“Living Bread”
Original sermon given August 11, 2024, written and delivered by Pastor Jeffrey Leininger at First Saint Paul’s Lutheran Church.
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“Living Bread"
John 6.41-51
John 6.41-51
In the name of the Living God and the risen Christ. Amen.
All of earth’s kingdoms pass away. All earthly ideologies crack and crumble. Everything you cram into your stomach through your mouth or into your brain through your eyes will end up either in the cesspit or the grave. Every form of self-preservation or self-indulgence-- none of this can truly satisfy and none of it will ultimately last.
Jesus in John 6 calls himself the “Living Bread” sent from heaven, and by so doing makes the most audacious and even offensive claim: when you’ve got him, you’ve got true life. And when you don’t, no matter how great life might seem, you’ve got nothing.
Now, I love bread. All kinds. Fresh, warm, right out of the oven with buttery goodness lathered on it. But in the ancient Mediterranean world bread was more than this. It was the basic staple for all human life. Grain was used for the paying of salaries and for taxation. It was a measure of wealth and a mechanism for political power. Ancient Roman coins were imprinted with the image of the grain-goddess Annona, the divine personification of the grain harvest—so important was the making of bread.
Another example of the centrality of bread in Jesus’ day comes from the Roman poet and satirist, Juvenal. In about 100 A.D. he decried the demise of the republic, the rise of imperial authoritarianism, and the shirking of civic responsibility. He lamented that the people these days crave only “bread and circuses”. That’s all you need to give them in order to keep them compliant and happy. “Bread and Circuses” -- bellies full of food and brains dulled by entertainment.
Jesus calls us to more. Jesus claims to be more. He’s far more than food for the body or something fun to watch on your phone. To reduce our Lord to mere “bread and circuses” would be the worst of idolatry. Rather, our Lord in today’s living witness of Holy Scripture claims to be the inseparable connection to the Father. To know Christ is to know God, and to be filled with life. To not know Christ is to not know God, and to have no life. That’s what Jesus means by claiming to be “Living Bread”.
To make this point with his own Jewish people gathered around him, the Lord likens himself to manna. He claims to be the manna become man, we might say. You probably recall the account from Exodus, when God sent them manna daily in their time in the wilderness. Literally, the word “manna” means “what is it?” because, well, they didn’t know what to call it. But it came every morning, and it sustained them with life, and it was God’s provision and promise for them on the journey.
But they all died, in the wilderness. And so will all of us. No earthly bread or earthly entertainment can alter that reality. Not even God’s manna in the wilderness in Exodus would. No amount of bread or circuses, no grain gods of this world will alter the inevitable reality that death comes for all of us.
Death is the result of sin in this world. It wasn’t supposed to be this way, in the beginning. Human beings rebelled against God, doubted his word, sought after other gods, tried to fill themselves and satisfy themselves with earthly cravings. “The wages of sin is death,” so the Apostle Paul wrote (Romans 6.23) and not the warmest, butteriest piece of bread can change that fact.
But Jesus, the true living bread changed that fact. Jesus said, “Truly, truly whoever believes in me has eternal life.” (John 6.47) Has it. Now. Whoever “eats” this bread—that is, has faith in the son of God—has true life in them, and will live forever. By believing in Christ Jesus, the “manna become man”, we have life and have it eternally.
Jesus gave his body as bread for the life of the whole world-- not just for one nomadic people wandering for forty years in the wilderness. He gave himself for all tribes and peoples and tongues and languages caught in their sinful cravings and captured in the spiral of death. He offered himself not just to bring us to a piece of geography—a promise land somewhere in Palestine— but he gives us final, glorious destination in heaven forever. The Lord offering of his body for the life of the world signified his crucifixion, where he suffered and died for the sins of all. By his sacrificial death, he brought life. By his offer of himself, he brought true life for all people of all time.
And by his third day rising again from the grave, he assured that all those who come to him in faith—whoever eats this living bread—will live forever.
Jesus, the manna become man, is here again for us today. In this holy sacrament, which he himself instituted by his own words, he gives us his very self in a mysterious, sacramental, but very real way. He is our manna, our food for forgiveness, our sustenance for the journey, our provision and promise along the way to the promise land.
Be filled by him, and nothing else.
Come soon Lord Jesus. Amen.