Pentecost 14B

Psalm 15

Lord, who shall abide in thy tabernacle? who shall dwell in thy holy hill?
He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart.
He that backbiteth not with his tongue, nor doeth evil to his neighbour, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour.
In whose eyes a vile person is contemned; but he honoureth them that fear the Lord. He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not.
He that putteth not out his money to usury, nor taketh reward against the innocent. He that doeth these things shall never be moved.

KJV/King James Version

Deuteronomy 4:1-2, 6-9

⁴So now, Israel, give heed to the statutes and ordinances I am teaching you to observe, so that you may live to enter and occupy the land that the LORD, the God of your ancestors, is giving you.

²You must neither add anything to the word that I am instructing you nor take away anything from it, but observe the instructions of the LORD your God with which I am instructing you.

⁶You must observe this diligently, for this will show your wisdom and discernment to the other nations, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, "Surely this great nation is a wise and discerning people!"

⁷For what other great nation has a god so near to it as the LORD our God is whenever we call to him? ⁸And what other great nation has statutes and ordinances as righteous as this entire law that I set before your face today?

⁹But take care and watch yourselves closely, so as neither to forget the things that your eyes have seen nor to let them slip from your mind all the days of your life; make them known to your children and your children's children—

Deuteronomy

Deuteronomy is one of the five books of the Pentateuch, Ha Torah, the first five books of the Hebrew scriptures. They've been called the Books of Moses, not because Moses could have written them, but because Moses is the central human character. Deutero means "second" and nomen means "law," so in a limited sense Deuteronomy refers to a second giving of the law.

We need to stay aware of how our English word "law" can lead to a caricature of Torah. God's covenantal way of Torah is fluid, dynamic, stretchy, and flexible, always on the side of grace, mercy, love, justice, and life. Especially during Luke's lectionary year when we also heard a lot from the prophet Jeremiah, we discussed neighborology—the word about our neighbor. "Give heed to the statutes and ordinances I am teaching you to observe, so that you may live…" Choose life by considering the needs of the other at least as important as our own. That's neighborology!

The compilation of Deuteronomy was a long time coming over about five centuries, from the United Monarchy of Saul, David, and Solomon, to events and written sources prior to the Babylonian exile, to events and sources afterwards during the rebuilding of Jerusalem, of community, of restoration of worship, of "rediscovery" and canonization of Torah into the post-exilic period of Persian hegemony. Wide, expansive, and inclusive, Deuteronomy demonstrates Torah neighborology lived out on turf and in time.


The Land

After they left Egypt, the history of God's people Israel became the story of their journey toward a place where they could settle, obey, live, farm, and thrive—a quest and a hope for free-flowing rivers and boundless goodness from the ground that would help recreate them as free people and provide the landed safety and sense of home Israel wanted and all humans yearn for. The refrain "into the land" rings throughout Deuteronomy; stewardship of the gift of the land is central to our keeping covenant with all creation. After they crossed the Jordan River into Canaan, the people received land that would offer life and sustenance if they cared for it well.


Today's First Reading

After liberating the people from Egyptian slavery, amidst the exodus desert at Mount Sinai God graced the people with the Ten Words or Commandments so they'd live in ways that would lead to life, and allow them to remain free. The already occupied Promised Land of Canaan would be filled with fake deities, yet humans need such guidelines all the time, because if we look closely, we'll notice false gods and death-dealing religions almost everywhere.

Scribes who assembled Deuteronomy placed today's passage that asks, "For what other great nation has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is whenever we call to him? And what other great nation has statutes and ordinances as just as this entire law that I am setting before you today?" [verses 7-8] immediately before the actual Ten Words or Commandments.

We find similar versions of the Ten Commandments or Ten Words/Decalogue [deca means "ten," logo/logos is "word, words"] twice in the Pentateuch: Exodus 20:2-17 and Deuteronomy 5:6-21. Exodus and Deuteronomy refer to the ten commandments of the Sinai Covenant as "words." At least twice in Exodus, the premiere account of the formation of Israel as God's people / Moses' people (who are one and the same), the people promise, "we will do all the words the Lord has spoken." Exodus 19:8; 24:3, 7


God in Our Midst

Our introductory devotional Psalm 15 describes the commandments in action. With "tabernacle," the poet who composed this psalm may have had in mind the commandments the people carried with them in the portable tent or tabernacle; "holy hill" well may have referenced the temple on Mount Zion, where God's essence dwelt. In this passage and later on in Jesus of Nazareth and in the Church, we find God, God's Word, and God's People form an unbreakable triad.

"…a god so near to it as the LORD our God"–the commandments have the same attributes or characteristics as God; this God whose people, "do all the words" have the same qualities as the God who gifted them. When they practice Torah/observe the Ten Words, the people assume God's justice, love, righteousness, and mercy. When God's obedient, observant people are nearby, in a very real sense God is there.

In our recent five weeks of John 6, we heard about manna and quail from heaven, water from the rock, feeding a whole lot of people with very few fish and five loaves of bread. Like people in the Old and New Covenant scriptures, we constantly receive signs or evidence of God's presence. These signs or symbols include waters of baptism, bread and wine of holy communion. Signs or symbols of God's nearness include the commandments that share God's characteristics. Signs of God's presence include us, the contemporary people of God, wherever we go…

Pentecost 13B

John 6:56-69

⁵⁶"Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. ⁵⁷Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me. ⁵⁸This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live forever." ⁵⁹Jesus said these things while he was teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum.

⁶⁰When many of his disciples heard it, they said, "This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?" ⁶¹But Jesus, being aware that his disciples were complaining about it, said to them, "Does this offend you? ⁶²Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? ⁶³It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is useless. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.

⁶⁴But among you there are some who do not believe." For Jesus knew from the first who were the ones that did not believe, and who was the one that would betray him. ⁶⁵And he said, "For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father." ⁶⁶Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him.

⁶⁷So Jesus asked the twelve, "Do you also wish to go away?' ⁶⁸Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. ⁶⁹We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God."

Interpreting Scripture

Locating the original setting in time and place (and purpose, to the extent we can figure it out) of a passage always is our first concern when we read scripture.

Accounts of Jesus' words and actions first made rounds in the oral tradition. After a while they got written down here and there. The community gathered around beloved disciple John assembled their gospel account from those manuscripts; they carefully edited and arranged them to reflect their theology of Jesus. As we observed about the Sermon on the Mount, like any teacher, preacher, or parent, Jesus repeated himself a lot and probably had stock sermons. In conversation with his disciples and with towns people he would have said identical or very similar words enough times people would remember and eventually write them down.

Especially over the past year, we've become aware we need to read the present through the past (presentism) and not interpret the past through events we now know about and attitudes that have changed (historicism). When Jesus announced he was the Bread of Life, his hearers would not have heard those words in terms of the Last Supper/Lord's Supper or related to a post-resurrection Eucharist/Holy Communion with the risen Christ. However, the contemporary church usually does.

This points to the fact we often do theology backwards, but theology is a different endeavor from history. Though we can't erase the Sacrament of Bread and Cup from our awareness, it's still important to remember feeding 5,000+ people and Jesus' Bread of Life declarations happened before the week we call Holy that includes Maundy Thursday, before Resurrection Sunday.


Bread of Life, Week 5

It's been called a marathon—five weeks of a single chapter of John's gospel.

Today marks the fifth Sunday in a row of chapter 6 of John's gospel! John is the gospel of abiding presence, the gospel that (maybe particularly) emphasizes the incarnation, enfleshment, embodiment of the pre-existent, eternal logos. Today we move from Jesus' "I am" declarations (that equate him with Yahweh's "I am" revelation to Moses) to the disciples "You are / Thou art" the Holy One of God.


Words in the Greek

Every translation of any text in any language always is also an interpretation.

In 6:60 "When many of his disciples heard it, they said, 'This teaching [logos] is difficult; who can accept it?'" The word translated "teaching" is logos in Greek. You probably remember John's gospel brings us a new creation and opens with, "In the beginning was the Word [logos], and the Word [logos] was with God, and the Word [logos} was God." John 1:1 "And the Word [logos] became flesh and tabernacled among us." John 1:14a

Most contemporary scholars believe teaching/logos in this context refers to the entirety of Jesus' birth, life, death, resurrection, and ascension.

"Difficult" is the root of our word sclerosis for physical hardening of body parts and organs, so it would be a hard to wrap heads around concept, and not necessarily something intellectually or academically tough.

John 6:68 "Simon Peter answered him, 'Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words [declaration, statement] of eternal life.'" I find it surprising this "word of eternal life" isn't logos again—but it's rhema, the other Greek term that translates into English as "word." You may have sung this as the gospel acclamation in some settings of the liturgy.


Question for post-COVID

In John's gospel, Jesus feeds 5,000+ with five loaves of bread made from barley—the poor person's grain. Barley was one of the seven agricultural gifts of the promised land, and a crop ready to harvest before the affluent people's wheat! This question is post-COVID because when we've celebrated Holy Communion in person or at home during COVID, everyone has been incredibly careful to use bread and cup elements that won't easily be contaminated and spread the virus.

For us as for Jesus, it's ideally a meal of common, ordinary, everyday already-on-hand grain and drink essentials. We sometimes use pre-baked thin wafers because they keep well and can be easily stored and transported, but they never feel filling or nourishing. What's my preference? Freshly baked sourdough always looks, feels, and tastes most real and most sustaining. One of the pastors in my Previous City LOVED Kings' Hawaiian Bread and often served it for Holy Communion. I enjoyed it with our Thursday evening community dinners, but for me it was too sweet and too soft, not tough enough for a Eucharistic Feast, though many besides Pastor Jon thought it was just right.

During more normal times we hope will soon return, what's your favorite Communion bread?

Pentecost 12B

John 6:51-58

⁵¹"I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh."

⁵²The religious leaders then disputed among themselves, saying, "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?"

⁵³So Jesus said to them, "Amen, amen, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. ⁵⁴Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day; ⁵⁵for my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. ⁵⁶Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. ⁵⁷Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me.

⁵⁸"This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live forever."

John's Gospel

We've talked about John's gospel as the outlier rogue that almost didn't make the canonical cut. A beloved community gathered around Jesus' youngest disciple John – often referred to as the "beloved disciple" – assembled the theologically intense account that's the latest of the four. Although synoptic gospels Matthew, Mark, and Luke that view Jesus' ministry in a similar way are all about the reign of God in Jesus Christ, John's Good News is even more purposeful about the right here and right now of Heaven on Earth. You may remember Jesus' first act of public ministry in John is changing ordinary water into wine at a days-long wedding celebration; that near-endless party establishes the style of Jesus' entire ministry.

Closely related, although the synoptics – and the apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians – bring us Jesus' Founding Meal of the Lord's Supper where he connects the bread and cup with his death (and Pauline theology reminds us Jesus is at the same time both crucified and risen), John instead narrates feedings of immense groups of hungry people with abundant leftovers and John's Jesus brings us his very alive self as the substantial bread of our spiritual lives and of our physical ones. Just as Jesus in John often talks about our abiding or remaining in him, in John's gospel Jesus gives us bread that is his body, bread that becomes part of our bodies, so Jesus abides in us and we abide in Jesus.


Bread of Life, So Far

During Mark's lectionary year we have more readings from John than in the other years. Mark being the shortest gospel leaves spaces to be filled, and John is the perfect solution, because although every year during the great fifty days of Easter we hear a lot of John, John's gospel doesn't get its own separate year. "For some reason" the people who assembled the lectionary scheduled five Sundays in a row from John 6. This Sunday is week 4.

On July 24th, Jesus himself fed a huge crowd with what began as five barley loaves and two fish. On July 31st and August 8th, Jesus talked about God providing manna via Moses in the exodus wilderness; on both those days, Jesus announced, "I Am the Bread of Life," in the first of the seven "I Am" declarations in John's gospel that link Jesus to Yahweh-God's self-revelation to Moses as "I Am" in Exodus 3.


Bread of Life, Take 4

Unlike the bread-like manna of the exodus trek that had to be gathered again each day (except on the day before Shabbat when they gathered enough for two days in order not to work on the Sabbath), the bread Jesus offers is for right here and right now, and it's also the staff and stuff of eternal, never ending life.

To prepare this blog I read several commentaries, and at least three of them mentioned different words for "eat." The word for eat in verse 52 is a polite… "eat," that has a similar feeling to our English eat. Then in verses 54, 56, 57, and 58 the Greek word can be translated as chew, chomp, munch, crunch, nosh, and other more obvious, less polite ways of taking in nourishment. Most weeks I check the Greek for the scripture I blog about, but I'm not sure I'd have noticed those words. If you have a commentary or a study bible, why don't you see if it mentions that distinction?


Bread of Life, More

Every scriptural reference to water, bread, or fruit of the vine doesn't necessarily refer to sacraments, but every reference does remind us we need a healthy creation's bounty to survive and thrive. (And creation needs us to become healthy and bountiful!) Previous weeks on John 6 I've cautioned don't immediately assume this Bread of Life refers to Holy Communion—but sometimes it does.

Jesus provides the spiritual essence we need to be fully alive. However, in all the gospels but probably most in John, probably even most in this chapter 6, what people assume is spiritual also is physical, embodied, and incarnate. The Christ of God always is enfleshed. As a Sunday or weekday assembly gathers around word and sacrament, receives the bread of life and cup of salvation that become part of their physical bodies, as those people of God then take the crucified and risen Jesus Christ out into the world, they live as his presence everywhere they go.


Sr. Suzanne Toolan's "I am the Bread of Life" musical setting of John 6 is a prayer for us in Jesus' words.

I Am the Bread of Life

I am the bread of life
You who come to me shall not hunger
And who believe in me shall not thirst
No one can come to me
Unless the Father beckons

Refrain:

And I will raise you up
And I will raise you up
And I will raise you up on the last day

The bread that I will give
Is my flesh for the life of the world
And if you eat of this bread
You shall live forever
You shall live forever

Refrain:

Scripture: John 6
Songwriter: Suzanne Toolan, RSM

Pentecost 11B

Psalm 34:1-8

¹I will always give thanks unto the Lord:
      his praise shall be in my mouth continually.
²My soul shall glory in the Lord:
      the humble shall hear it and be glad.
³Praise ye the Lord with me,
      and let us magnify his Name together.
⁴I sought the Lord, and he heard me:
      yea, he delivered me out of all my fear.
⁵They shall look unto him, and run to him:
      and their faces shall not be ashamed, saying,
⁶This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him,
      and saved him out of all his troubles.
⁷The Angel of the Lord pitched round about them,
      that fear him, and delivereth them.
⁸Taste ye and see, how gracious the Lord is:
      blessed is the man that trusteth in him.

1599 Geneva Bible. This is the translation colonial New Englanders – both Puritans and Pilgrims – would have read.

John 6:35, 41-51

³⁵Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.

⁴¹Then the religious authorities began to complain about Jesus because he said, "I am the bread that came down from heaven."

⁴²They were saying, "Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, 'I have come down from heaven'?" ⁴³Jesus answered them, "Do not complain among yourselves. ⁴⁴No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me; and I will raise that person up on the last day. ⁴⁵It is written in the prophets, 'And they shall all be taught by God.' Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me. ⁴⁶Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father. ⁴⁷Very truly, I tell you, whoever believes has eternal life.

⁴⁸"I am the bread of life. ⁴⁹Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. ⁵⁰This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. ⁵¹I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh."

John 6, week 3 of 5

In this lectionary year B that mostly features Mark's short gospel, we get five weeks of readings from John's gospel. Every so often I participate in Five Minute Friday, a weekly free write to a one-word prompt someone once called a writing flash mob! For this week's reflection I'm linking to my FMF post on my other main blog because with this week's from prompt, I couldn't resist writing about Jesus' origins:

• Five Minute Friday • From


Additional Comments

All four gospels were written long after Jesus' birth, life, death, resurrection, and ascension; by then, quite a few scrolls with details of Jesus' ministry had been making rounds and getting edited along the way. In addition to events in Jesus' life, the individuals and communities that produced the gospels intentionally wrote quite formal theology to convey their own testimony of Jesus and to address concerns people they wrote to might have had.

Although Matthew includes a Sermon on the Mount and Luke's somewhat similar version has Jesus speaking on a plain or level place, those almost definitely were from itinerant rabbi Jesus' stock sermons he used dozens of times with different variations for different audiences. It's similar with Jesus' words in our current chapter 6 of John's gospel. They got written down because (often the same) people heard them often and the content was so incisive it stuck with them.

Two weeks ago when we began considering Jesus' bread of life talk that includes the first of his "I Am" sayings, I cautioned don't assume too quickly that every instance of bread in this scripture passage refers to the bread of Holy Communion. Most scholars today believe verse 51 in today's reading, "…the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh" is not about the Lord's Supper, but about Jesus' body broken open for the life of the world at his crucifixion.

Our opening prayer, Psalm 34:1-8, tells us to taste the graciousness of the Lord. Ever notice how much God loves to come into our lives in ways our senses can taste, hear, see, touch, and smell?

Next Sunday

John 6, part 4: John 6: 51-58