Bread of Life - Part 2

The Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost

August 11, 2024

John 6:35-51

 “Bread of Life – Part 2”

Today’s Gospel lesson picks up where last Sunday’s left off. In fact, the opening verse of today’s lesson was the closing verse from last week’s lesson. We continue our journey through John 6 as we look at Jesus the Bread of Life. We are in week two of a 3-week series entitled, “Bread of Life.” May the Lord’s rich and abundant blessing rest upon the preaching, the hearing, and the living of his Word for Jesus’ sake.

“For this is the will of my Father, 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” (John 6:40). Jesus’ teaching stirs up controversy and a whole lot of grumbling ensues: “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” (John 6:42). The people know Jesus, but they really don’t know him at all. Sure, they are familiar with him and his earthly family, but that becomes a barrier, an obstacle, a roadblock, to a deeper knowing of Jesus for who he really is as the Son of God, the promised Messiah, the Bread of Life. There are lots of examples of grumbling – Grumpy from Snow White, Statler and Waldorf from The Muppets, but there’s room for us here, too. Grumbling gets in the way of gratitude, preventing us from seeing, let alone rejoicing in, God’s gifts that are right in front of us. Can this happen to us today? Does our familiarity with Jesus, perhaps over the course of our entire life, get in the way of really knowing Jesus? Do we think we have Jesus all sewn-up, boxed into a neat and convenient package? Beyond our pigeon-holing Jesus, there is Jesus the Bread of Life. He is able to do far more abundantly than all we can ask or imagine (Ephesians 3:20). He is more than capable of feeding us, but only if we know we’re hungry. “This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh” (John 6:50-51).

Besides today’s Gospel lesson, we also hear about bread in today’s Old Testament lesson with Elijah the prophet who is at the end of his rope out in the wilderness (1 Kings 19:1-8). Elijah had just experienced a high point in his life and ministry. After a 3-year drought, Elijah called for a contest on the top of Mt. Carmel between the prophets of Baal, who had the approval and endorsement of the king and queen, Ahab and Jezebel, and himself. The contest was to see whose sacrifice would be accepted and consumed by fire from heaven. Though they cried out all day long, and even cut themselves until they bled, the prophets of Baal got no response from their god; only radio silence. Then it was Elijah’s turn. Having prepared his sacrifice to the Lord, Elijah then called for the most precious commodity in a drought to be poured over that sacrifice. Not once, not twice, but three times water was poured out on the sacrifice until it gushed over everything and filled the trench around the altar. Elijah then prayed that the Lord would reveal himself so that the people might know he alone is God. Immediately, fire from heaven came down, consuming the sacrifice, the altar, the water, the stones – all of it. Clearly, God had revealed himself as the only true God in a powerful way. Elijah then ordered that the 450 prophets of Baal, who had led God’s people so far astray, be executed. And then the great drought was finally broken by life-giving rain. This is what precedes today’s Old Testament lesson. I encourage you to read 1 Kings 18 on your own. If you go to Mount Carmel in Israel, at its summit, where this event took place so many centuries ago, a statue of Elijah stands, reminding us of  that contest and its outcome.

While he was still rejoicing in this victory, Jezebel the queen sent a messenger to Elijah, letting him know that she would soon do to him what he had done to the prophets of Baal. In fear for his life, Elijah fled into the wilderness. Exhausted and demoralized, Elijah collapsed under a broom tree and asked God to die: “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my fathers” (1 Kings 19:4). Have you ever thought that, prayed that, or said that in your own life to God: “It is enough?” When everything seems against us, when we’ve run out of options, when there are no more resources, like Elijah, we can feel like we’re ready to give up. “It is enough.” Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah intending evil, but God sent his own messenger to Elijah for good and for blessing. God knew and understood Elijah’s exhaustion and pain. God knows and understands our own exhaustion and pain as well. There in the wilderness, out in the middle of nowhere, the angel of the Lord came to Elijah with bread and water. Notice the gentleness of God’s messenger: he doesn’t shout at Elijah: “Hey you, get up!” He doesn’t kick him to wake up. The angel touched Elijah to awaken him, urging him to eat and drink or the journey ahead of him to Mount Horeb would be too much. And so Elijah was refreshed and renewed with what the Lord provided through his angel messenger.

So often in life, it is the simple things that bring us refreshment and renewal. The gentle touch of a messenger – a trusted friend or family member, or even a total stranger – whom the Lord sends to us in our own discouragement and exhaustion can be life-giving. The gift of food and drink – even as simple as bread and water – when offered in loving care, can revive us for our journey ahead. How blessed we are to be on the receiving end of such gifts! How blessed we are to serve as the Lord’s instrument and be the one who gives such gifts! The Lord provides for the needs of his people, even as we spoke the words of today’s psalm together: “This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him, and delivers them. Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him! Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him!” (Psalm 34:6-8).

After he ate and drank, Elijah began a 40-day journey to Mount Horeb. There, God would meet him, not in the raging wind, or the earthquake, or the fire, but in a still small voice (1 Kings 19:9ff.). God would then call Elijah to do the next work that was before him. That 40-day journey of Elijah’s points ahead to Jesus’ own forty days in the wilderness (Matthew 4:1-11; Mark 1:12-13; Luke 4:1-13), battling Satan and temptation. After this was over, we’re told “angels came and were ministering to him” (Matthew 4:11). It all came to a head outside of Jerusalem on a Friday afternoon when Jesus the Bread of Life gave his flesh for the life of the world. There, on the tree of the cross, Jesus offered himself up to death so that we might have life – life with God that begins now and is brought to completion in the life to come. As Jesus tells us in today’s Gospel lesson: “For this is the will of my Father, 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” (John 6:40).

Having given his flesh for the life of the world upon the cross, Jesus the Bread of Life now gives us his  very Body and Blood to eat and drink in his holy Supper. In this blessed Sacrament, Jesus the Bread of Life unites himself to us and us to him, strengthening us for the journey ahead that we may “be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us” (Ephesians 5:1-2). Amen.