Today in the Spirit: Proper 13B
After taking us in our worship through Mark’s account of Jesus feeding the multitude and walking on water, the church now assigns readings on what happens next from the Gospel of John, Chapter 6, for the next four weeks. The Gospel reading John 6:24-35 relates the beginning of a tense dialogue between Jesus and some of the crowd who, just a day earlier, were fed the loaves and fish. Seeking to respond to their misunderstanding of who he is and why he has come, Jesus replies with the second of the I Am statements in John: “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst” (35).
Accounts of the Israelites grumbling in the desert come up mainly in Lent. This week, the OT reading from Exodus 16:2-4[5-8]9-15 supplies us with context to understand Jesus’ teaching on the bread of life in John. When the people quote Scripture to Jesus, “He gave them bread from heaven to eat” (Jn. 6:31), we, in fact, do find in Exodus that God said, “Behold, I am about to rain bread from heaven for you” (Ex. 16:4). And so, we are invited to enter into their confusion. The assigned Psalm 78:[1-13]14-26 (also appointed for every Maundy Thursday and Proper 13A) tightens our focus in worship on God’s provision for the Israelites in the desert, with particular attention on their craving for food: They spoke against God, saying, “Can God prepare a table in the wilderness…? (20, BCP New Coverdale).
Sponsored
At the halfway point of our Year B series in Ephesians, we come in Ephesians 4:1-6 to Paul’s transition in the letter from theological teaching to practical application. The beginning of the reading serves as an introduction to the entire second half of the letter: I, therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called (1). Alongside this call to walk by faith in the NT reading, the appointed Collect for the week reminds us that it is only by God’s “grace” and “through Jesus Christ” that “your faithful people offer you true and laudable service.” We walk rightly only by the power of God.
The Collect
Almighty and merciful God, it is only by your grace that your faithful people offer you true and laudable service: Grant that we may run without stumbling to obtain your heavenly promises; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
It Is the Bread that the LORD Has Given You to Eat (Exodus 16:2-4[5-8]9-15)
9 Then Moses said to Aaron, “Say to the whole congregation of the people of Israel, ‘Come near before the Lord, for he has heard your grumbling.’” 10 And as soon as Aaron spoke to the whole congregation of the people of Israel, they looked toward the wilderness, and behold, the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud. 11 And the Lord said to Moses, 12 “I have heard the grumbling of the people of Israel. Say to them, ‘At twilight you shall eat meat, and in the morning you shall be filled with bread. Then you shall know that I am the Lord your God.’” 13 In the evening quail came up and covered the camp, and in the morning dew lay around the camp. 14 And when the dew had gone up, there was on the face of the wilderness a fine, flake-like thing, fine as frost on the ground. 15 When the people of Israel saw it, they said to one another, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was. And Moses said to them, “It is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat. (9-15)
See if you can feel the tension in perspective found at the end of this reading. The Hebrew word manna means “What is it?” (16:31). The name given to this bread arises out of an attitude of questioning and doubt on the part of the Israelites. Yet, Moses will correct them with a positive affirmation, “It is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat” (15). Apparently, Moses’ correction had little effect on how the people felt. The “bread” remained for them manna(?). For the people speaking to Jesus in the Gospel reading, he was the subject of their questioning, as if they were asking, “How can you be the bread of life?”
Devotionally, in our walk with Jesus, we struggle to know what kind of bread (food, nourishment) he is for us. We can understand a concrete answer to our prayers: “bread,” physical provision in our time of need. But what is your presence with us? What is the real nourishment that comes from being related to you? The manna in the desert slowly becomes bread from heaven for the Israelites as they experience it, feeding them every day without fail. Likewise, we find that Jesus becomes bread from heaven experientially as he consistently enriches our lives.
Today, in the Spirit, entering into the confusion of the Israelites in the desert over the manna and that of the Jews by the lake over Jesus, I pray for the faith to know the Son of God as true nourishment from heaven above.
Demanding the Food They Craved (Psalm 78:[1-13]14-26)
15 He split rocks in the wilderness
and gave them drink abundantly as from the deep.
16 He made streams come out of the rock
and caused waters to flow down like rivers.
17 Yet they sinned still more against him,
rebelling against the Most High in the desert.
18 They tested God in their heart
by demanding the food they craved.
19 They spoke against God, saying,
“Can God spread a table in the wilderness?
20 He struck the rock so that water gushed out
and streams overflowed.
Can he also give bread
or provide meat for his people?”
21 Therefore, when the Lord heard, he was full of wrath;
a fire was kindled against Jacob;
his anger rose against Israel,
22 because they did not believe in God
and did not trust his saving power.
23 Yet he commanded the skies above
and opened the doors of heaven,
24 and he rained down on them manna to eat
and gave them the grain of heaven.
25 Man ate of the bread of the angels;
he sent them food in abundance. (15-25)
The narrative in this long psalm highlights God’s sovereign provision for Israel over every phase of their history, from the exodus from Egypt to the enthronement of David in Jerusalem. It reads (and sounds) more like a sermon than a song. In the required section for this week (14-26 in the BCP), our attention is fixed on the interaction between the Israelites and YHWH over the people’s clamoring for food in the wilderness. This supports the account of people looking for more food from Jesus and our Lord’s labeling himself the bread of life in the Gospel reading (Jn. 6:35).
This week, It is challenging to avoid facing our gross dependence on food for contentment in life. Unlike the people of Israel, almost everyone reading this devotion can be counted among those who never struggle to find food. Yet, what do we find? That, though our ability to acquire food is hardly lacking, our craving and demanding is the same. We are, if we are willing to admit it, a mirror image of the people of Israel in this psalm: They tested God in their hearts and demanded food for their craving (19); and later, For their heart was not fixed on him, neither did they continue steadfast in his covenant (37).
In his convicting book Fasting, Jentezen Franklin frequently refers to the idol worship every human being from Adam and Eve forward has given to the “Stomach king.” At one point, he writes, “The fact is we have a book full of promises (from God), but some of them will never be fulfilled while the Stomach king governs our appetites and controls our lives. [And commenting on our OT passages for this week]: “God had supernatural blessings to pour over the Israelites in the desert, but they preferred their carnal appetites. In the same way, God wants to pour supernatural blessings over our lives, but they won’t come if we are not disposed to seek Him in fasting and prayer” (my translation from Spanish).
You may not agree with everything in this passage. Still, I urge you today, with the help of the Holy Spirit, to acknowledge the power of food craving in our lives, stunting your spiritual growth in a land of plenty just as it did the Israelites in their desert of need.
But Grace Was Given to Each (Ephesians 4:1-16)
1 I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, 3 eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. 7 But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift. (1-7)
15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. (15-16)
As Paul transitions in Ephesians 4 from the conceptual to the practical, from the cosmic to the earth-bound, in this first section assigned for Sunday, he will make the puzzling connection between the dwelling place God is making us for himself in Christ (2:21-22) and the body [the church]…that builds itself up in love (16). We are, at once, both the building and the workers in the building project. I see the transitional at the beginning of verse 7 as a clarion call to individuals (each of us) to take up our part, using Christ’s gifts distributed to us to work in the church. We seek to be patient and bear with one another in our congregations, yes, but how? We do this not by passively avoiding intimate contact with one another but by standing shoulder to shoulder, rejoicing with those who rejoice, and weeping with those who weep.
Devotionally, we may need to hear this passage and consider how we have chosen to “live in harmony” with church members. Is our bond of peace based on maintaining a cool distance and avoiding getting too? Or is it that biblical harmony Paul commends in this passage, arising out of the heat of intimate relationships with one another? There is a difference between “going to church” and being a part of the church, being inside the building made of stone and constructing the building of God made of flesh, our flesh. Absorbing that but in that verse is the key. Under the church’s leadership, you have been given grace to press in and work to build yourselves into a building with others.
Today, in the Spirit, hearing Paul’s call to participate in God’s project to make for himself a dwelling in the world, eagerly seek your particular gifts for service, come alongside, and get to work.
Bread from Heaven (John 6:24-35)
30 So they said to him, “Then what sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform? 31 Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’” 32 Jesus then said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. 33 For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” 34 They said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.” 35 Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. (30-35)
What is Jesus really trying to get at here with this crowd of people? One way to figure that out might be to look at the three consecutive uses of bread from heaven in the text. First, the crowd, quoting loosely from the Hebrew scriptures, “‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat’” (Ex. 16:4, Neh. 9:5). Then Jesus responds (apparently as if they assumed it was really Moses who gave them manna), “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven” (32). It’s as if he is saying to them, “You’re settling for divine nourishment that only feeds your body when, now, what is available to you is divine nourishment that sustains both body and soul forever.” Food for the soul is here now, and it is I–“I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst” (35).
Devotionally, we must be careful that we haven’t arrived at the same problem of settling for less than is offered but from the other side. The crowd knew nothing of bread of life (or, “bread for life” a possible meaning of the Greek) and needed to step up to it. If we are not careful, we Christians can receive bread for life through Jesus and step down from it, back to settling for Jesus as an answer for our cares in the world and little more. Has your relationship with Jesus become merely a means for you to get what you need to cope with in this life, or is it more than that? If you are avoiding the means of grace given to us to receive spiritual nourishment—worship, prayer, meditation in the Scriptures and Holy Communion—chances are you will find yourself, just like the people in this passage, utterly unaware of who you are really talking to, the true bread from heaven for all of life.
Today, Holy Spirit, I invite you to examine my heart to see if I have lost my first love for the Son of God and settled for less. Assist me to repent and step again into intimacy with Jesus as food for every part of me.
Today in the Spirit
Reflections and related content, sent straight to your inbox.
Here’s the New ACNA Daily Office Lectionary, Formatted in a Single Table
UPDATE: I’ve created an experimental, two-year version of the ACNA Daily Office Lectionary. Click here to access it. I recently wrote a Rookie Anglican guide to the Daily Office Lectionary. This was partially prompted by a reader’s request for such an article. However, another reason the Daily Office Lectionary has been on my mind is that…
Here’s a Top-Secret, Experimental, Two-Year Version of the ACNA Daily Office Lectionary for Morning and/or Evening Prayer
As I explain in my guide to the Daily Office lectionary, a lectionary simply tells you what passages to read during a prayer/worship service. So, if you’re doing Morning or Evening Prayer, you use the Daily Office Lectionary to figure out what passages of Scripture you should read. The New (January 2018) ACNA Daily Office…
