Rev. George Miller
August 11, 2024
John 6:41-51
What an intense, exciting time this have
been.
3 weeks ago, I was in the land of orange
groves and alligators.
Now, I am in land of Imo’s Pizza and Eden
Seminary, with folk who love to ask “Where did you go to school?” and supermarkets
have huge wine selections.
My car spent its entire life driving over
flat earth, now it’s going up and down hills, on roads with swerves and off
ramps that can take you to Chicago, Memphis, and Kansas City.
We’ve already had our first Communion,
sadly, our first Memorial, and now the blessing of the Back Packs, with
preparations for pre-school.
Let’s not forget our youth returning from
their Mission Trip and the anxiety caused last week by my uneven stole!
What a time, and here we are, together
again, to further explore what it means to transform lives as the hands and
feet of Christ.
We continue today in the same space and
time that Jesus and the people were in last week.
It’s the day after Jesus fed the people
with 5 loaves and 2 fish.
The people have woken up early, got in
their boats and sailed across the lake.
Instead of greeting the people with more
miracles, Jesus has a discussion with them about their ancestors, Moses, and
bread from heaven.
It's a mystical, spiritual dialogue that
leaves everyone a bit perplexed, especially when Jesus says “I am the Bread of
Heaven.”
Well- this does not go over well. And the reason why?
Jesus is amongst people he grew up
with.
He is amongst people who knew him as a
kid; folk he played tag with; went to synagogue with.
Jesus is not an outsider who can pretend
to be anything and anyone he wishes to be.
He is with folk who knew his Momma, knew
his Daddy, where we went to school, and they don’t like the things he’s saying.
This reading is sooo real. It’s so true to
life.
How many of you have ever had the
experience of going away, or achieving great things in your professional life…
…but when you come back to your old
neighborhood….
you’re still Marty or Donny or Barbie, and
you’re still expected to take out the trash?
Or the people you went to school with remind
you of who you were or what you did when you were five or ten or fifteen?
How many here have ever found great
success or admiration from co-workers or folk you attended college with…
…but when you go home, old friends still
see you as they did in high school?
They remind you of that time you did that
thing that ended up a certain way and no one will ever let you live it down?
If you haven’t experienced that, God Bless
you.
If you have experienced that, God Bless
you as well, and how cool it is to know that Jesus experienced this also.
Because to hear folk say to Jesus “We knew
your Momma and we knew your Daddy” shows us just how human Jesus is and how
much he really did have a human experience right here on earth,
as he walked amongst us, talked with us,
ate with us,
living with the joys and the pains of what
it means to be human,
what it means to be real.
Jesus may have tried his best to teach what
it meant to be the Bread of Life, and to experience God through him.
And maybe the people did not get it, but
it doesn’t change who Jesus is nor what he is about.
Jesus shares with the people that whoever
comes to him will not be hungry, nor will they thirst, nor will they be driven
away.
And that is powerful….and it has had great
personal meaning to me these last 3 weeks.
Please allow me to share:
As stated before, these past few days have
been exciting, but they have acquired great adjusting.
When my best friend Tonya and I got into
my car on Tuesday, July 23, we drove straight through, from central Florida to
the big city of St. Louis.
When we arrived on Wednesday morning at
3:30 we were tired.
So it was wonderful when we entered my new
house, and we were greeted with gift bags and cards and a fridge full of food.
One of those items was a foot-long hero
sandwich.
While Tonya was here, we went out to eat, but
after dropping her off at the airport, the first meal I ate in my new house was
that delicious Dierbergs sandwich, with potato chips and Pepsi that Katy had
placed in the kitchen.
THAT sandwich was heaven, a moment of
nourishment that went beyond the stomach and felt more like manna.
A week later, I was blessed by Donna with a
dining room table that Lanny helped to pick up and patiently put together.
That night I had my first meal in my new
home, at a table.
You don’t realize how important a table is
until you go 9 days without one.
That meal was also heaven.
These two experiences validated something
essential to our faith- the importance of a meal, the importance of bread, of
cup, of table.
In other words, Communion.
The Lord’s Supper.
The way we come together, are united, experience
and share God through Christ.
Over the last 2 weeks, thanks to that
Dierbergs sandwich and the donated table, I am reminded of just how amazing
Jesus is and magnificent our faith is.
That Jesus cares about us being fed, physically
and spiritually.
That Jesus is the Bread of Heaven who also
cares that we are fed here on Earth.
How Jesus created a way for us to care for
one another and to make heaven known to each other when-
we feed each other, when we freely give to
one another, when we assist one another.
No matter if it is someone we went to high
school with, or someone we met on our Mission Trip, or the newly called Pastor.
Jesus has done something so amazing with
the gift of himself, the gift of celebrating his presence, and the presence of
God via bread.
It means we can experience the holiness of
God and the presence of Heaven any time and any place.
You can be from Germany, on a boat sailing
across the Atlantic to Ellis Island, and if you have a piece of brot,
you can celebrate the Lord’s Supper.
You can be from Bogota, Colombia living in
Kissimmee and if you have an arepa, you can experience Communion.
You can be far from orange groves and
alligators, but if you have a supermarket sandwich, you can experience the
gifts of Heaven.
It is so good to be here today, to be with
all of you-
to celebrate the Blessing of our
Backpacks,
-to celebrate where we went to school.
-to anticipate the start of classes.
It is so good to recall that Jesus had a
very human experience,
that he too knew what it was like to be
judged or doubted for who he was, not who he is.
Because knowing that means that Jesus truly
is a Savior we can turn to,
A savior we can confide in, find strength
in when we are doubted, when we are far from home, or we find ourselves in new
beginnings.
For that, we can say Amen.
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