Year B
Joshua 24:1-2a,14-18
Psalm 34:15-22
Ephesians 6:10-20
John 6:56-69<\/p>\n\n\n\n
May the words of my mouth O God\u2026 speak your truth\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What I hope you heard in this morning’s reading from Joshua\u2026 was that while Joshua said\u2026 As for me and my household\u2026 we will serve the Lord<\/em>\u2026 the people had to decide whether they would serve the gods of their ancestors\u2026 the ones they served beyond the River\u2026 or the gods of the Amorites\u2026 in whose land they were living\u2026 ] or whether\u2026 in sincerity and faithfulness\u2026 they would serve YHWH\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n What we didn\u2019t hear today in the missing verses\u2026 vv. 2b – 13\u2026 was how the Amorites\u2026 the Perizzites\u2026 the Canaanites\u2026 Hittites\u2026 Girgashites\u2026 Hivites\u2026 and the Jebusites\u2026 were all\u2026 either killed by God\u2026 or handed over to the Israelites\u2026 so that they could inherit the land that God had promised them through Moses\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n But if\u2026 for example\u2026 you’ve watched any of those Viking docudramas\u2026 you’ve no doubt heard those references to the old gods\u2026 and the new gods\u2026 ] even the apostle Paul\u2026 wrote in 1Corinthians 8:4\u2026 as to the eating of food offered to idols\u2026 we know that no idol in the world really exists\u2026 and that there is no God but one<\/em>\u2026 ] because over the course of many hundreds of years\u2026 there was an emerging awareness among the Israelites that there was only one true God\u2026 and this was given expression in the Shema<\/em>\u2026 Hear O Israel\u2026 the Lord our God\u2026 the Lord is One<\/em>\u2026 and Joshua’s people said\u2026 far be it from us that we should forsake the Lord\u2026 to serve other gods<\/em>\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Those who complied the lectionary readings\u2026 have repeated the final verses of last week\u2019s Gospel\u2026 as the beginning two verses of this week’s\u2026 and because Jesus’ message is so important\u2026 he says that in order to gain eternal life\u2026 one had to eat his flesh and drink his blood\u2026 and many of his disciples said\u2026 This teaching is difficult\u2026 who can accept it\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n Now the editors of the Jewish Annotated New Testament\u2026 suggest that the reasons this would have been abhorrent to the Jews\u2026 were because there were dietary prohibitions against ingesting the blood of any animal along with its meat\u2026 because it was too much like cannibalism\u2026 but even so\u2026 v. 53\u2026 which we heard last week\u2026 says that those who don’t eat his flesh and drink his blood\u2026 have no life in them\u2026 and v. 53 may refer to an ancient practice of theophagy\u2026 the ancient practice of eating one’s god\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1914\u2026 Preserved Smith\u2026 yes\u2026 that\u2019s his real name\u2026 wrote A Short History of Christian Theophagy\u2026 and I just checked a few days ago\u2026 it’s still for sale on Amazon\u2026 and if we go back in time from Jesus\u2026 like how astronomers have used the Hubble and James Webb telescopes to look back in time to teach about the evolution of the universe\u2026 when we move back past the mystery cults of Demeter and Dionysus\u2026 back past incarnate gods\u2026 back past the earliest known scriptures\u2026 back past even any notion of a divine being who had human characteristics\u2026 the way the Greek gods did\u2026 when we go back to the earliest emergence of religion\u2026 Smith claims that the first expressions were totemism\u2026 not an idol\u2026 not a human-made god\u2026 but a thing that simply\u2026 subtly\u2026 represented the sacred\u2026 and connected the tribe to it\u2026 and it was through the totem\u2026 that primitive people sought assistance from and union with the divine\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n But when the Jews said\u2026 This teaching is difficult<\/em>\u2026 they were getting stuck on the surface level of understanding\u2026 but it’s as though Jesus said\u2026 I\u2019m offering you the best that I\u2019ve got\u2026 hearty\u2026 grainy\u2026 crusty\u2026 seeded warm organic bread\u2026 made from stoneground flour\u2026 right out of the oven\u2026 with lots of softened butter melting down into it\u2026 why would you eat Wonder bread with hydrogenated corn oil\u2026 why do you settle for bread that\u2019s not real bread\u2026 and settle for life that\u2019s not real life\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus knew that when we eat spiritual food\u2026 when we make ourselves vulnerable to the body and blood of Christ\u2026 when we develop an inner disposition\u2026 that enables us to just touch the fringe of Jesus’ cloak\u2026 or drink the living water he brings\u2026 when we are reborn from above with a spiritual identity\u2026 that\u2019s when the bread we eat will give us eternal life\u2026 that\u2019s when we open ourselves to boundlessness\u2026 that’s when we empty ourselves into all that Christ is\u2026 and it’s that for which we were created\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n But after six weeks of reading John’s Bread of Life discourse\u2026 which is what this series of passages is called\u2026 I have struggled to find fresh meaning in it\u2026 there’s only so much one can say about Jesus teaching the disciples that his invitation to eternal life\u2026 wasn’t physical immortality\u2026 . wasn’t living forever\u2026 but was spiritual unity with God\u2026 and that’s when the Spirit spoke to me\u2026 and in a roundabout way\u2026 brought me to baptism\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the Episcopal church\u2026 we acknowledge seven sacraments\u2026 Reconciliation\u2026 Matrimony\u2026 Ordination\u2026 Unction\u2026 Confirmation\u2026 and Baptism and Communion\u2026 in the ELCA\u2026 we acknowledge two\u2026 Baptism and Communion\u2026 because they are the two practices that were (1) instituted by Christ\u2026 (2) involve tangible elements\u2026 such as water\u2026 or bread and wine\u2026 and (3) convey the promises of Grace\u2026 and over time\u2026 the church has changed the criteria for who could receive these sacraments\u2026 particularly communion\u2026 ] in the 19th and 20th centuries\u2026 you had to be both baptized and confirmed before you could receive\u2026 because confirmation was the rite of passage which bestowed full membership in the church\u2026 but in the 1970s and 1980s\u2026 both denominations recognized baptism as full initiation into the church\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n In baptism\u2026 we make a public affirmation\u2026 or one is made on our behalf\u2026 that we can’t do it all on our own\u2026 that we are only human and will miss God’s mark for us\u2026 in baptism\u2026 we die to our small selves\u2026 and are reborn as members of the body of Christ\u2026 in baptism\u2026 we reject society’s message of self-sufficiency\u2026 that we could and should do it all on our own\u2026 in baptism\u2026 we acknowledge our willingness to be fed by God’s light and life and wisdom and forgiveness and grace\u2026 ] and where do we receive this nourishment\u2026 in the bread and the wine\u2026 in the body and the blood… it is the satisfying and spiritual equivalent of hearty\u2026 grainy\u2026 crusty\u2026 seeded\u2026 warm bread\u2026 And we too\u2026 are those to whom Joshua spoke\u2026 we are those who must continue to make choices between the old and the new\u2026 must decide what to let go of\u2026 and what to hold on to\u2026 and so we ask the question of each other… who will you and your household serve\u2026 and where will you go\u2026 to empty idols which give no life\u2026 or to the One whose Word gives eternal life\u2026 I think we know the answer\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Year B Joshua 24:1-2a,14-18 Psalm 34:15-22 Ephesians 6:10-20 John 6:56-69 May the words of my mouth O God\u2026 speak your truth\u2026 What I hope you heard in this morning’s reading from Joshua\u2026 was that while Joshua said\u2026 As for me and my household\u2026 we will serve the Lord\u2026 the people had to decide whether they would serve the gods of their ancestors\u2026 the ones they served beyond the River\u2026 or the gods of the Amorites\u2026 in whose land they were living\u2026 ] or whether\u2026 in sincerity and faithfulness\u2026 they would serve YHWH\u2026 What we didn\u2019t hear today in the missing verses\u2026 vv. 2b – 13\u2026 was how the Amorites\u2026 the Perizzites\u2026 the Canaanites\u2026 Hittites\u2026 Girgashites\u2026 Hivites\u2026 and the Jebusites\u2026 were all\u2026 either killed by God\u2026 or handed over to the Israelites\u2026 so that they could inherit the land that God had promised them through Moses\u2026 But if\u2026 for example\u2026 you’ve watched any of those Viking docudramas\u2026 you’ve no doubt heard those references to the old gods\u2026 and the new gods\u2026 ] even the apostle Paul\u2026 wrote in 1Corinthians 8:4\u2026 as to the eating of food offered to idols\u2026 we know that no idol in the world really exists\u2026 and that there is no God but one\u2026 ] because over the course of many hundreds of years\u2026 there was an emerging awareness among the Israelites that there was only one true God\u2026 and this was given expression in the Shema\u2026 Hear O Israel\u2026 the Lord our God\u2026 the Lord is One\u2026 and Joshua’s people said\u2026 far be it from us that we should forsake the Lord\u2026 to serve other gods\u2026 Those who complied the lectionary readings\u2026 have repeated the final verses of last week\u2019s Gospel\u2026 as the beginning two verses of this week’s\u2026 and because Jesus’ message is so important\u2026 he says that in order to gain eternal life\u2026 one had to eat his flesh and drink his blood\u2026 and many of his disciples said\u2026 This teaching is difficult\u2026 who can accept it\u2026 Now the editors of the Jewish Annotated New Testament\u2026 suggest that the reasons this would have been abhorrent to the Jews\u2026 were because there were dietary prohibitions against ingesting the blood of any animal along with its meat\u2026 because it was too much like cannibalism\u2026 but even so\u2026 v. 53\u2026 which we heard last week\u2026 says that those who don’t eat his flesh and drink his blood\u2026 have no life in them\u2026 and v. 53 may refer to an ancient practice of theophagy\u2026 the ancient practice of eating one’s god\u2026 In 1914\u2026 Preserved Smith\u2026 yes\u2026 that\u2019s his real name\u2026 wrote A Short History of Christian Theophagy\u2026 and I just checked a few days ago\u2026 it’s still for sale on Amazon\u2026 and if we go back in time from Jesus\u2026 like how astronomers have used the Hubble and James Webb telescopes to look back in time to teach about the evolution of the universe\u2026 when we move back past the mystery cults of Demeter and Dionysus\u2026 back past incarnate gods\u2026 back past the earliest known scriptures\u2026 back past even any notion of a divine being who had human characteristics\u2026 the way the Greek gods did\u2026 when we go back to the earliest emergence of religion\u2026 Smith claims that the first expressions were totemism\u2026 not an idol\u2026 not a human-made god\u2026 but a thing that simply\u2026 subtly\u2026 represented the sacred\u2026 and connected the tribe to it\u2026 and it was through the totem\u2026 that primitive people sought assistance from and union with the divine\u2026 But when the Jews said\u2026 This teaching is difficult\u2026 they were getting stuck on the surface level of understanding\u2026 but it’s as though Jesus said\u2026 I\u2019m offering you the best that I\u2019ve got\u2026 hearty\u2026 grainy\u2026 crusty\u2026 seeded warm organic bread\u2026 made from stoneground flour\u2026 right out of the oven\u2026 with lots of softened butter melting down into it\u2026 why would you eat Wonder bread with hydrogenated corn oil\u2026 why do you settle for bread that\u2019s not real bread\u2026 and settle for life that\u2019s not real life\u2026 Jesus knew that when we eat spiritual food\u2026 when we make ourselves vulnerable to the body and blood of Christ\u2026 when we develop an inner disposition\u2026 that enables us to just touch the fringe of Jesus’ cloak\u2026 or drink the living water he brings\u2026 when we are reborn from above with a spiritual identity\u2026 that\u2019s when the bread we eat will give us eternal life\u2026 that\u2019s when we open ourselves to boundlessness\u2026 that’s when we empty ourselves into all that Christ is\u2026 and it’s that for which we were created\u2026 But after six weeks of reading John’s Bread of Life discourse\u2026 which is what this series of passages is called\u2026 I have struggled to find fresh meaning in it\u2026 there’s only so much one can say about Jesus teaching the disciples that his invitation to eternal life\u2026 wasn’t physical immortality\u2026 . wasn’t living forever\u2026 but was spiritual unity with God\u2026 and that’s when the Spirit spoke to me\u2026 and in a roundabout way\u2026 brought me to baptism\u2026 In the Episcopal church\u2026 we acknowledge seven sacraments\u2026 Reconciliation\u2026 Matrimony\u2026 Ordination\u2026 Unction\u2026 Confirmation\u2026 and Baptism and Communion\u2026 in the ELCA\u2026 we acknowledge two\u2026 Baptism and Communion\u2026 because they are the two practices that were (1) instituted by Christ\u2026 (2) involve tangible elements\u2026 such as water\u2026 or bread and wine\u2026 and (3) convey the promises of Grace\u2026 and over time\u2026 the church has changed the criteria for who could receive these sacraments\u2026 particularly communion\u2026 ] in the 19th and 20th centuries\u2026 you had to be both baptized and confirmed before you could receive\u2026 because confirmation was the rite of passage which bestowed full membership in the church\u2026 but in the 1970s and 1980s\u2026 both denominations recognized baptism as full initiation into the church\u2026 In baptism\u2026 we make a public affirmation\u2026 or one is made on our behalf\u2026 that we can’t do it all on our own\u2026 that we are only human and will miss God’s mark for us\u2026 in baptism\u2026 we die to our small selves\u2026 and are reborn 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