Olympic Level Faith - John 6:24-35

Well, we’re just about halfway through Ordinary Time in our liturgical year, but, more pressing, we’re halfway through the 2024 Olympic Games. I love the Olympics and I got very little done besides this sermon last week. As a former swimmer, the aquatic sports are my favorite, but I also thoroughly enjoyed watching team USA dominate in artistic gymnastics, and I was reminded about how exciting beach volleyball and table tennis can be. This week, I’m looking forward to the track and field events and the pentathlon, which boggles my mind. Why we decided to add fencing and shooting to the swimming/biking/running trifecta is beyond me, but you can bet I’ll be on the edge of my seat. 

Now I did struggle a little bit last week when it came to watching rugby sevens. I do not understand this sport. The U.S. medaled in rugby for the first time ever, and I wanted to be supportive, so I tried to read up on the rules. But an entire rugby game is less than 15 minutes long, so by the time I learned that a play is called a “try” in rugby, it was all over. With my uneducated sensibilities, watching rugby felt like watching my baby brother’s little league soccer games. 

Surely some of you have experienced this. As coaches and parents scream instruction and encouragement from the sidelines, all players from both teams, none more than 3 and a half feet tall run around the field in one giant clump chasing after the ball, which somehow continues to elude them. From time to time, someone’s little foot actually makes contact, but instead of following through with the play she stops and turns to grin with pride at her parents, as the scuffling clump moves on without her. There is no strategy or game plan, and very little teamwork. These things will come as the kids grow and practice, but for little leaguers, it’s all about the chase. 

Friends, I fear that when it comes to spiritual maturity in the Christian faith, we are often playing Little League. In last week’s passage from John’s Gospel, Jesus fed 5,000 people in the most fantastic miracle of his ministry so far. Today, we learned that afterwards, the ones who stuck around, which could still be in the thousands for all we know, all clamored into boats and headed to Capernaum to track Jesus down. When they finally find him, the first thing they ask is, “when did you get here?!” It’s giving real Little League energy. No strategy or game plan, very little teamwork, just the chase. 

Jesus claps back with a rebuke that is both a little snarky, and a little harsh: “you’re not here because my miracle opened your hearts, you’re here because you want another meal.” It is fair to assume that a lot of the people following Jesus are food insecure, yet Jesus chastises them for seeking out what appears to be a dependable source of sustenance, and tells them to seek instead “food that endures for eternal life.” This seems a tall order for people who don’t have food to endure until dinner time, but they are not deterred. They press on and ask, what is this food and how do we get it? Jesus then offers one of John’s famous “I Am” statements: I am the bread of life. 

Fair warning, the lectionary gives us a whole month with this particular “I Am statement,” so I’m not going to exhaust the interpretive reserves on week one. What’s unique about this week’s passage is that as he introduces the bread of life metaphor, Jesus criticizes the people not for their hunger, but for their method of pursuit, for the way that they chased him. Attaining the bread of life, we learn right away, is not like little league soccer. 

The people listening to Jesus preach and teach and witnessing his miraculous acts are missing the point of his message. This is not new. In fact, something very similar happened in Moses’ time. If you’ll remember, when the people were in the wilderness, God sent manna from heaven to feed them, and told them to collect a double portion on the sixth day, because the seventh day was for sabbath. 

But the people saw the gift of manna only as a means to quiet their rumbling stomachs, not as an expression of God’s deep generosity. They did not understand that while nourishment is part of God’s plan, so is rest, so is preparation, so is obedience to God’s way of life. So they ignored God’s instructions and went out on the seventh day in their giant clump to chase down some manna and were sorely disappointed. 

Likewise Jesus feeds five thousand people and instead of seeing the world in a new way and praising the unfathomable generosity of God, they get stuck on the temporary physical satisfaction of the meal and begin to chase after it, hoping for a repeat, perhaps even a permanent contract. So Jesus begins his bread of life sermon by explaining that the bread of life and the manna from heaven are one and the same. They are the grace that God extends freely to God’s people, and are part of God’s grand plan for the salvation of the world. This grace is a gift that cannot be earned, cannot be hoarded, and cannot be chased. 

This is good news. It is, in fact, the very best news. But it’s not without its challenges. God’s grace is life-altering and life-saving, but it is not a quick fix to our problems, and it’s not always pleasurable. Like young children who must commit to memory all the rules of soccer (or in my case, rugby sevens) and who must practice strategy and teamwork, we too must come to understand that the many gifts of God are more than just a series of pleasant circumstances, they are parts of God’s master plan, all working together to bring about the Kingdom. We must broaden our perspective, practice patience, and learn to trust that God’s love is even bigger than both our worst days, and our best ones.

As we head into this series of bread of life passages, it is my prayer that we can begin to notice when we are leaning into that Little League energy, desperately chasing after quick fixes and temporary pleasures. I hope we can remember that God is calling us to open our hearts and minds to the measure of God’s generosity and look for new life in the world, not just satisfactory repeats.

We might not be a community of Olympic athletes, but we can most certainly strive for Olympic faith. We can learn to trust that the bread of life which will sustain us into eternity is not something to be desperately chased. We can practice opening our eyes to see the gift of God’s grace offered freely at any and every given moment. Although we may start out in the little leagues, and may even find ourselves back there from time to time, by the grace of God we can work together to bring about the Kingdom until the world is filled with elite-level expressions of salvation and love. Amen.