Pentecost 13
Jesu
Juva
“Eating is Not Just About
Eating!”
Text: John 6:51-58; Proverbs 9:1-6; Ephesians 5:15-20
Grace,
mercy, and peace to you from God our
Father, and from our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.
Eating is not just about eating. If it were,
then a dinner at your house would be the same as a dinner at McDonalds would
the same as a dinner out at a fine restaurant.
But clearly, those three things are very different,
even if the food served at all three places were very much the same.
Eating is not just about eating. Just ask a
young lady when she is asked out to dinner by a young man. The choice of restaurant makes a big
difference and a big impression.
Eating is not just about eating. Business
people use meals to negotiate and close deals.
Couples use meals at wedding receptions to celebrate an important
day. Inviting someone
over to your house to eat means more than just eating together, but conversation
and sharing. Company dinners are
used for more than simply giving your employees a nice meal.
Eating is not just about eating. Wives (or
husbands!) that go to the trouble to cook a special meal do so as a sign of
love. Families eating
together talk about the day. Pot
luck dinners at churches reveal and create an atmosphere of closeness and
hospitality.
Eating is not just about eating. It is much
more than that.
And
so when we heard this evening the invitation from the book of Proverbs, the invitation
of Wisdom to come and eat at the feast that has been prepared, it is about much
more than simply eating. And when we
heard the invitation of Jesus in the Holy Gospel to eat His flesh and drink His
blood, it is about much more than simply eating. These are invitations to us to share in the
things of God. And the two meals that we are invited to in
these two readings are really one and the same.
And
so first from Proverbs, we heard that “Wisdom” has prepared a great feast. In fact so great is this feast that a special
house has been built for it, with seven pillars – seven being the Biblical
number of completeness. So great is this
feast that beasts have been slaughtered for it and so meat will be served – a
dish reserved only for very special and great occasions. And so great and expensive is this feast that
we would expect only a select, chosen few to be invited to take part. But in that we are surprised. Wisdom invites not the best and the
brightest, not the rich and the powerful, not the ones who think themselves
already wise and complete. No, invited
are all who are “simple,” all who “lack sense,” to come in and eat and
drink. Because eating is not just about eating. More
will be given than just food and drink.
Those who enter will be satisfied in both body and soul. They will receive not only Wisdom’s food and
drink, but also Wisdom itself. For the
goal of this feast, this meal, is that those who come
would “leave their simple ways and live, and walk in the way of insight.”
And so too in the invitation of Jesus in the Holy
Gospel. For as Jesus continues His discourse on the
heavenly food that He has come to bring to all, that He is “the bread of life,” He
also speaks of what more will be given than just food and drink. Because eating is not just about eating. Those who eat will be
satisfied in both body and soul.
They will receive not only Jesus’ food and drink, but in fact, Jesus
Himself. His very
flesh and blood as food and drink.
For the result of this feast, this meal, is that
whoever eats and drinks “abides in Me, and I in him.”
And
to this feast, you have been invited!
For
as I said before, these two readings describe not two different feasts, but one
and the same feast. For the person
spoken of as “Wisdom” in the reading from Proverbs is really the Son of God
Himself. The Son of God before He became incarnate as the man
Jesus Christ. The fact that wisdom is
called “she” in these verses is simply a quirk of Hebrew grammar – the same
idea as calling ships “she” in English.
But the context of these verses, in all of Proverbs chapters 8 and 9
make it clear that this invitation from Wisdom is really an invitation from God
Himself, the Son of God, inviting us to His banquet, to eat and to drink, and
in eating and drinking to share in the things of God.
And
when the Son of God “came down from
heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin
Mary and was made man,” He continued to offer this same invitation. For
Jesus ate and drank with many. He ate
and drank with tax collectors and sinners, with prostitutes, with cheaters and
thieves, with lepers, with outcasts. He
invited the poor, the lame, the blind and deaf, the “simple” and those “lacking
sense” to come and be with Him. To eat
and drink with Him, but in eating and drinking to receive much more than food
and drink – to hear and receive His teaching, His Word, His wisdom, and in
hearing and receiving to receive the gift of faith. Because
eating is not just about eating, especially when you eat with God Himself!
And so too with the words of Jesus that we heard from
John chapter 6. The banquet that Jesus spoke of in Proverbs,
and the banquet that He pointed to during His life on earth as He ate and drank
with tax collectors and sinners, is now the banquet He describes in great
detail to the crowds who gathered around Him along the Sea of Galilee, looking
for food. He had fed over 5,000 people
with the five loaves of bread and two fish, and when they came to Him looking
for more, He tells them: eating is not just about eating. They are looking for one kind of banquet, but
Jesus invited them instead to His banquet, to His feast! The feast of faith. The feast of wisdom. The feast of life. The feast where He gives not just food, but
where He gives Himself, His very flesh and blood, that those who eat and drink
do so not only physically, but also spiritually. To receive all the gifts of
God and be united with God. For as
He says, “Whoever feeds on My flesh and drinks My blood
abides in Me, and I in Him. As the
living Father sent Me, and I live because of the
Father, so whoever feeds on Me, He also will live because of Me.”
And
you simply cannot hear those words without thinking of the feast which our Lord
sets before us here each and every Sunday.
. . . Now, did the disciples
understand that the first time they heard these words of Jesus? Undoubtedly not! They were just as confused as those who left
Jesus because of these words, thinking them too hard to accept, or too
offensive, or too controversial. For as
the Jews disputed, “How can this man give us His flesh to eat?” . . .
But when the disciples were gathered in the Upper Room, and Jesus took
the bread, gave thanks, broke it and gave it to them saying, “Take
and eat, this is My body,” these banquet words of Jesus suddenly made
sense. Here was His feast of body and blood. Here was His feast of wisdom and
life. Here was His feast of
forgiveness and the sharing of all the things of God. Here
eating is not just about eating! It
is about abiding in Christ, and Christ in us.
And
to this feast, you have been invited!
You
have been invited – not just to eat and drink, but to receive and abide in
Christ and He in you.
To hear His Word and His wisdom. To learn who you are and who God is. To receive the gift of
faith. To
confess your sins and receive forgiveness. To humble yourself, admit
that spiritually we are but simple and lacking sense, and to receive His
care. And in coming to us and
feeding us with His body and blood, your Saviour lives in you and you in
Him. He takes all that is yours – your
sin, your weakness, your lowliness, and your death . . . and gives you all that
is His – His perfection, His strength, His kingdom, and His life. Because when you come to this House, God’s
House, and when you come to this Table, God’s Table, and when you feed on this
food and drink, God’s food and drink, eating
is not just about eating. This is
all much more than a meal. This is you,
participating already now, in the life of Heaven, which has no end.
Now
some, unfortunately, do not want to come to this feast of Word and Meal. For some, this talk of eating the flesh and
drinking the blood of Jesus is just too much.
For others, admitting that we are sinful, that we are the simple ones
and the ones lacking sense, is just too much.
And still others are too busy to stop and eat – instead, eating
spiritually the way many eat physically.
On the run, in their cars, fast food, frozen food, or no food at
all. And as the
physical health of many is suffering these days because of it, so also the
spiritual health of many. Either becoming obese on the spiritual junk food of this world, or
starving to spiritual death. And
it is a danger that even you and I in the church are
not immune to.
And
so the warning that we heard in the Epistle from Ephesians: “Look carefully then how you walk, not as
unwise but as wise, making the best use of time, because the days are evil.” For there are many “banquets” in this world
calling out to you. Banquets
to feast upon the things of this world, and the wisdom of this world, and many
are going into those banquets and filling their bodies and souls not with the
good things of God, but with the sinful and deceptive things and ideas of this
world. . . . And so, Paul says, look carefully how you
walk, and where you walk. Consider
carefully where you are feasting, what you are filling your mind with, and what
wisdom you are swallowing. Be wise,
because the days are evil. . . . There are many feasts, many banquets calling
out to you and inviting you in, but all lead to death. There is only one that leads to
life. There is only one where the
death and resurrection of Jesus is on the menu.
There is only one that can give you spiritual health and
strength, wisdom and insight, faith and trust, forgiveness and life.
And
how great is this feast? Some time ago I
was working with a couple whose lives were just crumbling and falling
apart. They were scared, and their
future was uncertain. The world and its
wisdom had let them down. Sin was
devouring them. And as we were together,
searching for hope, searching for assurance, the wife looked up at me from
across the table and, with her eyes full of tears, asked, “Can I have communion . . . now!?”
Jesus
said, “I am the bread of life.” Indeed, He is.
In the Name of the Father and of the (+) Son and of
the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Now
the peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds
through faith in Christ Jesus, our Lord.
Amen.