The Bread Of Life
Sermon
About A Loving God
There are certain people in every church who have a special love for the Lord’s supper.
I knew a man once who served as an elder in an open church. He and others came to the table and with their prayers asked God’s blessing on the communion service and the congregation. 'It’s the most awesome thing I’ve ever done,' he told me. 'I never step up to the table without a sense of my own inadequacy and a certain fear.'
Sometimes it is easy to forget that God fed the people in the wilderness, not because they were faithful, but because they needed food. 'Would that we had died by the hand of the Lord in Egypt ...,' the hungry people said, and, in spite of what they said, God rained bread from heaven.
Whenever I read that passage, I remember my own unworthiness to be so blessed. No matter how good I might try to be, and no matter how much good I might try to do, it is God who blesses, and it is God who saves.
That’s true for all of us and for *, as well. I say that because I think there’s hope in that. It’s not that * wasn’t a good man. Of course he was.
It is instead that our goodness is a response to God’s salvation. It brings glory, not to us, but to the living Savior.
'I lift up my eyes to the hills ...,' the psalmist says as he is about to leave the temple on his journey home.
The hills were places of danger where the local fertility gods were worshiped, and the issue for the psalmist is in whom he’ll put his trust.
His choice is clear.
'From whence does my help come?' he asks. 'My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth.'
We need to remember that. Death is always hard. It is not easy to lose someone that we love. We think of all the things we’ve talked about, of all the good things we remember, and, of course, we grieve.
But we grieve in the arms of a loving God, and we commit *
to that same faithful, loving God. It’s not that the people deserved the bread. It was given them even as they disobeyed. And it’s not that the psalmist earns some kind of special honor because he chooses to put his faith in God.
It is instead that God, and God alone, is faithful. When we put our faith in God, we can say, as does the psalmist, 'My help comes from the Lord ...,' and so I know God will keep my going out and coming in 'from this time forth and for evermore.'
But sometimes it doesn’t seem that way, does it? Sometimes death seems so final, and that’s why God sent Jesus.
Jesus embodies God’s promise of eternal life. As Paul reminds us in the words, there is a new covenant in the Savior’s blood. While Moses confirmed the old covenant by sprinkling the blood of slain oxen on the people (Exodus 24:8), Jesus confirms the new covenant in his own death, and God blesses the new covenant in Jesus’ resurrection.
'I am the bread of life ...' the Master says; 'he who comes to me shall not hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst.'
They came seeking real bread. They had seen him feed 5,000, and yet they felt the need to remind him, 'Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness ...'
And he answered, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven; my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven, and gives life to the world.'
'They replied, ‘Lord, give us this bread always.’ ' And he did.
Jesus is the Bread of Life.
The thing * did right was that he believed. His faith was not in his own goodness but in God’s.
Jesus is not a whole new thing at all. It was God’s plan from the beginning to feed the people and to bring them home. God saves, and Jesus, the one who is the Bread of Life, is the infinitely perfect expression of God’s saving grace.
Before Jesus raised Lazarus, he told Martha, 'I am the Resurrection and the Life; he who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die.'
So we do have hope, and like the psalmist, we put our trust in God.
Because he knew God is faithful, the psalmist, as he left for home, could write a litany of praise in which he says, 'I lift up my eyes to the hills ...,' and then the priest assures him, 'The Lord will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life.
'The Lord will keep your going out and coming in from this time forth and for evermore.’’
Let Us Pray
Blessed Savior, one whose will it is that we should know and serve the Bread of Life, we thank you for the life of ** and for the faith he had in Jesus.
Because you fed the people in the wilderness and now feed us in Jesus, we place our hope in you and you alone.
Walk with us in the days and weeks to come, and call us to lean on you, both now and always.
In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
*Person’s first name
**Person’s full name
I knew a man once who served as an elder in an open church. He and others came to the table and with their prayers asked God’s blessing on the communion service and the congregation. 'It’s the most awesome thing I’ve ever done,' he told me. 'I never step up to the table without a sense of my own inadequacy and a certain fear.'
Sometimes it is easy to forget that God fed the people in the wilderness, not because they were faithful, but because they needed food. 'Would that we had died by the hand of the Lord in Egypt ...,' the hungry people said, and, in spite of what they said, God rained bread from heaven.
Whenever I read that passage, I remember my own unworthiness to be so blessed. No matter how good I might try to be, and no matter how much good I might try to do, it is God who blesses, and it is God who saves.
That’s true for all of us and for *, as well. I say that because I think there’s hope in that. It’s not that * wasn’t a good man. Of course he was.
It is instead that our goodness is a response to God’s salvation. It brings glory, not to us, but to the living Savior.
'I lift up my eyes to the hills ...,' the psalmist says as he is about to leave the temple on his journey home.
The hills were places of danger where the local fertility gods were worshiped, and the issue for the psalmist is in whom he’ll put his trust.
His choice is clear.
'From whence does my help come?' he asks. 'My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth.'
We need to remember that. Death is always hard. It is not easy to lose someone that we love. We think of all the things we’ve talked about, of all the good things we remember, and, of course, we grieve.
But we grieve in the arms of a loving God, and we commit *
to that same faithful, loving God. It’s not that the people deserved the bread. It was given them even as they disobeyed. And it’s not that the psalmist earns some kind of special honor because he chooses to put his faith in God.
It is instead that God, and God alone, is faithful. When we put our faith in God, we can say, as does the psalmist, 'My help comes from the Lord ...,' and so I know God will keep my going out and coming in 'from this time forth and for evermore.'
But sometimes it doesn’t seem that way, does it? Sometimes death seems so final, and that’s why God sent Jesus.
Jesus embodies God’s promise of eternal life. As Paul reminds us in the words, there is a new covenant in the Savior’s blood. While Moses confirmed the old covenant by sprinkling the blood of slain oxen on the people (Exodus 24:8), Jesus confirms the new covenant in his own death, and God blesses the new covenant in Jesus’ resurrection.
'I am the bread of life ...' the Master says; 'he who comes to me shall not hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst.'
They came seeking real bread. They had seen him feed 5,000, and yet they felt the need to remind him, 'Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness ...'
And he answered, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven; my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven, and gives life to the world.'
'They replied, ‘Lord, give us this bread always.’ ' And he did.
Jesus is the Bread of Life.
The thing * did right was that he believed. His faith was not in his own goodness but in God’s.
Jesus is not a whole new thing at all. It was God’s plan from the beginning to feed the people and to bring them home. God saves, and Jesus, the one who is the Bread of Life, is the infinitely perfect expression of God’s saving grace.
Before Jesus raised Lazarus, he told Martha, 'I am the Resurrection and the Life; he who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die.'
So we do have hope, and like the psalmist, we put our trust in God.
Because he knew God is faithful, the psalmist, as he left for home, could write a litany of praise in which he says, 'I lift up my eyes to the hills ...,' and then the priest assures him, 'The Lord will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life.
'The Lord will keep your going out and coming in from this time forth and for evermore.’’
Let Us Pray
Blessed Savior, one whose will it is that we should know and serve the Bread of Life, we thank you for the life of ** and for the faith he had in Jesus.
Because you fed the people in the wilderness and now feed us in Jesus, we place our hope in you and you alone.
Walk with us in the days and weeks to come, and call us to lean on you, both now and always.
In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
*Person’s first name
**Person’s full name
