A truly hospitable God
Ordinary Sunday 20: 17th August, 2003
Fr John Davis, Vicar of St Peter's, Eastern Hill
Jesus said to the crowd: "I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh." (Jn 6:51)
These references to food and to eating reminded me that this is a church community where we do quite a lot of that, together. Over about a five week period about a month ago we had three major community meals – one for our Patronal festival with about 130 people, another for Shrine at Yankalilla for about 80 and another medieval occasion from the choir for around 120. Each Sunday mass there are refreshments or breakfast. We have meals with study groups, we have meals after special evensongs. It might be big in the Parish Hall or smaller in the Vicarage, but we enjoy sharing table together. This is perhaps particularly important for the building and strengthening of a community of faith whose homes are scattered all over the metropolitan area. At each of these meals we give thanks, or if the time is right we might together say the Angelus. God is with us in these gatherings. They are, more than a little, an extension of the holy sacramental meal we share as well.
What if we start with the consideration as a basic presupposition that the God we honour and worship is indeed truly hospitable? It is impossible to separate the idea of a meal, with more than one involved, from concepts of hospitality. And hospitality may often carry with it connotations of generosity. It is gratifying at all sorts of levels to be in receipt of generous hospitality. And before long, when we keep on exploring ideas like this, we are going to be starting to see these hospitable meals of God everywhere.
So then, it is perhaps no accident that so much of what we do as the people of God finds itself revolving around the hospitable sharing of food and drink together. We could consider so many more examples in the gospels alone. Consider all those people that Jesus not only spoke to and taught, but actually sat down at table with. He was therefore criticised as being a friend of tax collectors and sinners, a glutton and a drunkard. How might we interpret that? He was not afraid to be with, to share table with, those who were on the edge of respectability or quite beyond it. And we remember that for a Jew to eat at table was an act of great significance.
We could think too of those images of the kingdom of heaven as being like one great banquet, a great feast to which all were invited, but not everyone actually chose to arrive. Or hospitality on the daunting scale of the feeding of the five thousand. Reference to this action is found in each of the four gospels and God's provision is presented as being both wonderful and abundant – there is plenty to spare.
So where does all this come from?
There are Old Testament passages that can readily provide a context for our developing understanding of our God providing for us spiritually by means of a meal. Of course there is the manna in the wilderness during the Exodus that was provided to the escaping Hebrews when they had nothing at all to eat. This is perhaps the strongest and most enduring image of the providence of God for the people of God. Later they were to look back at these experiences in the desert as THE time when they came into direct contact with their God. God reached out to save them. Through the generations the manna bread, the quail and the water springing from the rock would be honoured. Those meals would be remembered.
Then there is the earlier Passover. The Passover is remembered and honoured each year in a meal and at a table where everyone is gathered, from the very youngest to the oldest. The ceremonial Passover meal, which in all likelihood the Lord was celebrating himself at the time of the Last Supper, uses the particular dishes to explain and to tell the story of the escape of the Hebrews from centuries of slavery in Egypt. There is a young lamb, a reminder of the sacrificed lambs on the night of that first Passover, there are bitter herbs, there is unleavened bread to remind of hasty departure, there is the cup of blessing. Those who share the meal, share the story and the shared story becomes their story.
And today in our first lesson from the Book of Proverbs, the wisdom of God is personified as a grand hostess. In a great house and in a great hall a huge feast is prepared. This is the feast of true understanding and life. Here is the banquet that Wisdom offers to everyone, even the ignorant and the foolish – perhaps especially to the ignorant and the foolish. The invitation is clear. Come eat and drink of what is provided. Leave foolishness and ignorance behind. This is the way to life.
So in this way God is seen to be visiting God's people, through God's Wisdom. Later, in the gospels, we see and hear of God visiting God's people in Jesus Christ, God's son. God in Jesus Christ offers us another meal, the food for eternal life in bread and wine; a meal which speaks of both death and resurrection. "Anyone who eats this bread will live forever". We share in this holy meal, week by week, day by day.
The theme is continued in each of the readings: "Taste and see the goodness of the Lord" the psalm response reminds us. And the New Testament second lesson from Ephesians offers both a word of caution and of encouragement. What does the writer say? Put all this into action, in the way that you live. Make the most of this time, be astute, do not be foolish. Give thanks to God. Sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs – "make melody to the Lord in your hearts". And do that, even in times that are bad and when not everything is how we would have it be.
John's gospel does not include an account of the Last Supper or the direct words of institution for the eucharist. We find these elsewhere in the Scriptures. But this whole 'bread of life' discouse, which has been the focus of our gospel lessons now for three weeks, has an unmistakably deep grounding of eucharistic references. They take us right to that ceremonial meal which is at the heart of Christian worship and devotion.
This whole section of John's gospel reminds us of gift and promise. It speaks of the life-giving connection that is between the one who offers himself, who is offered, and those who receive. Between God and us. And this is to do with eternal life. This is to do with being fully alive to all that is of God. At the Last Supper, the Lord commanded his disciples to do this.
We are told to do this thing: to eat and to drink of this living bread, this real restorative drink. In doing so, it will be for us as if we have within ourselves flesh of the Lord's flesh, blood of the Lord's blood. The connection will be that close. We are urged and directed to spiritually eat and drink of the body and blood of the Lord û he himself put it in those terms: the bread of life, the cup of salvation. For the best part of 2,000 years, this has been the pattern, this has been the custom. This action, this participation, will give us life in ways we could not have before understood or hoped to grasp. Do this, believe this, trust this. That is what the Lord is teaching in today's gospel
This simple idea and direction has been a key point of connection between God and the people of God. We do this in a holy meal in the context of worship. Reverent eating, symbolic food – but nonetheless basic readily available and recognisable food. The material food carries with it the spiritual food for the journey that is always continuing. The outward sign is signifying and effecting the inward grace. This is a wonderful thing that we can share in, in this way. It is God's way to us, and our way to God – or at least one of the very significant ones.
So it is then that we are indeed very familiar with this idea of spiritual food, spiritual drink, shared and taken into our own bodies, that is the central point of today's gospel. This is food that is special, sustaining, strengthening, comforting. We call this sacrament. We call this holy. It is strikingly powerful, even though it is essentially so very simple, in what is said and done. Those who believe, or those who would believe, reach for this holy sacrament, generation after generation. It speaks to our deepest needs.
Jesus said to the crowd: "I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh." (Jn 6:51)
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