John 6:24-35
First thoughts toward Sunday’s message:
I got a bread machine for my birthday earlier this year. I’ve used it a fair amount, mostly for pizza dough, not so much for sandwich bread. I’ve had a couple of disasters, which my Pastoral Relations Committee can tell you about (I made a big deal about offering to bring the bread to our next potluck, and we were all sorely disappointed…). I have made some good zucchini bread with the zucchini from the church garden.
I really like bread. I like eating it, making it, sharing it… and I like its symbolism, too. The bread of the communion table, certainly, but also the fact that bread is the most basic of food, and the foundation of just about every culture’s food. Sharing bread is no simple matter.
So I happen to like John 6, where Jesus says, “I am the bread of life.” That phrase has such depth to it, even if I don’t, at first glance, know what he means. (That’s the thing about bread, too, though: I don’t exactly know how yeast works, but I know that it does.) It’s challenging me to think about Jesus being our basic sustenance. There’s so much we think we need, but if we get back to basics, it’s just bread, just Jesus. To quote a book I mentioned a couple weeks ago (Longing for Enough in a Culture of More), “When you feel like you’re hungry but know you’re really not, what are you hungry for?” What would it mean to rely, simply, on Jesus?
Then there’s this passage from 1 Kings, in which a despairing Elijah awakes to find bread and water left by an angel of the Lord. This story needs some context, and we’ll talk about that Sunday, but it’s a great image, too… When we’re alone and full of despair, what does God provide?
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