Bread. What is it?

PENT 10B-2015

Bread.  The Israelites look out on the desert, after the dew had lifted, and asked “What is it?” It is manna, the bread from heaven that God promised. Take what you need; there is enough for everyone. 

The question is what intrigued me as I prepared the sermon; bread, what is it?

In our day, what is bread?

We have managed to immobilize large amounts of food for food aid projects to address famine, food banks and soup kitchens operate in cities and towns all over North America, and development projects are undertaken worldwide to create sustainable water sources and farms, but, is this all there is to bread – feeding people physically?

The readings have a couple of lines for us to draw our attention to:

After Jesus commends the disciples to work, not for food that perishes, but for food that endures and offers life, the disciples ask Jesus, “What must we do to perform the works of God?” “What must we do to perform the works of God?”

Ephesians speaks about vocations and gifts, focusing on the purpose of each vocation and gift – through their work people are “to equip the saints for the work of ministry” and “build up the body of Christ.” Together the whole community – everyone – working together is to “promote the body’s growth in building itself up in love.”  This is what BREAD is.

With the introduction of our current hymn book, a lovely addition was added to one of the post-communion prayers. The line of the prayer is welcome theology for our time and place, extending the image of bread as used in the Eucharist.  We are fed by Christ’s body by receiving the sacrament, the sacrament feeds us such that we pray these words in response, “By your spirit strengthen us to serve all in need and to give ourselves away as bread for the hungry.”

The prayer has moved forward from the question the disciples ask –“What must we do to perform the works of God?” We understand that to do God’s work means freely giving away that which we have received.

I heard the most beautiful true story at National Assembly:  

St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, was an established church in St. Petersburg, Russia.  It was built of wood and for generations had been kept up and loved by the people.  During World War II life was difficult in Russia, particularly for those on the margins.  The poor and those who were pushed off their lands congregated in St. Petersburg, looking for food and shelter.  As the war proceeded resources became ever more scarce; fuel to make small fires for warmth and the preparing of food was almost non-existent.  Citizens began to use pieces of board from the church to make their small fires so that they could survive … and guess what the church did?  They didn’t put up a fence, or hire a security guard, no chastisements were handed out – rather, the church allowed the people in need to use the resources they had to be bread, God’s kingdom in that time and place, for those people, a people in desperate need. By the end of the war, the church building was close to gone, except for the boards too high to reach. The building was gone; the people survived. The church - God’s story – was alive. It was alive in the actions of the people. That’s what it means to be bread for the world.  It is a costly grace -  St. Mark’s was a serving church, in mission for others.

They were a people liberated and then called to be a people of faith for people in need.

The ELCIC National Assembly in Edmonton closed with worship at Trinity Lutheran Church.  This large church, with services each week in German and English, houses the Synod Office of Alberta and the Territories, must seat around 900 people.  It had a balcony that stretched around 3 quarters of the building and side areas to the chancel for the choir.  There were double rows of pews down the centre with banks of pews off side aisles. 

The Anglican Primate Bishop Fred Hiltz preached the sermon, which was his reflections as an observer during Convention proceedings. He ordered the sermon around the Assembly theme: liberated by God’s grace.

He spelled out for us that not only did we embrace that we are liberated by God’s grace, which he suspected we already knew and believed as it’s “good” Lutheran theology.  He congratulated us on ingesting the theology such that in Assembly we acted on it; physically demonstrating that being liberated means sharing that this grace is for all; stressing that one truly isn’t liberated until one shares the grace.

Some of what he reflected was:

Liberated by God’s grace … you chose to accept proposals from KAIROS to live into and make happen suggestions made by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission; commendable because we didn’t have to go there because as an institution we were not culpable for residential schools;

Liberated by God’s grace … you chose to stand with Indigenous women and request a national inquiry into their disappearances.

Liberated by God’s grace … you chose to take make a statement on the Canadian Criminal justice system and set out a plan for a system that focuses on restorative practices, rehabilitation, and reintegration – including in the motion specific ways to go about doing this;

Liberated by God’s grace … you extended an olive leaf of reconciliation to brothers and sisters who felt a need to leave the church because of decisions made at previous conventions to allow for same sex marriage and the ordination of those who are gay.

Liberated by God’s grace … you are willing to look again at the churches policy on End-of-life-decisions and to continue to wrestle with current social issues.

Liberated by God’s grace …  you have set audacious goals to celebrate the 500^th Anniversary of Lutheran Reformation – starting 500 new refugee sponsorships, creating 500 new bursaries for students in schools of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land, planting 500,000 trees in Canada and around the world; and raising $500,000 for the Lutheran World Federation Endowment Fund .

Bishop Fred went on passionately for 28 and a half mins…or so… proud to be a partner in ministry and thankful for a push in the behind to the Anglican Church of Canada to get their act together to start living for others.  None of the work we did at Assembly was for us, it was for the healing of the world and more specifically for healing our relationships with the world around us, as a medium sized church and as individuals.

Liberated by God’s grace … you are looking forward from a perspective of abundance, not scarcity.

In essence Bishop Fred was saying that Liberated by God’s grace we are offering ourselves as bread for the hungry.

This is Resurrection’s100th anniversary year.   If you have noticed we have not been focused on the past.  Sure we have some neat historical pieces on display in the church hall, but, the anniversary is being marked by the present moving to the future: we have expressed why it is we come to this place (sharing with others the Good News we encounter here); we are practising spirited discipleship by reading portions of scripture; we have been “in mission for others” by giving away loonies; we are inviting people to join us for a celebration filled with music and followed by bread in the form of potluck and fellowship; we are knitting 100 toques, gathering 100 scarves and mitts to make 100 boxes –as bread- for the seafarers who come into the Halifax port this  winter; we are being bread by opening our hearts to 10 new refugees whose forms have finally accepted and entered the Canadian Immigration Services system; we are bread as the kitchen is refurbished to allow for ministry to happen in the church hall- over broken bread.  Living from abundance we are performing the works of God, equipping the saints for ministry, building up the body of Christ; we are being bread for the hungry!

For this I am beyond ecstatic!  Keep on carrying on.  Thanks be to God. Amen.