Pennsylvania.

The focus of this past week was stewardship and mission.

Which places us directly into the 6^th chapter of the gospel of Saint John.

“Jesus comes to us whether we like it or not, whether we’re hungry or not, whether we see it or not. According to John, Jesus has always been here.” That’s the truth Pastor Bob reminded us of in the sermon last week. It was toward the end if you want to watch the video on our YouTube page if you missed it. Regardless of where you were that day, from an AirBnB in Wrigleyville, Illinois last week,  I shouted “Yes! Thanks be to God!” as I watched that sermon.

And here’s why…if there is anything that the 6^th chapter of John might be saying to the community John is speaking to or the community I’m speaking to right now it’s this…Jesus is here. Jesus has always been here. Jesus will always be here.

And regardless of how good you’ve been in the past, how good you are today, or how good you will be tomorrow…Jesus is here. And regardless of whether you believed that truth last week when you heard Pastor Bob’s sermon, believe that truth today as you sit in worship with the worries, anxiety, and pain that you are carrying, or will ever believe that truth because of what may happen to you or someone you love, Jesus is here.

That’s stewardship. That’s the mission to which we are called.

Theologian Jean Vanier in a reflection called Drawn into the Mystery of Jesus Through the Gospel of John puts it this way, “Jesus is offering to us a personal, intimate relationship with him that will lead us into the very life of God and nourish this life. It will bring us to dwell in Jesus and to have Jesus dwell in us.”

When Jesus says, “I am the bread of life.” That’s what he’s talking about. When he says, “Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” That’s what he’s talking about. That he is with us and will always be with us.

As I’ve read and re-read and read again the 6^th chapter of John during these many summer weeks in which we are spending time in this chapter, I’ve asked myself, ‘I wonder what the people who first heard these words from Jesus some 2,000 years ago must have been thinking.’

To this point in time, all they really know about Jesus is that he’s a pretty good teacher. And he’s kind of becoming a bit of a celebrity.

And now you just heard him tell you that he’s the bread that has come down from heaven and that you should eat his flesh. If you were among the first to hear Jesus speak these words, you might have turned to someone and asked if they heard the same thing. Because you thought you just heard someone say something that would certainly sound like they have lost their mind. Say something that might end up on the front page of the daily newspaper or be a breaking news story on CNN or FOX.

C.S. Lewis, in his book Mere Christianity – which if you’ve never read, I highly recommend you take the time to read– makes the following statement about Jesus: “A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic – on the level with a man who says he is a poached egg – or he would be the devil of hell. You must take your choice.” Lewis goes on to say, “Either this was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us.”

For the people who first heard Jesus say “I am the bread of life come down from heaven.”, Jesus is no longer just a great human teacher. He is the messiah. The one sent to save. And as we see throughout the four gospels of Holy Scripture, this was hard for people to believe in Jesus’ day.

I think it’s often hard for us to believe today too. Especially as we live in a time and a place when Christian community and relationship with God through Jesus is becoming less and less important in the lives of God’s children.

My time in Chicago this past week was spent with about 50 of the ELCA’s best and brightest leaders. I was reminded again and again during the week that Jesus is still here. And that God still wants to be in relationship with us through Jesus. And that as hard that may be to believe from time to time, it remains true. It always will remain true.

One of the coaches that I was blessed to work with this week shared a poem with us that is often attributed to Archbishop Oscar Romero – although many have argued whether it is actually Romero’s words or just words written in the spirit of Romero.

Romero was bishop in El Salvador during their darkest days of civil war. He was assassinated while presiding over Holy Communion in 1990 for speaking the truth of Jesus’ presence for all of God’s children. Since El Salvador is an important part of Good Shepherd’s mission and ministry in this world, I want to share this poem with you as well.

In many ways, it helped me believe again that Jesus is here as I am fed each day by this Jesus, “the bread of life.” Who feeds every hunger I will ever have and quenches anything that may cause thirst. In the spirit of Romero…

It helps, now and then, to step back

And take the long view.

The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,

It is beyond our vision.

We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of

The magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.

Nothing we do is complete,

Which is another way of saying

That the kingdom always lies beyond us.

No statement says all that could be said.

No prayer fully expresses our faith.

No confession brings perfection.

No pastoral visit brings wholeness.

No program accomplishes the church’s mission.

No set of goals and objectives includes everything.

This is what we are about:

We plant seeds that one day grow.

We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future profits.

We lay foundations that will need further development.

We provide yeast that produces effects beyond our capabilities.

We cannot do everything

And there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.

This enables us to do something

And do it really well.

It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way

An opportunity for God’s grace to enter and do the rest.

We may never see the end results,

But that is the difference between the master builder and the worker.

We are workers, not master builders,

Ministers, not messiahs.

We are prophets of a future not our own.

https://www.journeywithjesus.net/PoemsAndPrayers/Ken_Untener_A_Future_Not_Our_Own.shtml

Brothers and sisters in Christ, Jesus is here. As you hear Jesus say to you again today “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”, my hope and prayer is that you are fed. Fed so you can gather with fellow brothers and sisters in worship, prayer, conversation, and community as followers of this Jesus, who is the Christ, the savior of the world. Fed…to be prophets of a future not our own. Amen.