Erl Purnell Sermon

bLent 4 ~ March 26, 2006 ~ A sermon preached by The Rev’d Erl G. Purnell at Old St. Andrew’s Church, Bloomfield, CT

2 Chronicles 36.14-23; Psalm 122; Ephesians 2.4-10; John 6.4-15

It’s our very own Andrew who tells Jesus that a boy in the crowd has five barley loaves and two fish. Five barley loaves; two fish. Not much food by any standards. We all know the story. We know in the end there’s enough to eat for about five thousand people in all. And don’t we always think of this incident as a miracle? Five thousand fed by five barley loaves and two fish. Gotta be a miracle of some sort.

Jesus always seems to approach life from the place of goodness and abundance. There’s always enough, in fact more than enough. In this regard lately I’ve been thinking a lot about Haiti, China, and Iraq.

Haiti because David LaBau gave me a book to read—Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed—and in it there’s a section about the island of Hispaniola, which, of course, includes the Dominican Republic on the eastern 2/3^rds of the island and Haiti on the western 1/3^rd. Moreover, this parish has an intimate relationship with L’École le Bon Samaritain in Carrefour, Haiti, and their founders Jean-Elie and Mona Millien.

China because our good friend David Powell is in China organizing an AA program there and teaching counselors how to treat that insidious disease using the twelve step method. But China also because the ascendancy of China as the dominant world power in the coming decade or so cannot be denied.

Iraq. I’m thinking about Iraq, as I’m sure you are too, because what’s happening there—a foreign occupation, civil strife (maybe civil war), an insurgency, and hardly any sense of security, safety, or normalcy—is devastating that country and its people, and destabilizing the region.

Jesus finds himself with a large crowd of people coming toward him. They are hungry and probably thirsty, although the story doesn’t say anything about multiplying three skins of water so everybody has enough to drink too. Be that as it may, a collection of some five thousand people gather and they’re hungry.

This tale is in all four canonical gospels. Surely something like this must have happened for it to have been remembered so well and told over and over again. While the specifics of the episode are important at one level—a lot of people, not much food, everyone ate their fill—at another, they serve as a challenging and powerful metaphor.

As I read the Gospel and think about Haiti, China, and Iraq, my question is “What do people hunger for?”

The afternoon that Jesus fed the five thousand, people wanted food to fill their bellies. That happened. More profoundly, however, they received a plate full of community, peace, and harmony. You’ll recall that the social structure in Jesus’ day was quite strict. Who one ate with was a matter of social status or class. A peasant would never eat with a merchant and a shepherd would be shunned by a scribe. You’ve heard me say this before, and it’s always worth repeating: the true miracle that occurred in the feeding of the five thousand was that Jesus brought together all the disparate elements of his stratified and structured society. He brought them together and, the story insists, they ate together and it was good. It was so good that there was food left over for any others—not just Palestinian Jews but anybody at all—who might be hungry for a new paradigm, a new version of the social order.

Jesus scholar John Dominic Crossan calls this eating together open commensality—eating with anybody so that nobody is ever excluded from the table. Open commensality is perhaps Jesus’ most extraordinary gift: “This is my body which is given for you…This is my blood of the new covenant…Do this in remembrance of me.” In other words, Jesus calls us together in fellowship to share living in common—the bread of life—shoulder to shoulder on the same hillside. This event signals the destruction of class and ushers in the radical concept of equality and inclusivity. All are invited to the Table; none are turned away…ever.

When we eat together, we are filled with community, peace and harmony. When we eat together, there is always enough, the story says, and I really believe it. Do you?

Haiti, China, Iraq. What do people hunger for in those places? Food enough. Shelter. Safety. Respect. Equality. Community, peace, harmony.

In each of those nations, as well in our own United States, the presenting issues of the day may seem quite different, but they’re really not. The Haitian landscape is an environmental disaster. The opportunity to work for a descent wage is rare. Gun-toting thugs intimidate and extort. Hungry children dress in pink uniforms and come to a small school where a few loving and gifted teachers give them the bread of life every day. No matter what it looks like, the human heart seeks stability and safety, enough to eat, and descent shelter.

China has a booming economy, although many farms are still run using human power. The cities are reaching for the sky and their space program is headed to the moon. Religion is stifled, healthcare is universal, the need for oil to fuel progress is driving prices higher world-wide, and HIV/AIDs is spreading rapidly. Too many people drink too much. Yet, what do individual Chinese seek? The same things that are important to us. They, too, want stability and safety, enough to eat, and descent shelter.

The mess in Iraq makes it difficult to consider the individual Iraqi. But those millions of innocent people struggle daily to survive. What do people in Iraq hunger for? Stability and safety, enough to eat, and descent shelter? Yes.

Long ago Jesus invited humankind to consider a new covenant relationship with God and so with each other. He proved his point by feeding five thousand people from across the whole social and cultural spectrum. And, he made sure there was bread enough left over for those not able to make it to the big picnic that day. The message is not a difficult one. Though we are different in many ways, we share a common life as human beings and children of God. Instead of starting with what we don’t have, with what’s wrong, with who should or shouldn’t be at our table, dare we accept our differences while passing the loaf of bread to all those around us?

What is so striking in Haiti, China, and Iraq is that their societies are dominated by one kind of oppression or another. Might makes right is the mantra of those in control or those trying to gain control. Either abusive power or, paradoxically, anarchy is the law of those lands. In Haiti and Iraq, the few impose their agenda—greed and/or religious control—on the majority. Frightened and desperate people are enlisted to fight when what they would prefer to have are honest jobs and a home to come to at night. In China, the absolute power of the communist government is slowly giving way to market driven economic forces, but the common person’s integrity and liberty is still compromised.

What does any of this have to do with the feeding of the five thousand? Everything. The model Jesus offered on that afternoon so long ago is still the most amazing and innovative idea for a society ever conceived. It is based on the premise that the individual has inherent integrity as a viable and respected member of the community and that no individual is above any other nor above the whole community. It doesn’t mean there aren’t leaders and followers. It does mean that the spirit of equality and respect is exercised in all relationships.

What do the people of Haiti, China, and Iraq hunger for? What do people the world around hunger for? Food enough. Shelter. Safety. Respect. Equality. Community, peace, harmony. And what, I’m sure you’re asking in frustration, can any of us do about it, especially in Haiti, China, and Iraq?

When we take seriously the notion of God among us, when we recognize our own community as the model for the world, when we have confidence in the efficacy of prayer, then we can do a lot. We can birth into consciousness the miracle of feeding the five thousand with the confidence that in so doing the world has taken a small step towards true equality and liberty, that it is better because we—you and I—are better in our hearts, and that knowing there is food enough is the first step in providing that food to all who hunger. And so, as the world awakens to what we birth, others will surely join.

Amen.