John 6:1-21
“Who’s Counting and Who Counts?”
July 29, 2018
Numbers are a critical part of who we are but they are not all we are. In order to make informed choices we often need just the facts. I’m one of those people who does not like to haggle. I don’t care if it’s for a $2.00 cookie cutter at a tag sale or when buying a new car. Most of the time I want numbers and facts to line up and upon hearing whatever is the price of something, I will make a choice based on what you tell me although I will admit that one place where I sometimes wish I could live in blissful ignorance of numbers would be in chain restaurants posting the calorie count on the menu. I understand and appreciate that we have a weight problem in this country – and after traveling in Europe in June, I was reminded that it is very much an American lifestyle issue.
This past week I was at a meeting of the board that oversees Bennington County Head Start and learned that currently 57% of the children ages 6 weeks to 5 years old who are in the program in sites around Bennington County are overweight or obese. This fact should be of great concern to all of those of us who care about children and their health and well-being. And I know I could certainly be eating more healthfully but it becomes hard to enjoy a meal out without doing the math and recognizing that if you don’t want to go over the recommended daily calorie count for a healthy lifestyle, your options will be limited and you may have to settle for leaving hungry or doing what dietitians often recommend which is asking for a to-go container when your food arrives and putting half in a doggy bag for another meal. And it is sobering to discover that a full 40% of food in the United States is never eaten while one in eight Americans struggles to put food on the table. We do not have a food shortage problem. We have a distribution problem in this country.
John’s Gospel tells us that unlike in the other three Gospel accounts, Jesus himself is the distributor of the barley loaves and the fish. In Mark, Matthew and Luke it’s the disciples who do the handing out. This is the telling of the miracle of taking the relatively meager offering of a boy and making it work for the 5000 (and most likely there were way more people than that since women and children would not have been counted back then) and turning it into not just enough but more than enough with leftovers. And who got those leftovers? Who would have been missing from this event on the grassy hill? Those who are there are obviously the faithful or the seekers and they’re wanting to fill up on what Jesus is serving and that’s both physical and spiritual. Jesus is offering to fill up more than their bellies because their need and ours is for more than physical sustenance.
We heard today of two of the most frequently cited miracles in the gospels with the feeding of the 5000 and Jesus walking on water. In both stories there are actions that astound. That is what we remember. The people were on the lookout for another great prophet and leader. Like Moses, the people see that Jesus is able to feed the hungry when that didn’t seem possible and he then goes on to calm treacherous waters when all common sense would say this wasn’t possible. However, if all we remember of these two great acts is the relief they provided to the people then Jesus becomes nothing more than a potential earthly king and a miracle worker. What Jesus did through his acts and through his words was to open the people to God’s ability to act in surprising ways and to transform the expectations of people. Jesus was the Word and the Word is God. Sometimes he used words that came from his mouth, “It is I; do not be afraid,” while at other times he did it through actions some thought impossible, like creating an all-you-can-eat feast from a boy’s meager five loaves and two fish. Jesus is the Word of God, the logos and he came to show us that we too have that ability. Sometimes we speak to do this and sometimes it is witnessed in how we move about our days, what we spend our time doing and serving.
Today’s passage is an invitation to a table fellowship that goes beyond a single meal. Jesus is showing his disciples and all of us what faith looks like. It is abundance from scarcity. It is making sure to include a mishmash of different people, each coming with their own back story. Here there are doubtful apostles, a boy with lunch to share and a hillside full of folks yearning for meaning. And then just when the people had their fill and he made sure that nothing goes to waste, Jesus moves on with miracle number two. It is with his walk on the water that we are assured of Jesus’ divinity – in case there was any doubt from the feeding of so many with what started out as so little.
In the face of so much need – in this community alone the Arlington Food Shelf, free and reduced breakfast and lunch at the schools and the Summer Lunch program are all attempting to make sure that the most vulnerable are included and don’t go hungry. This past year 189 adults and 51 children in our county needed a place to lay their heads and the Bennington County Coalition for the Homeless responded. The unmet need of those battling opioid addiction, especially throughout Bennington County, including neighbors here in Arlington, continues to be a struggle with a great lack of treatment available in a timely way. Jesus offered very real food and something more and that’s what we get to offer as church.
Throughout August, as we look ahead to the new school year, we can meet the needs of the littlest ones at Fisher Elementary by bringing in new socks and underwear for those times when there are accidents or children come to school in the cold weather with little protection for their feet. Just as Jesus provided food for hungry folks who could have been sent off with grumbling stomachs we have the chance to pass on the love of Jesus with underpants and socks for some of the most vulnerable in our community.
Next week we will affirm our belief in table fellowship when we share communion, but in the meantime, generosity can be spread. As we look ahead to that blessed meal, let us bear in mind the words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the minister and theologian who was put to death in a German concentration camp just 2 weeks before it was liberated by U.S. soldiers in 1945. Bonhoeffer wrote, “The table fellowship of Christians implies obligation. It is our daily bread that we eat, not my own. We share our bread. Thus we are firmly bound to one another not only in the Spirit but in our whole physical being. The one bread that is given to our fellowship links us together in a firm covenant. Now none dares go hungry as long as another has bread, and anyone who breaks this fellowship of the physical life also breaks the fellowship of the Spirit.” (Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together)
Our work is to welcome and care for those in need – no person is of less value in God’s eyes. This care we are to offer has nothing to do with worthiness and everything to do with living our faith. Let us then lift up this prayer from Timothy Peoples: “God, give me a heart to invite the poor, powerless, and needy to the table – so that they may feel not as leftovers, but included into a community that welcomes all. Amen.” (www.d365.org, 7/27/18)