Eighth Sunday after Pentecost
Scriptures: 2 Samuel 7:1-14a, Psalm 89:20-37, Ephesians 2:11-22, Mark 6:30-44
The best advice I’ve ever heard about preaching the Gospel of Mark is this: have a lot of caffeine first. Maybe a big cup of coffee. It’s one thing to talk about the incredible energy of Jesus’ ministry in this account of Jesus’ life. It’s another to read it, and witness the urgency of everything Jesus did. If I didn’t just make you thirsty, talking about coffee, this sermon might make you hungry.
I’m sure that I’m not alone in this: in our house, the pantries are fully stocked with all the staples: pastas, grains and beans, peanut butter and nuts, canned soup, and probably a half-dozen types of snack food. Our fridge and freezer are full of easy-to-prepare foods, and there’s always fresh fruit on our countertops.
So why is it that when I wander into the kitchen with a hankering, I feel that there’s nothing to eat? I have all this plenty, more than my ancestors could ever have imagined would be possible to keep fresh day-to-day… and yet, my mind seems to jump to something I don’t have – in my case, most often something we don’t keep stocked on purpose, such as Nutter Butters.
“There’s nothing to eat.” The truth is, at least in my privileged household, there’s plenty to eat. Something I reflect on with a sense of “survivor’s guilt” is the reality that my son may never know the hunger of need that so many children in our country and around the world know on a day-to-day basis. I and my family have access to such plenty, and I feel only want.
The truth is that that sense of limitation, of want, is not the life that God intends for me or anyone. It is a perspective steeped in sin, and is indeed an attitude that contributes to the physical hunger of so much of the world. Our mortal eyes look, and through them we look at feast and see famine.
In this mindset, from a place of fear, we are motivated to protect what little we have. We distort God’s gifts into things we deserve and need to fight to protect. We are impoverished not just in our wealth but because of our wealth. In this context, we even pervert phrases that should be used to welcome. A world of competition where even “come and get it” is nothing but an invitation to join me in my place of fear and isolation, where violence begets violence.
And that’s one thing I love about all the Gospels, including Mark’s.
These stories of Christ’s life and ministry all acknowledge the limited, human perspective, and give us a glimpse of how God views things. They reveal the intent God wrote into creation. They point toward the Kingdom of Heaven, which isn’t only a promise for what’s ahead, but a reality God wants for our shared lives, here on earth.
Back to the action Gospel of Mark. Compared to the other Gospels, it’s not easy to imagine Jesus stopping to eat in Mark, but that’s what happens at the beginning of this passage. After his rejection in Nazareth, Jesus had sent out his 12 disciples, two-by-two, with a mission. Mark 6:12-13: “They went out and preached that people should repent. They drove out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them.”
Today’s reading begins with them returning and reporting to Christ. The report is good: they reached many people in the surrounding towns. There’s a side-effect, though. Now there are thousands of people who’ve come out to learn more, and to see Jesus. Apparently, they didn’t have a Ruth Circle, because there was no plan for food.
I imagine that Jesus was pleased with their accomplishments, maybe even excited, but he doesn’t seem to respond with words of praise or rejoicing. Instead, he sees how tired and hungry the disciples are, and he tells them to take a break. Let’s go over there, to rest and get some food, says Jesus.
But, as they try to retreat to a place to rest, the crowds see their movement, and race to beat them there. Where Jesus pointed to a Sabbath, he and the disciples instead encounter a great spiritual hunger. “Sheep without a shepherd.” That’s how the Gospel tells us Jesus sees these gathered crowds
Pastor Heather Apel, who’s a friend of our community and assistant to our Bishop, Bill, draws out something that I looked at from another angle in last week’s sermon – and thank you to Jerry for delivering the sermon while I was on Navy drills. Remember that last week’s Gospel reading was about a feast that Herod Antipas served, at which the head of John the Baptizer was brought on a platter. That passage comes immediately before today’s Gospel story.
Herod’s feast ended with murder. Jesus’ feast fills the bellies of 5,000 hungry people. Pastor Heather writes:
Rather than turn them away, ignoring their need, the text says that Jesus had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd.
This shepherd imagery from Jesus is nothing new in the Bible.
-In Numbers 27, Moses prayed for a shepherd for the people of Israel who would help lead them as they entered the promised land.
-The prophet Ezekiel criticized the kings of Israel by saying they weren’t caring for the people because as shepherds they were feeding themselves rather than their sheep.
-[And o]f course there is the opening line from the well-known Psalm 23, which is appointed for today, “The Lord is my shepherd…”
-… Jesus himself is called the Good Shepherd in John 10.
However, in this story, the shepherd imagery [… is used to explain] Jesus’ compassion. This implies as much about who Jesus is as it [is] a critique [of] the supposed “shepherds” of the people in the land where they were living. Shepherds who would cut off the head of anyone who threatened their power and place in society. With this story coming right after the beheading of John the Baptist, Jesus knows that the earthly leaders who were supposed to lead and guide God’s people, have instead let that authority serve their own agenda and needs.
So Jesus, the Good Shepherd, saw a people whose very shepherds preyed upon them.
What did the disciples see? Well, hungry in body, like me, they looked into their pantry and saw “nothing to eat.” They wanted nothing more than for the crowds to go away, and to sit down and eat their own little meal in peace. Here’s how Jesus Christ responds to our sense of an empty pantry.
“You give them something to eat.” Verse 37.
Some are tempted to brush aside today’s miracle and others as the acts of one long ago, or perhaps even metaphor or simply old stories, the power of Jesus’ transforming ministry is still with us today, revealing even now that the way of the world leads to death, and the way of God leads to true life, a peaceable kingdom that overthrows human boundaries through love, turning human need into plenty.
No one who follows the way of Christ Jesus will say the words “come and get it” as a threat. To do so is to follow the way of Herod and other predators; it’s a rejection of everything Christ taught.
Christ’s words are, “taste and see.” When we have tasted and seen, our eyes are opened to the plenty God provides, and then – then – we are prepared to look upon our neighbors and follow Christ’s instructions to “give them something to eat.” We have enough to eat ourselves, and we have more than enough to share.
Siblings-in-Christ, we taste and see the resurrected body of our true Lord, Jesus Christ, when we remember him through the feast of Holy Communion.
This moring, taste and see that the Lord is Good. So fed, let our eyes be open to the abundance we have that God provides to share. So awakened, let us share of all we have and all we are – all of it the gift of God – with our neighbors so hungry for good things to eat.
I pray that, as individuals and as a community of faith, we are so fed and so emboldened by the power of Jesus Christ, who is able to accomplish in us far more than we can ask or imagine, to the Glory of God.
Amen.
-Pastor Will Bevins