Year B
Proverbs 9:1-6
Psalm 34:9-14
Ephesians 5:15-20
John 6:51-58
May the words of my mouth O God\u2026\u00a0 speak your truth\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The 1999 movie\u2026 The Matrix\u2026 is a story about a society which exists in a computer generated reality\u2026 like one of those computer games where each person has an avatar\u2026 and all of the avatars on everyone’s computers interact with each other in real time\u2026 millions of people… who are not only sedated\u2026 but who are kept in egg-shaped fluid-filled pods\u2026 like wombs\u2026 and every one of them is hard-wired into a massive main-frame computer system\u2026 but they don’t know it\u2026 they have no way to know that what they experience\u2026 a life that looks and feels just like this one\u2026 is a reality that exists only in their awareness\u2026 and in their collective experience\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And within this computer generated reality\u2026 Thomas Anderson is a man who by day\u2026 is a mid-level computer programmer\u2026 but by night\u2026 is a hacker known as Neo\u2026 who questioned his reality\u2026 who always had a sense that something was wrong\u2026 but the truth is more than he can imagine\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
So Neo is contacted by the legendary\u2026 and on-the-lam computer hacker Morpheus\u2026 and because I so appreciate word origins\u2026 Morpheus\u2026 is the mythological god of sleep and dreams\u2026 and is the word from which we get morphine\u2026 but back to the story\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Morpheus shares the prophecy that someone would be born into the Matrix with the power to free its people\u2026 someone called\u2026 the One\u2026 and Morpheus believes that Neo is this person\u2026 but as a result of being contacted\u2026 Neo himself becomes a target of the police\u2026 the police however\u2026 including the relentless Agent Smith\u2026 are nothing more than computer programs whose purpose is to prevent any change in the programming which would enable the humans to wake up\u2026 and discover the lie\u2026 and when Neo wakes up\u2026 wow\u2026 but if you haven’t seen the movie\u2026 well\u2026 I won’t spoil it for you\u2026 but it brings down the virtual house of cards\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Well\u2026 Wisdom has built her house\u2026 and to those without sense<\/em>\u2026 perhaps to those who are not yet awake\u2026 she says\u2026 come\u2026 eat of my bread\u2026 and drink of the wine I have mixed… and walk in the way of insight<\/em>\u2026 and because I so appreciate word origins\u2026 the word that’s translated as insight<\/em> can also mean to discern between<\/em>\u2026 when in 1Kings 3:9\u2026 Solomon says to God… Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people\u2026 able to discern between good and evil\u2026<\/em> and we too are to walk in the way of insight\u2026 to discern what’s true and what’s false\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n And Jesus said\u2026 I am the living bread that came down from heaven\u2026 whoever eats of this bread will live forever\u2026 and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh\u2026 and unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood\u2026 you have no life in you<\/em>\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n And speaking of eating\u2026 Thomas Cranmer\u2026 a sixteenth century leader in the British Reformation\u2026 and author of the Book of Common Prayer\u2026 wrote about our need to not only hear the scriptures\u2026 but to read\u2026 mark\u2026 and inwardly digest them\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n In Jewish belief\u2026 blood was life\u2026 and blood belonged to God\u2026 but if we take what Jesus is saying at face value\u2026 it’s almost impossible\u2026 not to conclude that he’s talking about cannibalism\u2026 its no wonder that the Jews quarreled among themselves\u2026 saying\u2026 how can this man give us his flesh to eat<\/em>\u2026 but we have to remember that Jesus was Sophia<\/em>\u2026 was Wisdom incarnate\u2026 was the Wisdom referred to in our reading from Proverbs\u2026 and Jesus knew the Jewish dietary laws\u2026 he knew that Leviticus 17:13-14 said\u2026 anyone who hunts down an animal or bird that may be eaten\u2026 shall pour out its blood\u2026 and cover it with earth\u2026 but whoever eats it\u2026 shall be cut off<\/em>\u2026 so if Jesus doesn’t mean it literally\u2026 how does he mean it\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n JD Walt\u2026 on his website seedbed.com wrote\u2026 clearly\u2026 Jesus shifts into a new gear in today\u2019s text\u2026 it\u2019s like he\u2019s grabbing the people by the lapels and trying to wake them up too\u2026 Jesus is revealing a completely different kind of life\u2026 eternal life\u2026 it’s different in quality\u2026 quantity\u2026 depth\u2026 love… power\u2026 and every other similar category we could name\u2026 understandably the people aren\u2019t getting it\u2026 they say things like\u2026 how can a person go back into their mother\u2019s womb\u2026 <\/em>and\u2026 how are you going to get any water from that well without a bucket\u2026 <\/em>and\u2026 it would take a fortune to feed all these people even a snack\u2026<\/em> and today is no different\u2026 it’s like telling Neo that he’s really not going to work in a shirt and tie\u2026 but exists in a watery cocoon\u2026 and expecting him to believe it\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fr. Bertie Pearson\u2026 Rector of Grace Episcopal Church in Georgetown, Texas\u2026 writes\u2026 if you stare up at the sun for too long… you start to see nothing but darkness\u2026 that’s not because the sun disappears\u2026 but because there’s way too much light\u2026 more than you can take in\u2026 and so you are blinded\u2026 if however\u2026 you hold up a prism\u2026 and allow it to catch that same blinding light\u2026 it splits it into the comprehensible spectrum of colors\u2026 from violet to red\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a similar manner\u2026 you can’t see God\u2026 not because God is hidden or won\u2019t reveal herself to you\u2026 but because God is infinite\u2026 eternal\u2026 God is far too huge for us to comprehend\u2026 but when the experiences of God\u2019s actions are filtered through the prism of the world\u2026 we experience God’s presence as beauty\u2026 truth\u2026 compassion\u2026 justice\u2026 peace\u2026 joy\u2026 and love\u2026 and they show us glimpses\u2026 shadows\u2026 and the faintest reflections of God’s true goodness\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Just as Morpheus wants Neo to wake up\u2026 to seeing the Matrix in which they live and which fools them into thinking it’s real\u2026 Jesus calls us\u2026 to a life of being awake\u2026 of seeing how we’re hooked into systems which promote fear\u2026 and which set limits on what we believe to be possible\u2026 it’s like the difference between being wired into the Matrix\u2026 and being wired into Jesus\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n We are given mortal life through mortal food and drink\u2026 we are kept alive\u2026 day by day\u2026 by pizza and Pepsi\u2026 by eggs and milk\u2026 by bread and wine\u2026 and you can increase or decrease your consumption\u2026 but give up food and water for Lent and you might not make it to Easter\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n In quoting Jesus in vv. 49 – 53\u2026 John chose to use the Greek verb phago<\/em>\u2026 this word is translated as “eat”\u2026 but in v. 54\u2026 John changes to verb to trogo<\/em>\u2026 trogo<\/em> is found five times in this Gospel and only once elsewhere in the Christian Scriptures\u2026 in John 13:18\u2026 but from v. 54 onward\u2026 it’s used to describe what Jesus tells us we must do to have eternal life within us\u2026 and trogo<\/em> means to gnaw\u2026 chew\u2026 crunch\u2026 but there have been some people\u2026 in some churches\u2026 who at communion\u2026 never chew\u2026 they dislike the idea of chewing on Jesus\u2026 they let the wafer or bread dissolve in their mouths\u2026 but the Gospel tells us that this act\u2026 is an active one\u2026 not passive… we are to gnaw on the Word\u2026 chew on its meaning\u2026 crunch every last bit of nourishment out of it\u2026 and this is why our two denominations established weekly communion in the mid – late 1970s\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n In John 14:12\u2026 Jesus said\u2026 Very truly… I tell you\u2026 the one who trusts in me will do the works that I do\u2026 and in fact\u2026 will do greater works than these<\/em>\u2026 I wonder what these greater works might be\u2026 I wonder if it might be to first wake up to our oppression\u2026 I wonder if it might be to challenge the systems which keep us oppressed\u2026 I wonder if it might be strive for justice and peace for all people\u2026 I wonder if Neo\u2026 knew Jesus\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Year B Proverbs 9:1-6Psalm 34:9-14Ephesians 5:15-20John 6:51-58 May the words of my mouth O God\u2026\u00a0 speak your truth\u2026 The 1999 movie\u2026 The Matrix\u2026 is a story about a society which exists in a computer generated reality\u2026 like one of those computer games where each person has an avatar\u2026 and all of the avatars on everyone’s computers interact with each other in real time\u2026 millions of people… who are not only sedated\u2026 but who are kept in egg-shaped fluid-filled pods\u2026 like wombs\u2026 and every one of them is hard-wired into a massive main-frame computer system\u2026 but they don’t know it\u2026 they have no way to know that what they experience\u2026 a life that looks and feels just like this one\u2026 is a reality that exists only in their awareness\u2026 and in their collective experience\u2026 And within this computer generated reality\u2026 Thomas Anderson is a man who by day\u2026 is a mid-level computer programmer\u2026 but by night\u2026 is a hacker known as Neo\u2026 who questioned his reality\u2026 who always had a sense that something was wrong\u2026 but the truth is more than he can imagine\u2026 So Neo is contacted by the legendary\u2026 and on-the-lam computer hacker Morpheus\u2026 and because I so appreciate word origins\u2026 Morpheus\u2026 is the mythological god of sleep and dreams\u2026 and is the word from which we get morphine\u2026 but back to the story\u2026 Morpheus shares the prophecy that someone would be born into the Matrix with the power to free its people\u2026 someone called\u2026 the One\u2026 and Morpheus believes that Neo is this person\u2026 but as a result of being contacted\u2026 Neo himself becomes a target of the police\u2026 the police however\u2026 including the relentless Agent Smith\u2026 are nothing more than computer programs whose purpose is to prevent any change in the programming which would enable the humans to wake up\u2026 and discover the lie\u2026 and when Neo wakes up\u2026 wow\u2026 but if you haven’t seen the movie\u2026 well\u2026 I won’t spoil it for you\u2026 but it brings down the virtual house of cards\u2026 Well\u2026 Wisdom has built her house\u2026 and to those without sense\u2026 perhaps to those who are not yet awake\u2026 she says\u2026 come\u2026 eat of my bread\u2026 and drink of the wine I have mixed… and walk in the way of insight\u2026 and because I so appreciate word origins\u2026 the word that’s translated as insight can also mean to discern between\u2026 when in 1Kings 3:9\u2026 Solomon says to God… Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people\u2026 able to discern between good and evil\u2026 and we too are to walk in the way of insight\u2026 to discern what’s true and what’s false\u2026 And Jesus said\u2026 I am the living bread that came down from heaven\u2026 whoever eats of this bread will live forever\u2026 and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh\u2026 and unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood\u2026 you have no life in you\u2026 And speaking of eating\u2026 Thomas Cranmer\u2026 a sixteenth century leader in the British Reformation\u2026 and author of the Book of Common Prayer\u2026 wrote about our need to not only hear the scriptures\u2026 but to read\u2026 mark\u2026 and inwardly digest them\u2026 In Jewish belief\u2026 blood was life\u2026 and blood belonged to God\u2026 but if we take what Jesus is saying at face value\u2026 it’s almost impossible\u2026 not to conclude that he’s talking about cannibalism\u2026 its no wonder that the Jews quarreled among themselves\u2026 saying\u2026 how can this man give us his flesh to eat\u2026 but we have to remember that Jesus was Sophia\u2026 was Wisdom incarnate\u2026 was the Wisdom referred to in our reading from Proverbs\u2026 and Jesus knew the Jewish dietary laws\u2026 he knew that Leviticus 17:13-14 said\u2026 anyone who hunts down an animal or bird that may be eaten\u2026 shall pour out its blood\u2026 and cover it with earth\u2026 but whoever eats it\u2026 shall be cut off\u2026 so if Jesus doesn’t mean it literally\u2026 how does he mean it\u2026 JD Walt\u2026 on his website seedbed.com wrote\u2026 clearly\u2026 Jesus shifts into a new gear in today\u2019s text\u2026 it\u2019s like he\u2019s grabbing the people by the lapels and trying to wake them up too\u2026 Jesus is revealing a completely different kind of life\u2026 eternal life\u2026 it’s different in quality\u2026 quantity\u2026 depth\u2026 love… power\u2026 and every other similar category we could name\u2026 understandably the people aren\u2019t getting it\u2026 they say things like\u2026 how can a person go back into their mother\u2019s womb\u2026 and\u2026 how are you going to get any water from that well without a bucket\u2026 and\u2026 it would take a fortune to feed all these people even a snack\u2026 and today is no different\u2026 it’s like telling Neo that he’s really not going to work in a shirt and tie\u2026 but exists in a watery cocoon\u2026 and expecting him to believe it\u2026 Fr. Bertie Pearson\u2026 Rector of Grace Episcopal Church in Georgetown, Texas\u2026 writes\u2026 if you stare up at the sun for too long… you start to see nothing but darkness\u2026 that’s not because the sun disappears\u2026 but because there’s way too much light\u2026 more than you can take in\u2026 and so you are blinded\u2026 if however\u2026 you hold up a prism\u2026 and allow it to catch that same blinding light\u2026 it splits it into the comprehensible spectrum of colors\u2026 from violet to red\u2026 In a similar manner\u2026 you can’t see God\u2026 not because God is hidden or won\u2019t reveal herself to you\u2026 but because God is infinite\u2026 eternal\u2026 God is far too huge for us to comprehend\u2026 but when the experiences of God\u2019s actions are filtered through the prism of the world\u2026 we experience God’s presence as beauty\u2026 truth\u2026 compassion\u2026 justice\u2026 peace\u2026 joy\u2026 and love\u2026 and they show us glimpses\u2026 shadows\u2026 and the faintest reflections of God’s true goodness\u2026 Just as Morpheus wants Neo to wake up\u2026 to seeing the Matrix in which they live and which fools them into thinking it’s real\u2026 Jesus calls us\u2026 to a life of being […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1342","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1342","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1342"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1342\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1343,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1342\/revisions\/1343"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1342"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1342"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/twochurches.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1342"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}