Scripture text: John 6:35-51
----Sermon #1----
Preached at Canadochly Lutheran Church on August 9, 2015
I’m sure there would be many surprises. First off, he would not be blonde and blue eyed, but would obviously resemble the people of that time and place. Dark skin, dark hair and eyes, full beard, probably a bit short and maybe a bit frumpy looking. Not the tall and regal figure we’ve come to expect, but a short little Jewish man.
Something like this.
And his personality? Again, I think we’ve come to expect a certain calm serenity, that he’s this unobtrusive and inoffensive character, perhaps because we’ve gotten so conditioned to seeing pictures of those faux blue eyes staring blankly into space.
Jesus been hitting the Ativan a little too much.
What a shock it might be for us to see him irritable or even sarcastic. “You’re not here because you saw signs, but because you want more bread.” He growls at the crowd at one point. There’s a certain snark in that line. A certain edge that we’re not used to.
This shouldn’t come as any real surprise to anyone, that the real Jesus often does not meet our expectations. Our expectations and impressions are formed without any real context of the flesh-and-blood human being that he was; we know only the stories and our own minds will fill in the spaces between the lines of those stories, creating a character that is somewhat like the real thing, but not quite there. It’s the best we can do. We’re thousands of miles and thousands of years removed from the real thing and there is no such thing as a time machine or a TARDIS that would allow us to remedy that.
However, truth be told, even those would could touch, see, and hear him with their own senses were often baffled by the “real Jesus.” He was not what they expected. He was often not what they wanted. Perhaps it is good that he had an edge to him, a bit of sarcasm and irascibility, because the more he defied those expectations the more disliked he was going to be. Calm serenity was not going to change any of that. Best to be honest and sincere.
“Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know?”.The people in the crowd comment. Well, yes, he is. “How can he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” Well, he’s that too. How can that be? Well, there’s the rub, isn’t it?
Expectation comes from experience. Experience comes from memory. And memory anchors us in the past. The people of the crowd are having a hard time recognizing that there might be more to Jesus than the little boy they used to see running down the streets of their village. A lot more.
But Jesus isn’t interested in the expectations of the past. His view is future oriented, what is yet to be. “I am the bread of life” is a statement of future reality. It is not the manna in the wilderness. It’s something new, something radical, something transformative. It’s life as it’s meant to be.
We may not realize it, but we are often stuck in the same rut as the people of that crowd. We think we know Jesus, but what we know is the Jesus of our expectation. It’s the Jesus of Sunday School classes we took as a kid. It’s the Jesus of the serene painting, with his blonde hair and blue eyes and catatonic look. It’s a Jesus stuck in the past, clouded by memory and nostalgia.
But that’s not who he is. He’s a lot more.
Expectation comes from experience. Experience comes from memory. And memory anchors us in the past. And the past is often times where we are stuck. “We want our country back” we bellow at politicians (as if it left us or something.) We pine for the days when church pews were full. We wish the radio still played the “good music” and TV the “good shows” instead of today’s garbage. No, if we had that time machine, we would likely not use it to satisfy some historical curiosity. We’d use to go back and relive our past life, dwelling in the places we wish we could be and trying to dodge those old regrets that still haunt us.
You know what the problem with all that is? Just how limiting it is. The more we look to the past, the more we admit how little faith we have in the future. We set our sights far too low. Our expectations of what is to come are diminished and small. How little hope we have.
And Jesus? Well, we’re drawn to the fake Jesus of our own minds more than the real one, because the real one seems too good to be true. Bread that takes away all hunger. Sins forgiven and forgotten. Life without limits. Being accepted and loved for who we are when we can’t even do that to ourselves. Come on! There’s nothing real about any of that.
Except, that it is real. And that’s who Jesus is. And that’s what he offers. And that’s the future that he brings, something far more grand and wondrous than anything out of history, memory, or nostalgia. If there was such a thing as a time machine, we would want to get in and go forward, not backward, in time and go into that wondrous kingdom that Jesus promises to bring. A place where tears are wiped away, death is no more, and the world is the way it is meant to be.
That is what this is all about. That’s God’s work, his plan, his scheme, his promise.
No, this is not what we expect. Nor is Jesus. It’s all so much bigger than our expectations. That’s the wonder of grace. Our future is far more grand than we can possibly imagine. Because that’s who our God is, always bigger than we expect, always more loving and giving than we can believe. He defies expectations, because if he didn’t what hope would there be? No, God is good. God is great and he offers a future that even our greatest hopes pale before. It’s his gift to his precious world and to you and I, his precious children. Amen.
----Sermon #2----
Preached at St. John's Lutheran Church on August 9, 2015 (Based loosely on the children's sermon preached at Canadochly that morning.)
You know what my favorite thing as a kid was? You’ll probably never guess, but I don’t think I knew for sure what it was until I grew up and became an adult. It’s not a toy or a game or a person. It was “tomorrow.” That’s right; my favorite thing as a kid was the future.
Think about it. Tomorrow is the day when your friend comes over to play. Tomorrow is the day when grandma picks you up to take you shopping for a new toy. Tomorrow is the day when you’re going to beat that boss level on that video game. Tomorrow is when you’re going to the movies or to the swimming pool or on vacation or off to camp or whatever. No matter how great today is, tomorrow is going to be even better.
There was always something to look forward to...tomorrow.
In fact, you could probably say that one of the biggest differences between children and adults concerns this perspective. Adults don’t like tomorrow. Tomorrow means going back to work. Tomorrow means sitting on hold with customer service for hours. Tomorrow means doctors’ appointments and sitting in traffic. It’s responsibilities and tedium and trying to navigate through this thing we’ve tricked ourselves into believing is life.
For the adult, yesterday is their favorite thing. Yesterday we were young. Yesterday we were careful. Yesterday didn’t hurt so much. Yesterday was before our friends grew up and moved away. Yesterday was when we still had a grandma. Yesterday was when the music was good and the TV programs were fun and wholesome. No matter what today is like, yesterday was far better.
You see this all over the place, this longing for yesterday. A good bit of our political discourse is about getting our country back to some “Golden Age” that people vaguely remember from the past. A good bit of our talk in the church is about getting our congregations back to a “golden age” when pews were full and we didn’t worry about the budget. People pine for what once was or, more accurately, what they believe once was. Nostalgia clouds our view of history and we so quickly and often deliberately forget the bad things in the past in an effort to dress it up as something better than whatever tomorrow might bring.
All that’s a problem, because you know what that really says about us as a people? It shows how little hope we truly have. How little faith we have in the future. How low our expectations about life really have become. There’s nothing to look forward to anymore. We can’t believe that the real Golden Age might be something yet to be, something in the future. No, it had to be something we lost in the past and only by pining for yesterday will we ever get something like it again.
We Christians however have pledged ourselves as disciples of Jesus Christ. We seek to living into his teachings. In order to do that however, we also have to understand his perspective when it comes to this sort of thing. And when we look to the stories of Jesus’ life and teaching, we do not find an echo of our cynicism about past and future. What we find is hope.
“I am the bread of life.” Jesus teaches. “Those who eat of this bread will live forever.” Those words are future oriented. It’s a vision of what will be in God’s kingdom. It’s a vision we find time and time again throughout the Scriptures. For such an old book, written thousands of years ago, it’s perspective is always to the future, always to what will be. It is a book of hope and it speaks time and time and time again about bread that takes away all hunger, sins forgiven and forgotten, life without limits, being accepted and loved for who we are when we can’t even do that to ourselves, days where there will be no more tears and no more death. All of it promised to us in God’s kingdom.
It’s a future that’s too good to be true. Too good to believe. But it is also the future we are promised. It’s who Jesus really is. You see, I think tomorrow is his favorite thing too, just it was for me when I was a child. Doesn’t matter how awesome today was, tomorrow is going to be even more awesomer. It’s God’s kingdom, God’s promises, come in their fullness.
And that’s our hope. In a lot of ways, that’s what our faith is about. It’s faith in those promises that bring us such hope. That’s God’s work, his plan, his scheme, his promise. That’s what it’s been about since day one, from the first time he spoke to the Patriarchs until now. A better tomorrow, a better world, life as it’s meant to be.
It’s all so much bigger than our paltry expectations. That’s the wonder of grace. Our future is far more grand than we can possibly imagine. Because that’s who our God is, always bigger than we expect, always more loving and giving than we can believe. But that’s who he is and this is what he’s about. God is good. God is great and offers a future that even our greatest hopes pale before. It’s his gift to his precious world and to you and I, his precious children. Amen.
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