Flesh and blood: the food of Life

Sermon Notes Sunday, Aug. 15, 2021 Proper 15 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. John 6: 55,56 This Sunday marks the 3rd Sunday that we have opened John's Gospel to Jesus' sermon in the synagogue in Capernaum. We have one more lesson from that same sermon next week. If it seems like an inordinate amount of attention to a passage where nothing physical happens, no healing, no casting off of demons, no miracles and no movement from place to place, let us fully appreciate what does happen. Jesus thoroughly offends just about everyone. He systematically pares off his would-be followers until only the 12 disciples are left. Their allegiance is more out of resignation than enthusiasm. He began by confronting those who followed him after the feeding of the 5000. He told them they chased after superficial rewards. He told them they misunderstood their own religious heritage, venerating Moses instead of the Father in heaven. Jesus breaks every rule ever written about how to make friends and influence strangers. The church should well note that when Jesus builds his church he doesn't entice, he doesn't mollify his would-be followers, he doesn't pander to their lifestyle. He tells them they are starving. They've been flat out wrong about everything they've come to believe. Their pride in family and tradition counts for nothing. Most importantly he tells them He alone is the source of life. To follow him they must drop away everything else. Some of them grabbed their oars and sailed back from where they came. Others who were still intrigued enough to hear more did indeed hear more. Jesus told them that he was the bread of life. He who comes to him will never be hungry again. He who believes in him would never again thirst. So that's good. That's positive. Those who heard it were glad they hung around. Not for long! Jesus says don't think for a moment that you believe in me. Because you don't. You don't know me. If you did know me you would see the Father in me, but you don't. You know me as Joseph and Mary's son. You don't know me as the One who is One with the Father. You think I came from a nearby village. You don't know I come down from heaven. That last claim sent more of them away. Its audacity convinced them of Jesus' inflated self-importance. Scripture clearly stated that the Messiah would come from heaven. So Jesus was ascribing to himself a super-heroic title that scripture reserved for someone else. Someone who truly did come from heaven and not from the backroads of Galilee. But for those who remained to listen, Jesus' next claim sent them running away. So Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. 55 The "offense" of his words operates at several levels. Obviously eating flesh and drinking human blood offends us all, as much today as it did then. But the offense goes deeper than that. In Genesis, God forbade man to consume the life blood of any beast. And the life blood of a human was sacrosanct beyond human justice. Genesis 9 gives us God's blessing on the earth after the flood as he spoke to Noah. "And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man. "Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image."1 Jesus turns this law of God on its head. He invites us to eat of his flesh and drink of his blood and thereby receive life. We are not condemned to God's reckoning, we are saved to eternal life. But who can stand it? Jesus finally links all the themes of his sermon together. He is the living Son of the living Father. The life of the father flows in Him. Whoever feeds on Him feeds on the eternal life of the Father. This is the only way the eternal life of the Father is passed on to mankind, through the life of the Son. This is the true bread that comes down from heaven. No one who eats of this bread shall ever hunger. The lesson is complete. To Jesus' listeners it was a hard lesson indeed and those left to hear the end were puzzled, confused, and shaken. It was largely because of this lesson and the sacrament of communion that the early church practiced in response, that pagans considered Christians cannibals. Today there may be many objections to Christianity, but cannibalism isn't one. Jesus himself provided the path for the church when he said at his last supper with his disciples, "Do this in remembrance of me." But it is worth considering that in scrubbing his language we may have lost touch with the impact of his words. They should leave us as shaken as his listeners. Jesus sets before us a condition, the only condition, for his abiding presence with us. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. If we settle on Holy Communion as the means to this end, I'm afraid we may miss Jesus' offering. We have to go through Holy Communion to welcome the Real Presence of Jesus in us and we in Him. His blood in our veins. His body, our food. Holy Communion is a starting place and a refueling station where we experience that exchange in flesh and spirit. But it doesn't end there at the communion rail. We take what we receive and carry it forward with us in faith. Our faith is as indispensable as Jesus' body and blood. Faith seeks understanding. We pray that our faith leads us to understanding, but sometimes understanding isn't given to us. I do not understand how it is that Jesus is present in me and I in him or how Holy Communion affects me physically as well as spiritually. But I believe it. I believe it because that is what Jesus said. The hard lessons aren't so hard when we don't have to explain them, just have faith in them. Our post-communion hymn today pretty much sums it up for me. "Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus.. Just to take him at his word. Just to rest upon his promise. Just to know, 'Thus says the Lord.'" Amen. 1 The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. (2016). (Ge 9:3-6). Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles. --------------- ------------------------------------------------------------ --------------- ------------------------------------------------------------