Deacon Pete's Sermon for Aug 2 2015

You’re not yourself when you’re hungry…I stole that line from the snickers commercials.  You’ve probably seen them, the most recent being a take off on the Brady Bunch.  Carol and Mike are sitting on the couch, a man walks in, carrying an ax, a kind of cross between a biker dude and a cave man.  He is whining about Greg tossing the football in his face and breaking his nose.  Carol and Mike recommend eating a Snickers and lo and behold, Marsha appears in place of the cave man biker dude.  You’re not yourself when you’re hungry.
Enter the Israelites.  They have been traveling for 6 weeks.   They are 6 weeks past the oasis of Elim with its fresh water and date trees.  They are 6 weeks into this journey and the promised land is no where in sight.  They are running low on supplies and the pillar of fire is only leading them to more sand.  The whole congregation is upset, full of doubts, and incredibly, they have forgotten the violence and unjustice of slavery in Egypt, they remember only that they were full of bread.  You’re not yourself when you’re hungry.
The Isaelites are not themselves.  They are not behaving as beloved children of God, chosen by God from all other nations to be God’s very own.  They see the desert as a barren, inhospitable place and have no sense that God is with them.  Moses and Aaron take the brunt of the people’s grumbling and dissatisfaction until God steps in.  They are all about to learn something. Unlike Aaron and Moses who are frustrated by their folks, God hears their concerns and responds.  God rains food from the skies and the people learn that God is indeed faithful and can be trusted.  God is using the manna to test them.  Are they faithful enough to gather only what they need for this day, are they trusting that tomorrow God will provide for that day?  Will the Israelites let the experience of God providing daily bread teach them that this is indeed a God who is faithful in relationship.  Will they let this experience teach them that God will feed them physically and more importantly that God will feed them spiritually.  Will this experience be a Snickers moment for them, one that will encourage and allow them to be themselves, God’s chosen people?
We aren’t ourselves when we’re hungry.  We also aren’t ourselves when we’ve eaten but haven’t digested or processed what we have been given to eat.  Our reading from Ephesians speaks of another type of food that God gives us, the nourishment of grace; ”each of us is given grace according to the measure of Christ’s gift.” This grace is a food that is ours abundantly, is rained down upon us as the manna was rained down upon the Israelites.  Our task is to gather it, to claim it and then to use it to nourish ourselves.  We are then called to digest this grace, to process this grace and to share it with others. This grace is made manifest in all our works of ministry, in all the ways we build up the body of Christ.
Here in this diocese we have worked hard to feed children this summer.  At the Eaton Reading program children were provided with breakfast, lunch and frequent snacks for the last 5 weeks.  They were fed regularly and they were fed with joy and kindness.  They were given manna for their bodies.  They were also fed cognitively.  They spent the day in 6 learning stations, stations focused on the alphabet, reading, writing, and phonics.  They read and read and read.  The growth in their comfort and competence when reading was significant.  They were also fed physically and relationally. They played games inside and outside, games that were unfamiliar to many of them.  They visited a farm, had the zoo mobile come to them.  They went to the planetarium, the aquarium and the science museum.  Their horizons were expanded.  Much of the time they received one-on-one attention and individual care thanks to our adult and teen volunteers.  We aren’t ourselves when we’re hungry and we are not ourselves when we allow others to remain hungry for the grace that we have been given.   The Eaton Reading program was an experience for that provided an opportunity for grace to be shared.  It was a work of ministry freely given with no strings attached, with no plan for future returns to us.  Without praying a prayer or singing a hymn the children who attended and those who volunteered worked to build up the body of Christ.
Today’s Gospel occurs the day after Jesus multiplies the loaves and the fishes.  The crowd has been fed and they are pretty happy.  They have been fed, but they have not processed the food they have been given.  They want a sign from Jesus, they want manna raining from heaven.  Jesus responds that He is the Bread of Life and whoever comes to Him will never be hungry.  Jesus does not promise an endless feast of physical food but offers himself as spiritual food that will satisfy all of our needs; spiritual, physical, and relational.  In this offering of himself, Jesus is not feeding us as individuals. Jesus feeds us corporately, at this table.  We are fed and fueled by the same bread, the same faith. (Rev. David Sellery, The Jesus Diet, us6.campaign-archive2.com)
The Grace we receive here is free and it is a gift unlike any other.  It is a gift grounded in transformation, but not for our transformation only, it is also given to us for the transformation of others.  We are here to do God’s work in the world, to share the Bread of Life (ibid).  We are not ourselves when we are hungry.  We are not ourselves when we eat for ourselves alone.  It is only when we take the nourishment offered here, process it and spread it that we become ourselves.
Abundance is a river from God flowing through us to others.  It is only by feeding others that we will truly end our own hunger.  Amen.