A sermon for the Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost [Proper 16B/Lectionary 21]
John 6:56-69 and Joshua 24:1-2a, 14-18
“Choose this day whom you will serve…as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.”
Those are the words that Joshua, Moses’ trusty assistant, speaks to all the tribes as they prepare to live there. It has been a hard-won campaign to subdue the native Canaanites, to make the Promised Land a region hospitable to the Israelites and their faith. They have fought and they have settled where they belong. Even more so it has been a hard-won campaign for God. God has done most of the heavy-lifting, delivering them out of slavery in Egypt, leading them through the Red Sea, and bringing them through the trials and temptations of the wilderness. God has fed them with manna day by day and has protected them from serpents and other dangers. Now his people are assembled and ready to begin this new life, and Joshua decides to lay the decision that lies before them as clearly as he can. It’s like a big division. They can serve other gods and go other ways, but why not serve the one God who just claimed them and saved them? That is what he and his household are going to do. It reminds me of what American author David Foster Wallace says about atheism. There’s really no such thing. “There’s no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship.”
We are living in a time of decisions being laid before us—so many decisions that have so much life-or-death weight to them. Our minds are filled, for example, with images of Afghans faced with the gut-wrenching decision of having to serve the Taliban or face unknown consequences. Or protests about school board decisions for the fall. And what about news sources? Choose today which channel your family will watch! As for me and mine…
Of course, people are still drawing lines and making decisions about how they and their family will continue to move through this COVID pandemic, even as some among us deny there is anything to worry about at all. I resonated so much with an article in the Wall Street Journal a couple of weeks ago with the title, “Vaccination Status Has Americans Picking Sides.” The writer for the piece interviewed multiple people who have seen their families and close friendships divided over things like wearing masks and getting a vaccine. One woman who had planned a huge birthday celebration for her two-year-old decided briefly to uninvite family members who weren’t vaccinated, or to at least ask them to stand outside. In the end she just cancelled it altogether. Our congregation sent out a simple survey last week to gauge interest in Sunday School for young children. The responses were so interesting. Many people have decided what’s best for their family is only to meet in classes outside. Others will only participate if masks are required. Some won’t send their children if masks are required. We’ll figure it out.
My wife was in Target last week with all three of our children doing their back to school shopping, and all of them were in masks. Another shopper approached my wife and accosted her for having our children in masks, saying that it would harm their brain development. No children should be putting those on their faces, she said. It’s like everywhere you turn is it “Choose today which ideology you will serve. As for me and my house, we are doing this.” I’m just glad Melinda didn’t tell that lady that our household doesn’t think pineapple belongs on pizza.
Wouldn’t it be nice if our faith, at the very least, was devoid of hard decisions and confusing teachings like this? Wouldn’t it be great if our relationship with God were one area where things just came easy, where we could so easily make the leap to belief and practice? Jesus finds out that it isn’t, and so do his disciples. You may remember that a crowd follows him throughout the gospels, and that crowd increases as he makes his way through the towns and villages of Galilee. Today he is in Capernaum, and for the first time in John’s gospel, the crowd visibly dwindles. People leave him. They make their choice to follow something else. Or at least not follow him anymore. All that is left is the Twelve. And I imagine that must be extremely hard to deal with. I imagine that must be demoralizing to some degree because most of us find it demoralizing when people decide to disconnect themselves from us. Generally the point is to increase the number of people who are on our side, who are in line with our lives and beliefs, not weed them out. And whatever Jesus is doing and saying is, at least at this point, starting to weed them out. They choose that day in Capernaum whom they will follow. And most of them don’t choose Jesus.
I remember that our seminary classes started with summer Greek. Before you could actually register for other classes, you had to prove you could read and understanding basic biblical Greek. I didn’t realize it at the time, but it was a way of weeding people out. The faculty were very patient and gracious with grading, but without fail there was always a person or two who just could not master the concepts and eventually went on to do something else. It was a bit sad to see that happen, but maybe it actually helped them to find their true calling.
The particular teaching that gives the crowd of disciples trouble is Jesus’ words about his flesh being the bread of life and that those who eat it will have life forever. In John’s account of Jesus’ Last Supper, we do not hear about Jesus breaking the bread and sharing the cup of wine. Instead, John uses Jesus’ words and teachings after the feeding of the 5000 as the lesson about Holy Communion. The life of Jesus’ followers will center around this giving of his flesh and blood. When they partake of the meal where that sacrifice is remembered and emphasized, Jesus will abide in them and they in him. That means if you are a follower of Jesus you will always be nourished by Jesus’ selfless giving and by participating in the community that lifts up that selfless giving as God’s way. But for many of those who went about with Jesus, this is just one bridge too far. This teaching is too difficult. It’s like Greek.
The Lord’s Supper and having faith that he abides in us in the bread and the wine is only one element of our faith that may seem difficult to swallow and accept. There are many things about Jesus’ way that make us stop and wonder if it is for us, after alif it our cup of tea, after all. In other places Jesus talks a lot about loving enemies and forgiving our persecutors. He talks about giving what we have to the poor. He models compassion for groups of people we tend to despise.
And then there are all of the teachings about Jesus and his life that have become part of our faith, and these are often too much for us to take in. I’m talking about things like his miraculous birth from a virgin. And his walking on water. And the sign that starts this whole teaching in the first place, the miracle of the loaves and the fishes. We live in a very rational age, where we think everything must be scientifically tested before it can be trusted. It is difficult to hear these things about Jesus and from Jesus and still decide to follow along because his words speak truth.
A friend of mine, who is a pastor, recently shared that his own brother, who just like him grew up attending worship in church and who carried that faith into adulthood, recently confessed that he can no longer believe. The brother told my colleague that he just can’t mentally accept the claims of religion and Jesus and was no longer involved in a faith community. I think many of us know people who are in a similar situation, and, in fact, that story is probably reflected in our own faith journey’s to some degree. What my friend did was buy his brother a book that talked about working through doubt to find faith. The brother read it and, lo and behold, it worked. But that kind of story doesn’t always end that way. Sometimes we just struggle to believe and find it hard to make the choice to keep going. It’s important to notice, however, that Peter never claims to understand what Jesus is saying. In fact, it almost sounds like he doesn’t make sense of it all. But he does know that he can’t turn anywhere else. Jesus has the words of eternal life. That is, there is something deeply true and life-giving about life with Jesus that compels him to stay.
What is most fascinating about this moment in Jesus’ life, at least to me, is not the people who turn away, or how Peter stays, but how Jesus responds to all of this. He doesn’t go running along after the people who turn away right at that moment, worrying about how he can immediately convince them to come back, which is what I think the church often does when people leave. He doesn’t wring his hands about his numbers and adjust his strategy. He just keeps going. Even for those who stick with him he knows there are going to be things that just don’t make sense, that will blow their socks off. Even of the Twelve remaining there will be betrayers and deniers. And then there is the spectacle of the cross. It’s like Jesus says that day, “If you think these words of mine are offensive and something to complain about, just wait until you see what happens in Jerusalem. No one will get it.”
No, Jesus doesn’t go running after the people who turn away, but he does chase us with his love. Jesus doesn’t go back to the drawing board, wondering how he can change his message so as to attract more believers. He doubles down on the message. He doubles down on being the Son of the God who claimed the forgotten slaves in Egypt and who led the cranky Israelites through the desert. He doubles down on calling the dead to new life and showing that love is his way and that his love is forever. He never changes his mind, never changes his course on showing the grace that God has committed to give to all people. Jesus watches people choose something else to worship for the time being, but still doubles down on his love for them, even though it means being lifted up on the cross in order to draw all people to himself.
And that means, my friends, all people. Those wearing masks and those who won’t. Those who don’t want the vaccine and those who want the vaccine to be a requirement. Those who master Greek and those who flunk out. Those who understand what’s happening in Holy Communion and those who think it’s strange. Those who believe what we do and those who don’t. Eventually all of our stories, all of our decisions, all our mistakes and failures and triumphs and victories will be viewed in the light of the one who has died for us because of his love.
He has the words of eternal life. Now, really…what else could we choose?
Thanks be to God!
The Reverend Phillip W. Martin, Jr.
Said Another Way 