Sermon for Sunday 2 August 2009 - Melanie

John 6:24-35

For those of you who enjoy baking, I found this bread recipe recently – you might want to try it.

Mum’s bread recipe
• Remove teddy bear from oven and preheat oven to 230.
• Melt 1 cup margarine in saucepan.
• Remove teddy bear from oven and tell Billy "no, no."
• Spread melted margarine in loaf tin.
• Take margarine tub away from Billy and clean cupboards.
• Measure 350g bread flour.
• Take margarine tub away from Billy again and bathe cat.
• Apply antiseptic and bandages to scratches sustained while removing margarine from cat's tail.
• Assemble ½ tsp salt, ½ tsp yeast, ½ tsp sugar, and 200ml water
• Take smouldering teddy bear from oven and open all doors and windows for ventilation.
• Take telephone away from Billy and assure party on the line the call was a mistake. Call BT and attempt to have long distance call removed from bill.
• Sift dry ingredients in bowl and beat well.
• Let cat out of refrigerator.
• Add water and knead dough.
• Rescue cat and take razor away from Billy. Explain to kids that you have no idea if shaved cats will sunburn. Throw cat outside while there's still time and he's still able to run away.
• Wait for dough to rise
• Take the teddy bear out of the broiler and throw it away -- far away.
• Answer the door and meekly explain to nice policeman that you didn't know Billy had slipped out of the house and was heading for the street. Put Billy in playpen.
• Shape the dough to fit into the loaf tin. Bake for 45 mins.
• Answer door and apologize to neighbour for Billy having stuck a garden hose in man's letterbox. Promise to pay for ruined carpet.
• Tie Billy to clothesline.
• Remove burned bread from oven
A bit of fun – but it does bring us to the subject of the gospel today : I am the bread of life.
Those words are so familiar to us today
that it is sometimes difficult to have a sense
of the impact of the words spoken by Jesus.

What is it about bread that is so nourishing for us?
So filling
So essential
That we could not live without it.
We can get a clue from looking at the word bread
in different languages.
In Hebrew it is lehem.
So we get the word Beth (pronounced Bet) meaning house
then lehem – meaning bread
House of bread.
But the same word lahme in Arabic means meat.
So Bet – lehem becomes house of meat.
Bread or meat –
substantial,
necessary,
vital to life.
Then there is the Latin.
Cum pane – with bread
has given roots for our modern word companion,
or accompaniment
It implies sharing together,
eating together,
nourishing each other,
walking together.
The one Who accompanies is like a midwife,
helping us to come to Iife,
to live more fully.
It is at the heart of all human growth.
We human beings need to walk together, encouraging each other to continue the journey of growth and the struggle for liberation,
and to break through the shell of egotism
that engulfs us and prevents us from
realizing our full humanity

And then of course there are different traditions around the world with bread.
I heard a story of one western traveler who spent some time with the Bedouin – the nomads in Egypt.
As he travelled with them,
he discovered that part of the hospitality
of the father of the tent dwellers
was to pour out at his feet the equivalent of a bushel of cakes of bread.
The nomads in the desert bake all their bread during the few times when they are close to a generous supply of water.
They make a lot of bread and carry it with them as they travel.
To prevent it from becoming stale on the journey
they bake their bread with a thick hermetically sealed crust,
which keeps the inside moist and fresh.
Once a cake of bread is opened, it must be eaten more or less all at once,
because it cannot be saved.
The father of the tent dwellers picked up one of the cakes of bread at the traveler’s feet and broke it open.
The traveller scooped out the insides and ate the delicious bread.
But even as he was eating the first cake,
the father of the tent dwellers broke another and put it before him.
The traveller thanked him and said that he had had enough now,
but he was urged on to a third one, even though he was only nibbling at a second.
The traveller tried to say that he was very full,
and that he would need to leave soon.
Could the father of the tent dwellers help him to get back to the jeep or take him to the monastery?
He knew that time was pressing,
and he needed to get on somewhere else.
But the father of the tent dwellers broke the third cake,
and urged him to have a fourth.

We’ve probably all been in houses for meals where
it has seemed impossible to say no.
Somehow the gift of food is linked to the gift of the self.
To reject food seems to be rejecting the giver of the food ;
and to consume the food is to offer the gift giver the greatest affirmation.
This poor traveler found himself in exactly the same position.
He was forcing himself to eat a third cake and to nibble at a fourth.
Even then his host was urging him to a fifth, sixth and even a seventh.
When the travelers protests became louder and more forceful,
the father of the tent dwellers did something incredible.
He took one cake after the other from all that were lying on the ground –
all the bread of his family –
and broke each one open in front of the traveler.
The gesture was unmistakable.
He wanted the traveler to know that he had withheld nothing,
that he had put everything at the traveler’s disposal.
He wanted him to know that he had been well received,
and that by this gesture,
this extravagant waste,
this complete sacrifice,
he would be persuaded, convinced of his kindness.

When we hear a story like this,
we begin to appreciate just what Jesus meant
when he said
I am the bread of life.

I am the very essence of life,
the heart,
the physical and spiritual essential of life.
The meat,
the companion,
the accompanier –
all that you need in this life.

You might know the story of the bread church in Liverpool.
The church was called ‘Somewhere Else’ (the name arose because the church meets
above a shop called News from Nowhere)

The old Methodist
Central Hall in Liverpool city centre had been closed, and a lady called Barbara Glasson
was given the following brief:
‘Go and find if there’s a place for the Methodist
church in the city centre; and for God’s sake do something different.’
And taking with her the word ‘bread’ which had come to her, she went.
As Barbara wandered the streets,
meeting and talking to people,
she discovered rhythms,
a sense of the place.
And she started making bread with some friends.
(I don’t think she used the recipe we heard at the beginning)

People became involved in bread making,
some through providing ingredients,
others through coming to find out what was going on, and gradually the community grew.
The church became a focus for many people
– some of them quite needy.
Barbara found herself responding to those with mental health issues,
and those who had been abused?
But through it all God is at work:
in the welcome,
in the faithsharing group,
in Sunday worship,
weddings and baptisms,
in the bubbling up of vocations to ordained ministry.
Barbara describes her ministry as that of a scarecrow.
She has looked lovingly at an empty patch,
hoping for signs of life,
staying with the belief in the invisible things God has sown.

Bread then is vital to life in so many ways.
And today in our service we break bread together. Just as the children of Israel received bread from heaven,
God was breaking bread with Israel,
and so also Christ broke bread with his apostles.
Nothing has been kept back from us by God.
Nothing has been withheld,
and all has been generously supplied.
The divine self emptying love of God
is present with us today
as we too break bread together.
Let us remember too that it was in breaking bread
that the disciples eyes were opened
as they traveled the Emmaus road
and they showed warm hospitality to a stranger.
So as we too assemble as a community,
gather and welcome
and share our lives on the road,
let us pray that our eyes too will be opened
to the risen Christ among us ;
and that as we come together today to break bread,
we will remember those words of Christ
I am the bread of life.