Pentecost 10 Year B

Ephesians 3.14-21; John 6.1-21

As the keen-eared amongst you will know, we’ve been reading through St Mark’s Gospel this church year. So far we’ve reached Chapter 6. But in today’s gospel reading we switch to St John’s. You may be aware that this happens from time to time – unlike Matthew, Mark and Luke, which get a year each for us to read them through, the Gospel of John gets inserted at various points into that continuous reading of the other Gospels. That happens every year during the season of Easter in particular, but also at this point in our reading of St Mark’s Gospel. The reason being, as Esther pointed toward last week, that in Mark Chapter 6 we arrive at material that is common to both Mark and John, indeed to all four Gospels: the feeding of the 5,000 and the account of Jesus walking on the water. And John uses this common material– even if each Gospel does tell it with their own particular and distinctive emphases – John uses this common material as the starting point for one of those long meditations that punctuate his Gospel. A meditation in this instance that we will hear and reflect on over the next few Sundays, a meditation on Jesus as the Bread of life.

So this morning’s Gospel – that feeding of the 5,000 – is both central to the apostles memory of Jesus’ ministry as set out in all four gospels, and also the starting point for a central way of understanding who Jesus is, and what he does – as the Bread of life, who comes down from heaven to give abundant life to the world.

If you were here last week you will remember that this feeding of the 5,000 happens, somewhat ironically, after Jesus has taken his disciples off to a deserted place to rest awhile. But the crowds follow them. And you may also remember that Esther suggested that such deserted places – the place of encounter with God – might provide a model for what the church, at its best, might be.

In today’s Gospel we heard how, in the midst of that previously deserted place, Jesus takes bread, give thanks, and shares it so that all present are fed. A model for what the church might be, indeed.

But let’s rewind a little.

The abundant crowd that has followed Jesus to the other side of the Lake raises a familiar anxiety: the disciples are perhaps understandably concerned that there are not enough resources to go round. The crowd in all its need, hunger and longing has drawn close seeking nourishment, and the disciples look at their meagre resources, and worry. In John’s telling, Jesus gets them to articulate their concern: “Where are we to buy bread for these people?”, he asks. And Philip answers, ‘Six months wages would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little.’ Like many of us faced with sudden overwhelming need, they think surely not, we can’t do this, we haven’t enough to go around, there isn’t enough time or money to satisfy everyone. Time and money are scarce commodities and we don’t have enough. In Mark’s version of this story, the disciples ask Jesus to send the crowd away. Jesus responds that they must give them something to eat. The disciples protest, and then Jesus invites them to go and see what there is. The great temptation, with limited resources, is to shut the door, look after ourselves, feed ourselves, send everyone else away.

Instead Jesus redirects the disciples gaze – away from their own meagre resources, to what is out there – go and see. Feeding the crowd, meeting its need, is not something we have to do by ourselves, go and see and you may be surprised by what then happens. In John’s version, a young boy appears, unbidden: bearing five barley loaves and two fish. Which Jesus takes, and gives thanks, and shares, And so the crowd is fed, not by the disciples digging into their own pockets, not by calculating how much they have got that they can afford to share, but by responding to the young boy who offers to share what he has; that offering is taken and brought to Jesus, where it is blessed, and broken and shared, and the feeding of all happens.

The eucharistic overtones are unmistakable. It is no coincidence that in John’s account of the Last Supper there is no sharing of bread and wine; his telling of that night before Jesus dies is about the washing of feet. For his moment when Jesus takes what is offered, blesses it, and through sharing transforms it into an offering of himself – his account of that is here. This is not about magically turning stones into bread (as the devil famously tempted Jesus to do) – it is about what the crowd that have gathered are found to possess, that is offered and blessed and broken and discovered to be more than enough.

This deserted place, like church at its best, in a world of sometimes overwhelming need, becomes the place where what is already present is revealed and blessed and broken and shared, and found to be more than enough. Where the crowd, where the others around you, are not seen as threat, but as gift.

Edinburgh is about to embark on its annual carnival of human creativity, where the depth and possibilities of human creativity will be wonderfully on display. Where new connections will be made and strangers become friends. Where the resources that we humans might bring to the challenges of living together are glimpsed in new and fresh ways. And in the midst of all that, church, at its best, will continue to welcome all, and, day by day, take the bread and wine of ordinary life, take ourselves, all those who gather around Jesus, and offer that to the one who made us and gives us life. To the one who takes us, and blesses us, that all that we might have to offer might be shared, and together we might all be fed.

And as we do so, we discover ever more deeply what is, in the words of our reading from Ephesians, the breadth, length, height and depth of the love of Christ – we learn to not simply bemoan our own poor resources, because we will never have enough, but learn to trust in God’s abundant providing of what is necessary and true and nourishing; learn to open our eyes and go and see, and see the crowd, not as a crowd of potential problems, but as those who have what we, all of us together, need. Amen.