Sermon Notes: August 1, 2021

On Sunday, my pastor was out of town.  Months ago he had asked if I would lead church when he was gone, and of course, I said yes.  When it got closer to time, and I saw the readings, I was happy--bread month!

As I listened to the Gospel being read, I was struck by the people asking God for a sign.  I started there, asking "What more of a sign do people want?"  From there, I went back to Psalm 78:  23-29, which we had just sung responsively.  I talked about how manna had come to the people on the run from Egypt, that at first they were grateful, but then they complained about the lack of variety.

I talked about how we're not any better, and I referenced a poem I once wrote that began with the line, "She would complain about the taste of pies in Heaven"--and that's all of us.  Then I made my way back to the Gospel, with Jesus telling the people to hold out for the true bread, which is him.

I asked us to think about what nourishes us.  Society will give us specific answers, answers usually designed to sell us stuff.  I talked about Richard Rohr's book Falling Upward, and his theory about the two halves of a human life.  For the first half, we work towards the milestones that our society tells us we should want:  the education and degrees, the job, the spouse, the children, the house.  Then we might get to the midlife and wonder what it has all been for.

If we're lucky, we come to the question of what nourishes us, and we start sorting that out.  If we're really lucky, we move towards a life that really matters.

I said that the past 18 months had triggered some of that for many of us, and that the next few weeks might offer additional challenges.  I pointed us to verse 34, and introduced N.T. Wright's idea that this line would make a good prayer:  "Give us this bread always."  I challenged us to use the influx of bad news as the monasteries use bells--to remind us to pray.  So that every time we hear a piece of bad news, we should use that as a reminder to pray:  "Give us this bread always."

Along the way, I talked about the inbreaking Kingdom of God, not as a place that happens after we die or in the far, far future, when we've had a chance to transform society, but it's happening right here, right now, shimmering just behind the surface of what our society tells us is real life.  And we have a chance to be part of it.  We need to ask not only what we nourishment we need, but what our society needs.  And then we can pray that Jesus gives us that nourishment always and in all ways.