IF ANYONE EAT OF THIS BREAD

By Dr. Eric C. Stumpf, Senior Pastor

St. Paul’s Ev. Lutheran Church – Munster, IN

 + Pentecost 10 (B) + John 6:35-51

 9 Aug 2009

            The word “bread” can bring many different images to mind.  In my mind it evokes memories of walking into my mother’s kitchen as a boy after school and smelling the delicious odor of fresh baked bread.  I have to confess since I grew up with it I took it for granted.  However, God is generous.  God gave me a wife that makes delicious homemade bread.  The smells of home baked bread still give me a treat when I walk into my home.

            The lack of bread can stir up some large social changes in history.  When the recession was recognized over a year ago the news media often showed old black and white news reel clips from the Depression, haggard unshaven men shuffling in lines to receive a hunk of bread and a bowl of soup.

            Revolutions have started because of the lack of bread.  When told that the French people of Paris had no bread to eat, Marie Antoinette, the Queen of France, is supposed to have said, “Then let them eat cake.”  Such callous indifference sparked the French Revolution.

            In February 1917 when the women of Petrograd, Russia, were tired of spending about 45 hours a week waiting in lines for bread, they started a riot which eventually lead to the Russian Revolution.

            Today bread counts for a very small fraction of the weekly food expenses.  People spend more money on soft drinks, juices, bottled tea, and bottled water than they do for bread.  Even though it is a small part of the total cost we eat more bread today than we did in 1970; yet, according to some we are no healthier for it. 

In Scripture

            Bread is an important concept in Scripture, both in the Old and New Testament.  God often linked bread, the staff of life, to His relationship with Him.  For example, and this is a big example, because it directly ties into the event of the feeding of the 5000 in the wilderness, when Israel was in the wilderness they needed food.  God sent them manna in the morning.  Jesus duplicates this sign by feeding the 5000 in the wilderness;  yet, some saw the connection and some did not.  Other parallel events was the grumbling of the people of Israel and the grumbling of the people who wanted Jesus to be their Bread King, controlled by them.  When Jesus tells them to look to him to bring salvation, Jesus was connecting to the Bronze serpent episode the people experience in the wilderness.  Elsewhere in the Old Testament you have the story of Elijah who tells Israel they will have a three year drought because of their unfaithfulness to God by worshipping the god Baal, a fertility god.  Elijah is on the run, but God feeds him in the wilderness (1 Kings 19:17).  After his showdown with the prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel where he shows the only true God is Jahweh, Queen Isabelle puts a price on his head and swears she will have him killed.  Elijah is on the run again, but God provides him bread in the wilderness (chapter 19), our Old Testament lesson this morning.

            Now in Jesus’ ministry another critical crossroads comes up.  The first was when he began his ministry and was tempted by Satan.  Remember bread was also an issue – Jesus is hungry, he could turn stones into bread, but Jesus says man does not live by bread alone, but by the word of God.  It sets the stage for this other crossroads event.  What did it mean that Jesus was the Bread of Life.  It meant much more than Jesus could multiply loaves, a miracle, but that Jesus the very Word of God was also the only means to sustain man for eternal life, the bread that satisfies every hunger.  In order to have this life, you must have Jesus.  It’s not a buffet, Jesus is not just one of many dishes one can chose or not chose.  Jesus is the meal, is the means of life.  The crossroads was there, the result was some refused to follow Jesus anymore, others said, “To whom shall we go, You have the words of eternal life.”

            The question for us this morning is, “Is Jesus your Bread of Life, or is he just a side dish?” 

Bread of Life

            God knows food is important to us.  For the whole world God continues to feed humanity from the fruits of the earth, God’s creation, so that all humanity might have that connection that a power greater than themselves provides their daily bread.  Of course, we want them to know it is God our Heavenly Father who is the provider and give him thanks.  But through this connection God’s grace is even more generous as He provides His own Son to give us eternal life. 

            Food is important to us as well.  I went to Amazon.com and found books on what it means to be Lutherans.  It is amazing to see how many books, especially humerous books show the importance of food among us.  Consider the title, If there Were No Lutherans Would There Still Be Green Jello? By Steve Molin.  A book given to me by Charlie Hott called Luther’s Small Dictionary defined “food -- as something Lutherans need every time they go to church.”  That of course is true, especially when we think of the Bread of Life, Jesus and his words of life for us, and Jesus who gave himself in the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper.  While we enjoy our coffee and donut at Koinonia, it is the Lord’s Supper we know that offers us the greatest treasure.  Here we have what Jesus’ own words offer to us, “Given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.”  John presents that theme in this lesson when Jesus tells us, I am the living bread that came down from heaven.  If anyone east of this bread, he will live forever. 

Through the encouragement of the Word we are lead to the Lord’s Table to receive this treasure and to be nourished to eternal life.  That is our mission here at St. Paul’s, that is the focus of our school, and that is the purpose of our efforts in missions, as you will hear later when our Alaskan mission reports on their work. 

SDG