17th Sunday in Ordinary Time/Proper 12
Episcopal Lectionary (track 1)
2 Samuel 11:1-15
John 6:1-21
Saint Stephen's Episcopal Church, New Harmony, IN
I‘m sure you all have noticed by now that I most often preach on the Gospel text and if ways surface to connect the other readings and the psalm…well then that is a bonus.
But today is different.
As I was reading and preparing this week
I kept hearing from my favorite sources:
IF YOU ARE GOING TO READ THIS TEXT FROM
2nd SAMUEL ALOUD IN THE CONGREGATION
…YOU MUST PREACH ON IT!
I resisted all week…and then I caved.
Before we engage the David/Joab/Bathsheba/Uriah story
I must give an introduction to the Gospel
because this week begins
a stretch of five Sundays of Gospel texts
from the sixth chapter of John…the Bread of Life Discourse
John’s Gospel is divided into the Book of Signs and the Book of Glory
(plius a prologue and an epilogue)
We are in the Book of Signs…
John’s Gospel doesn’t ever use the word miracle
…in John we have SIGNS
And the pattern is
First the Sign…
then a dialogue about the sign…
and then an extended discourse that tries to unpack the meaning of the sign
…this is when Jesus does all the talking.
In today’s gospel we have the sign…
and over the next 4 weeks that sign is unpacked.
So a few observations and a question for us to carry through the next few weeks:
1. There is no “Last Supper” in John. This story is John’s eucharistic story that encapsulates the whole meal ministry of Jesus…
In the story we heard that familiar language
language we still use when we gather around this table:
Jesus took the loaves
And he offered thanks for them
and he broke them in order to give them away
And all were filled and there were many leftovers
2. John puts this in the middle of his Gospel…not at the end just before the crucifixion. In this way John wants to emphasize that God sustains and provides for us EVERY DAY…in the midst of each and every day.
3. The theme that characterizes this narrative is Abundance!
It says “There was a great deal of grass” (This is stunning in a desert place;)
and “The leftovers filled 12 baskets” (12 in the Bible is the perfect complete number)
ABUNDANCE!
There is and there always will be, enough!
4. The moment in the story that caught me flat-footed this week was the detail about the boy.
I can picture him… this little boy,
I imagine him overhearing the tension among the adults about how to feed this growing crowd
And I imagine him thinking to himself…
“Well, I have this ABUNDANCE…I have 5 barley loaves!
I imagine that 5 loaves to this boy was like how it felt holding your first hundred dollar bill!
And 2 WHOLE fish…not the pieces he was likely used to!
But when Andrew tells of this boys exuberant hopefulness he loses something…
he has a mocking tone…he is laughing under his breath:
“There is a boy here who (ha ha) has five barley loaves and two fish (ha ha…and then you have to put on your best Eeyore voice:
but what are they among so many people?”
5. I think the problem is that we misplace the emphasis. When we talk about Eucharist we do the same thing. Eucharist is the whole event…from the minute we walk through that door until we go to love and serve the Lord.
Then the ritual language around this table
the taking
the blessing
the breaking
the sharing
If we emphasize only the noun
If we emphasize only what’s in the cup or on the plate…
I think we miss the miracle/we miss the significance of the loaves and fish. We miss THE SHARING!
6. All of this leads to a question…
WHEN HAVE I EVER SHARED
MY “LOAVES AND FISH”
AND NOT EXPERIENCED ABUNDANCE?
…and I don’t mean the times when I expect a return…only when I share my loaves and fish freely
If the answer is rarely or never
we have located the miraculous in the sharing itself
sharing…even though it might seem like subtraction
is actually multiplication
In the weeks that follow we will be contemplating Jesus’ statement
I am the Bread of Life.”
What does it mean for God to sustain life through the incarnation…
the presence of Jesus? Which is want we celebrate around this table.
What does it mean for God to sustain life…not from a distance but
“Up close and Personal”?
It must have something to do with the everyday human need for nourishment
and the everday act of eating.
God wants to get that close…to inhabit the whole of us…cell by cell.
__________________________________
On to 2 Samuel!
Whew! This is a very steamy story!
A story about the very bad behavior of David!
Biblically speaking this is a story about David
But it’s hard to hear this without desperately wanting to give Bathsheba a voice
After all, she is a silent victim…one of them
Her only words: “I am pregnant”
So here is the story with a little Cindy-Commentary
The details are so rich…so telling.
It is the time of year when Kings go to battle
But…wait…then why is David lying on his couch
in his comfy digs in Jerusalem
While Joab and the officers and troops are laying down their lives in the midst of fierce battle?
You know the saying: “Idle hands are the devil’s workshop?”
So true…
David starts out with a little Peeping Tom action on the rooftop
and he SEES Bathsheba.
She is beautiful.
He SEES and he WANTS.
He learns who she is…and who her husband is.
But no hurdle there. He is the King. He gets what he wants.
The power differential could not be more stark
Bathsheba has none.
David has it all
“I am pregnant” is all she can say.
David’s story of sinning against the Commandments dives deeper.
He invites Uriah home predicting that surely he will want to have relations with his wife. But Uriah is so honorable that he won’t enjoy the comfort of his home and his wife while others are away battling the enemy!
Twice he tries to trick Uriah…all to cover up his sin against Bathsheba.
When that doesn’t work…the sins go deeper still.
He instructs Joab to place Uriah on the front line.
But not only that…he instructs Joab to pull back all support.
David not only kills Uriah…but every soldier in his command!
So…I love this about the Bible
It isn’t afraid to tell the human sin story of even its most important characters.
So what are we to do with this story?
In a way it is quite timely.
David is the bearer of ultimate privilege
Privilege is on our minds these days
It has made David lazy and insensitive
He sees himself as completely entitled
Justifying his actions comes too easily
We each have areas where we have power over another
Or over a situation
Or an event
I can turn red when I think about the times I have justified thoughts or actions with David-like lines
“Well, I deserve this or that…
Which usually implies that someone else had to lose out
Or “She probably deserved what happened to her” which usually implies that I didn’t take a stand in the face of injustice or shaming
Yes…we all have some power.
How do we manage or spend it?
Do we bring forth life or death?
But the story today is not the whole story
Next week we get the rest of the story.
Through the prophet Nathan David is called to repentance
And that repentance takes form of Psalm 51…David’s song of contrition:
“Have mercy on, O God, in your kindness
In your compassion blot out my offence.
Wash me through and through from my wickedness
And cleanse me from my sin
And so we have the truly despicably behaved David…
Who through the prophet has his eyes opened to his sinfulness
And pleads and pleads for the mercy he is not sure he deserves.
Thank goodness God doesn’t speak the language of deserving and undeserving!
All of this, quite naturally, leads us right back to Abundance
John 1:16 From his fullness we have all received grace upon grace
And 10:10 I came that they might have life and have it abundantly
In today’s feeding of the 5k and in John’s Gospel as a whole
God’s abundance breaks out in the midst of perceived scarcity
This is what God is like.
The small boy gets this
His ability to imagine is fertile
It hasn’t been dulled by adult Eeyore-ness.
David was the beneficiary of this abundance in the form of MERCY
And all those gathered on the plentiful green grass received their fill in the form of sharing bread and fish until satisfied.
This is what God is like.
Could it be what I am like?
What does it mean for me to distribute my loaves and fish?
What do I have---what gift---what spiritual, relational, physical, monetary gift do I have
That when shared…seems to multiply???
We have loaves and fish
We have mercy
And we can multiply them in the sharing
And that is the way we participate in grace upon grace to abundant life!
